In Search of the Totem-Pole.
Hour after hour and day after day we are coasting along shores that
become monotonous in their beauty. For leagues the sea-washed roots of
the forest present a fairly impassable barrier to the foot of man. It is
only at infrequent intervals that a human habitation is visible, and
still more seldom does the eye discover a solitary canoe making its way
among the inextricable confusion of inlets. Sometimes a small cluster of
Indian lodges enlivens the scene; and this can scarcely be said to
enliven it, for most Indian lodges are as forlorn as a last year's
bird's-nest. Sometimes a bright little village gives hope of a break in
the serenity of the season--a few hours on shore and an extra page or
two in our log-books. Yet again, sometimes it is a green jungle, above
the sea, out of which rise diminutive box-houses, like exaggerated
dove-cotes, with a goodly number of towering cedar columns, curiously
carved, perhaps stained black or red in patches, scattered through them.
These are Indian cemeteries. They are hedged about with staves, from the
top of which flutter ragged streamers. They are rich in rude carvings of
men and birds and beasts. Now and again a shield as big as a target, and
looking not unlike an archery-target, marks the tomb of some warrior.
The unerring shafts of death search out the obscurest handfuls of people
scattered through these wide domains; and every village has its solemn
suburb, where the houses of the dead are decorated with barbaric
bric-a-brac.
Many of the tombs are above ground--airy sarcophagi on high poles
rocking in the wind and the rain. Some are nearer the earth, like
old-fashioned four-poster bed-steads; and there the dead sleep well.
Others are of stone, with windows and peaked roofs,--very comfortable
receptacles. But most of the bodies are below ground, and the last
vestiges of their graves are lost in the depths of the jungle.
Incineration is not uncommon in Alaska, and in such cases the ashes are
distributed among the winds and waves. Birds feast upon the bodies of
certain tribes--meat-offerings, very gracious in the sight of the Death
Angel; but by far the larger portion find decent burial, and they are
all long and loudly and sincerely mourned.
We awoke one morning at Casa-an, and found ourselves made fast to a
dock. On the dock was a salmon-house, or shed, a very laboratory of
ancient and fish-like smells. It was not long before the tide slipped
away from us and left the steamer resting easily on her beam-ends in
shallow water. We were prisoners for a few hours; but we were glad of
this, for every hour was of interest to us. This was our first chance to
thoroughly explore an Indian village; and, oh! the dogs, cousins-german
to the coyotes, that shook off their fleas and bayed us dismally! Lodges
of the rudest sort were scattered about in the most convenient
localities. As for streets or lanes, there were none visible. The
majority of the lodges were constructed of hemlock bark or of rough
slabs, gaudily festooned with split salmon drying in the sun. The lodges
are square, with roofs slightly inclined; they are windowless and have
but one narrow door about shoulder high.
The Casa-an Indians are a tribe of the Haidas, the cleverest of the
northern races. They are expert craftsmen. From a half dollar they will
hammer out or mold a bangle and cover it with chasing very deftly cut.
Their wood-carvings, medicine-man rattles, spoons, broth bowls, and the
like, are curious; but the demand for bangles keeps the more ingenious
busy in this branch of industry. Unfortunately, some simple voyager gave
the rude silversmiths a bangle of the conventional type, and this is now
so cunningly imitated that it is almost impossible to secure a specimen
of Haida work of the true Indian pattern. Very shortly the Indian
villages of Alaska will be stocked with curios of genuine California
manufacture. The supply of antiquities and originals has been already
nearly, if not quite, exhausted. It is said that no sooner is the boom
of the paddle-wheel heard in the noiseless Alaskan sea than the Indian
proceeds to empty of its treasures his cedar chest or his red Chinese
box studded with brass nails, and long before the steamer heaves in
sight the primitive bazar is ready for the expected customer. There is
much haggling over the price of a curio, and but little chance of a
bargain. If one has his eye upon some coveted object, he had best
purchase it at once at the first figure; for the Indian is not likely
to drop a farthing, and there are others who will gladly outbid the
hesitating shopper.
