The religious belief of these people was extremely limited and confined; or rather, in all probability, their explanations were but little understood by their visitors.  They had an idea of a benevolent and omnipotent spirit, the creator of all things.  They represent him as assuming various shapes at pleasure, but generally that of an immense bird.  He usually inhabits the sun, but occasionally wings his way through the aerial regions, and sees all that is doing upon earth.  Should anything displease him, he vents his wrath in terrific storms and tempests, the lightning being the flashes of his eyes, and the thunder the clapping of his wings.  To propitiate his favor they offer to him annual sacrifices of salmon and venison, the first fruits of their fishing and hunting.

Besides this aerial spirit they believe in an inferior one, who inhabits the fire, and of whom they are in perpetual dread, as, though he possesses equally the power of good and evil, the evil is apt to predominate.  They endeavor, therefore, to keep him in good humor by frequent offerings.  He is supposed also to have great influence with the winged spirit, their sovereign protector and benefactor.  They implore him, therefore, to act as their interpreter, and procure them all desirable things, such as success in fishing and hunting, abundance of game, fleet horses, obedient wives, and male children.

These Indians have likewise their priests, or conjurers, or medicine men, who pretend to be in the confidence of the deities, and the expounders and enforcers of their will.  Each of these medicine men has his idols carved in wood, representing the spirits of the air and of the fire, under some rude and grotesque form of a horse, a bear, a beaver, or other quadruped, or that of bird or fish.  These idols are hung round with amulets and votive offerings, such as beavers’ teeth, and bears’ and eagles’ claws.

When any chief personage is on his death-bed, or dangerously ill, the medicine men are sent for.  Each brings with him his idols, with which he retires into a canoe to hold a consultation.  As doctors are prone to disagree, so these medicine men have now and then a violent altercation as to the malady of the patient, or the treatment of it.  To settle this they beat their idols soundly against each other; whichever first loses a tooth or a claw is considered as confuted, and his votary retires from the field.  Polygamy is not only allowed, but considered honorable, and the greater number of wives a man can maintain, the more important is he in the eyes of the tribe.  The first wife, however, takes rank of all the others, and is considered mistress of the house.  Still the domestic establishment is liable to jealousies and cabals, and the lord and master has much difficulty in maintaining harmony in his jangling household.

In the manuscript from which we draw many of these particulars, it is stated that he who exceeds his neighbors in the number of his wives, male children, and slaves, is elected chief of the village; a title to office which we do not recollect ever before to have met with.