Note 131 — Chapter XIII

This, in common with other statements of the kind, is more than doubtful. The best account of their religion is by Mr. Sproat, but even he acknowledges that, after two years devoted to the subject, and to the questioning of others who had passed half a lifetime amongst the "Ahts," he could discover very little about their faith which could be pronounced indisputably accurate. Even the Indians themselves are by no means at one on the subject, people without a written creed or sacred books being apt to entertain very contradictory ideas on their theological tenets. I endeavoured to fathom some of their beliefs, and I had ample opportunities; but I confess to the difficulty of getting behind these reserved folk, and I did not meet with sufficient success to make the results worth recording.