Time is no object in the eyes of these people. If an Indian thought he
could make a quarter more on the sale of a curio by holding it a month
longer, until the arrival of the next excursion boat, or even by getting
into his canoe and paddling a day or two over to the next settlement, he
would as lief do it as not. By the merest chance I drew from a heap of
rubbish in the corner of a lodge a Shaman rattle, unquestionably
genuine. This Shaman rattle is a quaintly carved rattle-box, such as is
used by sorcerers or medicine-men in propitiation of the evil spirit at
the bedside of the dying. The one I have was not offered for sale, nor
did the possessor seem to place much value on it; yet he would not budge
one jot or tittle in the price he first set upon it, and seemingly set
at a guess. Its discovery was a piece of pure luck, but I would not
exchange it for any other curio which I chanced to see during the whole
voyage.
In one of the lodges at Casa-an a chief lay dying. He was said to be the
last of his race; and, judging from appearances, his hours were fast
drawing to a close. He was breathing painfully; his face was turned to
the wall. Two or three other Indians sat silently about, stirring at
intervals a bright wood-fire that burned in the centre of the lodge. The
curling smoke floated gracefully through a hole in the roof--most of it,
but not quite all. As we entered (we were in search of the dying chief;
for, as he seemed to be the one lion in the settlement, his fame was
soon noised abroad) we found that the evangelist had forestalled us. He
was asking the price of salmon in San Francisco; but upon our appearance
he added, solemnly enough: "Well, we all must die--Indians and all." An
interpreter had reluctantly been pressed into service; but as the
missionary work was not progressing, the evangelist dropped the
interpreter, rolled up his spiritual sleeves and pitched in as follows:
"Say, you Injun! you love God? You love Great Spirit?" No answer came
from the thin, drawn lips, tightly compressed and visible just over the
blankets edge in the corner of the lodge. "Say, John! you ready to die!
You make your peace with God! You go to heaven--to the happy
hunting-ground?" The chief, who had silenced the interpreter with a
single look, was apparently beyond the hearing of human speech; so the
evangelist, with a sigh, again inquired into the state of the salmon
market on the Pacific coast. Then the stricken brave turned a glazed eye
upon the man of God, and the latter once more sought to touch that heart
of stone: "I say, you Injun! you prepared to meet Great Spirit? You
ready to go to happy hunting-ground?" The chief's eyes flamed for a
moment, as with infinite scorn he muttered between his teeth to the
evangelist: "You ---- fool! You go to ----!" And he went.
While the steamer was slowly righting we had ample time to inspect the
beached hull of a schooner with a history. She was the Pioneer of
Casa-an once commanded by a famous old smuggler named Baronovich. Long
he sailed these waters; and, like Captain Kidd, he bore a charmed life
as he sailed. It is a mystery to me how any sea-faring man can trust his
craft to the mercy of the winds and tides of this myriad-islanded inland
sea. This ancient mariner, Baronovich, not only braved the elements, but
defied Russian officials, who kept an eye upon him night and day. On one
occasion, having been boarded by the vigilant inspectors, and his
piratical schooner thoroughly searched from stem to stern, he kindly
invited the gentlemen to dine with him, and entertained them at a board
groaning with the contraband luxuries which his suspicious guests had
been vainly seeking all the afternoon. It is a wee little cabin and a
shallow hold that furnish the setting for a sea-tale as wildly
picturesque as any that thrills the heart of your youthful reader; but
high and dry lies the moldering hulk of the dismantled smuggler, and
there is no one left to tell the tale.
As we lounged about, some hideous Indians--I trust they were not framed
in the image of their Maker,--ill-shapen lads, dumpy, expressionless
babies, green-complexioned half-breeds, sat and looked on with utter
indifference. Many of the Haida Indians have kinky or wavy hair,
Japanese or Chinese eyes, and most of them toe out; but they are, all
things considered, the least interesting, the most ungainly and the most
unpicturesque of people. If there is work for them to do they do it,
heedless of the presence of inquisitive, pale-faced spectators. Indeed
they seem to look down upon the white-man, and perhaps they have good
reasons for so doing. If there is no work to be done, they are not at
all disconcerted.
I very much doubt if a Haida Indian--or any other Indian, for that
matter--knows what it is to be bored or to find the time hanging heavily
on his hands. I took note of one old Indian who sat for four solid hours
without once changing his position. He might have been sitting there
still but that his wife routed him out after a lively monologue, to
which he was an apparently disinterested listener. At last he arose with
a grunt, adjusted his blanket, strode grimly to his canoe and bailed it
out; then he entered and paddled leisurely to the opposite shore, where
he disappeared in the forest.
