APPEARANCE OF THE NATIVES—ORNAMENTS—OTTER-HUNTING—FISHING—CANOES

In point of personal appearance the people of Nootka are among the best-looking of any of the tribes that I have seen. The men are in general from about five feet six to five feet eight inches in height; remarkably straight, of a good form, robust and strong, with their limbs in general well turned and proportioned, excepting the legs and feet, which are clumsy and ill formed, owing, no doubt, to their practice of sitting on them, though I have seen instances in which they were very well shaped; this defect is more particularly apparent in the women, who are for the most part of the time within doors, and constantly sitting while employed in their cooking and other occupations.[74] The only instance of deformity that I saw amongst them was a man of dwarfish stature; he was thirty years old, and but three feet three inches high; he had, however, no other defect than his diminutive size, being well made, and as strong and able to bear fatigue as what they were in general.[75]

Their complexion, when freed from the paint and oil with which their skins are generally covered, is a brown, somewhat inclining to a copper cast. The shape of the face is oval; the features are tolerably regular, the lips being thin and the teeth very white and even; their eyes are black but rather small, and the nose pretty well formed, being neither flat nor very prominent; their hair is black, long, and coarse, but they have no beard, completely extirpating it, as well as the hair from their bodies, Maquina being the only exception, who suffered his beard to grow on his upper lip in the manner of mustachios, which was considered as a mark of dignity.

As to the women, they are much whiter, many of them not being darker than those in some of the southern parts of Europe. They are in general very well-looking, and some quite handsome. Maquina's favourite wife in particular, who was a Wickinninish princess, would be considered as a beautiful woman in any country. She was uncommonly well formed, tall, and of a majestic appearance; her skin remarkably fair for one of these people, with considerable colour, her features handsome, and her eyes black, soft, and languishing; her hair was very long, thick, and black, as is that of the females in general, which is much softer than that of the men; in this they take much pride, frequently oiling and plaiting it carefully into two broad plaits, tying the ends with a strip of the cloth of the country, and letting it hang down before on each side of the face.

The women keep their garments much neater and cleaner than the men, and are extremely modest in their deportment and dress; their mantle, or kutsack, which is longer than that of the men, reaching quite to their feet and completely enveloping them, being tied close under the chin, and bound with a girdle of the same cloth or of sea-otter skin around their waists; it has also loose sleeves, which reach to the elbows. Though fond of ornamenting their persons, they are by no means so partial to paint as the men, merely colouring their eyebrows black and drawing a bright red stripe from each corner of the mouth towards the ear. Their ornaments consist chiefly of ear-rings, necklaces, bracelets, rings for the fingers and ankles, and small nose-jewels (the latter are, however, wholly confined to the wives of the king or chiefs); these are principally made out of copper or brass, highly polished and of various forms and sizes; the nose-jewel is usually a small white shell[76] or bead suspended to a thread.

The wives of the common people frequently wear for bracelets and ankle rings strips of the country cloth or skin of the metamelth painted in figures, and those of the king or principal chiefs, bracelets and necklaces consisting of a number of strings of Ife-waw, an article much prized by them, and which makes a very handsome appearance. This Ife-waw, as they term it, is a kind of shell of a dazzling whiteness and as smooth as ivory; it is of a cylindrical form, in a slight degree curved, about the size of a goose quill, hollow, three inches in length and gradually tapering to a point, which is broken off by the natives as it is taken from the water; this they afterwards string upon threads of bark and sell it by the fathom; it forms a kind of circulating medium among these nations, five fathoms being considered as the price of a slave, their most valuable species of property. It is principally obtained from the Aitizzarts, a people living about thirty or forty miles to the northward, who collect it from the reefs and sunken rocks with which their coast abounds, though it is also brought in considerable quantity from the south.[77]

Their mode of taking it has been thus described to me:—To one end of a pole is fastened a piece of plank, in which a considerable number of pine pegs are inserted, made sharp at the ends; above the plank, in order to sink it, a stone or some weight is tied, and the other end of the pole suspended to a long rope; this is let down perpendicularly by the Ife-waw fishers in those places where that substance is found, which are usually from fifty to sixty fathoms deep. On finding the bottom, they raise the pole up a few feet and let it fall; this they repeat a number of times, as if sounding, when they draw it up and take off the Ife-waw which is found adhering to the points. This method of procuring it is very laborious and fatiguing, especially as they seldom take more than two or three of these shells at a time, and frequently none.

Though the women, as I have said, make but little use of paint, the very reverse is the case with the men. In decorating their heads and faces they place their principal pride, and none of our most fashionable beaus when preparing for a grand ball can be more particular; for I have known Maquina, after having been employed more than an hour in painting his face, rub the whole off, and recommence the operation anew, when it did not entirely please him.

The manner in which they paint themselves frequently varies, according to the occasion, but it oftener is the mere dictate of whim. The most usual method is to paint the eyebrows black in form of a half-moon and the face red in small squares, with the arms and legs and part of the body red; sometimes one half of the face is painted red in squares and the other black; at others dotted with spots of red and black instead of squares, with a variety of other devices, such as painting one half of the face and body red and the other black.

