222 THE GREAT DENE RACE.

CHAPTER XV. Commerce. Home Transactions.

As most of the travel and transportation incidental to the life of the modern Dénés is occasioned by the fur trade, it is but natural that we should now enter into a few details concerning commerce among them. Before they were aware of the value of furs in the eyes of the whites, all their business transactions were so few and so simple that the whole system could hardly be dignified by the name of commerce. Even to-day if you make abstraction of the fur trade, scarcely anything will be left in that line save occasional bartering.

Among themselves the Dénés will not be so mean as to “sell” anything. They simply give it away. But as their great social principle is do ut des, it follows that their generosity is of a rather cheap kind. You express admira- tion for an object, and forthwith it passes into your hands and becomes your property. But you are always expected to return at least its equivalent in goods. Any one who respects himself and has a care for his reputation in the tribe will generally more than pay for that object. Nay, were an Indian desirous of making profits in an easy manner, he would simply have to bestow his belongings on people known for their generosity. But you need not broach the subject to a Déné. “We people (Dénés)”, he would promptly tell you, “we are not a set of mercenaries like the whites, who speak of nothing but selling and purchasing. We simply give away our goods’. As a matter of fact, a free gift without an eye to ulterior compensation is something almost unknown among them.

In case the beneficiary of these “bounties” should forget to return the compliment, he is soon reminded of his obligations through the intervention of a third person. Unless desirous of provoking a dispute, the creditor will never accost the debtor bent on mentioning such a subject. If the object offered the former through the obliging friend be not agreeable, it is merci- lessly declined until something of a value at least commensurate with that of the original transaction is brought forward.

Among the Chilcotins, however, deals akin to a public sale or auction often took place when I was stationed among them. Nothing would then be more common than to see a youth entering a house, of an evening, with some object in hands, a blanket, piece of skin, snares, a belt or any other part of the wearing apparel, crying out as he came in: 6hkhet, buy! If any of the inmates was in need of, or took a fancy to, the proffered article, he would hand the boy what he deemed a fair equivalent for the same, which,