CHAPTER XITHEIR GAME OF SING-GAMBLE

THE GAME OF SING GAMBLE—SKOKOMISH TRIBE.

There are still many practices of the early Indians continued through the present generation of half civilized and half-blood descendants. The Indian has an inveterate love of gambling. Indeed, the Indian life is all a game of chance, so superstitious a being is he. They probably have gambled ever since the days of the first Indian. Among the games is that of “sing-gamble,” which though divested of much of its old-time ceremony, is still the great game of chance among them. In its simple form it is but a plain game of guessing with the chances equally for or against the players. The Indians, however, believe in it with all their soul and they will throw their whole soul into it to-day as they will risk their all, horses, dogs, canoes, jewelry, almost their wives and children upon its infatuous chances. The preparation and ceremony formerly attendant upon it is what gave to the game its great renown. To-day when played with more than a dozen persons it is still a game of great moment. The writer, who recently visited the Skokomish Indians had the pleasure of witnessing a “sing-gamble,” which lasted almost an entire night, though but a few took part. The illustration accompanying this story is a good representation of the scene, as it is an exact likeness of the half-breed and full-blood Indians who participated. Night time, that lends the most weirdness, is chosen as the time for the “sing-gamble.”

In brief, a huge fire was built, on either side of which a long board was laid down on a shorter piece, so that they might be said to represent the strings of a violin. The players ranged themselves back of the boards in two opposing sides. The gambling paraphernalia consisted of several sticks of green alder with the bark peeled off, excepting some that had a little ring of bark left around the middle of the stick. Counters for the game were secured in the shape of sharpened cedar sticks, which were set in the ground on either side of the fire in front of the players. In that instance 30 points constituted the game, though it is often run up to 60. Preliminary to the start the bets had to be arranged between the players. Two canoes, a silver watch, two ponies, $1.50 in silver, a coat, a shirt and some other things were wagered on the result. This preliminarytook up a great deal of time and much talking, but was finally adjusted to the satisfaction of all. Then the game began.

Two of the players on one side selected each two of the alder sticks, which were about four inches long and an inch in diameter. Each man took one clean of bark and one with the circle of bark left in the middle, that was the distinguishing mark. The point to be detected by the opposing side was which hand held the clean stick or which the one with the bark on it. First the two Indians having the sticks fumbled with them under their shirts, then they brought them forth and the music began, all the Indians on that side joining in and at the same time those not holding the sticks keeping time by rapping on the board in front of them with long sticks of hard wood. The music, if such it could be called, was rapid and vociferous, a kind of sing-song monotone drawling affair, which at times changed to something very like a rude melody.

All this time the two players were swinging their hands at half arm, bending at the elbow, in front of them, while they leaned far forward with their bodies, anon at times throwing their heads back and their chests out and all the time keeping up that dreadful, unearthly singing. Occasionally they would dextrously throw the short sticks in the air, catch them again and slap them under their shirts, bring them forth again, all the time keeping up with the procession of noise and the motions of their bodies.

The more pandemonium, the more hurrah the harder it was supposed to be for the opponents to guess the proper hand that held the bark-ringed stick.

Whenever an opponent made a guess he quickly threw out one hand to arm’s length in a pointing way, while with the other he made a fanning motion in a half circle, placing the palm of the hand over the other arm at about the elbow. Practice makes this a very graceful motion. The singing and noise ceases and the player opens up his hands. If the other has guessed rightly, the two sticks are tossed across the fire and the other side takes them up while the men just losing them become the guessers. Two Indians do the playing while two are selected on the other side to do the guessing. Whenever one side makes a point, which consists in a failure of the opponents to guess rightly, they mark it up by sticking one of the cedar sticks into the ground in front of them. When they lose they pull one out.

This game lasted from about 9 in the evening until 3 in the morning, and before it ended the Indians were nearly exhausted from their excessive singing and excited motions. Sweat poured off some of them in streams during the performance, and they divested themselves of everything but trousers and shirt. Some became very hoarse from the singing. Many of them rode to the scene on their ponies from distances of several miles and next day it was one of the topics of the reservation.

The Rev. Myron Eells, who for a score of years has been a missionary among the Indians of Puget Sound, has made investigations into the myths and traditions of the people among whom he has labored, and has stored up many an interesting story of the Thunderbird superstition. He says:

The general idea among the Indians is that thunder is caused by an immense bird, whose size darkens the heavens, whose body is the thunder cloud, the flapping of whose wings causes the thunder, and the bolts of fire, which it sends out of its mouth to kill the whale for its food, are the lightning. The Makahs and some other tribes, however, invest the animal with a twofold character, human and bird-like. According to them the being is supposed to be a gigantic Indian, named in the dialects of the various coast tribes Kakaitch, T’hlu-kluts, and Tu-tutsh, the latter being the Nootkan name. He lives in the highest mountains and his food consists of whales. When he goes after food he puts on a great garment, which is made of a bird’s head, a pair of very large wings, and a feather covering for his body, and around his waist he ties the lightning fish, which slightly resembles the sea horse. This animal has a head as sharp as a knife, and when he sees a whale he darts the lightning fish into its body, which he then seizes and carries to his home. Occasionally, however, he strikes a tree, and more seldom a man.

