30 | | REPORT—1890.

animal is henceforth, as it were, a relation of the shaman, and helps him
whenever he is in need of help. He is not allowed to speak about his
Vk a! yin, not even to say what shape it has. When he returns from the
woods the shaman is able to cure diseases, to see and to catch souls, &e.
The best time of the day for curing disease is at nightfall. A number of
people are invited to attend the ceremonies. The patient is deposited
near the fire, the guests sit around him. Then they begin to sing and
beat time with sticks. The shaman (who uses no rattle) has a cup of
water standing next to him. He takes a mouthful, blows it into his
hands, and sprinkles it over the sick person. Then he applies his mouth
to the place where the disease is supposed to be and sucks at it. As
soon as he has finished sucking, he produces a piece of deer-skin or the like,
as though he had extracted it from the body, and which is supposed to
have produced the sickness. If the soul of the sick person is supposed
to be absent from the body the shaman sends his #l’k’a’yin (not his

soul) in search. The é/’k’d’yin brings it, and then the shaman takes it

and puts it on the vertex of the patient, whence it returns into his
body. These performances are accompanied by a dance of the shaman,
Before the dance the si/oua must ‘give name to the earth,’ which else
would swallow the shaman. When acting as a conjurer for sick persons
he must keep away from his wife, as else his powers might be interfered
with. He never treats members of his own family, but engages another
shaman for this purpose. It is believed that he cannot cure his own
relatives. Rich persons sometimes engage a shaman to look after their
welfare.

The shaman is able to harm a person as well as to cure him. He
causes sickness by throwing a piece of deer-skin, or a loop made of a
thong, on to his enemy. If someone has an enemy whom he wants
to harm he endeavours to obtain some of his saliva, perspiration, or
hair, the latter being the most powerful means, particularly when taken
from the nape or from the crown of the head. This he gives to the
shaman without saying to whom it belongs, and pays him for bewitching
it. I did not learn the method of treating these excretions of the enemy’s
body, except that the performance takes place at nighttime. Then
the man to whom the saliva, perspiration, or hair belongs undergoes
cramps and fits. The sQunii’am, as well as the siOua, may take the
soul of an enemy and shoot it with arrows or with a gun, and thus
kill their enemy. If a man is ‘too proud and insolent’ the doctor
will harm him by simply looking at him. It is told of one shaman that
he made people sick by giving them charred human bones to eat.

The third function of the shaman is to detect evil-doers, particularly
thieves, and enemies who made a person sick by employing a shaman.
They solve this task by the help of their tl’ka’yin. When it is assumed
or proved that a man has caused the sickness of another the latter
or his relatives may kill the evil-doer.

Il. THE NOOTKA.

Our knowledge of the Nootka is not so deficient as that of most other
tribes of British Columbia, as their customs have been described very
fully by G. M. Sproat in his book ‘ Scenes and Studies of Savage Life ’
(London, 1868). The descriptions given in the book are lively and