g THE HAIDAH INDIANS OF 



the edges to designate their value. The Haidahs, instead of disks, use sticks or 

 pieces of wood four or five inches long, and a quarter of an inch thick. These 

 sticks are rounded and beautifully polished. They are made of yew, and each 

 stick has some designating mark upon it. There is one stick entirely colored and 

 one entirely plain. Each player will have a bunch of forty or fifty of these sticks, 

 and each will select either of the plain sticks as his favorite, just as in backgammon 

 or checkers the players select the black or white pieces. The Indian about to 

 play, takes up a handful of these sticks, and, putting them under a quantity of 

 finely-separated cedar bark, which is as fine as tow and kept constantly near him, 

 lie divides the pins into two parcels which he wraps up in the bark and passes 

 them rapidly from hand to hand under the tow, and finally moves them round on 

 the ground or mat on which the players are always seated, still wrapped in the fine 

 bark, but not covered by the tow. His opponent watches every move that is made 

 from the very first with the eagerness of a cat, and finally, by a motion of his 

 finger, indicates which of the parcels the winning stick is in. The player, upon 

 such indication, shakes the sticks out of the bark, and with much display and skill 

 throws them one by one into the space between the players till the piece wanted 

 is reached, or else, if it is not there, to show that the game is his. The winner 

 takes one or more sticks from his opponent s pile, and the game is decided when 

 one wins all the sticks of the other. 



As neither of the players can see the assortment of the sticks, the game is as 

 fair for one as the other, and is as simple in reality as &quot;odd or even&quot; or any child s 

 game. But the ceremony of manipulation and sorting the sticks under the bark 

 tow gives the game an appearance of as much real importance as some of the skilful 

 combinations of white gamblers. 



The tribes north of Vancouver s Island, so far as my observation has extended, 

 use this style of sticks in gambling, while the Selish or Flat-heads use the disks. 

 Some persons have termed this game Odd and Even, and others have designated it 

 Jack Straws; but the game as played by the Haidahs is as I have described it. 



Kitkun, the chief whom I have alluded to, came to my office one day with one 

 of his tribe, and took quite an interest in explaining the game. The two men 

 played slowly at first, the Chief explaining as the game proceeded, till finally they 

 played with their usual earnestness and rapidity, and I found that the game, with 

 its accompaniment of singing and beating time, was quite as exciting and as inter 

 esting as any Indian game I ever witnessed. Sometimes the game is played 

 between only two persons, at other times a dozen may be seen seated on each side, 

 particularly when different bands meet. Then the excitement is intense, and the 

 game is kept up day and night without intermission, and some Indians lose every 

 thing they possess, and come out of the play stark naked and remain in a state of 

 nudity till some friend gives them a blanket or an old shirt. 



It is probable that the Haidahs have other gambling games, but I have seen 

 only this kind, and the game which Kitkun explained to me was played with a 

 hunch of sticks which I obtained in Sitka, showing that the northern tribes have 

 the same game with sticks, in common, as the Selish or Flat-head Indian tribes 

 have a common game with disks. 



