RIVER AND SEA CANOEIXGK 167 



forest fires in partially inhabited districts are more serious, or when near trails or roads. 

 In the long summer of Vancouver Island, where rain, as in California, is almost unknown, 

 these fires, once started, may burn for weeks ay, months. 



The Indians of this part of the coast, of dozens of petty tribes, all speaking different 

 languages, or, at all events, varied dialects, are not usually prepossessing in appearance, but 

 the male half-breeds are often fine-looking fellows, and the girls pretty. The sailor will 

 be interested in their cedar canoes, which on Vancouver Island are beautifully modelled. A 

 first-class clipper has not more graceful lines. They are always cut from one log, and are 

 finely and smoothly finished, being usually painted black outside, and finished with 

 red ornamental work within. They are very light and buoyant, and will carry great 

 weights ; but one must be careful to avoid rocks on the coast, or " snags " in the 

 rivers, for any sudden concussion will split them all to pieces. When on the 

 Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition, a party of men found themselves suddenly 

 deposited in a swift -running stream, from the canoe having almost parted in half, 

 after touching on a sunken rock or log. All got to shore safely, and it took 

 about half a day of patching and caulking to make her sufficiently river-worthy 

 (why not say " river- worthy " as well as " sea-worthy ? ") to enable them to reach 

 camp. The writer, in 1864, came down from the extreme end of Bute Inlet an 

 arm of the sea on the mainland of British Columbia across the Gulf of Georgia (twenty 

 miles of open sea), coasting southwards to Victoria, V.I., the total voyage being 180 

 miles, in an open cedar canoe, only large enough for four or five people. The trip occupied 

 five days. But while there is some risk in such an undertaking, there is little in a 

 voyage in the great Haidah canoes of Queen Charlotte's Island (north of Vancouver Island). 

 These canoes are often eighty feet long, but are still always made from a single log, the 

 splendid pines of that coast* affording ample opportunity. They have masts, and carry 

 as much sail as a schooner, while they can be propelled by, say, forty or fifty paddles, 

 half on either side, wielded by as many pairs of brawny arms. The savage Haidahs are 

 a powerful race, of whom not much is known. They, however, often come to Victoria, or 

 the American ports on Puget Sound, for purposes of trading. 



" How/' it might be asked, " does the trade communicate with so many varieties of 

 natives, all speaking different tongues ? " The answer is that there is a jargon, a kind of 

 " pigeon-English/' which is acquired, more or less, by almost all residents on the coast for 

 purposes of intercourse with their Indian servants or others. This is the Chinook jargon, a 

 mixture of Indian, English, and French the latter coming from the French Canadian 

 voyageurs, often to be found in the employ of the Hudson's Bay Company, as they were 

 formerly in the defunct North- West Company. Some of the words used have curious 

 origins. Thus, an Englishman is a " King-George-man/' because the first explorers, Cook, 

 Vancouver, and others, arrived there during the Georgian era. An American is a 

 " Boston-man/' because the first ships from the United States which visited that coast 



* Douglas pines Lave been measured in British Columbia which were forty-eight feet ill circumference at their 

 base, and therefore about sixteen feet through. These magnificent trees are only second in size to the "Big 

 Trees" of California. 



