ahas (of
the Middle West). Both these groups are in part agricultural, and it
does not appear how they have come to differ from their neighbors in
this regard. Food restrictions are reported for the Northwest
region.[813]

+459+. There is no clear report of totemic food restrictions in Central
America or in South America;[814] but these regions have as yet not been
thoroughly examined for clan usages.

+460+. (e) _Magical ceremonies for increasing the supply of food._ Such
ceremonies exist, or have existed, in many regions and among peoples of
various grades of culture, civilized as well as savage, but the cases in
which they are, or were, conducted by totemistic clans are comparatively
few. This sort of economic function of the totem clan is most definite
and important in Central and parts of Southeast Australia, where every
clan is charged with the duty of increasing the supply of its totem for
the benefit of its connected clans; and magical rites are performed in
the fertile coast region no less than in the arid region about Lake
Eyre--that is, in these cases the employment of magic seems not to be
conditioned on the natural resources of the land. Similar totemic clan
functions appear in the islands of Torres Straits, the Turtle and Dugong
clans performing ceremonies to increase the supply of turtles and to
attract dugongs. Magical control of totems for the benefit of the whole
community is reported to be found in the Siouan Omaha clans (in the
center of the North American continent). The tribes just mentioned are
those in which the social organization is definitely totemistic.

+461+. Elsewhere the economic function attaches to other bodies than
totemic clans, as in parts of Southeast Australia, and in West Australia
(where the ceremonies are conducted by the exogamous classes). In New
Guinea the totemic character of the performances appears to be doubtful.
A single instance of clan action has been found among the East African
Baganda--the women of the Grasshopper clan undertake to increase the
supply of their totem; why this duty is assigned to the women is not
clear--the custom appears to involve a relaxation of totemistic rules.
The economic festivals and "dances" of the Siouan Mandans and Hidatsa
are general tribal ceremonies. Among the Pueblo Indians such rites are
the care of religious fraternities;[815] the Zuni Frog clan performs a
ceremony to procure rain, but this duty is mainly committed to
rain-priest