Polygamy is everywhere practiced, and the number of wives is regulated only by wealth, girls being bought of parents at any price which may be agreed upon, and returned, and the price recovered, when after a proper trial they are not satisfactory. The transfer of the presents or price to the bride's parents is among some tribes accompanied by slight ceremonies nowhere fully described. The marriage ceremonies at Millbank Sound are performed on a platform over the water, supported by canoes. While jealousy is not entirely unknown, chastity appears to be so, as women who can earn thegreatest number of blankets win great admiration for themselves and high position for their husbands. Abortion and infanticide are not uncommon. Twin births are unusual, and the number of children is not large, although the age of bearing extends to forty or forty-six years. Women, except in the season of preparing the winter supply of fish, are occupied in household affairs and the care of children, for whom they are not without some affection, and whom they nurse often to the age of two or three years. Many families live together in one house, with droves of filthy dogs and children, all sleeping on mats round a central fire.[261]
HAIDAH GAMBLERS.
The Haidahs, like all Indians, are inveterate gamblers, the favorite game on Queen Charlotte Islands being odd and even, played with small round sticks, in which the game is won when one player has all the bunch of forty or fifty sticks originally belonging to his opponent. Farther south, and inland, some of the sticks are painted with red rings, and the player's skill or luck consists in naming the number and marks of sticks previously wrapped by his antagonist in grass. All have become fond of whisky since the coming of whites, but seem to have had no intoxicating drink before. At their annual trading fairs, and on other occasions, they are fond of visiting and entertaining friends with ceremonious interchange of presents, a suitable return being expected for each gift. At these reception feasts, men and womenare seated on benches along opposite walls; at wedding feasts both sexes dance and sing together. In dancing, the body, head, and arms are thrown into various attitudes to keep time with the music, very little use being made of the legs. On Queen Charlotte Islands the women dance at feasts, while the men in a circle beat time with sticks, the only instruments, except a kind of tambourine. For their dances they deck themselves in their best array, including plenty of birds' down, which they delight to communicate to their partners in bowing, and which they also blow into the air at regular intervals, through a painted tube. Their songs are a simple and monotonous chant, with which they accompany most of their dances and ceremonies, though Mackenzie heard among them some soft, plaintive tones, not unlike church music. The chiefs in winter give a partly theatrical, partly religious entertainment, in which, after preparation behind a curtain, dressed in rich apparel and wearing masks, they appear on a stage and imitate different spirits for the instruction of the hearers, who meanwhile keep up their songs.[262]
After the salmon season, feasting and conjuring are in order. The chief, whose greatest authority is in his character of conjurer, ortzeetzaiakas he is termed in the Hailtzuk tongue, pretends at this time to live alone in the forest, fasting or eating grass, and while there is known astaamish. When he returns, clad in bear-robe, chaplet, and red-bark collar, the crowd flies at his approach, except a few brave spirits, who boldly present their naked arms, from which he bites and swallows large mouthfuls. This, skillfully done, adds to the reputation of both biter and bitten, and is perhaps all the foundation that exists for the report that these people arecannibals; although Mr Duncan, speaking of the Chimsyans in a locality not definitely fixed, testifies to the tearing to pieces and actual devouring of the body of a murdered slave by naked bands of cannibal medicine-men. Only certain parties of the initiated practice this barbarism, others confining their tearing ceremony to the bodies of dogs.[263]
MAGICIANS AND MEDICINE-MEN.
None of these horrible orgies are practiced by the Queen Charlotte Islanders. The performances of the Haidah magicians, so far as they may differ from those of the Nootkas have not been clearly described by travelers. The magicians of Chatham Sound keep infernal spirits shut up in a box away from the vulgar gaze, and possess great power by reason of the implicit belief on the part of the people, in their ability to charm away life. The doctor, however, is not beyond the reach of a kinsman's revenge, and is sometimes murdered.[264]With their ceremonies and superstitions there seems to be mixed very little religion, as all their many fears have reference to the present life. Certain owls and squirrels are regarded with reverence, and used as charms; salmon must not be cut across the grain, or the living fish will leave the river; the mysterious operations with astronomical and other European instruments about their rivers caused great fear that the fisheries would be ruined; fogs are conjured away without the slightest suspicion of the sun's agency.[265]European navigators they welcome by paddling their boats several times round the ship, making long speeches, scattering birds' down, and singing.[266]Ordinary presents, like tobacco or trinkets, are gladly received, but a written testimonial is most highly prized by the Haidahs, who regard writing as a great and valuable mystery. They have absolutely no methods of recording events. Although living so constantly on the water, I find no mention of their skill in swimming, while Poole states expressly that they have no knowledge of that art.[267]
Very slight accounts are extant of the peculiar methods of curing diseases practiced by the Haidahs. Their chief reliance, as in the case of all Indian tribes, is on the incantations and conjurings of their sorcerers, who claim supernatural powers of seeing, hearing, and extracting disease, and are paid liberally when successful. Bark, herbs, and various decoctions are used in slight sickness, but in serious cases little reliance is placed on them. To the bites of the sorcerer-chiefs on the main, eagle-down is applied to stop the bleeding, after which a pine-gum plaster or sallal-bark is applied. On Queen Charlotte Islands, in a case of internal uneasiness, large quantities of sea-water are swallowed, shaken up, and ejected through the mouth for the purpose, as the natives say, of 'washing themselves inside out.'[268]
HAIDAH BURIALS.
Death is ascribed to the ill will and malign influence of an enemy, and one suspected of causing the death of a prominent individual, must make ready to die. As a rule, the bodies of the dead are burned, though exceptions are noted in nearly every part of the territory. In the disposal of the ashes and larger bones which remain unburned, there seems to be no fixed usage. Encased in boxes, baskets, or canoes, or wrapped inmats or bark, they are buried in or deposited on the ground, placed in a tree, on a platform, or hung from a pole. Articles of property are frequently deposited with the ashes, but not uniformly. Slaves' bodies are simply thrown into the river or the sea. Mourning for the dead consists usually of cutting the hair and blackening anew the face and neck for several months. Among the Kaiganies, guests at the burning of the bodies are wont to lacerate themselves with knives and stones. A tribe visited by Mackenzie, kept their graves free from shrubbery, a woman clearing that of her husband each time she passed. The Nass Indians paddle a dead chief, gaily dressed, round the coast villages.[269]
The Haidahs, compared with other North American Indians, may be called an intelligent, honest, and brave race, although not slow under European treatment to become drunkards, gamblers, and thieves. Acts of unprovoked cruelty or treachery are rare; missionaries have been somewhat successful in the vicinity of Fort Simpson, finding in intoxicating liquors their chief obstacle.[270]
THE NOOTKAS.
