APPENDIX. 489 



living by the chase have always been more warlike and hardy 

 than their fish-eating relatives of the west, and, having had 

 less intercourse with the whites, have suflered less in numbers, 

 in health, in morals, and in their ancient customs, languages, 

 and tribal distinctions. The principal tribes in the eastern 

 part of the Territory are the Nez Perces, Snakes, Yakimas, 

 Pelouses, Klickatats, Bannacks (Pannacks, Bawnacks, Bonacks, 

 or Bonnacks, as their name is variously spelled), Wenatches, 

 Okinagans, Snakes or Shoshonees, Spokanes, Pend d'Oreilles, 

 and Coeur d'Alenes. The Nez Perces and some of the Spo- 

 kane Indians near Colville have permanent dwellings — cabins 

 or lodges made of skins— and cultivate large fields of grain. 

 All the tribes have firearms and horses, some of them large 

 herds. Hereditary slavery is common among the Indians in 

 the western district, and the proximity of the white men does 

 not seem to have much efiect upon it, otherwise than by de- 

 creasing the number of both masters and slaves. It is the 

 custom among most of the tribes owning slaves to flatten the 

 heads of the freemen as a sign of their honorable social posi- 

 tion ; and an Indian with a round head is looked upon as an 

 ill-favored fellow, and considered a slave or a freedman. The 

 great chiefs have often two or three wives. Polygamy and 

 slavery also prevail among many of the tribes in the basin of 

 the Columbia. — It is supposed that the first white man who 

 saw the land of what is now Washington Territory was a 

 Greek, called Juan de Fuca (though that was not his baptismal 

 name), in 1592. He was in charge of a Spanish vessel sent 

 out to fortify the supposititious strait of Anian, to prevent the 

 English from passing through it from the Atlantic to the 

 Pacific. Fuca reported having found a Strait between latitude 

 47° and 48°, but he made no fortifications. This was just 

 after the English cast off the Roman Catholic faith, declared 

 the grants of possessions in the 'New World to be void, and 

 aspired to an equal share with Spain in the trade and domain 

 of the newly discovered lands and seas. It was nearly two 

 hundred years before Washington was seen again. In 1775, 

 21* 