The origin of the bird, according to Mr. Swan, as given by the Chehalis and Chinook Indians, is as follows: “Ages ago an old man named Too-lux, or the south wind, while traveling north, met an old woman named Quoots-hooi, who was an ogress or giantess. He asked her for food, when she gave him a net, telling him that she had nothing to eat, and he must go and try to catch some fish. He accordingly dragged the net and succeeded in catching the grampus, or, as the Indians called it, a little whale. This he was about to cut with his knife, when an old woman cried out to him to take a sharp shell and not to cut the fish crossways, but split it down the back. Without giving heed to what she said he cut the fish across the side and was about to take off a piece of blubber, but the fish immediately changed into an immense bird, that, when flying,completely obscured the sun, and the noise made by its wings shook the earth.” They also add that this Thunderbird flew to the north and lit on the top of the Saddleback mountain, near the Columbia river, where it laid a nest full of eggs. It was followed by the giantess, who found the eggs; whereupon she began to break and eat them, and from these mankind, or at least the Chehalis and Chinook tribes, were produced. The Thunderbird, called Hahness by those Indians, came back, and, finding its nest destroyed, went to Too-lux, the south wind,for redress, but neither of them could ever find the ogress, although they regularly went north every year.

THE THUNDERBIRD MASK—TWANAS

As to the cause of thunder among these tribes Mr. Swan says that when a young girl reaches womanhood she has to go through a process of purification, which lasts a month. Among other customs at this time, if there is a southwest wind, with signs of rain, she must on no account go out of doors, else the southwest wind is so offended that he will send the Thunderbird, who then, by shaking his wings, causes the thunder, and from whose eyes go forth the flashes of lightning. As far as Mr. Swan knew, every thunder storm which occurred while he lived at Shoalwater Bay (three years) was attributed by the Indians to this cause—that is, to some girl disobeying this law.

The Indians are very superstitious in regard to this bird, believing that if they possess any feather, bone or other part of it, or bone of the lightning fish, it will be of supernatural advantage to them. A Makah, who had been very sick, was reduced to a skeleton, and it was believed could not recover, yet he managed to crawl one day, says Mr. Swan, to a brook near by, and while there he heard a rustling which so frightened him that he covered his face with his blanket. Peeping out he saw a raven near him, apparently trying to throw up something, and, according to the Indian, it did throw up a piece of bone about three inches long. The Indian secured this, believing it to be a bone of the Thunderbird, and he was told by the Indian doctors that it was a medicine sent to him by his Ta-mahn-a-wis, or guardian spirit, to cure him. It was a fact that he did recover very quickly, perhaps through the effect of his imagining it to be such a bone and a strong medicine. It may also have been dropped by the raven.

On one occasion, at a display of fireworks in Port Townsend, a number of rockets bursting showed fiery serpents. These the Indians believed belonged to the Thunderbird, and offered large sums for pieces of the animal. They told Mr. Swan they would give two hundred dollars for a backbone of one.

A Quiniault Indian once professed to have obtained a feather of one of these birds. He said he saw one of them light, and, creeping up softly, tied a buckskin string to one of its feathers and fastened the other end to a stump. When the bird flew away it left the feather, which was forty fathoms long. No other Indian saw it, for he was careful to keep it hid, but possession of it was not questioned by the rest, as he was very successful in catching sea otter. According to the Makahs, one of the principal homes of the bird is on a mountain back of Clayoquot, on Vancouver island, where is a lake, and around it the Indians say are many bones of whales which the bird has killed.

Many of the northwestern Indians have a performance in honor of this Thunderbird, which is called the thunderbird performance or “black ta-mahn-a-wis.” It is said to have originated with the Nittinat Indians, according to the followinglegend, as recorded by Mr. Swan: Two men had fallen in love with the same woman, but she would not give either the preference, whereupon they began to quarrel. But one of them, of more sense than the other, said: “Do not let us fight about that squaw. I will go and see the chief of the wolves and he will tell me what is to be done, but I cannot get to his house except by stratagem. Now, they will know we are at variance; so do you take me by the hair and drag me over these sharp rocks, which are covered with barnacles, and I shall bleed and pretend to be dead, and the wolves will come and carry me away to their house.” This was done, but when the wolves were ready to eat him he jumped up and astonished them by his boldness. The chief wolf was so much pleased with his bravery that he taught the man the mysteries of the Thunderbird performance. This, the most savage of all the Indian ceremonies, spread among all the Indians on Puget Sound, as well as to the north, the latter being the most savage in the performance of the ceremonies. Among other things, the performers hoot like owls, howl like wolves, paint their bodies black, especially the face, from which fact, in whole or in part, comes the English name “black tamahnawis;” scarify their arms, legs and sometimes the body, so as to bleed profusely, in remembrance of its origin; they make much noise by firing guns, pound on drums to represent thunder flash torches of pitchwood about as a representation of lightning, and whistle sharply in imitation of the wind. The ceremonies, however, vary in different tribes, being much more savage and bloody in some than in others. Among the Makahs five days are usually occupied in secret ceremonies, such as initiating candidates and other performances, before any public outdoor ceremonies take place. Among the Clallams the candidate for initiation is put into a kind of mesmeric sleep, which does not appear to be the case with the Makahs. Among the Clallams, however, the secret ceremonies are not always as long as among the Makahs.

Superstition was born with the first man, and is about the only thing in the world that remains unchanged today. The more ignorant the people the deeper we find them plunged into the dark maze of the mythical. People of highly civilized nations are not free from this clinging shadow of the forgotten or unknown past, and, although they laugh at the idea as being rank foolishness, they will feel a little shiver if they are the first to cross the track of a funeral, or they will stop and pick up a pin which points toward them on the sidewalk, not because they need it, but because—well, just because they want to. Civilized people call this trait an eccentricity in themselves and superstition in the savage.

Savages the world over are steeped in superstitious myths, traditions and in folk-lore which is peculiar each to its own tribe, or clan, but through it all there are threads which connect one tribe or people with another, though miles of distance may intervene.

The stories vary in detail and in the telling, but the main points are identical, showing conclusively that at some pre-historic time men had a means of inter-communication without telegraph, ships or railroads, and that a myth originated by the medicine men or prophets of one tribe or nation would spread far beyond the boundaries of the tribe which first practiced it.

There are today two remarkable instances of this fact, both semi-religious a and both originating with the medicine men.