But a method of painting which they sometimes employed, and which they were much more particular in, was by laying on the face a quantity of bear's grease of about one-eighth of an inch thick; this they raised up into ridges resembling a small bead in joiner's work with a stick prepared for the purpose, and then painted them red, which gave the face a very singular appearance.

On extraordinary occasions the king and principal chiefs used to strew over their faces, after painting, a fine black shining powder procured from some mineral, as Maquina told me it was got from the rocks. This they call pelpelth,[78] and value it highly, as, in their opinion, it serves to set off their looks to great advantage, glittering especially in the sun like silver. This article is brought them in bags by the Newchemass,[79] a very savage nation who live a long way to the north, from whom they likewise receive a superior kind of red paint, a species of very fine and rich ochre, which they hold in much estimation.

Notwithstanding this custom of painting themselves, they make it an invariable practice, both in summer and winter, to bathe once a day, and sometimes oftener; but as the paint is put on with oil, it is not much discomposed thereby, and whenever they wish to wash it off, they repair to some piece of fresh water and scour themselves with sand or rushes.

In dressing their heads on occasion of a festival or a visit, they are full as particular and almost as long as in painting. The hair, after being well oiled, is carefully gathered upon the top of the head and secured by a piece of pine or spruce bough with the green leaves upon it. After having it properly fixed in this manner, the king and principal chiefs used to strew all over it the white down obtained from a species of large brown eagle which abounds on this coast, and which they are very particular in arranging so as not to have a single feather out of place, occasionally wetting the hair to make it adhere. This, together with the bough, which is sometimes of considerable size and stuck over with feathers by means of turpentine, gives them a very singular and grotesque appearance, which they, however, think very becoming, and the first thing they do, on learning the arrival of strangers, is to go and decorate themselves in this manner.

The men also wear bracelets of painted leather or copper and large ear-rings of the latter, but the ornament on which they appear to set the most value is the nose-jewel, if such an appellation may be given to the wooden stick which some of them employ for this purpose. The king and chiefs, however, wear them of a different form, being either small pieces of polished copper or brass, of which I made many for them in the shape of hearts and diamonds, or a twisted conical shell about half an inch in length, of a bluish colour and very bright, which is brought from the south. These are suspended by a small wire or string to the hole in the gristle of the nose, which is formed in infancy by boring it with a pin, the hole being afterwards enlarged by the repeated insertion of wooden pegs of an increased size, until it becomes about the diameter of a pipe-stem, though some have them of a size nearly sufficient to admit the little finger.

The common class, who cannot readily procure the more expensive jewels that I have mentioned, substitute for them, usually, a smooth, round stick, some of which are of an almost incredible length, for I have seen them projecting not less than eight or nine inches beyond the face on each side; this is made fast or secured in its place by little wedges on each side of it. These "sprit-sail-yard fellows," as my messmate used to call them, when rigged out in this manner, made quite a strange show, and it was his delight, whenever he saw one of them coming towards us with an air of consequence proportioned to the length of his stick, to put up his hand suddenly as he was passing him, so as to strike the stick, in order, as he said, to brace him up sharp to the wind; this used to make them very angry, but nothing was more remote from Thompson's ideas than a wish to cultivate their favour.

The natives of Nootka appear to have but little inclination for the chase, though some of them were expert marksmen, and used sometimes to shoot ducks and geese; but the seal and the sea-otter form the principal objects of their hunting, particularly the latter.

Of this animal, so much noted for its valuable skin, the following description may not be uninteresting:—The sea-otter[80] is nearly five feet in length, exclusive of the tail, which is about twelve inches, and is very thick and broad where it joins the body, but gradually tapers to the end, which is tipped with white. The colour of the rest is a shining, silky black, with the exception of a broad white stripe on the top of the head. Nothing can be more beautiful than one of these animals when seen swimming, especially when on the look-out for any object. At such times it raises its head quite above the surface, and the contrast between the shining black and the white, together with its sharp ears and a long tuft of hair rising from the middle of its forehead, which looks like three small horns, render it quite a novel and attractive object. They are in general very tame, and will permit a canoe or boat to approach very near before they dive. I was told, however, that they are become much more shy since they have been accustomed to shoot them with muskets, than when they used only arrows.[81]

The skin is held in great estimation in China, more especially that of the tail, the fur of which is finer and closer set than that on the body. This is always cut off and sold separately by the natives. The value of a skin is determined by its size, that being considered as a prime skin which will reach, in length, from a man's chin to his feet. The food of the sea-otter is fish, which he is very dexterous in taking, being an excellent swimmer, with feet webbed like those of a goose. They appear to be wholly confined to the seacoast, at least to the salt water. They have usually three or four young at a time, but I know not how often they breed, nor in what place they deposit their young, though I have frequently seen them swimming around the mother when no larger than rats. The flesh is eaten by the natives, cooked in their usual mode by boiling, and is far preferable to that of the seal, of which they make much account.

