THE PACIFIC SALMON. 57 



to fish successfully Mr. Lo has to exert himself in a manner 

 not at all to his liking. 



It is a picturesque sight to watch one of these Indians 

 fishing — his brown, nude figure pictured against the dark 

 basaltic rock throwing and withdrawing his net, and if suc- 

 cessful, the blue and orange of the great Salmon struggling 

 in the net which glitters in the sun like an interlacing of dia- 

 mond cords. The fish is cast violently on the rock, and a 

 war-whoop thrills the air. Almost instantly, a squaw, as 

 nude as the fisherman on the rocks, appears and gets the 

 Salmon. In a short time a fire is blazing in the rancherie. 

 The Salmon is split in two, and on a hoop is roasting before 

 the fire. By the time the Salmon is cooked, the fisherman 

 may have a hundred lying on the rock. He then shoulders his 

 net, and returns to the rancherie, having all the fish that can 

 be cured that day. After disposing of the cooked Salmon, 

 he curls himself up under the shade of some rock, and sleeps 

 away the greater part of the day. When he dies, a great 

 wooden Salmon is erected on a pole over the place where he 

 sleeps in the Memaloose house. May he never be resurrected! 



The squaw, when she finishes eating the fragments of 

 Salmon that her lord has left, proceeds to the rock and carries 

 the fish to the rancherie. She then cleans and splits them 

 and hangs them on the rafters. The eggs are thrown into a 

 hole in the corner of the rancherie. When they ripen to a 

 peculiar degree of nastiness, they are bailed out and molded 

 in a press into blocks, dried, and kept to be the food of 

 Tyees, on occasions of great state. The Salmon are smoked 

 on the rafters, then taken down, baled, and then hoisted up 

 into Salmon-houses, that are built high up in the branches of 

 trees. In former days, if any of these Indians offended an 

 officer of the Bay Company, he would find out the location 

 of their Salmon houses, and would send a missionary, armed 

 with a pair of telegraph-climbers and some arsenic, who 

 would investigate the contents of the bales. It is enough to 