The Nootkas, the second division of the Columbian group, are immediately south of the Haidah country; occupying Vancouver Island, and the coast of the main land, between the fifty-second and the forty-ninth parallels. The wordnootkais not found in any native dialect of the present day. Captain Cook, to whom we are indebted for the term, probably misunderstood the name given by the natives to the region of Nootka Sound.[271]The first European settlement in this region was on the Sound, which thus became the central point of early English and Spanish intercourse with the Northwest Coast; but it was soon abandoned, and no mission or trading post has since taken its place, so that no tribes of this family have been less known in later times than those on the west coast of Vancouver Island. The chief tribes of the Nootka family, or those on whose tribal existence, if not on the orthography of their names authors to some extent agree, are as follows.[272]TheNitinats,Clayoquots, andNootkas, on the sounds of the same names along the west coast of Vancouver Island; theQuackollsandNewittees,[273]in the north; theCowichins,Ucletas, andComux, on the east coast of Vancouver and on the opposite main; theSaukaulutuchs[274], in the interior of the island; theClallums,[275]Sokes, andPatcheena, on the south end; and theKwantlumsandTeets,[276]on the lower Fraser River. These tribes differ but little in physical peculiarities, or manners and customs, but by their numerous dialects they have been classed in nations. No comprehensive or satisfactory names have, however, been applied to them as national divisions.[277]
Between the Nootka family and its fish-eating neighbors on the north and south, the line of distinction is not clearly marked, but the contrast is greater with the interior hunting tribes on the east. Since their first intercourse with whites, the Nootkas have constantly decreased in numbers, and this not only in those parts where they have been brought into contact with traders and miners, but on the west coast, where they have retained in a measure their primitive state. The savage fades before the superior race, and immediate intercourse is not necessary to produce in native races those 'baleful influences of civilization,' which like a pestilence are wafted from afar, as on the wings of the wind.[278]
NOOTKA PHYSIQUE.
The Nootkas are of less than medium height, smaller than the Haidahs, but rather strongly built; usually plump, but rarely corpulent;[279]their legs, like those ofall the coast tribes, short, small, and frequently deformed, with large feet and ankles;[280]the face broad, round, and full, with the usual prominent cheek-bone, a low forehead, flat nose, wide nostrils, small black eyes, round thickish-lipped mouth, tolerably even well-set teeth; the whole forming a countenance rather dull and expressionless, but frequently pleasant.[281]The Nootka complexion,so far as grease and paint have allowed travelers to observe it, is decidedly light, but apparently a shade darker than that of the Haidah family.[282]The hair, worn long,is as a rule black or dark brown, coarse, and straight, though instances are not wanting where all these qualities are reversed.[283]The beard is carefully plucked out by the young men, and this operation, repeated for generations, has rendered the beard naturally thin. Old men often allow it to grow on the chin and upper lip.
NOOTKA HAIR AND BEARD.
To cut the hair short is to the Nootka a disgrace. Worn at full length, evened at the ends, and sometimes cut straight across the forehead, it is either allowed to hang loosely from under a band of cloth or fillet of bark, or is tied in a knot on the crown. On full-dress occasions the top-knot is secured with a green bough, and after being well saturated with whale-grease, the hair is powdered plentifully with white feathers, which are regarded as the crowning ornament for manly dignity in all these regions. Both sexes, but particularly the women, take great pains with the hair, carefully combing and plaiting their long tresses, fashioning tasteful head-dresses of bark-fibre, decked with beads and shells, attachingleaden weights to the braids to keep them straight. The bruised root of a certain plant is thought by the Ahts to promote the growth of the hair.[284]
The custom of flattening the head is practiced by the Nootkas, in common with the Sound and Chinook families, but is not universal, nor is so much importance attached to it as elsewhere; although all seem to admire a flattened forehead as a sign of noble birth, even among tribes that do not make this deformity a sign of freedom. Among the Quatsinos and Quackolls of the north, the head, besides being flattened, is elongated into a conical sugar-loaf shape, pointed at the top. The flattening process begins immediately after birth, and is continued until the child can walk. It is effected by compressing the head with tight bandages, usually attached to the log cradle, the forehead being first fitted with a soft pad, a fold of soft bark, a mould of hard wood, or a flat stone. Observers generally agree that little or no harm is done to the brain by this infliction, the traces of which to a great extent disappear later in life. Many tribes, including the Aht nations, are said to have abandoned the custom since they have been brought into contact with the whites.[285]
NOOTKA FACE-PAINTING.
The body is kept constantly anointed with a reddish clayey earth, mixed in train oil, and consequently little affected by their frequent baths. In war and mourning the whole body is blackened; on feast days the head, limbs, and body are painted in fantastic figures with various colors, apparently according to individual fancy, although the chiefs monopolize the fancy figures, thecommon people being restricted to plain colors. Solid grease is sometimes applied in a thick coating, and carved or moulded inalto-rilievointo ridges and figures afterwards decorated with red paint, while shining sand or grains of mica are sprinkled over grease and paint to impart a glittering appearance. The women are either less fond of paint than the men, or else are debarred by their lords from the free use of it; among the Ahts, at least of late, the women abandon ornamental paint after the age of twenty-five. In their dances, as in war, masks carved from cedar to represent an endless variety of monstrous faces, painted in bright colors, with mouth and eyes movable by strings, are attached to their heads, giving them a grotesquely ferocious aspect.[286]The noseand ears are regularly pierced in childhood, with from one to as many holes as the feature will hold, and from the punctures are suspended bones, shells, rings, beads, or in fact any ornament obtainable. The lip is sometimes, though more rarely, punctured. Bracelets and anklets of any available material are also commonly worn.[287]
The aboriginal dress of the Nootkas is a square blanket, of a coarse yellow material resembling straw matting, made by the women from cypress bark, with a mixture of dog's hair. This blanket had usually a border of fur; it sometimes had arm-holes, but was ordinarily thrown over the shoulders, and confined at the waist by a belt. Chiefs wore it painted in variegated colors or unpainted, but the common people wore a coarser material painted uniformly red. Women wore the garment longer and fastened under the chin, binding an additional strip of cloth closely about the middle, and showing much modesty about disclosing the person, while the men often went entirely naked. Besides the blanket, garments of many kinds of skin were in use, particularly by the chiefs on public days. In war, a heavy skin dress was worn as a protection against arrows. The Nootkas usually went bareheaded, but sometimes wore a conical hat plaited of rushes, bark, or flax. European blankets have replaced those of native manufacture, and many Indians about the settlements have adopted also the shirt and breeches.[288]
DWELLINGS OF THE NOOTKAS.
