Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/53

 SECT. I.] TRIBES NORTH OF THE UNITED STATES. 17 described, do, so far as they are known, belong, with a single exception, to one family and speak kindred languages. I have designated them by the arbitrary denomination of Athapascas, which, derived from the original name of the lake since called " Lake of the Hills," is also that which was first given to the central part of the country they inhabit. Their southern boun- dary as above described is not in all its details precisely correct, and is rather that which existed eighty years ago, before en- croachments had been made on their territory by the Knisti- naux. The exception alluded to is that of the " Quarrellers," or " Loucheux," a small tribe near the mouth of Mackenzie's River, immediately above the Eskimaux, whose language they generally understand, whilst their own appeared to Mackenzie and to Captain Franklin to be different from that of the adja- cent Athapasca tribes. As we have no vocabulary of it, no definitive opinion can be formed of its character. But a portion of the territory included within the boundaries we have assigned to the Athapascas remains still unexplored. The Rocky Mountains are a continuation of the Mexican Andes. The Columbia is the only large western river, empty- ing into the Pacific, which, as well as its numerous tributaries, has its source in that chain. Between the 35th and 40th degrees of north latitude, the distance from the mountains to the sea may not be less than nine hundred miles. Their course being west of north, they gradually approach the shores, from which they are not farther than four hundred miles in the lati- tude of 57°-5S°. The coast thence recedes westwardly, whilst the chain continuing its course northwardly, terminates west of Mackenzie's River, within a very short distance of the Arctic Ocean. No part of the inland country west of the Rocky Mountains and north of the 59th or 60th degree of lat- itude, has as yet been explored ; or at least no account of it has ever been published ; and it is only from analogy, and be- cause the whole of the extensive territory above described, which has been explored, is inhabited by Indians of the Atha- pasca family, that it is presumed, that this will also be found to be the case with the Indians of the portion not yet explored. The most easterly Athapasca tribe, which extends to Hud- son's Bay, has received from the agents of the Company of that name the appellation of Northern Indians, as contradistinguish- ed from the eastern Knistinaux, who inhabit the country south VOL. II. 3