West of the Rocky Mountains, the ethnological affinities run from north to south (or _vertically_) until we reach the area of the great Paduca family; one, in respect to its direction and distribution, of the most remarkable in America.
The ethnology of the parts between the Pacific, the Rocky Mountains, the Northern Athabaskan, and the Paduca area, is very nearly the ethnology of Oregon. Here we find two great families; and by their sides four or five isolated, or nearly isolated, languages, a phenomenon for which we are now prepared.
The first of the great divisions is one that is conveniently called--
_Area._--Discontinuous. Chiefly the lower part of Fraser's River, and the parts between that and the Columbia.
_Divisions._--1. Tribes to the north of the Columbia, continuous. 2. Tribes to the south of the Columbia, either wholly or nearly isolated.
_Sub-divisions._--Value of the classification unascertained. _a._ Continuous Tsihaili. 1. Shushwap. 2. Salish. 3. Skitsuish. 4. Piskwaus. 5. Kawitchen. 6. Skwali. 7. Checheeli. 8. Kowelits. 9. Noosdalum.
_b._ Isolated, or nearly isolated, Tsihaili.--The Nsietshawus, or Killamucks(?).
_Conterminous_, with the _a._ Hailtsa, _b._ Nass, _c._ Athabaskan Taculli and Tsikunni on the north; _d._ Kitunaha, on the east; _e._ Sahaptin; _f._ Tshinúk on the south. The isolated Tsihaili surrounded by Tshinúks, Tlatskanai (discontinous Athabaskans) and Jakons.
The _Shushwap_, or _Atnahs_, are the northernmost of the Tsihaili, and are conterminous with the Taculli. Their number, according to Mr. Hales, is about 1200, increased from 400.
_The Salish._--The Salish language falls into three dialects; those of _a_, the Kullelspelm or Ponderays (Pend' oreilles), _b_, the Spokan, improperly called Flat-heads (since they have no such habit as the one suggested by the name), and _c_, the Okanagan.
A fair sample of the Salish traditions is the following. A ceremony called by them (the Salish) _Sumash_, "deserves notice for the strangeness of the idea on which it is founded. They regard the spirit of a man as distinct from the living principle, and hold that it may be separated for a short time from the body without causing death, or without the individual being conscious of the loss. It is necessary, however, in order to prevent fatal consequences, that the lost spirit should be found and restored as quickly as possible. The conjuror, or medicineman, learns, in a dream, the name of the person who has suffered this loss. Generally there are several at the same time in this condition. He then informs the unhappy individuals, who immediately employ him to recover their wandering souls. During the next night they go about the village from one lodge to another singing and dancing. Towards morning they enter a separate lodge, which is closed up, so as to be perfectly dark; a small hole is then made in the roof, through which the conjuror, with a bunch of feathers, brushes in the spirits in the shape of small bits of bone, and similar substances, which he receives on a piece of matting. A fire is then lighted, and the conjuror proceeds to select out from the spirits such as belong to persons already deceased, of which there are usually several; and should one of them be assigned by mistake to a living person he would instantly die. He next selects the particular spirit belonging to each person, and causing all the men to sit down before him, he takes the spirit of one (_i.e._, the splinter of bone, shell, or wood, representing it), and placing it on the owner's head, pats it, with many contortions and invocations, till it descends into the heart and resumes its proper place. When all are thus restored the whole party unite in making a contribution of food, out of which a public feast is given, and the remainder becomes the perquisite of the conjuror.