LOGGING, farming in a small way, and work as day-laborers, have been the chief means of civilized labor among the men on the reservation. A large share of their land is first-class, rich bottom land, though all was covered originally with timber. It had been surveyed, assigned to the different heads of families, and certificates of allotment from the government issued to them. Nearly all of them have from one to ten acres cleared, most of which is in hay.

Still when there has been a market for logs at the neighboring saw-mills, they have preferred that work, not because there is more money in it, for actually there is less, but because they get the money quicker. It comes when the logs are sold, generally within three months after they begin a boom. But in regard to their land, they must work some time after they begin to clear it, before it is done; then a year or two longer, before they can obtain much of a crop of hay from it. Hence it has been up-hill work to induce most of them to do much work at clearing land. For several years before their annuities ceased, in 1881, the government made a rule that no able-bodied man should receive any annuities until he had performed labor on his land equal in value to the amount he should receive. From the example of the few adjoining settlers, some are beginning to see that farming is more profitable than logging. The largest share of good timber on the reservation has been taken off during the past twenty years, so that now a number have bought timber off the reservation for logging. They own their own teams, keep their own time-books, and at present attend to all their own business in connection with these camps. In one respect they differ from white folks—in their mode of conducting the business. Instead of one or two men owning every thing, hiring the men, paying all expenses, and taking all the profits, they combine together and unitedly share the profits or losses. When the boom is sold, and all necessary expenses which have been incurred are paid, they divide the money among themselves according to the amount of work each has done. A few have tried to carry on camps as white people do, but have always failed.

Very few now pursue the old avocations of fishing and hunting, except the old ones. Nearly all the able-bodied men work at some civilized pursuit. Take a ride over the reservation on almost any pleasant day, and nearly all the men will be found to be busy at something.

In the winter, however, it is different. They have very little work for rainy days, and so there is more temptation to gamble and tamahnous. “Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.”

The women have less temptation than the men in winter. When they have no outdoor work, or it is stormy, they can sew, do housework, make mats and baskets, and all, even the very old ones, are commonly busy at some of these things. Some of them are good washerwomen and some are cooks in the logging-camps. They are by no means so near in a state of slavery as some Indian women in the interior, but are treated with considerable propriety by their husbands.

A few of the young men, after having been in school for a time, have been apprenticed to the trades of carpenter, blacksmith, and farmer, and have done so fairly, that they were employed by the government after the white employees were discharged.

The Clallams have done very little logging or farming. A number have obtained land at Port Discovery, Jamestown, Elkwa, and Clallam Bay, but only a little of it is first-class land, and they have used it for gardens and as a place for a permanent home, so that they should not be driven from one place to another, more than for farming. At Seabeck, Port Gamble, Port Townsend, and Port Discovery, they work quite constantly in the saw-mills; at Jamestown, for the surrounding farmers; at Port Angeles, Elkwa, and Clallam Bay, more of them hunt and fish than elsewhere. A number earn considerable money taking freight and passengers in their canoes. The obtaining of dog-fish oil is something of a business, as logging-camps use a large amount of it. In September there is employment at the Puyallup and surrounding region, about ninety miles from Skokomish, in picking hops. Hop-raising has grown to be a large business among the whites, and Indians have been preferred for picking the hops, thousands of whom flock there every year for the purpose, from every part of the Sound, and even from British Columbia and the Yakama country. Old people, women, and children do as well at this as able-bodied men. It has not, however, always been a healthy place for their morals, as on Sundays and evenings gambling, betting, and horse-racing have been largely carried on. At one time “The Devil’s Playground,” in the Puyallup Valley was noted as the place where Indians and low whites gathered on the Sabbath for horse-racing and gambling, but it became such a nuisance to the hop-growers, as well as to the agents, that they combined and closed it.

A part of the Clallams earn considerable money by sealing, off the north-west coast of the Territory, a very profitable business generally from January to May. In 1883 the taxes of those Clallams who live in Clallam County were $168.30.