The Nootkas choose strong positions for their towns and encampments. At Desolation Sound, Vancouver found a village built on a detached rock with perpendicular sides, only accessible by planks resting on the branches of a tree, and protected on the sea side by a projecting platform resting on timbers fixed in the crevices of the precipice. The Nimkish tribe, according to Lord, build their homes on a table-land overhanging the sea, and reached by ascending a vertical cliff on a bark-rope ladder. Each tribe has several villages in favorable locations for fishing at different seasons. The houses, when more than one is needed for a tribe, are placed with regularity along streets; they vary in size according to the need or wealth of the occupants, and are held in common under the direction of the chief. They are constructed in the manner following. A row of large posts, from ten to fifteen feet high, often grotesquely carved, supports an immense ridge-pole, sometimes two and a half feet thick and one hundred feet long. Similar but smaller beams, on shorter posts, are placed on either side of the central row, distant from it fifteen, twenty, or twenty-five feet, according to the dimensions required. This frame is then covered with split cedar planks, about two inches thick, and from three to eight feet wide. Theside planks are tied together with bark, and supported by slender posts in couples just far enough apart to receive the thickness of the plank. A house like this, forty by one hundred feet, accommodates many families, each of which has its allotted space, sometimes partitioned off like a double row of stalls, with a wide passage in the middle. In the centre of each stall is a circle of stones for a fire-place, and round the walls are raised couches covered with mats. In rainy weather, cracks in the roof and sides are covered with mats. No smoke or window holes are left, and when smoke becomes troublesome a roof-plank is removed. The entrance is at one end. These dwellings furnish, according to Nootka ideas, a comfortable shelter, except when a high wind threatens to unroof them, and then the occupants go out and sit on the roof to keep it in place. Frequently the outside is painted in grotesque figures of various colors. Only the frame is permanent; matting, planks, and all utensils are several times each year packed up and conveyed in canoes to another locality where a frame belonging to the tribe awaits covering. The odor arising from fish-entrails and other filth, which they take no pains to remove, appears to be inoffensive, but the Nootkas are often driven by mosquitos to sleep on a stage over the water.[289]
FOOD OF THE NOOTKAS.
The Nootkas, like the Haidahs, live almost wholly on the products of the sea, and are naturally expert fishermen. Salmon, the great staple, are taken in August and September, from sea, inlet, and river, by nets, spears, pots or baskets, and even by hooks. Hooks consist of sharp barbed bones bound to straight pieces of hard wood; sea-wrack, maple-bark, and whale-sinew furnish lines, which in salmon-fishing are short and attached to the paddles. The salmon-spear is a forked pole, some fifteen feet long, the detachable head having prongs pointed with fish-bone or iron, and the fish in deep water is sometimes attracted within its reach by a wooden decoy, forced down by a long pole, and then detached and allowed to ascend rapidly to the surface. Spearing is carried on mostly by torch-light. A light-colored stone pavement is sometimes laid upon the bottom of the stream, which renders the fish visible in their passage over it. Nets are made of nettles or of wild flax, found along Fraser River. They are small in size, and used as dip-nets, or sunk between two canoes and lifted as the fish pass over. A pot or basket fifteen to twenty feet long, three to five feet in diameter at one end, and tapering to a point at the other, is made of pine splinters one or two inches apart, with twig-hoops; and placed, large end up stream, at the foot of a fall or at an opening in an embankment. The salmon are driven down the fall with poles, and entering the basket are taken out by a door in the small end. This basket is sometimes enclosed in another one, similar but of uniform diameter, and closed at one end. Fences of stakes across the river oblige the salmon to enter the open mouth in their passage up, and passing readily throughan opening left in the point of the inner basket, they find themselves entrapped. In March, herring appear on the coast in great numbers, and in April and May they enter the inlets and streams, where they are taken with a dip-net, or more commonly by the fish-rake—a pole armed with many sharp bones or nails. Early in the season they can be taken only by torch-light. Halibut abound from March to June, and are caught with hooks and long lines, generally at some distance from shore. For all other fish, European hooks were early adopted, but the halibut, at least among the Ahts, must still be taken with the native hook. Many other varieties of fish, caught by similar methods, are used as food, but those named supply the bulk of the Nootka's provision. In May or June, whales appear and are attacked in canoes by the chief, with the select few from each tribe who alone have the right to hunt this monarch of the sea. The head of their harpoon is made of two barbed bones and pointed with muscle-shell; it is fastened to a whale-sinew line of a few feet in length, and this short line to a very long bark rope, at one end of which are seal-skin air-bags and bladders, to keep it afloat. The point is also fastened to a shaft from ten to twenty-five feet in length, from which it is easily detached. With many of these buoys in tow the whale cannot dive, and becomes an easy prey. Whale-blubber and oil are great delicacies, the former being preferred half putrid, while the oil with that of smaller denizens of the sea preserved in bladders, is esteemed a delicious sauce, and eaten with almost everything. Sea-otters and seals are also speared, the former with a weapon more barbed and firmly attached to the handle, as they are fierce fighters; but when found asleep on the rocks, they are shot with arrows. Seals are often attracted within arrow-shot by natives disguised as seals in wooden masks.
Clams and other shell-fish, which are collected in great numbers by the women, are cooked, strung on cypress-bark cords, and hung in the houses to dry for winter use. Fish are preserved by drying only, the use of saltbeing unknown. Salmon, after losing their heads and tails, which are eaten in the fishing season, are split open and the back-bone taken out before drying; smaller fry are sometimes dried as they come from their element; but halibut and cod are cut up and receive a partial drying in the sun. The spawn of all fish, but particularly of salmon and herring, is carefully preserved by stowing it away in baskets, where it ferments. Bear, deer, and other land animals, as well as wild fowl, are sometimes taken for food, by means of rude traps, nets, and covers, successful only when game is abundant, for the Nootkas are but indifferent hunters. In the time of Jewitt, three peculiarities were observable in the Nootka use of animal food, particularly bear-meat. When a bear was killed, it was dressed in a bonnet, decked with fine down, and solemnly invited to eat in the chief's presence, before being eaten; after partaking of bruin's flesh, which was appreciated as a rarity, the Nootka could not taste fresh fish for two months; and while fish to be palatable must be putrid, meat when tainted was no longer fit for food. The Nootka cuisine furnished food in four styles; namely, boiled—the mode par excellence, applicable to every variety of food, and effected, as by the Haidahs, by hot stones in wooden vessels; steamed—of rarer use, applied mostly to heads, tails, and fins, by pouring water over them on a bed of hot stones, and covering the whole tightly with mats; roasted—rarely, in the case of some smaller fish and clams; and raw—fish-spawn and most other kinds of food, when conveniences for cooking were not at hand. Some varieties of sea-weed and lichens, as well as the camass, and other roots, were regularly laid up for winter, while berries, everywhere abundant, were eaten in great quantities in their season, and at least one variety preserved by pressing in bunches. In eating, they sit in groups of five or six, with their legs doubled under them round a large wooden tray, and dip out the food nearly always boiled to a brothy consistency, with their fingers or clam-shells, paying little or no attention to cleanliness. Chiefs and slaves have trays apart, andthe principal meal, according to Cook, was about noon. Feasting is the favorite way of entertaining friends, so long as food is plentiful; and by a curious custom, of the portion allotted them, guests must carry away what they cannot eat. Water in aboriginal days was the only Nootka drink; it is also used now when whisky is not to be had.[290]
NOOTKA BATTLES AND BOATS.