The first is the ghost dance, made vaguely familiar by the battle of Wounded Knee some years ago in the Dakota Bad Land. The other is the myth of the Thunderbird, the Skam-son of the Haidas, and known from Cape Flattery to Wisconsin by various tribal names.

The object of this chapter is to show the remarkable hold which a mythical tale can get on the savage mind, and how the Ta-mahn-a-wis sway the people of their tribe by their dark practices; hence the myth of the Thunderbird as believed in by them from the coast to the great lakes.

The tale involving the origin of this strange creature has already been given as it is told among the Twanas, but it is more than probable that each tribe has its own version of the first appearance of it in their horizon, as all Indians believe in a multitude of spirits, both good and bad.

The idea of a Great Spirit as is generally taken by whites to cover the Indian religion is erroneous, as every mountain, river, lake or other natural object, as well as natural phenomenon, is accredited with being the home of some particular spirit; in fact, the old Greek mythology is a good comparison, and illustrates the idea exactly.

Hence we find the thunder personified by an immense bird with some tribes, and with others as half bird, half man, or a man who wears a bird’s skin, but, all agree that the personage is of colossal proportions, and give it the name of Thunderbird.

DAKOTA DESIGNS OF SMALLER THUNDERERS.

Surroundings modify the form and features of this mythical being to a great extent, and account for the different descriptions of it given by different tribes.

The Twanas believe it to be an immense bird which lives on the top of a high mountain, and feeds on whales which it kills by lightning. It is here in the form of an eagle, with quill feathers sixty fathoms long in each wing.

With them it is a good spirit, harming no one unless an individual has displeased it; then the person is killed by a glance from its eye, which is the lightning. They believe that it is the god of rain, and also that the image of it carved on their implements of war or the chase gives the owner strength in fighting and good luck in hunting. Thus it is a hunter-warrior-rain god. Rev. Eells reports a carving of the Twana version cut in a basaltic boulder near Eniti, Wash., which the Indians say is the face of the Thunderbird, and they believe that if the rock is shaken or removed in any way it will cause rain.

Among the Haidas of Queen Charlotte island it is believed to be an immense creature, half man, half bird, whose body is the mountains to the sea, shielded from view by heavy clouds, the main difference in the story being in the lightning, which is here personified by the fish instead of described as a glance of the eye of the bird covered with feathers, and who is accompanied by the lightning fish, which he darts at the whales and kills them for food. This lightning fish is pictured as the Killer whale, which is feared by the Indians, as it attacks them sometimes while voyaging about in their canoes; hence they credit it as a companion of the Thunderbird, or Skam-son, as they call it. As with the Twanas, the thunder is caused by the flapping of the wings as the creature flies from Skam-son. This is easily accounted for by the fact that the Haidas are a sea-going nation, a nation of fishermen, who gain their living fromthe ocean; hence they would naturally associate a fish of some kind with any tradition or myth where it could be used.

They tattoo the image of the bird on their bodies as a clan or family mark in t he same manner as they do the otter, halibut, skate and other designs, to signify the family the individual belongs to; or, as one remarked to Judge Swan of Port Townsend: “If you had the image of a swan tattooed on your body the Indians would know your family name.”

The figure is carved on their totem posts and canoe stems and painted on the house fronts, and various implements with the belief, as among the Twanas, that it gives them power, courage and luck in hunting, fishing or war. A mask representing the head of the bird is worn in the Ta-mahn-a-wis dances and ceremonies, which have something to do with the Thunderbird, though just what this is has never been clearly ascertained, as the Indians will not allow whites to witness these Ta-mahn-a-wis practices, which are of the nature of a secret society among civilized people.

The Twanas and the Clallams also use a mask of a different design for the same purposes. No tribes tattoo the figure on their person, so far as known, outside of the Haidas.

OJIBWA FLYING THUNDERBIRD

Leaving the coast and going eastward we find the Thunderbird among the Sioux of Dakota and Eastern Montana again, this time being personified in an immense eagle, with four joints to the wing and which dwells in a lodge on the top of a high knoll or butte. The lodge has four doors, one for each cardinal point of the compass, and at each door there is a guardian spirit. These spirits are a beaver, a butterfly, an otter and one other animal not clearly defined, whose duty it is to guard and act as messengers for the Thunderbird.

As with the Twanas, the lightning is a glance from the eye, and a person who has a presentment that the Thunderbird is displeased with him and intends to kill him, retires to a high hill to await his doom, after having bid his friends farewell. Sometimes, owing to the isolated position of the individual, he is actually struck by lightning during some of the heavy thunder storms of the region, and that settles the myth all the firmer in the Indian mind, for the Thunderbird it was who killed him, just as he said it would. Here the myth assumes three or four, or rather a family of thunderers, some good, some evil, some who guard the destiny of the warrior and strike terror into the heart of the enemy, others who see that the hunter does not come home empty handed.

Some are headless and have wings, some are wingless but provided withheads, but the Thunderbird, with a big “T,” who is the rain god and thunder creater and good spirit-in-chief, is described as a very large bird which flies fast. This bird has a whole brood of little ones, who follow behind the big thunderer and make the long rumble noticeable in the prairie thunder peals. The old bird is wise and good, harming no one, and causing rain, which makes the plants grow, but the young ones are like young men, very mischievous, and will not listen to counsel and are continually doing a great deal of damage, and killing an occasional person purely in a playful way, for when they grow old, they settle down and become good spirits, too. Nothing can kill or destroy the Thunderbird but an immense giant, who can stride over rivers and mountains and can kill anything by a look. This giant still exists, but nobody knows where, and is always hunting for the thunderer, who has to fly from place to place to keep away from the evil giant, thus causing storms by flying about. The old bird starts with the loud crash of noise, and then the little ones rise in a swarm and make a lot more noise, but not so loud as the old one, which flies very fast.

