We visited the Indian village of Ketchikan. The Episcopalians have a
mission at this place. The teacher is an able young woman. A young
lady, a handsome half-breed Indian girl, came upon the wharf to meet
someone who came on the boat. Her carriage, language and manner were
those of a lady. We landed some freight at this point. The freight
agent was a half-breed Indian, quite good looking and a gentleman.
New Metlakahtla is a most attractive village on the Annette Islands.
The Metlakahtlans are the most progressive race in Alaska. Mr. Duncan
visited the United States in 1887, enlisting aid for the Indians. Henry
Ward Beecher and Phillips Brooks became champions of his cause.
The government at Washington assured Mr. Duncan that his people would
be protected in any lands which they might select in Alaska.
In the spring of 1887 four hundred Metlakahtlans crossed to the Annette
Islands.
These enterprising people print their own newspaper. They have a
photographer. The silversmiths, woodcarvers and bark weavers do a large
business on tourist days.
The salmon cannery ships from six to eight thousand cases a year. There
is a government school and a boarding school for girls. On steamer days
the Indian band plays on a platform built on the tall stump of a cedar.
These people, all Christians, have all subscribed and faithfully live
up to a code of rules, called the Declaration of Residents.
The inhabitants are greatly disturbed over the discovery of gold on
these islands. The white man discovered the gold and now he wants the
islands. Will the government keep faith with the Metlakahtlans?
Now let me tell the boys and girls what our vessel has down in her
hold. Our boat, The Queen, is three hundred and fifty feet long and
draws twenty-five feet of water, so you see she has a big hold down
below her decks. There are twenty big steers going to Juneau to be made
into beef; two big gray horses going to Dawson to work about the mines
in the Klondike and when winter comes to be killed and dried for meat
for dogs, as there will be no feed for the horses in the Klondike when
winter sets in and the grass dies. A sad fate. They are gentle horses,
poking their noses into your hand as you pass for an apple, peach or
bit of grain. There are five hundred chickens down there, too, going
to different points in Alaska. Two little Esquimaux pups, worth one
hundred dollars each, are also here. Their mother, which was killed
by the electric cars at Seattle the day before we sailed, cost four
hundred dollars. The little curly-haired fellows play and tumble about
very much like kittens, then suddenly they remember their mother and
set up such a pitiful wail.
There is also a big, black Husky aboard. He is a cross between an
Indian (not an Esquimaux) dog and a wolf. He is a big, heavy fellow,
large of head, strong of limb and feet widened in muscular development
wrought in his race by generations of hard service in this rugged
climate. He is valued at three hundred and fifty dollars. He will pull
three hundred pounds and travel forty miles a day over ice and snow,
being fed but once a day on dried fish.
The most curious and by far the handsomest dog aboard is a Malamute.
He is a beautiful dog. His furry coat is heavy and his fine ears stand
erect. For actions, manners and affection for his master he is a fine
specimen of the canine tribe. His walk is somewhat of a stride like
that of the bear.
His owner, who lives in Chicago, is aboard. He paid three hundred
dollars for the dog and took him home, but it is too warm for him in
Chicago, so he is taking him back to Alaska.
There are many cases of oranges, lemons, peaches, apples, apricots
and plums and tons of groceries of all sorts for Skagway, Dawson,
Juneau, Sitka and other Alaskan points. Also many pounds of dressed
beef, mutton, flour, cornmeal, oatmeal and canned goods. There are one
thousand cases of oil, lots of dry goods and many miners’ outfits. So
you see there is quite a traffic up and down this coast.
As we steam steadily on toward the home of Hoder, the stormy old god
of winter, the air grows colder, the scenery more wild and strange.
Snowclad mountains, sun-lit clouds resting on their peaks and veiling
their sides, blue sky and sparkling water make a scene which may be
imagined but not described.
[Illustration: FORT WRANGEL, ALASKA.]
Alaska is the aboriginal name and means “great country.” It was at the
request of Charles Sumner that the original name was retained. Seven
million two hundred thousand dollars for a field of stony mountain,
icebergs and glaciers! Had Seward gone mad? Ah, no. He builded wiser
than he knew. Alaska is nine times the size of the New England States
and cost less than one-half cent per acre.
