16 THE BELLA COOLA INDIANS

reliable traditions of Carrier settlements there. The probable
explanation is that the Bella Coola formerly extended over
the area, either in actual fact or according to mythology, but
were supplanted by the Carriers.

The Dean River is called Nuia/, and the generic name for
the people of the Dean valley is Sutshmx. About eighty years
ago a smallpox epidemic so reduced the villages on the Kims-
quit that the survivors abandoned them and moved to the
Dean. At that time a certain Kimsquit man is believed to
havesaid: “‘Wewill take their places and kill even their dogs.”’

Since that time, the joint settlement has suffered one
epidemic after another, until a mere handful of the people
survive, and they are almost entirely descended from the
Kimsquit River immigrants. Within the last few years, these
have requested permission from the Bella Coola to abandon
Kimsquit entirely and live among them. The two groups have
always been on the best of terms, but the Bella Coola have not
forgotten the fate of the Dean River people and have been
unwilling to admit the Kimsquit survivors.

Villages on the Kimsquit River, Sa-tsk‘
*(44) Sa-tsk‘: this large and important town, at the mouth
of the river, was deserted at the time of the smallpox epidemic.
*(45) Nuxwilst: this settlement can be grouped with the
last-mentioned, although situated on the shore of Dean Chan-
nel, at the site of the present Manitou Cannery, six miles
away. No meaning of the name is known.

TRIBAL ORGANIZATION

The subject of this monograph is the people of the above
forty-five villages. They will be referred to as a tribe, and as
this term is customarily limited to a political unit, a brief
justification for its use is necessary.

Each Bella Coola village consisted of a single row of houses,
built along the shore of a river or the ocean. The front doors