The Indian women are the slaves of their husbands. They have to perform all the domestic duties and drudgeries of the tribe, and are never allowed to unite in their religious ceremonies or amusements.
That the reader may form a better idea of the appearance and dress of the women, I have given on the preceding page the [portrait] of a beautiful girl of the Riccarees (a part of the Pawnee tribe), whose name is Pshan-shaw (the Sweet-scented Grass). “The inner garment, which is like a frock, is entire in one piece, and tastefully ornamented with embroidery and beads. A row of elk’s teeth passes across the breast, and a robe of young buffalo’s skin, elaborately embroidered, is gracefully thrown over her shoulders, and hangs down to the ground behind her.”
On the same page the reader may find, as illustrative of Indian childhood, a [portrait] of the grandson of a chief of the Blackfeet, a boy of six years of age. He is represented at full length, with bow and quiver slung, and his robe of raccoon skin thrown over his shoulder. This young chief, his father dying, was twice stolen by the Crows, and twice recaptured by the Blackfeet, and then placed in the care of a Mr. M’Kenzie until he should be old enough to assume the chieftainship of his tribe, or be able to defend himself against his foes.
The Indian mothers do not have many children, possibly owing to the early age at which they marry. For example, the ages of the four brides just mentioned ranged from twelve to fifteen. Two or three is the average, and a family of five is considered quite a large one.
The children are carried about much in the same way as those of the Araucanians. A sort of cradle is made by bandaging the infant to a flat board, the feet resting on a broad hoop that passes over the end of the cradle. Another hoop passes over the face of the child, and to it are hung sundry little toys and charms; the one for the amusement of the infant, and the other for its preservation through the many perils of infantile life. When the mother carries the child, she hangs the cradle on her back by means of a broad strap that passes over her forehead. Both the cradle and band are ornamented with the most brilliant colors which native art can furnish, and are embroidered in various patterns with dyed porcupine quills.
Among the tribes which inhabit the banks of the Columbia River, and a considerable tract that lies contiguous to it, the cradle is put to a singular use, which has earned for the tribes the general title of Flat-heads. To the upper part of the cradle is fastened a piece of board, which lies on the child’s forehead. To the other end of the board are fastened two strings, which pass round the foot or sides of the cradle. As soon as the infant is laid on its back, the upper board is brought over its forehead, and fastened down by the strings. Every day the pressure is increased, until at last the head is so flattened that a straight line can be drawn from the crown of the head to the nose. One of these cradles with a child undergoing this process of head flattening, is illustrated below. The mother’s head is a type of its permanent effect.
THE FLAT-HEADED WOMAN.
This is perhaps the most extraordinary of all the fashionable distortions of the human body, and the wasp waist of an European belle, the distorted leg of the female Carib, and even the cramped foot of the Chinese beauty, appear insignificant when compared with the flattened head of a Chinnook or Klick-a-tack Indian. Mr. Catlin states that this custom was one far more extended than is the case at present, and that even the Choctaw and Chickasaw tribes of Mississippi and Alabama were accustomed to flatten their heads, their burial-places affording incontrovertible evidence that such must have been the case, and at no very distant date.
The reader, especially if he dabble in phrenology, might well imagine that such a practice must act injuriously upon the mental capacities of those who are subjected to it. Let us, for example, fancy a skull which has been so ruthlessly compressed that it only measures an inch and a half, or at the most two inches, in depth, at the back; that it is in consequence much elongated, and forced outward at the sides, so that it is nearly half as wide again as it would have been if it had been permitted to assume its normal form. The hair, combed down in one place, and expanding in others, would seem to have its natural capabilities much altered, even if not in many cases destroyed. Yet those who have mixed with the Flat-headed tribes say that the intellect is in no way disturbed, much less injured, and that those members of the tribe who have escaped the flattening process are in no way intellectually superior to those who have undergone it. Indeed, as Mr. P. Kane observes, in his “Wanderings of an Artist,” the Chinnooks despise those who retain the original shape of their heads. They always select their slaves from the round-headed tribes, the flattened head being the sign of freedom.