_The Yellow Knives._--Called also the Copper Indians, from occupying, like the Dog-ribs, a portion of the river so called.
_The Carriers, Tahkali, or Taculli._--These occupy the greater portion of New Caledonia, and, of all the Athabaskans, they are those that are best known. They are divided into "eleven clans, or minor tribes, whose names are, beginning at the south, as follows:--(1) the _Taūtin_, or _Talkótin_; (2) the _Tsilkótin_, or _Chiltokin_; (3) the _Naskótin_; (4) the _Thetliótin_; (5) the _Tsatsnótin_; (6) the _Nulaáutin_; (7) the _Ntshaáutin_; (8) the _Natliáutin_; (9) the _Nikozliáutin_; (10) the _Tatshiáutin_; and (11) the _Babine_ Indians. The number of persons in these clans varies from fifty to three hundred. All speak the same language, with some slight dialectical variations. The _Sikani_ (or _Secunnie_) nation has a language radically the same, but with greater difference of dialect, passing gradually into that of the _Beaver_ and _Chippewyan_ Indians.
"The _Tahkali_, though a branch of the great _Chippewyan_ (or _Athabascan_) stock, have several peculiarities in their customs and character which distinguish them from other members of that family. In personal appearance they resemble the tribes on the Upper Columbia, though, on the whole, a better-looking race. They are rather tall, with a tendency to grossness in their features and figures, particularly among the women. They are somewhat lighter in complexion than the tribes of the south.
"Like all Indians, who live principally upon fish, and who do not acquire the habits of activity proper to the hunting tribes, they are excessively indolent and filthy, and, as a natural concomitant, base and depraved in character. They are fond of unctuous substances, and drink immense quantities of oil, which they obtain from fish and wild animals. They also besmear their bodies with grease and coloured earths. They like their meat putrid, and often leave it until the stench is, to any but themselves, insupportable. Salmon roes are sometimes buried in the earth and left for two or three months to putrefy, in which state they are esteemed a delicacy.
"The natives are prone to sensuality, and chastity among the women is unknown. At the same time, they seem to be almost devoid of natural affection. Children are considered by them a burden, and they often use means to destroy them before birth. Their religious ideas are very gross and confused. It is not known that they have any distinct ideas of a God, or of the existence of the soul. They have priests, or doctors, whose art consists in certain mummeries, intended for incantations. When a corpse is burned, which is the ordinary mode of disposing of the dead, the priest, with many gesticulations and contortions, pretends to receive in his closed hands something, perhaps the life of the deceased, which he communicates to some living person, by throwing his hands towards him, and at the same time blowing upon him. This person then takes the rank of the deceased, and assumes his name in addition to his own. Of course the priest always understands to whom this succession is properly due.