Filth was everywhere, and evil odors; but far, far aloft the eagles were
soaring, and the branches of a withered tree near the settlement were
filled with crows as big as buzzards. Once in awhile some one or another
took a shot at them--and missed. Thus the time passed at Casa-an. One
magnifies the merest episode on the Alaskan voyage, and is grateful for
it.
Killisnoo is situated in a cosy little cove. It is a rambling village
that climbs over the rocks and narrowly escapes being pretty, but it
manages to escape. Most of the lodges are built of logs, have small,
square windows, with glass in them, and curtains; and have also a kind
of primitive chimney. We climbed among these lodges and found them quite
deserted. The lodgers were all down at the dock. There were inscriptions
on a few of the doors: the name of the tenant, and a request to observe
the sacredness of the domestic hearth. This we were careful to do; but
inasmuch as each house was set in order and the window-curtains looped
back, we were no doubt welcome to a glimpse of an Alaskan interior. It
was the least little bit like a peep-show, and didn't seem quite real.
One inscription was as follows--it was over the door of the lodge of the
laureate:
JOSEPH HOOLQUIN.
My tum-tum is white,
I try to do right:
All are welcome to come
To my hearth and my home.
So call in and see me, white, red or black man:
I'm de-late hyas of the Kootznahoo quan.
Need I add that _tum-tum_ in the Chinook jargon signifies the soul!
Joseph merely announced that he was clean-souled; also _de-late
hyas_--that is, above reproach.
At the store of the Northwest Trading Company we found no curios, and it
is the only store in the place. Sarsaparilla, tobacco, blankets, patent
medicines, etc., are there neatly displayed on freshly painted shelves,
but no curios. On a strip of plank walk in front of the place are
Indians luxuriously heaped, like prize porkers, and they are about as
interesting a spectacle to the unaccustomed eye.
Our whistle blew at noon. We returned on board, taking the cannery and
oil-factory on the way, and finding it impossible to forget them for
some time afterward. At 12.45 p. m. we were off, but we left one of the
merriest and most popular of our voyagers behind us. He remained at
Killisnoo in charge of the place. As we swam off into the sweet sea
reaches, the poor fellow ran over the ridge of his little island,
looking quite like a castaway, and no doubt feeling like one. He sprang
from rock to rock and at last mounted a hillock, and stood waving his
arms wildly while we were in sight. And the lassies? They swarmed like
bees upon the wheelhouse, wringing their hands and their handkerchiefs,
and weeping rivers of imaginary tears over our first bereavement! But
really, now, what a life to lead, and in what a place, especially if
one happens to be young, and good-looking and a bit of a swell withal!
But is there no romance here? Listen! We came to anchor over night in a
quiet nook where the cliffs and the clouds overshadowed us. Everything
was of the vaguest description, without form and void. There seemed to
be one hut on shore, with the spark of a light in it--a cannery of
course. Canoes were drifting to and fro like motes in the darkness,
tipped with a phosphorescent rim. Indian voices hailed us out of the
ominous silence; Indian dogs muttered under their breath, yelping in a
whisper which was mocked by Indian papooses, who can bark before they
have learned to walk or talk.
Softly out of the balmy night--for it was balmy and balsamic (we were to
the windward of the cannery),--a shadowy canoe floated up just under our
rail; two shadowy forms materialized, and voices like the voices of
spirits--almost the softest voices in the world, voices of infantile
sweetness--hailed us. "_Alah, mika chahko!_" babbled the flowers of the
forest. My solitary companion responded glibly, for he was no stranger
in these parts. The maids grew garrulous. There was much bantering, and
such laughter as the gods delight in; and at last a shout that drew the
attention of the captain. He joined us just in season to recognize the
occupants of the canoe, as they shot through a stream of light under an
open port, crying "_Anah nawitka mika halo shem!_" And then we learned
that the sea-nymphs he had put to flight were none other than the belles
of Juneau City, the Alaskan metropolis, who were spending the summer at
this watering-place, and who were known to fame as "Kitty the Gopher,"
and "Feather-Legged Sal."