HAIDA TATOOING—THUNDERBIRD HEAD.

The giant killed one of the old ones a long, long time ago, back of Little Crow’s village, near the head of the Mississippi river, and the medicine men still have totems made of the feathers and bones, and they are very strong medicine against evil.

This bird had “a face like a man, nose like an eagle bill, body long and slender and four joints to each wing, which were painted zigzag like the lightning, and the back of the head was rough and red,” according to the Dakota tradition. This is the Sioux story of the Thunderbird. Going a little further east we find the Ojibwa, who live in Minnesota and around the shores of Lake Superior with a myth of the thunderer which makes it entirely a good spirit, a sort of servant of the medicine man, shaman or priest, and who helps them to work cures, find good medicine plants, and many other things which have a good influence.

With the Ojibwa it is also an immense eagle-like bird but without any superfluity of wing joints. The thunder is the noise of its flying and it causes rain which makes medicine plants grow and also it can apparently find a medicine plant to fit the particular disease by looking on the earth, in the sky or in the inside of the earth, either of which places it can visit at will under the instructions of the medicine man or shaman, who holds a controlling power over it.

There is no record of any masks being used to represent the thunderer, directly east of the coast tribes, the only representations being from Indian drawings, which interpret their idea and which are represented in this book.

There are no carvings or images except those worked in beads, from near Fort Snelling, Minnesota, which represent the bird with the red breast and tail, and having somewhat of an eagle form.

OJIBWA THUNDERER

The Ojibwa figures are from drawings on the “music board” used by the Ojibwa at the initiation of candidates into the society of the Mide-wiwin or great medicine, and are really notes in the medicine song of this society, for they are only one of numerous characters painted in rows on a board which are translated into a chant by the Mide men to mean some particular achievement of the Thunderbird under the guidance of that society.

This Thunderbird lives somewhere up in the sky and can only be brought to the earth by the Mide or shaman priests, who are the medicine men of the tribe, and members of the Mide-wiwin society, and then only to serve some good end in the making of medicine.

Thus the Thunderbird of the Pacific Coast degenerates into a servant of the Ojibwa medicine man, or else the servant grows to the proportion of a God as he travels West according to which version is taken as to the origin, but it is likely that the servant grew to be the God, as all tales grow in the telling, especially among an ignorant people like the Indians.

Most of these myths and folk-lore tales have their origin in a “dream” or trance of some medicine man whose word is taken without question by his people because he is really a religious magician or prophet-doctor who is credited with many supernatural powers, has “visions” and foretells events. They are clever in the means they employ to bring about a desired end and thus “speak a single, straight tongue” to their people who would as soon cut off a hand as to doubt the statements of the Ta-mahn-a-wis men. With this kind of a power wielded over them it is no wonder that the simple-minded Indian peoples the earth, the sea and the air with all kinds of demons of which the Thunderbird is but one example, and has a noise for every Skal-lal-a-toot, and a Skal-lal-a-toot for every noise, with spirits inhabiting everything, totems, fetiches and charms for and against a thousand and one things which he does not understand and credits to the supernatural.

The illustrations of the Puget Sound Indian accompanying are very characteristic of the race. In the main the general characteristics are such that they cannot be mistaken. The infusion of white and foreign blood during the last 30 years or so has had a marked effect upon the later generation and to a great extent changed the current of Indian life. Leaving out of the question the general features of color and vigorousness of form they are readily distinguishable from the pure bloods about them. Half-breeds more readily fall into and adopt the customs and practices of the whites and to a considerable extent are not averse to manual labor. Hence they are found in the mills and forests of the country sharing the burdens of civilized life.

But work for a genuine Siwash is no more palatable than it is to a Patagonian. He sticks to his “canim” like a leech to the epidermis. Laziness is a cultivated characteristic of the old-time Indian, is grafted into his being as indelibly as the tattooing on the arm of an East India man and he will never work so long as the sands on his native beach contain a live clam or the hills above a huckleberry bush from which his klootchman can dig a bivalve or pick a wicker basket of blue berries. He will not even deign to assist in these simple labors, and in this he does not surpass his kinsman who are reared in the interior. These are the drudgery of his klootchman and night or day, sun or rain, she may always be found on the beach rustling up the next meal. He will sometimes accompany her and when there are two baskets to “tote” he may even consent to carry one, but it is much more to his nature to trudge along at the rear empty handed. This characteristic is more apparent in the cities when, having more of one or the other than the family larder requires for the time being, they seek the towns to dispose of it for a trifling sum, which is to be expended in knick knacks, gew gaws, etc., etc., that are the fancy of the Indian mind.

BUILDING SIWASH CANIM

The one thing only which the old-time Siwash thinks it not beneath his dignity to indulge in is fishing, and this is his particular special privilege which he never permits any interference with. True, his dame has the privilege of fishing for cod and dogfish and the commoner species, but the taking of thelordly salmon is never relegated to her. If he is one of the old-time Indians wrapped still in the superstitious beliefs of his ancestors, not only is she not permitted the pleasure of the chase for salmon, but she is never permitted to put her foot inside the salmon canim, nor is she ever allowed to touch the salmon line or hook. That would forever spoil either canoe or line from use by the imperious head of the household. These practices, while still in vogue among the more isolated villages, is not so strictly adhered to by Indians who almost daily come in contact with the whites, nor are these remnants of a superstitious race very widely known among their enlightened and civilized neighbors. A trip to any of the favorite fishing grounds about the Sound and a study of the life of the village will convince any one that were they suddenly removed from all influence of civilized life, the Indian of today is just as he was when the first white man’s boat ploughed the gentle waters of the Sound. The thoroughbred Siwash will not even countenance the pretty gearing of the modern fisherman, but clings tenaciously to those articles fashioned by his own hand. He, however, will use the spoon in trolling, but it is one he has made himself from the metal and polished in his own way, swung from a bit of wire crooked and fashioned in his own odd fashion. His is an invention unprotected, yet he will never trouble himself about letters patent, for no white man can ever imitate his work successfully. There is something about it that seems to have a most unusual attraction for the finest and best, for a Siwash is seldom met with winter or summer, on a fishing expedition without one or more of the best fish the water contains.