Lances and arrows, pointed with shell, slate, flint, or bone, and clubs and daggers of wood and bone, were the weapons with which they met their foes; but firearms and metallic daggers, and tomahawks, have long since displaced them, as they have to a less degree the original hunting and fishing implements.[291]The Nootka tribes were always at war with each other, hereditaryquarrels being handed down for generations. According to their idea, loss of life in battle can be forgotten only when an equal number of the hostile tribe are killed. Their military tactics consist of stratagem and surprise in attack, and watchfulness in defense. Before engaging in war, some weeks are spent in preparation, which consists mainly of abstinence from women, bathing, scrubbing the skin with briers till it bleeds, and finally painting the whole body jet-black. All prisoners not suitable for slaves are butchered or beheaded. In an attack the effort is always made to steal into the adversary's camp at night and kill men enough to decide the victory before the alarm can be given. When they fail in this, the battle is seldom long continued, for actual hand-to-hand fighting is not to the Nootka taste. On the rare occasions when it is considered desirable to make overtures of peace, an ambassador is sent with an ornamented pipe, and with this emblem his person is safe. Smoking a pipe together by hostile chiefs also solemnizes a treaty.[292]
Nootka boats are dug out each from a single pine-tree, and are made of all sizes from ten to fifty feet long, the largest accommodating forty or fifty men. Selecting a proper tree in the forest, the aboriginal Nootka fells it with a sort of chisel of flint or elk-horn, three by six inches, fastened in a wooden handle, and struck by a smooth stone mallet. Then the log is split with wooden wedges, and the better piece being selected, it is hollowed out with the aforesaid chisel, a mussel-shell adze, and a bird's-bone gimlet worked between the two hands. Sometimes, but not always, fire is used as an assistant. Theexterior is fashioned with the same tools. The boat is widest in the middle, tapers toward each end, and is strengthened by light cross-pieces extending from side to side, which, being inserted after the boat is soaked in hot water, modify and improve the original form. The bow is long and pointed, the stern square-cut or slightly rounded; both ends are raised higher than the middle by separate pieces of wood painted with figures of birds or beasts, the head on the bow and the tail on the stern. The inside is painted red; the outside, slightly burned, is rubbed smooth and black, and for the whale fishery is ornamented along the gunwales with a row of small shells or seal-teeth, but for purposes of war it is painted with figures in white. Paddles are neatly made of hard wood, about five and a half feet long with a leaf-shaped blade of two feet, sharp at the end, and used as a weapon in canoe-fighting. A cross-piece is sometimes added to the handle like the top of a crutch.[293]
In addition to the implements already named are chests and boxes, buckets, cups and eating-troughs, all of wood, either dug out or pinned together; baskets of twigs and bags of matting; all neatly made, and many of the articles painted or carved, or ornamented with shell work. As among the Haidahs, the driedeulachonis often used as a lamp.[294]The matting and coarser kindsof cloth are made of rushes and of pine or cedar bark, which after being soaked is beaten on a plank with a grooved instrument of wood or bone until the fibres are separated. The threads are twisted into cords between the hand and thigh; these cords, hung to a horizontal beam and knotted with finer thread at regular intervals, form the cloth. Thread of the same bark is used with a sharpened twig for a needle. Intercourse with Europeans has modified their manufactures, and checked the development of their native ingenuity.[295]
PROPERTY OF THE NOOTKAS.
Captain Cook found among the Ahts very "strict notions of their having a right to the exclusive property of everything that their country produces," so that they claimed pay for even wood, water, and grass. The limits of tribal property are very clearly defined, but individuals rarely claim any property in land. Houses belong to the men who combine to build them. Private wealth consists of boats and implements for obtaining food, domestic utensils, slaves, and blankets, the latter being generally the standard by which wealth or price is computed. Food is not regarded as common property, yet any man may help himself to his neighbor's store when needy. The accumulation of property beyond the necessities of life is considered desirable only for the purpose of distributing it in presents on great feast-days, and thereby acquiring a reputation for wealth and liberality; and as these feasts occur frequently, an unsuccessful man may often take a fresh start in the race. Instead of being given away, canoes and blankets are often destroyed, which proves that the motive in this disposal of property is not to favor friends, but merely to appear indifferent to wealth. It is certainly a mostremarkable custom, and one that exerts a great influence on the whole people. Gifts play an important part in procuring a wife, and a division of property accompanies a divorce. To enter the ranks of the medicine-men or magicians, or to attain rank of any kind, property must be sacrificed; and a man who receives an insult or suffers any affliction must tear up the requisite quantity of blankets and shirts, if he would retain his honor.[296]Trade in all their productions was carried on briskly between the different Nootka tribes before the coming of the whites. They manifest much shrewdness in their exchanges; even their system of presents is a species of trade, the full value of each gift being confidently expected in a return present on the next festive occasion. In their intertribal commerce, a band holding a strong position where trade by canoes between different parts may be stopped, do not fail to offer and enforce the acceptance of their services as middlemen, thereby greatly increasing market prices.[297]
The system of numeration, sufficiently extensive for the largest numbers, is decimal, the numbers to ten having names which are in some instances compounds but not multiples of smaller numbers. The fingers are used to aid in counting. The year is divided into months with some reference to the moon, but chiefly by the fish-seasons, ripening of berries, migrations of birds, and other periodical events, for which the months are named, as: 'when the herrings spawn,' etc. The unit of measure is the span, the fingers representing its fractional parts.[298]The Nootkas display considerable taste in ornamentingwith sculpture and paintings their implements and houses, their chief efforts being made on the posts of the latter, and the wooden masks which they wear in war and some of their dances; but all implements may be more or less carved and adorned according to the artist's fancy. They sometimes paint fishing and hunting scenes, but generally their models exist only in imagination, and their works consequently assume unintelligible forms. There seems to be no evidence that their carved images and complicated paintings are in any sense intended as idols or hieroglyphics. A rude system of heraldry prevails among them, by which some animal is adopted as a family crest, and its figure is painted or embroidered on canoes, paddles, or blankets.[299]
NOOTKA ART AND GOVERNMENT.
