POTLATCH AND DEVIL DANCE
The potlatch was the greatest institution of the Indian and is to this
day. It was the crowning glory of the Indian life and worth the meade
of a thousand victories over the foe. It was the ambition of the hyas
tyee, the politics of every ruler who could secure wealth enough to
accomplish the great and glorious end. It impoverished the giver but
brought gladness to the hearts of the people, and honor ever after to
him who gave. It was a beautiful custom; beautiful in the eyes of the
natives of high or low degree, confined to no particular tribe but to
be met with everywhere along the coast. It no doubt had its origin far
back in the misty past. Come from whence—who can tell? Perhaps, through
the generations of the world down through all the ups and downs and
changes and variation of mankind, keeping step with that most beautiful
of all civilized customs, the gifts of Yuletide, for Christ’s sake, and
perchance the very same origin marked the beginning of both.
Before the introduction of the cloths and implements of civilized man,
the simple native satisfied himself and the people by giving of those
things he could gather from the chase or manufacture by his crude arts.
Skins of wild animals fancifully wrought and colored, the wild ponies
of his herds, bows and arrows, his canoes, everything he sacrificed on
the altar of the potlatch which meant a gift, to give, etc. When he was
enabled to get blankets, knives, guns, etc., from the whites the potlatch
took a wider range and not even the glittering yellow gold was spared
the sacrifice. The great day set so many suns or moons ahead, arrived,
great was the interest and excitement of the occasion. From far and near
assembled the invited guests and tribes and with feasting, singing,
chanting and dancing, the bounteous collection was distributed; a chief
was made penniless, the wealth of a life time was dissipated in an hour,
but his head forever after was crowned with the glory of a satisfied
ambition; he had won the honor and reverence of the people.
The gifts were not always preserved by the recipients, especially with
some of the Sound tribes for it was a work of a noble unselfish brave to
immediately destroy whatever had been thrown to him. So it was that fine
new blankets, guns, bows and arrows and the like were often destroyed
scarcely before they touched the ground. At the Old-Man-House potlatches
have been given within the residency of the whites when the frenzied
Indians have fallen upon a shower of gifts and soon had them entirely
destroyed. The blankets, easily secured by barter with the Hudsons Bay
company’s agents, were usually hung up and with knives and daggers would
in a twinkling be slashed and cut into hundreds of fragments and strips.
The blankets in those days cost a great deal of money, $10 to $20 a pair,
so that in a very short time hundreds of dollars worth of valuables would
soon be destroyed.
Back in the distant past and not within the memory of the Indians of
to-day the ceremony had its attendant features of a more heathenish kind,
for the blood of sacrifice was spilled as a more fitting observance of
the grand occasion. Slaves succumbed to the horrible rites and moaned
out their death chants which blended and contrasted with the mirthful
song of their possessors, engaged for the time in their dance of blood.
An incident of the awful tragedies is inspiringly told, if such a
construction can be put upon it, by an early missionary, an eye witness,
whose description is re-clothed in the splendid words of Hezzekiah
Butterworth:
“I once witnessed a potlatch and I hope I may never see such a scene
again. I had landed among a tribe of northern Indians on the Whulge,
where I had gathered a little church some months before, and I expected
to hold a meeting on the night I arrived in one of the canoes. The place
was deserted; the woods were all silent. Sunset flashed his red light
along the sea, such a sunset as one only sees here in these northern
latitudes. A wannish glare of smoky crimson lingering long into the
night. As soon as the sun went down I began to hear a piping sound like
birds in all the woods around. The calls answered one another everywhere.
I had never heard a sound like that. I tried to approach one of the
sounds but it receded before me.
“Suddenly a great fire blazed up and lit the sky. I approached it; it
was built on a little prairie. Near it was a large platform covered with
canoes, blankets, pressed fish, berry cakes, soap—clayey or berry soap,
wampum and beads. Not an Indian was in sight save one. She was an old
squaw bound to a stake or tree.
“‘What is this?’ I asked in Chinook.
“‘Cultus tee-hee.’
“‘Cultus tee-hee?’
“‘Dah-blo!’
“She wailed in Chinook.
“‘When—tamala?’ (to-morrow.)
“‘Ding Ding’—
“‘Cultus tee-hee.’
“‘Cultus hee-hee.’
“‘Dah-blo!’
“Then I knew that all was preparation for a potlatch, and that there was
to be a devil dance—ding ding—at that very hour.
“It was a night of the full moon, as such a night would be selected for
such a ceremony. The moon rose red in the smoky air, and the sounds like
the bird calls grew louder and wilder. Then there was a yell; it was
answered everywhere, and hundreds of Indians in paint and masks came
running out of the timber upon the prairie. Some were on all fours, some
had the heads of beasts, fishes and birds, some had wings and many tails.
“Then came biters attended by raving squaws. The biters were to tear
the flesh from the arms of any who were not found at the dance after a
certain hour.
“Now the drums began to beat and the shells to blow. Indians poured out
of the woods in paint, blankets and beads.
“A great circle dance was formed; the ta-mahn-a-wis or spirit dance was
enacted. Great gifts were made as at a pow-wow or wah-wah. Then the dark
crowd grew frantic, and under the full moon gleaming on high came the
devil’s dance.
“The first victim was a live dog. He was seized, torn in pieces and eaten
by the dancers, so as to redden their faces with blood. The yells were
now more furious; the dancers leaped into the air and circled around the
old woman tied to the tree.
“I will not describe the sickening sight that followed; I will only say
that the old hag, who was accused of casting an evil eye, shared the same
fate as the dog.
“Why do you worship the devil?’ I asked an exhausted brave the next day.
“‘Good spirits always good; him we no fear. Please the devil and him no
harm you. All well—happy; good ta-mahn-a-wis, bad ta-mahn-a-wis, see?’”
It was plain—the old philosophy of the sinking sailor who prayed ‘good
lord! good devil!’ The tradition was—it came out of the long past—that
the devil must be appeased.
[Illustration: QUINIAULT TRIBESMAN]