But if not great hunters, there are few people more expert in fishing. Their lines are generally, made from the sinew of the whale, and are extremely strong. For the hook, they usually make use of a straight piece of hard wood, in the lower part of which is inserted, and well secured with thread or whale sinew, a bit of bone made very sharp at the point and bearded; but I used to make for them hooks from iron, which they preferred, not only as being less liable to break, but more certain of securing the fish. Cod, halibut, and other sea fish were not only caught by them with hooks, but even salmon.

To take this latter fish, they practise the following method:—One person seats himself in a small canoe, and, baiting his hook with a sprat, which they are always careful to procure as fresh as possible, fastens his line to the handle of the paddle; this, as he plies it in the water, keeps the fish in constant motion, so as to give it the appearance of life, which the salmon seeing, leaps at it and is instantly hooked, and, by a sudden and dexterous motion of the paddle, drawn on board. I have known some of the natives take no less than eight or ten salmon of a morning, in this manner, and have seen from twenty to thirty canoes at a time in Friendly Cove thus employed.

They are likewise little less skilful in taking the whale. This they kill with a kind of javelin or harpoon thus constructed and fitted: the barbs are formed of bone, which are sharpened on the outer side, and hollowed within, for the purpose of forming a socket for the staff; these are then secured firmly together with a whale sinew, the point being fitted so as to receive a piece of mussel-shell, which is ground to a very sharp edge, and secured in its place by means of turpentine.[82] To this head or prong is fastened a strong line of whale sinew about nine feet in length, to the end of which is tied a bark rope from fifty to sixty fathoms long, having from twenty to thirty sealskin floats or buoys attached to it at certain intervals, in order to check the motion of the whale and obstruct his diving. In the socket of the harpoon a staff or pole of about ten feet long, gradually tapering from the middle to each end, is placed; this the harpooner holds in his hand, in order to strike the whale, and immediately detaches it as soon as the fish is struck.

The whale is considered as the king's fish, and no other person, when he is present, is permitted to touch him until the royal harpoon has first drawn his blood, however near he may approach; and it would be considered almost a sacrilege for any of the common people to strike a whale before he is killed, particularly if any of the chiefs should be present.[83] They also kill the porpoise[84] and sea-cow[85] with harpoons, but this inferior game is not interdicted the lower class.

With regard to their canoes, some of the handsomest to be found on the whole coast are made at Nootka, though very fine ones are brought by the Wickinninish and the Kla-iz-zarts, who have them more highly ornamented. They are of all sizes, from such as are capable of holding only one person to their largest war canoes, which will carry forty men, and are extremely light. Of these, the largest of any that I ever saw was one belonging to Maquina, which I measured, and found to be forty-two feet six inches in length at the bottom, and forty-six feet from stem to stern. These are made of pine,[86] hollowed out from a tree with their chisels solely, which are about three inches broad and six in length, and set into a handle of very hard wood.

This instrument was formerly made of flint, or some hard stone ground down to as sharp an edge as possible, but since they have learned the use of iron, they have almost all of them of that metal. Instead of a mallet for striking this chisel, they make use of a smooth round stone, which they hold in the palm of the hand. With this same awkward instrument they not only excavate their canoes and trays and smooth their planks, but cut down such trees as they want, either for building, fuel, or other purposes, a labour which is mostly done by their slaves.

The felling of trees, as practised by them, is a slow and most tedious process, three of them being generally from two to three days in cutting down a large one; yet so attached were they to their own method, that notwithstanding they saw Thompson frequently, with one of our axes, of which there was a number saved, fell a tree in less time than they could have gone round it with their chisels, still they could not be persuaded to make use of them.

After hollowing out their canoes, which they do very neatly, they fashion the outside, and slightly burn it, for the purpose of removing any splinters or small points that might obstruct its passage through the water, after which they rub it over thoroughly with rushes or coarse mats, in order to smooth it, which not only renders it almost as smooth as glass, but forms a better security for it from the weather; this operation of burning and rubbing down the bottoms of their canoes is practised as often as they acquire any considerable degree of roughness from use. The outside by this means becomes quite black, and to complete their work they paint the inside of a bright red, with ochre or some other similar substance; the prows and sterns are almost always ornamented with figures of ducks or some other kind of bird, the former being so fashioned as to represent the head, and the latter the tail; these are separate pieces from the canoe, and are fastened to it with small flexible twigs or bark cord.

Some of these canoes, particularly those employed in whaling, which will hold about ten men, are ornamented within about two inches below the gunwale with two parallel lines on each side of very small white shells, running fore and aft, which has a very pretty effect. Their war canoes have no ornament of this kind, but are painted on the outside with figures in white chalk, representing eagles, whales, human heads, etc. They are very dexterous in the use of their paddles, which are very neatly wrought, and are five feet long, with a short handle and a blade seven inches broad in the middle, tapering to a sharp point. With these they will make a canoe skim very swiftly on the water, with scarcely any noise, while they keep time to the stroke of the paddle with their songs.