To the Nootka system of government the terms patriarchal, hereditary, and feudal have been applied. There is no confederation, each tribe being independent of all the rest, except as powerful tribes are naturally dominant over the weak. In each tribe the head chief's rank is hereditary by the male line; his grandeur is displayed on great occasions, when, decked in all his finery, he is the central figure. At the frequently recurring feasts of state he occupies the seat of honor; presides at all councils of the tribe, and is respected and highly honored by all; but has no real authority over any but his slaves. Between the chief, or king, and the people is a nobility, in number about one fourth of the whole tribe, composed of several grades, the highest being partially hereditary, but also, as are all the lower grades, obtainable by featsof valor or great liberality. All chieftains must be confirmed by the tribe, and some of them appointed by the king; each man's rank is clearly defined in the tribe, and corresponding privileges strictly insisted on. There are chiefs who have full authority in warlike expeditions. Harpooners also form a privileged class, whose rank is handed down from father to son. This somewhat complicated system of government nevertheless sits lightly, since the people are neither taxed nor subjected to any laws, nor interfered with in their actions. Still, long-continued custom serves as law and marks out the few duties and privileges of the Nootka citizen. Stealing is not common except from strangers; and offenses requiring punishment are usually avenged—or pardoned in consideration of certain blankets received—by the injured parties and their friends, the chiefs seeming to have little or nothing to do in the matter.[300]
NOOTKA SLAVERY AND MARRIAGE.
Slavery is practiced by all the tribes, and the slave-trade forms an important part of their commerce. Slaves are about the only property that must not be sacrificed to acquire the ever-desired reputation for liberality. Only rich men—according to some authorities only the nobles—may hold slaves. War and kidnapping supply the slave-market, and no captive, whatever his rank in his own tribe, can escape this fate, except by a heavy ransom offered soon after he is taken, and before his whereabouts becomes unknown to his friends. Children of slaves, whose fathers are never known, are forever slaves. The power of the owner is arbitrary and unlimited over the actions and life of the slave, but a cruel exercise of his power seems of rare occurrence, and, save the hard labor required, the material condition of the slave is but little worse than that of the common free people, since he is sheltered by the same roof and partakes of the same food as his master. Socially the slave is despised; his hair is cut short, and his very name becomes a term of reproach. Female slaves are prostituted for hire, especially in the vicinity of white settlements. A runaway slave is generally seized and resold by the first tribe he meets.[301]
THE NOOTKA FAMILY.
The Nootka may have as many wives as he can buy, but as prices are high, polygamy is practically restricted to the chiefs, who are careful not to form alliances withfamilies beneath them in rank. Especially particular as to rank are the chiefs in choosing their first wife, always preferring the daughters of noble families of another tribe. Courtship consists in an offer of presents by the lover to the girl's father, accompanied generally by lengthy speeches of friends on both sides, extolling the value of the man and his gift, and the attractions of the bride. After the bargain is concluded, a period of feasting follows if the parties are rich, but this is not necessary as a part of the marriage ceremony. Betrothals are often made by parents while the parties are yet children, mutual deposits of blankets and other property being made as securities for the fulfillment of the contract, which is rarely broken. Girls marry at an average age of sixteen. The common Nootka obtains his one bride from his own rank also by a present of blankets, much more humble than that of his rich neighbor, and is assisted in his overtures by perhaps a single friend instead of being followed by the whole tribe. Courtship among this class is not altogether without the attentions which render it so charming in civilized life; as when the fond girl lovingly caresses and searches her lover's head, always giving him the fattest of her discoveries. Wives are not ill treated, and although somewhat overworked, the division of labor is not so oppressive as among many Indian tribes. Men build houses, make boats and implements, hunt and fish; women prepare the fish and game for winter use, cook, manufacture cloth and clothing, and increase the stock of food by gathering berries and shell-fish; and most of this work among the richer class is done by slaves. Wives are consulted in matters of trade, and in fact seem to be nearly on terms of equality with their husbands, except that they are excluded from some public feasts and ceremonies. There is much reason to suppose that before the advent of the whites, the Nootka wife was comparatively faithful to her lord, that chastity was regarded as a desirable female quality, and offenses against it severely punished. The females so freely brought on board the vessels of early voyagers and offeredto the men, were perhaps slaves, who are everywhere prostituted for gain, so that the fathers of their children are never known. Women rarely have more than two or three children, and cease bearing at about twenty-five, frequently preventing the increase of their family by abortions. Pregnancy and childbirth affect them but little. The male child is named at birth, but his name is afterwards frequently changed. He is suckled by the mother until three or four years old, and at an early age begins to learn the arts of fishing by which he is to live. Children are not quarrelsome among themselves, and are regarded by both parents with some show of affection and pride. Girls at puberty are closely confined for several days, and given a little water but no food; they are kept particularly from the sun or fire, to see either of which at this period would be a lasting disgrace. At such times feasts are given by the parents. Divorces or separations may be had at will by either party, but a strict division of property and return of betrothal presents is expected, the woman being allowed not only the property she brought her husband, and articles manufactured by her in wedlock, but a certain proportion of the common wealth. Such property as belongs to the father and is not distributed in gifts during his life, or destroyed at his death, is inherited by the eldest son.[302]
From the middle of November to the middle of January, is the Nootka season of mirth and festivity, when nearly the whole time is occupied with public and private gaiety. Their evenings are privately passed by the family group within doors in conversation, singing, joking, boasting of past exploits, personal and tribal, and teasing the women until bed-time, when one by one they retire to rest in the same blankets worn during the day.[303]Swimming and trials of strength by hooking together the little fingers, or scuffling for a prize, seem to be the only out-door amusements indulged in by adults, while the children shoot arrows and hurl spears at grass figures of birds and fishes, and prepare themselves for future conflicts by cutting off the heads of imaginary enemies modeled in mud.[304]To gambling the Nootkas are passionately addicted, but their games are remarkably few and uniform. Small bits of wood compose their entire paraphernalia, sometimes used like dice, when the game depends on the side turned up; or passed rapidly from hand to hand, when the gamester attempts to name the hand containing the trump stick; or again concealed in dust spread over a blanket and moved about by one player that the rest may guess its location. In playing they always form a circle seated on the ground, and the women rarely if ever join the game.[305]They indulge in smoking,the only pipes of their own manufacture being of plain cedar, filled now with tobacco by those who can afford it, but in which they formerly smoked, as it is supposed, the leaves of a native plant—still mixed with tobacco to lessen its intoxicating properties. The pipe is passed round after a meal, but seems to be less used in serious ceremonies than among eastern Indian nations.[306]
NOOTKA AMUSEMENTS.