They know just the hour, just the spot and place when and where to fish and seldom are seen trolling any other time. Trout a Siwash has no love for and never attempts to take. He may have his camp on a stream alive with the finest of the trout species, but he never molests them. A polluted dog salmon lying dead upon the sand bank is more preferable in his eyes and he will pick up one and walk away with the same grim satisfaction that he will after having speared or hooked a monster silver side, the king of the genus.

The klootchman is no less characteristic in appearance and features than the Siwash himself. They are decrepit in looks, bowed in form from the constant life-long use of the canim, prematurely old and unsociable as a black bear. There is if possible more superstition, more mystery to the klootchman than to her lordly partner. She never talks to the whites unless it is to offer for sale the fruit from the forest, the catch from the salt water or when around on begging expeditions, and of the latter there is little. The Siwash will stoop to outright begging, especially if he is a chief or has become debauched by associates with evil-minded whites, but his wife scarcely ever.

La belle klootchman is both the pride of the family and the belle of the village, and on her is lavished all the fashion and vermillion of the sweet societyof the natives. She dotes on loud colors and is noticeably proud of whatever she wears as long as it is bright and showy. She ages, however, like an autumn leaf and once past sweet sixteen she is relegated to the shades of ugliness and forgotten. Of all things, Indian, the hardest to determine would be the age of the pure blood Siwash or klootchman. They may be about 30 or may be 75, they all look alike after reaching the usual majority in years.

Outside the supplying of daily wants the only other task of the pure-blood Siwash is the building of his cedar canoes. Seldom is it that the whites get an opportunity of seeing this work in progress. It is most always done on or near the beach in out-of-the-way places and the old-fashioned Indian-made hand adz is as religiously adhered to as it ever was. The interior of the cedar log was originally cleared by burning, but occasionally they will now condescend to the use of a heavier instrument secured from the whites to get rid of the core. In trimming down, fashioning and finishing up the canoe the little bit of sharpened steel is, however, always used.

Early Indians, and for that matter all of the present day, entertained a righteous dread of photography. Electricity, the galvanic battery and the telegraph wires were things as dreadful to them as their imaginary Skal-lal-la-toot, that ranged the woods about their villages. They believe that these things are spirits of some kind that have been through the influence of the white man’s Ta-mahn-a-wis or big medicines enslaved to the fellow who happens to possess the electrical appliance.

When the old trader, William Deshaw, who has been frequently mentioned in connection with Port Madison Indians, first came to Agate pass to look after the Indians there he took with him an old-fashioned galvanic battery. This mysterious instrument probably invested him, in the eyes of the simple savages, who had never before heard of such things, with greater power than anything else he could possibly have taken among them. It promoted him at once to the position of a great white Ta-mahn-a-wis, whose influence was never afterwards disputed. Soon after his appearance there and acquaintance with the Old-Man-House tribes the construction of the old Puget Sound Telegraph & Cable company’s line was carried past their village and it became a thing of dreadful consequence to the Indians. They avoided it and feared it as they did the “evil eye.” It was quite an impossible thing to ever get an Indian to lend a hand at replacing the wires in position when they happened to become broken down during the winter storms. Touch an electric wire? They would sooner have suffered the loss of a hand under a chopping block.

The old trader tells of many amusing spectacles with the use of the old galvanic battery on some of the Indians. As before stated the practices of their severe superstitious rites often caused many of the Ta-mahn-a-wis men to fall into trance-like and comatose conditions, from which it was impossible, by anyknown Indian agency to arouse them. The old trader tells of one that occurred at Old-Man-House in which the efficacy of the old galvanic battery was proved to the Indians satisfaction with a vengeance. One of these old medicine men had after several days of unusual exertion and privation fallen into a comatose condition. Every art known to the other’s Ta-mahn-a-wis had been exerted to no purpose and as a last resort the Indians had sent for the white Ta-mahn-a-wis living across the narrow pass.“So he’s dead, is he?” inquired the trader of the Indians who went after him.

“Yes, he’s dead. Indian Ta-mahn-a-wis no good for him,” returned the couriers.

“Umph! yes, well white man’s Ta-mahn-a-wis fetch him,” said the trader and he went after the old battery. Going across he found the Indian lying on the floor of a hut upon the inevitable rush mat and to all intents and purposes dead as a mackerel, with a howling, prancing mob of his brethren about him.

The trader felt of him, but he was cold and bloodless without apparent pulse or life. He cleared a space about him and arranged his battery. The Indians becoming subdued watched the process with incredulity and stoical silence. The poles of the instrument were placed so that the full effect of the electric current would be most keenly felt, and then the operator turned it on with force enough to have broken up the nerve system of a dozen ordinary men. With a bound and a shriek the prostrate form was on his feet in an instant and so sudden was the transformation that half the onlookers were knocked down by the terrified and quickened medicine man by his wild leap into the air. He bolted for the door and took for the woods amidst the greatest consternation of his mourning friends. He did not return for some days, but the evil spirit that had been supposed to have taken possession of him was effectually squelched. After that there was no more incredulous smiles and looks when the galvanic battery was around.

This trader, who knew Seattle’s famous old chief almost as a brother, says they had a great time trying to secure a photograph of him in the early days. There was but one small photograph gallery in Seattle at that time. Many days and weeks passed before the old settler could induce the chief even to go near the place. By degrees they got him in the building, but when he would see the muzzle of the camera pointed at him, he would invariably break away. One day the settlers went all the way to Fort Steilacoom and bought a new suit of soldiers clothes for him to be photographed in. The old chief was greatly pleased at such a compliment, but when he found there was to be a string to the proposition, a consideration in the way of submitting to be photographed, the settlers could do nothing further with him. In the language of the old trader, “That put a squibosh on the whole business.”

