92 CRUISINGS IN THE CASCADES 



measured one of these cedar canoes that was thirty- 

 four feet long and five and a half feet beam, and was 

 told by its owner that he had carried in it four tons 

 of freight on one trip, and two cords of green wood 

 on another. It would carry fifty men comfortably 

 and safely. There are not many of the Indians that 

 can make the larger and better grade of canoes, and 

 the trade is one that but few master. 



There is one famous old canoe builder near Van- 

 couver, to whom Indians go from distances of a 

 hundred miles or more when they want an extra 

 fine, large, light canoe. For some specimens of his 

 handiwork he gets as high as $80 to $100. The In- 

 dians throughout Washington Territory and British 

 Columbia do considerable freighting for whites, on 

 streams not navigable for steamers, and they take 

 freight up over some of the rapids where no white 

 man could run an empty canoe. 



Some of these Flatheads are industrious and are 

 employed by the whites in salmon canneries, lum- 

 bering and logging operations, farming, etc. Steam- 

 boat men employ them almost exclusively for deck 

 hands, and they make the best ones to be had in the 

 country; better than either whites or Chinamen. 

 They are excellent packers by education. In this 

 densely-timbered country horses can not, as a rule, 

 be used for packing, and the Indians, in going across 

 country where there is no watercourse, pack all 

 their plunder on their backs. Whites traveling in 

 the woods also depend on Indians to pack their lug- 

 gage; consequently it is not strange that the latter 

 become experts at the business, and it is this 

 schooling that makes them valuable as deck hands. 