But the Nootka amusement par excellence is that of feasts, given by the richer classes and chiefs nearly every evening during 'the season.' Male and female heralds are employed ceremoniously to invite the guests, the house having been first cleared of its partitions, and its floor spread with mats.[307]As in countries more civilized, the common people go early to secure the best seats, their allotted place being near the door. The élite come later, after being repeatedly sent for; on arrival they are announced by name, and assigned a place according to rank. In one corner of the hall the fish and whale-blubber are boiled by the wives of the chiefs, who serve it to the guests in pieces larger or smaller, according to their rank. What can not be eaten must be carried home. Their drink ordinarily is pure water, but occasionally berries of a peculiar kind, preserved in cakes, are stirred in until a froth is formed which swells the body of the drinker nearly to bursting.[308]Eating is followed by conversation and speech-making, oratory being an art highly prized, in which, with their fine voices, they become skillful. Finally, the floor is cleared for dancing. In the dances in which the crowd participate, the dancers, with faces painted in black and vermilion, form a circle round a few leaders who give the step, which consists chiefly in jumping withboth feet from the ground, brandishing weapons or bunches of feathers, or sometimes simply bending the body without moving the feet. As to the participation of women in these dances, authorities do not agree.[309]In a sort of conversational dance all pass briskly round the room to the sound of music, praising in exclamations the building and all within it, while another dance requires many to climb upon the roof and there continue their motions. Their special or character dances are many, and in them they show much dramatic talent. A curtain is stretched across a corner of the room to conceal the preparations, and the actors, fantastically dressed, represent personal combats, hunting scenes, or the actions of different animals. In the seal-dance naked men jump into the water and then crawl out and over the floors, imitating the motions of the seal. Indecent performances are mentioned by some visitors. Sometimes in these dances men drop suddenly as if dead, and are at last revived by the doctors, who also give dramatic or magic performances at their houses; or they illuminate a wax moon out on the water, and make the natives believe they are communing with the man in the moon. To tell just where amusement ceases and solemnity begins in these dances is impossible.[310]Birds' down forms an important item in the decoration at dances, especially at the reception of strangers. All dances, as well as other ceremonies, are accompanied by continual music, instrumental and vocal. The instruments are: boxes and benchesstruck with sticks; a plank hollowed out on the under side and beaten with drum-sticks about a foot long; a rattle made of dried seal-skin in the form of a fish, with pebbles; a whistle of deer-bone about an inch long with one hole, which like the rattle can only be used by chiefs; and a bunch of muscle-shells, to be shaken like castanets.[311]Their songs are monotonous chants, extending over but few notes, varied by occasional howls and whoops in some of the more spirited melodies, pleasant or otherwise, according to the taste of the hearer.[312]Certain of their feasts are given periodically by the head chiefs, which distant tribes attend, and during which take place the distributions of property already mentioned. Whenever a gift is offered, etiquette requires the recipient to snatch it rudely from the donor with a stern and surly look.[313]
MISCELLANEOUS CUSTOMS.
Among the miscellaneous customs noticed by the different authorities already quoted, may be mentioned the following. Daily bathing in the sea is practiced, the vapor-bath not being used. Children are rolled in the snow by their mothers to make them hardy. Camps and other property are moved from place to place by piling them on a plank platform built across the canoes. Whymper saw Indians near Bute Inlet carrying burdens on the back by a strap across the forehead. In a fight they rarely strike but close and depend on pulling hair and scratching; a chance blow must be made up by a present. Invitationsto eat must not be declined, no matter how often repeated. Out of doors there is no native gesture of salutation, but in the houses a guest is motioned politely to a couch; guests are held sacred, and great ceremonies are performed at the reception of strangers; all important events are announced by heralds. Friends sometimes saunter along hand in hand. A secret society, independent of tribe, family, or crest, is supposed by Sproat to exist among them, but its purposes are unknown. In a palaver with whites the orator holds a long white pole in his hand, which he sticks occasionally into the ground by way of emphasis. An animal chosen as a crest must not be shot or ill-treated in the presence of any wearing its figure; boys recite portions of their elders' speeches as declamations; names are changed many times during life, at the will of the individual or of the tribe.
CUSTOMS AND CANNIBALISM.
