CHAPTER XXXI.
OUR TOBACCO.
THE white race of people that the Klamath Indians found in this land had a weed they called tobacco, which we call Hah-koom, and taught them to use it by smoking it in the pipe and to cultivate it by selecting a proper place, pile brush over the ground and then burn it, which would leave the ground with a loose layer of wood ashes. Over this, while the ashes were yet dry and loose, they would sow the seed and protect the crop by putting around it a brush fence. From year to year they would select from the best stalks seed for the next year and at times to hold the seed for a number of years if necessary, for if kept properly it will grow after being kept for a long time. The only thing that will bother or destroy the crop of tobacco is the deer and they often jump over the brush fence and eat every part of the crop, even to the roots.
When an Indian takes his pipe to smoke he inhales the smoke and keeps it in his lungs for ten or fifteen seconds and then blows it out through his nose mostly, some through the mouth and then he gives a slow grunt, saying a few words in a plain audible tone. These words are to the Wa-gas the white people we loved so well, wishing that the Wa-gas, would give them good luck, long life, that they could see them come back or that they themselves could go to see them and be with them, and many other kinds of wishes for the Wa-gas. The old women doctors use tobacco very freely and have pipes that hold a handful of tobacco at a single smoking, and they ask the Wa-gas to givethem good luck in curing a sick person. The doctors are about the only ones of the women that smoke. The Indians have the most complete control over themselves and can smoke one, two or three times a day, or quit for a week or longer without a murmur.