Archaeologist for April 1895” – Hill-Tout; i.e., a report by C. B. Moore on “Archaeology of the St. John’s, Florida.” The magazine Archaeologist was shortlived (1893–1895). I am indebted to the Interlibrary Loan department of Simon Fraser University for help in locating this particular article, and for other services.
16 It would be useful to correct this early attitude by a paragraph from Hill-Tout’s address to the Anthropological Association meeting in San Francisco in 1905, printed in American Anthropologist (1905): “In the study of primitive man the greatest difficulty the sophisticated student has to contend with, I have found-, is the essential difference of his own from his subject’s plane of thought -in other words, the difficulty to see things from the native point of view. He can make no satisfactory advance till he has emptied his mind of all its preconceptions regarding primitive man, which more often than not are founded on early misconceptions and limited knowledge of his life and thought. We have been studying the savage more or less systematically for a quarter of a century now, yet I am convinced we are but just beginning to know and to understand him as he really is. Speaking for myself, I would like to say that I have found nothing so helpful to me in getting behind his eyes and beholding the universe from his viewpoint as the study of his names and name systems” (p. 684).
ETHNOLOGICAL STUDIES OF THE MAINLAND HALKOMELEM, A DIVISION OF THE SALISH OF BRITISH COLUMBIA1
The following notes are a summary of the writer’s studies of the Lower Fraser Indians. They deal chiefly with the Tcilqeuk [Chilli-wack] 2 and Kwantlen tribes. The Indians inhabiting the Lower Fraser district comprise in all some fourteen or fifteen separate tribes, an enumeration of which was given by Dr. F. Boas in his Report to the British Association, 1894. They occupy the shores of the estuary, extending up the river as far as Spuzzum, which forms the dividing-line between them and the Thompson beyond. Collectively they are known to themselves as the Halkomelem or Henkomenem people. The name, according to my informants, signifies “those who speak the same language.” This division of the Salish is not confined to the Mainland. An important branch of it is found on Vancouver Island, over against the estuary. The speech of both branches, although exhibiting interesting dialectical differences, is mutually intelligible. The Halkomelem tribes occupy a larger and more scattered territory than any other of the Salish divisions of British Columbia, the distance between the most eastern and the most western tribes being upwards of 200 miles. When it is remembered that the speech of the Salish tribes which border upon them on every side is so strange and different as to be quite unintelligible to the Halkomelem people, the practical homogeneity of their own speech, despite the fact of their widely scattered territories, has a significance we cannot afford to overlook. It assuredly reveals to us, as plainly as the unwritten past can be revealed, that they cannot have occupied their present territories for any considerable time. The intercourse between the different tribes, as far as can be gathered from themselves, was never very free or extended, the nature of the country forbidding this. Consequently we should find vastly greater divergence in the speech of the upper and lower, the Mainland and Island, tribes than is the case if they had been settled for any great length of time in their present quarters. While the Salish language as a whole, with its dozens of dialects and scores of sub-dialects, displays such capacity for dialectical variation as it does, we can hardly believe that the same tendency to change is absent from the Halkomelem speech. We may safely conclude, therefore, that the Halkomelem tribes are comparative late-comers in the territories they now occupy. All lines of available evidence tend to confirm this view.3 Whether the Island or the Mainland tribes constitute the parent branch, or whether the Island or the Mainland was the earlier home of the division, cannot now be determined. This, and the kindred question of the original home of the whole undivided Salish stock, will be dealt with later, when our investigations have covered the whole field of inquiry.
The Tcilqeuk [Chilliwack]
Ethnography
The Chilliwack have greatly decreased in number during the past two generations, though they do not appear to have ever been a populous tribe, even in the old days. As at present constituted the tribe is subdivided into eight separate groups or village communities, which together number about fifty adult males. The names of these villages and their respective chiefs, as given to me by Captain John, siam of Suwale [Soowahlie], are as follows:
| Villages | Chiefs | Adult males |
| l. Sqai [Skway]4 | Motes | 9 |
| 2. Sqaialo [Squiala] | Klacalem | 4 |
| 3. Atselits [Atselits or Atchelitz] | Swaius | 2 |
| 4. Skaukel [Skaukel or Skulkayn] | Qatekueta | 9 |
| 5. Yukukweus [Yakweakwioose] | Qateselta | 7 |
| 6. Tciaktel [Chiaktel or Tzeachten] | 3 | |
| 7. Clalki | Weuseluk | 1 |
| 8. Suwale [Soowahlie] | Swales | 12 |
In earlier days the tribe was less scattered than at present, and had its settlements on the upper reaches of the Chilliwack River, contiguous to Soowahlie, the former headquarters of the tribe. I obtained from Captain John the names of these old settlements: (1) Suwale ‘melting away’ (the people here once died in great numbers); (2) Skwealets “coming in of the water'; (3) Stlep ‘home country’ (on a level stretch of land lying between the forks of the river, here the old long communal houses of the tribe were situated); (4) Caltelitc, from cacal ”back' (on the edge or “back” of a slough); (5) Qoqaia ‘maggot-fly’ (so called because of the number of maggot-flies found here in the summer). These settlements constituted the original home of the Chilliwack, according to the traditions of the tribe. They have no record of any other ancestral home. In their own words, they “have always dwelt there, looking on the same sky and the same mountains.”
According to one of their myths, they dwelt here before the Chilli-wack River sprang from the mountains. This river rises in a mountain lake known locally as Cultus Lake, but called by the Indians themselves Swieltca;5 and its formation is said to have come about in the following manner. In the olden days there lived a youth who frequented this lake. Its shores were his training-ground. One day he came to the village and said he had learned in a dream (ulia) how to make water run. The people laughed and jeered at him. Said he to them: “To show you that I can do as I say I will make the water of the lake run by the village before the sun sets.” With that he started for the lake. A little later he appeared in the village again. “Look out now,” he cried; “the water will soon be here.” Presently a small stream of water was seen descending the slope. In a short time this increased to a rushing torrent, which, as there was no bed for it to run in, divided and ran in several directions, cutting out in its course the different channels or arms through which the water now flows before uniting in the one stream. It is quite possible this myth or tradition has some foundation in fact. The waters of the river are clearly the overflow of the lake. This overflow may have formerly had some other outlet, which for some reason or other failed to do its work, and a new outlet became necessary. While none of the Chilliwack Indians entertain any doubt about the truth of this tradition, the younger and more intelligent of them believe that the youth of the story in his wanderings round the lake discovered some weak spot in the margin overlooking the slope occupied by the tribe, which required but a little assistance from him to become an outlet for the lake’s overflow. They do not believe any longer in the magic part of it. They are, indeed, now generally very sceptical of the marvellous feats and wonder-working powers of their old-time shamans, as recorded in the tribal myths and traditions. Thus we see the disintegrating forces introduced by our advent at work here, as in other sides of their life and character.
Sociology
In their social organisation and customs the Chilliwack differ in some interesting respects from the neighbouring Halkomelem tribes. This may be possibly due to the fact that the Chilliwack are not true members of the Halkomelem division, though they now speak its tongue. They have a tradition among them that up to a century ago