In sorcery, witchcraft, prophecy, dreams, evil spirits, and the transmigration of souls, the Nootkas are firm believers, and these beliefs enable the numerous sorcerers of different grades to acquire great power in the tribes by their strange ridiculous ceremonies. Most of their tricks are transparent, being deceptions worked by the aid of confederates to keep up their power; but, as in all religions, the votary must have some faith in the efficacy of their incantations. The sorcerer, before giving a special demonstration, retires apart to meditate. After spending some time alone in the forests and mountains, fasting and lacerating the flesh, he appears suddenly before the tribe, emaciated, wild with excitement, clad in a strange costume, grotesquely painted, and wearing a hideous mask. The scenes that ensue are indescribable, but the aim seems to be to commit all the wild freaks that a maniac's imagination may devise, accompanied by the most unearthly yells which can terrorize the heart. Live dogs and dead human bodies are seized and torn by their teeth; but, at least in later times, they seem not to attack the living, and their performances are somewhat less horrible and bloody than the wild orgies of the northern tribes. The sorcerer isthought to have more influence with bad spirits than with good, and is always resorted to in the case of any serious misfortune. New members of the fraternity are initiated into the mysteries by similar ceremonies. Old women are not without their traditional mysterious powers in matters of prophecy and witchcraft; and all chiefs in times of perplexity practice fasting and laceration. Dreams are believed to be the visits of spirits or of the wandering soul of some living party, and the unfortunate Nootka boy or girl whose blubber-loaded stomach causes uneasy dreams, must be properly hacked, scorched, smothered, and otherwise tormented until the evil spirit is appeased.[314]Whether or not these people were cannibals, is a disputed question, but there seems to be little doubt that slaves have been sacrificed and eaten as a part of their devilish rites.[315]
The Nootkas are generally a long-lived race, and from the beginning to the failing of manhood undergo little change in appearance. Jewitt states that during his captivity of three years at Nootka Sound, only five natural deaths occurred, and the people suffered scarcely any disease except the colic. Sproat mentions as the commonest diseases; bilious complaints, dysentery, a consumption which almost always follows syphilis, fevers, and among the aged, ophthalmia. Accidental injuries, as cuts, bruises, sprains, and broken limbs, are treated with considerable success by means of simple salves or gums, cold water, pine-bark bandages, and wooden splints. Natural pains and maladies are invariably ascribed to the absence or other irregular conduct of the soul, or to the influence of evil spirits, and all treatment is directed to the recall of the former and to the appeasing of the latter. Still, so long as the ailment is slight, simple means are resorted to, and the patient is kindly cared for by the women; as when headache, colic, or rheumatism is treated by the application of hot or cold water, hot ashes, friction, or the swallowing of cold teas made from various roots and leaves. Nearly every disease has a specific for its cure. Oregon grape and other herbs cure syphilis; wasp-nest powder is a tonic, and blackberries an astringent; hemlock bark forms a plaster, and dog-wood bark is a strengthener; an infusion of young pine cones or the inside scrapings of a human skull prevent too rapid family increase, while certain plants facilitate abortion. When a sickness becomes serious, the sorcerer or medicine-man is called in and incantations begin, more or less noisy according to the amount of the prospective feeand the number of relatives and friends who join in the uproar. A very poor wretch is permitted to die in comparative quiet. In difficult cases the doctor, wrought up to the highest state of excitement, claims to see and hear the soul, and to judge of the patient's prospects by its position and movements. The sick man shows little fortitude, and abandons himself helplessly to the doctor's ridiculous measures. Failing in a cure, the physician gets no pay, but if successful, does not fail to make a large demand. Both the old and the helplessly sick are frequently abandoned by the Ahts to die without aid in the forest.[316]
NOOTKA BURIAL.
After death the Nootka's body is promptly put away; a slave's body is unceremoniously thrown into the water; that of a freeman, is placed in a crouching posture, their favorite one during life, in a deep wooden box, or in a canoe, and suspended from the branches of a tree, deposited on the ground with a covering of sticks and stones, or, more rarely, buried. Common people are usually left on the surface; the nobility are suspended from trees at heights differing, as some authorities say, according to rank. The practice of burning the dead seems also to have been followed in some parts of this region. Each tribe has a burying-ground chosen on some hill-side or small island. With chiefs, blankets, skins, and other property in large amounts are buried, hung up about the grave, or burned during the funeral ceremonies, which are not complicated except for the highest officials. The coffins are often ornamented with carvingsor paintings of the deceased man's crest, or with rows of shells. When a death occurs, the women of the tribe make a general howl, and keep it up at intervals for many days or months; the men, after a little speech-making, keep silent. The family and friends, with blackened faces and hair cut short, follow the body to its last resting-place with music and other manifestations of sorrow, generally terminating in a feast. There is great reluctance to explain their funeral usages to strangers; death being regarded by this people with great superstition and dread, not from solicitude for the welfare of the dead, but from a belief in the power of departed spirits to do much harm to the living.[317]
CHARACTER OF THE NOOTKAS.
The Nootka character presents all the inconsistencies observable among other American aborigines, since there is hardly a good or bad trait that has not by some observer been ascribed to them. Their idiosyncrasies as a race are perhaps best given by Sproat as "want of observation, a great deficiency of foresight, extreme fickleness in their passions and purposes, habitual suspicion, and a love of power and display; added to which may be noticed their ingratitude and revengeful disposition,their readiness for war, and revolting indifference to human suffering." These qualities, judged by civilized standards censurable, to the Nootka are praiseworthy, while contrary qualities are to be avoided. By a strict application, therefore, of 'put yourself in his place' principles, to which most 'good Indians' owe their reputation, Nootka character must not be too harshly condemned. They are not, so far as physical actions are concerned, a remarkably lazy people, but their minds, although intelligent when aroused, are averse to effort and quickly fatigued; nor can they comprehend the advantage of continued effort for any future good which is at all remote. What little foresight they have, has much in common with the instinct of beasts. Ordinarily, they are quiet and well behaved, especially the higher classes, but when once roused to anger, they rage, bite, spit and kick without the slightest attempt at self-possession. A serious offense against an individual, although nominally pardoned in consideration of presents, can really never be completely atoned for except by blood; hence private, family, and tribal feuds continue from generation to generation. Women are not immodest, but the men have no shame. Stealing is recognized as a fault, and the practice as between members of the same tribe is rare, but skillful pilfering from strangers, if not officially sanctioned, is extensively carried on and much admired; still any property confided in trust to a Nootka is said to be faithfully returned. To his wife he is kind and just; to his children affectionate. Efforts for their conversion to foreign religions have been in the highest degree unsuccessful.[318]
THE SOUND INDIANS.
