Note 119 — Chapter II · HUNTERS AND FISHERS.

This military function of slavery, as we shall see, also exists among several pastoral and agricultural peoples. The industrial part of society, in such cases, is not quite differentiated from the military part. As for the Tlinkits, Tsimshian and Ahts, the employing of slaves for protecting the master or his property is facilitated by the slave-trade: a purchased slave, brought from a great distance, may be made to fight, where it would not be safe to employ in warfare a slave captured from a neighbouring tribe; for the latter will probably be much inclined to go over to the enemies, who often are his own kindred. But the example of the Aleuts, whose slaves are prisoners of war and their descendants119, shows that even captive slaves may be employed in warfare. We shall not very much wonder at this, if we take into consideration, that prisoners of war are sometimes soon forgotten, and even repelled, by their former countrymen. So “if a Mojave is taken prisoner he is forever discarded in his own nation, and should he return his mother even will not own him”120. The expectation of such treatment may induce captive slaves to fight on their masters’ side against their own tribesmen rather than join the latter.