THE KWAKIUTL INDIANS. 425 



The following" very cliaracteristic descriptioihs were given to Mr. 

 George Hunt in the summer of 1895. He tells them as follows : 



I was walking on the street of the Nimkish village when I saw 

 He'x'hak'En, who was sitting on his summer seat. He called me and 

 said: "O, my dear! Your days, young men, are good. But our past 

 ways'^^"ere evil when we were all at w^ar against each other. I mean 

 you have no troul)le nowadays. I was three times pursued by north- 

 ern Indians at the time when we were still naked." Then I asked 

 He'x'hak'En, "Where did this happen"?" And he said, "At Ga'wide. 

 We were in two canoes harpooning porpoises. I was in the one, my 

 friend, NEmoXtsaXqo'lag-ilis, was in the other one. I had killed two 

 porpoises. When it got day, I saw four canoes, and I told my friend. 

 He said to me: 'I will go to the island Ga/wide'; and I said, 'I will 

 go to O'gwamalis. Take good care of yourself. Good bye.' Then I 

 paddled away. My canoe was flying like a bird. Two of the canoes 

 pursued me, but they could not overtake me. Then I looked back and 

 I saw that they could not catch up with my friend, who had nearly 

 arrived at Ga'wide. Then I watched them and I saw how the warriors 

 were looking for my friend. It grew night and I felt badly, for I saw 

 that the warriors had a fire on the beach. I asked my steersman : 

 'What do you think? Sliall we look after my friend and see if they 

 have enslaved him!' He agreed, and we paddled to the island. When 

 we arrived there, I took my gun and went ashore. I went to where the 

 fire was burning on the beach and saw that the w^arriors had unloaded 

 their canoes. I said to my companion: 'Take care, my dear, I am 

 going to shoot them.' We hauled up our canoe and hid. As soon as 

 we reached there, we sat down close to them. They were eating. 

 There were five men in line from my seat and my friend said that there 

 were three in line from his seat. We put thirty balls of buckshot 

 each in our guns and fired both at the same time. I had killed three 

 and wounded the two others. My friend had killed two and wounded 

 the third man. And I saw two more men running away. Then we 

 ran to the wounded ones and killed them. One man and four women 

 we took alive and made them our slaves. We took the property of the 

 northern people. I looked into a large box, and when I opened it I saw 

 much red cedar bark and abalone shells which were attached to it, and 

 whistles of a ha'mats'a. I asked one of the women: 'What is that in 

 this box?' She only replied: 'Horn, horn, hum, hom, hdm, ham, ham, 

 ham, hn, hu,' and she bit her own arm. Then I knew that one of these 

 men whom we shot had been a ha/mats'a. I cried ha,p right away. 

 There were also two coppers in the bottom of that box. Then we came 

 here to Alert Bay in the canoe of the dead men. Here we were met by 

 our tribe, the Nimkish. We were invited at once by Chief Koax'ila- 

 no'kumO, together with our slaves. He gave us dried halibut to eat. 

 As soon as we had eaten, the chief spoke and said: 'My dear, tell us 

 where did you get these women?' Then I spoke to him and told what 