The Sound Indians, by which term I find it convenient to designate the nations about Puget Sound, constitute the third family of the Columbian group. In this division I include all the natives of that part of Washington which lies to the west of the Cascade Range, except a strip from twenty-five to forty miles wide along the north bank of the Columbia. The north-eastern section of this territory, including the San Juan group, Whidbey Island, and the region tributary to Bellingham Bay, is the home of theNooksak,Lummi,SamishandSkagitnations, whose neighbors and constant harassers on the north are the fierce Kwantlums and Cowichins of the Nootka family about the mouth of the Fraser. The central section, comprising the shores and islands of Admiralty Inlet, Hood Canal, and Puget Sound proper, is occupied by numerous tribes with variously spelled names, mostly terminating inmish, which names, with all their orthographic diversity, have been given generally to the streams on whose banks the different nations dwelt. All these tribes may be termed theNisquallynation, taking the name from the most numerous and best-known of the tribes located about the head of the sound. TheClallamsinhabit the eastern portion of the peninsula between the sound and the Pacific. The western extremity of the same peninsula, terminating at Cape Flattery, is occupied by theClassetsorMakahs;while theChehalisandCowlitznations are found on the Chehalis River, Gray Harbor, and the upper Cowlitz. Excepting a few bands on the headwaters of streams that rise in the vicinity of Mount Baker, the Sound family belongs to the coast fish-eating tribes rather than to the hunters of the interior. Indeed, this family has so few marked peculiarities, possessing apparently no trait or custom not found as well among the Nootkas or Chinooks, that it may be described in comparatively few words. When first known to Europeans they seem to have been far less numerous than might have been expected from the extraordinary fertility and climatic advantages of their country; and since they have been in contact with the whites, their numbers have been reduced,—chiefly through the agency of small-pox and ague,—even more rapidly than the nations farther to the north-west.[319]
These natives of Washington are short and thick-set, with strong limbs, but bow-legged; they have broad faces, eyes fine but wide apart; noses prominent, both of Roman and aquiline type; color, a light copper, perhaps a shade darker than that of the Nootkas, but capable of transmitting a flush; the hair usually black and almost universally worn long.[320]
All the tribes flatten the head more or less, but none carry the practice to such an extent as their neighbors on the south, unless it be the Cowlitz nation, which might indeed as correctly be classed with the Chinooks. By most of the Sound natives tattooing is not practiced, and they seem somewhat less addicted to a constant use of paint than the Nootkas; yet on festive occasions a plentiful and hideous application is made of charcoal or colored earth pulverized in grease, and the women appreciate the charms imparted to the face by the use of vermilion clay. The nose, particularly at Cape Flattery, is the grand centre of facial ornamentation. Perforating is extravagantlypracticed, and pendant trinkets of every form and substance are worn, those of bone or shell preferred, and, if we may credit Wilkes, by some of the women these ornaments are actually kept clean.
SOUND DRESS AND DWELLINGS.
The native garment, when the weather makes nakedness uncomfortable, is a blanket of dog's hair, sometimes mixed with birds' down and bark-fibre, thrown about the shoulders. Some few fasten this about the neck with a wooden pin. The women are more careful in covering the person with the blanket than are the men, and generally wear under it a bark apron hanging from the waist in front. A cone-shaped, water-proof hat, woven from colored grasses, is sometimes worn on the head.[321]
Temporary hunting-huts in summer are merely cross-sticks covered with coarse mats made by laying bulrushes side by side, and knotting them at intervals with cord or grass. The poorer individuals or tribes dwell permanently in similar huts, improved by the addition of a few slabs; while the rich and powerful build substantial houses, of planks split from trees by means of bone wedges, much like the Nootka dwellings in plan, and nearly as large. These houses sometimes measure over one hundred feet in length, and are divided into rooms orpens, each house accommodating many families. There are several fire-places in each dwelling; raised benches extend round the sides, and the walls are often lined with matting.[322]
FOOD OF THE SOUND INDIANS.
In spring time they abandon their regular dwellings and resort in small companies to the various sources of food-supply. Fish is their chief dependence, though game is taken in much larger quantities than by the Nootkas; some of the more inland Sound tribes subsisting almost entirely by the chase and by root-digging. Nearly all the varieties of fish which support the northern tribes are also abundant here, and are taken substantially by the same methods, namely, by the net, hook, spear, and rake; but fisheries seem to be carried on somewhat less systematically, and I find no account of the extensive and complicated embankments and traps mentioned by travelers in British Columbia. To the salmon, sturgeon, herring, rock-cod, and candle-fish, abundantin the inlets of the sound, the Classets, by venturing out to sea, add a supply of whale-blubber and otter-meat, obtained with spears, lines, and floats. At certain points on the shore tall poles are erected, across which nets are spread; and against these nets large numbers of wild fowl, dazzled by torch-lights at night, dash themselves and fall stunned to the ground, where the natives stand ready to gather in the feathery harvest. Vancouver noticed many of these poles in different localities, but could not divine their use. Deer and elk in the forests are also hunted by night, and brought within arrow-shot by the spell of torches. For preservation, fish are dried in the sun or dried and smoked by the domestic hearth, and sometimes pounded fine, as are roots of various kinds; clams are dried on strings and hung up in the houses, or occasionally worn round the neck, ministering to the native love of ornament until the stronger instinct of hunger impairs the beauty of the necklace. In the better class of houses, supplies are neatly stored in baskets at the sides. The people are extremely improvident, and, notwithstanding their abundant natural supplies in ocean, stream, and forest, are often in great want. Boiling in wooden vessels by means of hot stones is the ordinary method of cooking. A visitor to the Nooksaks thus describes their method of steaming elk-meat: "They first dig a hole in the ground, then build a wood fire, placing stones on the top of it. As it burns, the stones become hot and fall down. Moss and leaves are then placed on the top of the hot stones, the meat on these, and another layer of moss and leaves laid over it. Water is poured on, which is speedily converted into steam. This is retained by mats carefully placed over the heap. When left in this way for a night, the meat is found tender and well cooked in the morning." Fowls were cooked in the same manner by the Queniults.[323]
I find no mention of other weapons, offensive or defensive, than spears, and bows and arrows. The arrows and spears were usually pointed with bone; the bows were of yew, and though short, were of great power. Vancouver describes a superior bow used at Puget Sound. It was from two and a half to three feet long, made from a naturally curved piece of yew, whose concave side became the convex of the bow, and to the whole length of this side a strip of elastic hide or serpent-skin was attached so firmly by a kind of cement as to become almost a part of the wood. This lining added greatlyto the strength of the bow, and was not affected by moisture. The bow-string was made of sinew.[324]The tribes were continually at war with each other, and with northern nations, generally losing many of their people in battle. Sticking the heads of the slain enemy on poles in front of their dwellings, is a common way of demonstrating their joy over a victory. The Indians at Port Discovery spoke to Wilkes of scalping among their warlike exploits, but according to Kane the Classets do not practice that usage.[325]Vancouver, finding sepulchres at Penn Cove, in which were large quantities of human bones but no limb-bones of adults, suspected that the latter were used by the Indians for pointing their arrows, and in the manufacture of other implements.[326]
MANUFACTURES OF PUGET SOUND.
The Sound manufactures include only the weapons and utensils used by the natives. Their articles were made with the simplest tools of bone or shell. Blankets were made of dog's hair,—large numbers of dogs being raised for the purpose,—the wool of mountain sheep, or wild goats, found on the mountain slopes, the down of wild-fowl, cedar bark-fibre, ravellings of foreign blankets, or more commonly of a mixture of several of these materials. The fibre is twisted into yarn between the hand and thigh, and the strands arranged in perpendicular frames for weaving purposes. Willow and other twigs supply material for baskets of various forms, often neatly made and colored. Oil, both for domestic use and for barter, is extracted by boiling, except in the case of the candle-fish, when hanging in the hot sun suffices; it is preserved in bladders and skin-bottles.[327]