At the next attempt to get the old fellow photographed somebody got him to “swilling” a little and managed to get the old fellow into the gallery. He was too much under the influence of the liquid to know what was being done, and the photographer got a shot at him. When the old chief came to his senses he was dreadfully outraged in feeling and said that he “didn’t want any more shots at him.” After that when looking through a picture book the old chief was very careful. The Indian’s superstition led him to believe that men in a picture took the evil genius of the photograph, or the electric wire lurked to pounce out and enslave him.

Symbolic Drawing—Northern Indians

It may be interesting, and at this time something of a relief from the duller monotony of the pages preceding, to give one of the characteristic legends which were current among the Indians when first the whites came among them. This may properly be termed the Siwash legend of the first frog, and gives the sad fate that befell a too ardent Indian lover.

“Many many snows ago the Great Tyee of all lived upon the earth; the snows that have come and gone since then cannot well be counted by men. The Great Tyee was not only chief over man, but also over the birds, the fish and all the animals in the woods. All feared him and did his bidding.

“The Great Tyee had been very successful in his wars, and had subjugated all the chiefs but Clack-a-mas, a warrior who had long and well fought against the Great Tyee. At last both, growing tired of war, resolved to smoke the great peace pipe and bury the hatchet, and to more firmly cement their growing friendship the Great Tyee asked for and obtained the consent of Clack-a-mas to the marriage of his daughter Kla-Kla-Klack-Hah (the woman who talks) to Wah-Wah-Hoo, the Tyee’s only son. But the Great Tyee’s plans for the marriage of his son were destined to be nipped in the bud. Wah-Wah-Hoo had long and ardently loved a maiden of his own tribe, a daughter of one of the lesser chiefs. Hah-Hah had all those graces which go to make a woman charming, and she was as deeply in love with Wah-Wah-Hoo as he with her.

“It is easier to imagine than to depict the grief of the lovers when they learned the will of the Great Tyee. To Wah-Wah-Hoo it seemed that nothing was left him to do but to prepare for the wedding, which was to take place immediately. It had not as yet occurred to him to disobey the Great Tyee. Such a path was fraught with too much danger to be taken at once, and for the present no ray of hope penetrated through the dark cloud that had settled down and quenched the bright light of his and Hah-Hah’s happiness.

“Daily the preparations for the marriage went on, and as the day of its consummation drew nearer Wah-Wah-Hoo became more and more reluctant to carry out the command of the Great Tyee. On the day before the wedding Hah-Hah, robed in her brightest skins, went to keep the last tryst with her recreant lover. They met in a grassy dell, sprinkled over with brightest wild flowers; but to the infatuated lover Hah-Hah was the loveliest flower of them all. Love stole away his reason, and, forgetful of his duty to the Great Tyee, his father, Wah-Wah-Hoo gathered Hah-Hah up in his arms and hurried away into the forest. They journeyed many suns into the somber woods and finallybuilt themselves a shelter on the bank of a great river, where, forgetful of the wrath of the Great Tyee, they were happy.

“The wedding day dawned. Kla-Kla-Klack-Hah, robed in her best skins, stood waiting the coming of Wah-Wah-Hoo to claim and to carry off his bride. The minutes swiftly multiplied into hours until Clack-a-mas, deeply chagrined at the disdainful treatment of his daughter, sought an explanation of the Great Tyee. A search was immediately instituted for Wah-Wah-Hoo, and then, and not until then, was the flight of the lovers discovered.

“At once the Great Tyee ordered his swiftest runners and his best trailers to follow and to bring back his disobedient son. Swiftly they ran through the woods, searching long and far, but baffled at last, they were compelled to return to the Great Tyee with the story of their failure.

“Then the Great Tyee went out, and, seated upon the river bank, called about him the chiefs of all the animals in the woods and of the fishes in the sea and commanded them as they feared his anger to search for and to find his son. They, dreading his power, immediately set out upon their quest.

“The snake, squirming his way in and out among the berry patches, searched long and arduously for the lovers. The chief of the mosquitos, calling about him his band, who number more than the grains of sand on the sea shore, searched for and found the lovers; but the chief, remembering that when, in an inadvertent and hungry moment he had alighted upon Hah-Hah’s cheek she had spared his life, ordered his band to disperse and to say nothing of the lovers. The squirrel, running up and down the trees hoarding his winter stores, kept watch that the lovers did not go by him unseen. The eagle, in ever-increasing circles, soared high above the land and kept a watchful eye that the lovers did not escape him. The chief of the wolves found them, but, remembering that Wah-Wah-Hoo had saved his life when caught in a trap, he, too, commanded his followers to say nothing of the lovers.

“Soon the chilling blasts of winter went whistling through the woods, and the ice king, seizing the earth in his stifling grasp, wrapped it in a mantle of snow. Hunger—grim, gaunt, unrelenting hunger—entered Wah-Wah-Hoo’s wigwam, and stole from him that which he loved best of all, Hah-Hah. Wah-Wah-Hoo, looking for the last time upon his sweetheart, turned away and hurried to the big rock overlooking the swirling water of the river. There, singing his death song, he flung himself into the water. But Wah-Wah-Hoo was destined not to die. The chief of the fishes swallowed him, and, swimming to the spot where the Great Tyee was standing, spewed him forth upon the bank.

“The Great Tyee cursed his son and changed him into a frog, whose dismal croaking is now heard, telling his sad story to the sons of man and warning them to be obedient.”

