The Atna of the Copper River.—Here the reader must be cautioned against being misled by the name; as it will appear again, applied to another division of Indians, the Atnas or Shushwap, who are a distinct people from the Atnas of the Copper River. These last occupy the river last-named; where they work in iron, as well as in copper, burn their dead, and derive their descent from the raven.
The Koltshani.—These are the Kolúches of the interior, falling into two divisions; the language of one of which is intelligible to the Atnas, and the Kenays equally. The more distant one is savage and inhospitable, with the credit of indulging in cannibalism. The name seems to belong to the Atna language; where Koltshani=stranger. It also seems the word on which the scientific term, Kolúch, has been founded.
The Ugalents, or Ugalyakhmutsi.—About thirty-eight families. Locality, King William's Sound, and the parts around Mount Elias.—The Ugalyakhmutsi are conterminous with the Tshugatsi Eskimo, and as (on the sea-coast at least) the Kenays lie to the north of these last, there is a partial discontinuity of the Eskimo area. The difference between the Ugalyakhmutsi, and the Eskimo tongues is exhibited in the Mithridates. The present writer considers that it is exceedingly over-rated. Indeed, from the first investigations which he made upon the subject, where he compared the Ugalyakhmutsi of the Mithridates with the Sitka, Kenay, Kadiak, and Unalashkan of Lisiansky, he was inclined to place the Ugalents in the Eskimo class at once—and that in its more limited extent. Nevertheless, the tables of Baer's Beyträge sufficiently show that it has a closer resemblance to the Atnah and Kolooch. At all events, its transitional character is undoubted. In manners and appearance the Ugalentses are Kolúch, and in their manner of life, migratory nomades and fishers.
The Sitkans.—Of the Sitka dialect we have numerous vocabularies; one by Cook, under the name of the Norfolk Sound language. The number who speak this, is put by Mr. Green, an American missionary, at 6500.
The Tungaas.—Of this we have only a short vocabulary of Mr. Tolmic, which is stated by Dr. Scouler, to exhibit affinities with the Sitkan. This is the case. Whether, however, these affinities with the languages to the north of the Tungaas localities, are so much greater than those with the tongues spoken southwards, as to justify us in drawing a line between the true Kolúch dialects and those that will soon be enumerated, has yet to be ascertained. Assuming, however, that this is the case, and, again, insisting upon the conventional character of the present class, and the transitional nature of the Kolúch languages, I consider that the undoubted Kolúch dialects end in the neighbourhood of Queen Charlotte's Islands.
Still there are tribes to the back of those on the coast which have yet to be noticed:—
The Inkhuluklait.—Dwelling on the river Chulitna, and allied to the—
Magimut.—who are allied to the—
Inkalit.—These, in one village alone, are 700 strong; their language has been said to be a mixture of the Kenay, Unalashkan, and Atna. The Inkalit are neighbours of the Kuskokwim, with whom they are continually at war.