The northwest coast of Alaska was discovered and explored by a Russian
expedition under Behring, in 1741. Russian settlements were made and
the fur trade developed.
The climate is no colder than at St. Petersburg and many other parts
of Russia. The warm Japan current sweeps the coast and tempers the
climate. Sitka is only three miles north of Balmoral, Scotland. The
isothermal line running through Sitka runs through Richmond, Va.,
giving both points the same temperature. The average summer temperature
is fifty-two degrees and the average winter weather thirty-one degrees
above zero.
The average rainfall at this point is eighty-two inches. Native grasses
and berries grow plentifully in the valleys. The chief wealth of the
country lies in its forests, fish, fur-bearing animals and mines.
The forest consists of yellow pine, spruce, larch, fir of great size,
cypress and hemlock. The wild animals include the elk, deer and bear.
The fur-bearing animals are the fox, wolf, beaver, ermine, otter and
squirrel. Fur-bearing seals inhabit the waters along the coast. Salmon
abound in the rivers.
It is one of the secrets of the rebellion that the large sum paid
to Russia for Alaska was to compensate her for the presence of her
warships in our harbor during the early days of the Civil War, thus
helping to prevent English interference.
Fort Wrangel is delightfully located on the green slopes of the
mountains. It was once a Russian military post and takes its name from
the Russian governor of Alaska, Baron Wrangel.
Here are some fine totem poles. Totemism is a species of heraldry.
Their whales, frogs, crows, and wolves are no more difficult to
understand than the dragons, griffins, and fleur-de-lis of European
heraldry. The totem pole of the Alaskan Indian is his crest, his
monument. The totem is his clan name, his god. He is a crow, a raven,
an eagle, a bear, a whale, or a wolf. It is the old story of Beauty and
the Beast. The beautiful raven maiden may live happily with her bear
husband.
Every Indian claims kinship with three totems. The clan totem is the
animal from which the clan descended. There is a totem common to all
the women of the clan. The men of the clan have a totem and each
individual when he or she arrives at manhood or womanhood chooses a
totem sacred to him or herself. This totem is his guardian angel and
protects him from danger and harm. The Alaskan Indian believes the
eagle to be the American man’s totem and the lion and the unicorn the
two totems of the Englishman.
The civilized races of antiquity all passed through the totem period.
Our Indians all had their totems as their names indicate, Blackfeet,
Crow and Sioux. Totems are common to all savage races, but the Alaskan
Indian is the only North American who erects a monument to his totem.
While the totem protects the Indian the Indian is in duty bound to
protect his totem. He may neither kill nor eat his own totem, but he
may with impunity kill the god of another. If you kill his totem he
will be grieved and sorrowfully ask, “Why you kill him, my brother?”
These people were evolutionists long before Darwin. There are no
monkeys, however, among the totems of the Alaskan Indians.
When an Indian marries he takes his wife’s name, the name of her clan
totem. The children, too, belong to the mother’s totem, and, of course,
take her name. The wife is the head of the family, managing it and
transacting all the business.
These Indians and all the Indians of southern Alaska are Tlingits.
Tlingit means people. There are many traditions among them of a
supernatural origin; one to the effect that the crow in whom dwelt the
Great Spirit lived on the Nass River, where he turned two blades of
grass into a man and a woman. This was the first pair from whom sprang
all Tlingits. They have tales of a migration from the southeast, the
Mars River country. Their propitiation of evil spirits, their shamanism
and their belief in the transmigration of souls, all point to Asiatic
origin, yet there is no tradition among them of any such origin. Once,
many thousands of snows ago, a Tlingit stole the sun and hid it, then
nearly all the people died, but the crow found it and placed it in the
sky again. After this the tribe increased.
The Tlingit idea of justice is something of a novelty. The code,
however, is short; an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, is
always strictly demanded. A Tlingit once shot at a decoy duck, but he
made the owner pay for the shot used. A young Indian stole a rifle and
accidentally killed himself with it. His relatives made the owner pay
for the dead thief. If a patient dies under a doctor’s care he pays for
him.
Before the advent of the white man shamanism held sway. When a Tlingit
fell ill he sent for his medicine man, who by incantations cured him,
or failing that, accused some one of bewitching his patient. The wizard
or witch was tortured and put to death, after which the sick Indian
recovered or died, as the case might be.
