296 VOYAGE IN A CANOE FROM FORT OWEN TO VANCOUVER. 



generally extend over a tract of country of more than one hundred miles square. The journeys 

 are performed with horses and canoes. Many individuals of the nation prefer to use canoes 

 entirely ; these are made of the inner thin bark of the white pine, spread over red-cedar hoops, 

 sewed with spruce roois, in the manner of the birch canoes of the Chippewas and other eastern 

 Indians. The white-pine bark is a very good substitute for birch, but has the disadvantage of 

 being more brittle in cold weather. These canoes are also shaped somewhat differently, not 

 being turned up at the ends like those of the Chippewas. 



Just above Lake Pend d Oreille the Clark river divides into three streams, which again unite, 

 thus forming two or three large islands. One of these streams is wide, shallow, and swift. Here 

 the Indians annually construct a fence, which reaches across the stream, and guides the fish into 

 a wier or rack, where they are caught in great numbers. To the natives this is a place of great 

 resort. To Lake Rootham, long celebrated for the superior quality and vast numbers ot its 

 beaver, they go to catch the latter animal and to hunt deer. To other places they go to hunt deer 

 alone; to others to cut flag and rushes lor mats, and still again to others to hunt bear. The old 

 method of cooking fish in bowls of wicker or basket work, heating the water by hot stones, is 

 still occasionally practised; although the operation is not very cleanly, it is still very rapid, and 

 the fish thus cooked have an excellent flavor. In summer the Indians live principally on fish, 

 which they catch not only by wiers and fish-traps, but by the hook and line and by spearing. 

 They also collect camas and bitter roots, and a berry, called in some of the eastern States the 

 sugar-berry or sugar-pear. These they dry separately, and also in cakes, with moss, for winter 

 use. This food affords nourishment merely sufficient to sustain life. In the autumn, in addition 

 to hunting venison and bear, they dry meat and fish for winter use. When the severe cold 

 weather has fairly set in, the whole band moves to some noted venison hunting-ground, where 

 during the heavy snows the deer cannot escape, and are readily pursued and killfed with clubs. 



They hunt over the whole section so thoroughly as entirely to exterminate these animals 

 in that locality, leaving none to breed. In this way they have destroyed the deer entirely 

 in all but two or three places. To each of them they will proceed during the coming and one 

 or two subsequent winters ; the deer will then all be destroyed, leaving the inhabitants no 

 dependence, unless by that time they shall have sufficient land under cultivation to support 

 them ; otherwise, there will be a great deal of suffering among these people. Last winter 

 they killed eight hundred deer ; these were but just sufficient for their wants. The Indians 

 say that in old times there were but very few deer ; latterly they became much m &amp;gt;re plenti 

 ful. About six years ago there was a very severe winter and a very heavy fall of snow. The 

 Indians wantonly slaughtered many thousands of these animals, most of which were so poor 

 as almost to be reduced to skin and bone, and for the most part unfit for food. The same winter 

 many deer died from cold and starvation. As the deer are easily killed during a heavy fall of 

 snow, the Indians are in the habit of praying for the latter as a great blessing. The following 

 is a short account of the operations of the missionaries : They came among these Indians about nine 

 years ago, and found them to be a poor, miserable, half-starved race, with an insufficiency of food 

 and nearly naked, living upon fish, camas and other roots, and, at the last extremity, upon the 

 pine-tree moss. They (the Indians) were in utter misery and want in want of every/ king. Their 

 whole lime was occupied in providing for their bellies, which were rarely full. They were of a 

 peaceable disposition, brave, good-tempered, and willing to work. Of spiritual things they were 

 utterly ignorant. Unlike the Indians east of the mountains, they had no idea of a future state or 

 of a Great Spirit; neither had they any idea of a soul. In fact, they had not words in their 

 language to express such ideas. They considered themselves to be animals nearly allied to the 

 beaver, but greater than the beaver and why? Because, they said, &quot; the be.iver builds houses 

 like us, and he is very cunning, to ) ; but we can catch the beaver, and he cannot catch us 

 therefore we are greater than he.&quot; They thought when they died that was the last of them. 

 While thus ignorant, it was riot uncommon for them to bury the very old and very young alive, 



