SIDNEY, B.C. - Bald eagles circled high overhead Friday as members of a Vancouver Island First Nation laid to rest the stolen remains of their ancestors, returned to them after more than a century on display in a museum far from home.

Members of the Tseycum First Nation rose with the sun to bless the 55 sets of remains, which were repatriated earlier this week from the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Smoke drifted to the roof in the band's long house in a sacred ceremony rarely witnessed by non-natives, as members of the band blessed their ancestors and welcomed them home.

The plain cedar caskets were then loaded into pickup trucks and driven from the traditional long house to a new burial ground that was blessed earlier in another ceremony by members of the band, located just outside Sidney, B.C., on the Saanich Peninsula.

Band members followed the procession on foot, singing the Tseycum Paddle Song.

"Being in New York City wasn't the place for them. Here in Tseycum territory, they're home,'' Danny Sam, a band elder, said as he stood among the 41 graves dug for the ancestral remains.

"This is where they belong.''

The bones were among many removed from graves in B.C. by an archaeologist before the turn of the last century, and sold to museums around the world.

"The ceremony is about welcoming our ancestors home, brushing them off and laying them down so they can rest in peace, hopefully forever,'' said Tseycum Chief Vern Jacks.

Jacks said the ceremony is about healing. When the reburial is completed, band members will get to work on repatriating more remains from museums around the world, including museums in London, Berlin, Copenhagen and Chicago.

"Our ancestors don't belong in a box in a museum,'' Jacks said. "We had to go there and get them home.''

The museum in New York was very co-operative in returning the remains, he said, and he hopes that other facilities around the world that still have the bones of Canadian First Nations will take the same approach.

The band is hoping to have remains returned next from Chicago's Field Museum.

"We're going to do it with patience and respect. You've got to respect one another to keep things moving,'' Jacks.

"This was something that was taken away from us without consultation. Today, we're saying, `Hey, you did wrong, come on and work with us.'''