The man in the moon, among some of the tribes, has a very pretty story reserved for him, which like the young brave who was turned into a croaking frog was placed in the moon for his too ardent love for a dusky maiden. The legend more properly belongs to the Vancouver island tribes. The following version was told by an Indian who is thought to be over 100 years old and it is faithfully believed in by himself and his tribe:

“‘Many, many snows ago, long before a white man came to this country, there lived in a village on Quatsino sound the Great Tyee of all. He was not only tyee over men, but also over the animals, birds and fishes. His smile was like the sun coming from behind the cloud, his frown like the lightning, quick and awful, no man could stand before it and live.

“‘Wah-nah-ho, the Great Tyee’s son, was just the opposite from his father, sunny tempered, and loved by every one. The animals and birds in the forest, the fishes in the sea, all loved and did his bidding. Now, Wah-nah-ho was unhappy. He loved Tum-Tum, the fairest maiden in all the land, and the Great Tyee had commanded him to marry Shingoopoot’s daughter, who was ugly, ill-tempered, and who had already had one husband. Now, Wah-nah-ho, who in all things else had been a most obedient son, rebelled against his father, and with Tum-Tum at night when all the village was asleep, stole away, and running swiftly, hid themselves in the forest.

“‘The Great Tyee, when he discovered the flight of the lovers, was very wroth, and swore that he would not show himself to his people until the couple were found and brought before him. All the young men of the tribe immediately plunged into the forest and hurried away to look for the lovers. They searched long and at a great distance, but unsuccessfully, and one by one returned to the village. Then the Great Tyee ordered all the animals and birds out of the forest, and all the fishes out of the rivers determined that hunger should compel his disobedient son to return.

“‘Finally, as day after day, he set his unsuccessful snares in the woods and searched the streams for food, Wah-nah-ho was at last driven to return to the village. He sought his father with his sweetheart, and on his knees told him of his love for Tum-Tum, and begged for forgiveness. The Great Tyee’s wrath broke forth at the sight of his son, and he placed him in the sky with his sweetheart, where they now dwell, telling the sons and daughters of man to be obedient.’”

The wonders of the course of nature have ever challenged human attention. In savagery, in barbarism, and in civilization alike, the mind of man has sought the explanation of things. The Indians around Puget Sound have not been less curious than the other races. Like the rest, they have a strong yearning to understand the causes of all natural phenomena, such as the movement of the heavenly bodies, the change of the seasons, the succession of the night and day, the powers of air and water, the growth of trees, the overflowing of rivers, the curious forms of storm-carved rocks, the mysteries of life and death, the origin of the institutions of society all demand explanation. While the desire of the savage to know is as strong as it is with the civilized man, his curiosity is much more easily satisfied. The sense of the savage is dull compared with that of the civilized man; some people think that the barbarian has highly developed perceptive faculties. Nothing could be farther from the truth. For he sees few sights, hears few sounds, tastes of but few flavors, smells of but few odors, so by reason of the extreme narrowness of his experiences his whole sensible organization is coarse and blunt and his powers of penetration are limited. He experiences some things difficult to account for with his crude understanding. But he attempts to explain it nevertheless. To his understanding supernatural power is necessary to the performance of the acts which he describes, so he invents a story which explains the phenomena to his satisfaction. He repeats it to others and in their hands it grows and changes, becoming more refined and reasonable as the race advances. Thus are the mythologies, the philosophies, the religions, and the explanations of natural phenomena of the savage man evolved; and just in proportion as he advances in the scale of civilization the less he believes in these old traditions; the more difficult the phenomena of nature for him to explain, the more skeptical he becomes; in short, the more he knows, the less he thinks he knows.

Their folklore explains all of the phenomena of nature to the satisfaction of the savage, however foolish and simple it may seem to us.

Our Indians have not advanced far enough yet for their myths to contain any of those lofty ideals and refined sentiments which crept into the poetic legends of Greece, neither have they any conception of infinite power. But nevertheless the performances of their Demi-gods, with that queer mixture of power and weakness, and our “stick-siwashes” bear a striking resemblance. The myths of the origin of the world and of man, the fire-stealing, the romantic adventures of gods and heroes, and of the sun and moon, have much in common, one with the other.

The most remarkable character in lore of the Puget Sound Indian was old S’Beow. As the stories go, he is supposed to have been originally an Arctic or white fox; but changed himself into a man. Ki-ki, or the bluejay, was his grandmother. He had great power over his enemies although he was often misled and even killed by them. He could change himself into the form of any animal or thing he wished to; could cut himself to pieces and put himself together again, and do many other wonderful things. He is described as having cut himself in pieces and poking the pieces out through a small hole in an ice house in which he had been imprisoned and securing his liberty. There is also a story of S’Beow playing ball with his own eyes.

Eldridge Morse, who has studied these legends systematically describes the Indians’ conception of S’Beow as follows: He was a very short, pussy, big-bellied man who looked a little like Santa Claus, with a long, heavy white beard reaching to his waist; short white hair, sharp black eyes, sharp pointed ears like those of an Arctic fox, and small hands and feet. From either side of his mouth protruded an ugly cougar’s tusk. He wore a short coat of mountain goat’s wool and had four live bluejays for buttons.

An old Indian up on the Stillaguamish river believes that his father saw S’Beow once. He relates the experience as follows: At the southern point of Camano island there is an old land slide.

Many years ago there was a band of Indians camped at that point on the beach. His father and family were in a canoe paddling toward the camp. It was just dusk and the ruby rays of a summer sun-set had not yet disappeared. As if by magic or ta-mahn-a-wis, a man stood out on the bluff above them. He swelled himself up and again he swelled himself up until he was recognized as the form of old S’Beow, standing there as tall as the big fir trees. Presently S’Beow kicked the bluff over onto the Indians camped on the beach and buried them all, then stepped across onto Hat island and disappeared.