Captain E. C. Merriman, of the U. S. Navy, destroyed the power of the
shaman by rescuing the accused and punishing the shaman.
The shaman spends the greater part of his life in the forest, fasting
and receiving inspiration from his totemic spirits. A concoction of
dried frogs’ legs and sea water give him power to perceive a man’s
soul--the Tlingit woman had no soul then--escaping from his body and
to catch it and restore it to the man.
The Tlingits practiced cremation, but the body of a shaman was never
cremated, it would not burn. It was always buried in a little box-like
tomb. The body was wrapped in blankets and placed in a sitting posture,
surrounded by the masks, wands, rattles, and all the paraphernalia of
the office of a shaman, ready for use in the heaven to which he had
gone.
The missionaries have destroyed faith in the shaman and broken up the
practice of cremation.
[Illustration: CHIEF SHAKE’S HOUSE, FORT WRANGEL.]
At Fort Wrangel we called on the chief. He has the tallest and the most
handsomely carved pole in the Indian village.
There are three kinds of totem poles. The family totem pole, which is
erected in front of the home. On it are carved figures representing the
totems of the family, the wife’s totem always surmounting the pole and
the husband’s next below. Then appear totems of other members of the
family.
The death totem pole is erected at the grave. On it are engraved the
totems of the dead man’s ancestors, as well as his own. The third class
of poles are erected to commemorate some remarkable event in history
of the tribe or of the man. These poles may be seen up and down the
coast from Vancouver to Yakutat.
“And they painted on the grave-posts
Of the graves yet unforgotten,
Each his ancestral totem,
Each the symbol of his household,
Figures of the bear, the reindeer,
Of the turtle, crane and beaver.”
--_Longfellow._
The fine flower of the native races of the coast are the Haidas. They
are taller and fairer, with more regular features than any of the
Columbian coast tribes. They are aliens to the Tlingits, differing
from them mentally and physically, in speech and customs. The Tlingits
call them “people of the sea.” They were the Norsemen of the Pacific
shores; the coppery Erics and Harolds, who sailed the blue waters of
the Pacific, sweeping the coast, attacking native villages, Hudson Bay
Company posts, and the settlements of the whites. The harbor at Seattle
was a place of rendezvous.
The origin of this daring race is a mystery. They hold many traditions
in common with the Aztec and Zunis of Mexico. Marchand identifies them
with those whom Cortes drove out of Mexico. Many of their images are
similar to silver relics found in the ruins of Guatemala.
These people bear a resemblance to the Japanese. They have Japanese
words in their language; they sit always at their work and cut towards
them in using tools, which are much like those in use by the Japanese
to-day. They have also many modern Apache words in their speech, while
their picture writing is similar and in many cases the same as that of
the Zunis.
Their own legend of their origin runs in this wise: During a great
flood when every living thing on the earth perished, a few people
floated to the tops of the mountains in canoes, which they anchored
with heavy stones. The water rose so high, however, that they at last
were drowned.
The only living thing to survive the flood was a raven. When the waters
had subsided he flew down to the coast, where the waves dashing on the
rocks sent forth a noise as of thunder. Presently he heard the cry of
babies; directly a huge shell came rolling in on the sandy beach. The
raven opened it and out came a strange people. In thankfulness for
their deliverance they have made the raven their clan totem.
These people make baskets and mats to-day exactly like those made by
the natives of the Islands of Polynesia, while their carving, in which
they excel all other tribes of the North, resembles the sculpture of
ancient Egypt.
Totem poles originated with these people and spread from them to other
tribes with whom they came in contact. They practiced cremation and
their death totem poles are always hollow, making a receptacle for the
ashes of the dead.
The earliest explorers found these people living in houses built of
heavy, hewn logs, and planks hewn out and neatly mortised. The houses
were covered with a hip roof, supported by heavy rafters and thatched
with an odd sort of shingle, clipped or hewn out of the logs. On the
plank floors were mats made from a rush which grows on the islands.
The old Hydahs were a warlike people, who were ever waging battle with
the fierce Chilkats.
[Illustration: ENTERING WRANGEL NARROWS.]