Indians riding by the spot mourn and wail and cry for them to this day. This fact together with the existence of the old slide at that place proves the truth of the whole story to the entire satisfaction of the savage.

It is very difficult to gather legends from the Puget Sound Indians, however. Rev. Myron Eels, the venerable missionary of the Skokomish reservation, Judge James G. Swan of Port Townsend, and Eldridge Morse, of Snohomish, have met with some success. The latter gentleman is the only one who has gathered them systematically and he has published nothing.

The Indians manifest much embarrassment when approached by a collector of traditions until they learn that he is already familiar with them, then his sailing is clear if he does not make fun of them. After all the investigator is not sure at the present day how much of the story is an Indian tradition and how much of it has been mixed with a story that some missionary has told.

The Makahs of Cape Flattery tell many stories of animals quite allegorical in their nature, which differ in details only from the legends of the other West coast tribes. One of their leading characters is the demon Skana. According to the Indian belief he can change himself into any form. There are many stories told of him. A long time ago the Indians were seal hunting in calm weather on a smooth sea. A killer whale kept close to the canoe, and the Indians amused themselves by throwing stones from their canoe ballast at him. The creature, tiring of this treatment, made for the shore, where it grounded on the beach. The curious Indians were attracted by a smoke which they saw curling up from the beach, and put for shore that they might learn its cause. Upon reaching the shore they were much surprised to find a large canoe, instead of Skana, on the beach, and that a man was on shore cooking some food by an out-door fire. He asked them why they threw stones at his canoe. “You have broken it,” said he; “now go into the woods and get some cedar to mend it with.”

After they had complied with his request he said to them: “Turn your backs to the water and cover your heads with your skin blankets, and don’t look till I call you.” They obeyed, and heard the canoe grate on the beach as it was being hauled into the surf. Then the man exclaimed: “Look now!” They looked and saw the canoe just going over the first breaker, the man sitting in the stern. They looked again and the canoe came up outside of the second breaker a killer, and not a canoe, with the man, or demon, in its belly. According to James G. Swain this allegory is common to all the tribes of the Northwest coast, and even in the interior where the salmon takes the place of the ocra, which never ascends fresh water rivers. To the north the Chilkat and other tribes carve the figure of a salmon, inside of which is the full length figure of a nude Indian.

A casual observer might mistake this for another Jonah story taught the Indians by the missionaries, but it is said to too far antedate their arrival.

James G. Swan tells the story of one legend of the man in the moon, which is common to the West coast Indians, and quite interesting.

The moon discovered a man about to dip his bucket into a brook after some water, so it sent down its arms, or rays, and grabbed the man, who, to save himself, seized hold of a big salal bush, but the moon being more powerful took the man, bucket and bush up to himself, where they have ever since lived, and can be seen every full moon during clear weather. The man is a friend of the wind god, and at the proper signal empties his bucket, causing it to rain on the earth.

Not far from the Snoqualmie hop ranch, on the Snoqualmie prairie, is a large mountain called Old Si, with what seems to be the image of a human form on the face of it. The story of its origin as told by the old Snoqualmie Indians, is one of the best legends that the Puget Sound Indians possess.

Snoqualm, the moon, then the king of the heavens, commanded the spider ty-ee (chief) to make a rope of cedar bark and stretch it from the sky to the earth. Upon seeing this, S’Beow’s son, Si’Beow, told Ki-ki, the bluejay, S’Beow’s grandmother, to go up along the rope and then told his father to follow her.

The bluejay kept going up and going up and going up and S’Beow following after her, kept climbing up and climbing up and climbing up and the bluejay kept flying up and flying up and flying up a long time until she reached the under side of the sky, and S’Beow kept climbing up and climbing a-lo-ong time until he too got to where the great rope was fastened on the under side of the sky. And the bluejay began pecking away and she continued picking away and picking away and picking away until she made a hole through into the sky. It was well into the night when Ki-ki finished making her hole through and S’Beow followed after her into the sky. When S’Beow got through the hole he found himself in a lake. He changed himself into a beaver and got caught in a dead-fall beaver trap, which had been set by Snoqualm and when Snoqualm examined his trap in the morning he found a dead beaver with his skull crushed in. The Great Ty-ee took the beaver out of the trap, took the beaver to his home, skinned it, stretched the skin upon a hoop, hung it up to dry and threw the carcass over in the corner of his smoke house. All day long and well into the night S’Beow lay there a dead beaver’s carcass. At last Snoqualm fell into deep sleep and was heard snoring loudly. Then S’Beow got up, took his skin from the wall, removed it from the hoop and put it on himself and set about to explore the house of the Great Ty-ee. Outside the house he found some great forests of fir and cedar trees, which he pulled out by he roots and by his ta-mahn-a-wis (magic) made them small enough so that he could carry them under his arm.

He then entered the house and found hidden on one shelf the machinery that made the daylight, which he carried under the other arm. He took some fire from under the smoke hole, put some ashes around it and wrapped it with bark and leaves and carried it in one hand, in the other he carried the sun which he found hidden on the same shelf as the machinery which made the daylight. With all these things he proceeded to the lake out of which he had been trapped on the previous day, transformed himself into a beaver again, dove tothe bottom of the lake and found where the spider Ty-ee had made the rope fast. He changed himself back into old S’Beow again and descended to earth, where he set out all the great trees around Puget Sound. He gave fire to the people, set the Sun in position and put the machinery that makes the daylight to working.

When Snoqualm awoke and saw what had been stolen, he in great rage pursued old S’Beow, going straight away to the place where the rope was made fast and started to descend to earth. The rope gave way with him and Snoqualm and the great rope fell in a heap making that great mountain near the head waters of the Snoqualmie river, and the outline of the human face which the Indian fancies to this day that he can see in the distance is what is left of old Snoqualm, once the Great King of the Heavens.

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