BARBARIANS GOING TO WORK—HUMOR. 409 
though civilized men and women are apt to consider their prodigal hos- 
pitality as little better than sheer wastefulness All Indians are “cousins” 
when they come to a camp hungry. 
I have said that they are not tawdry in their dress. Young Indians 
who have mingled with the whites a few years show uniform good taste in 
their dress, especially in the northern counties; and even old Indians are 
never seen with those grotesque medleys of all conceivable objects, pepper- 
casters, patent-medicine labels, oyster-cans, and the like, heaped about 
their necks, such as may be seen in the interior of the continent. 
Mention was made above of their ready adaptation of themselves to 
the uses of civilization. Who would ever have seen an Algonkin brave 
offer to go to work for his conquerors? In 1850~51, before the Indians of 
the Sacramento Valley had any knowledge whatever of civilization, an 
adventurous pioneer went to the Upper Sacramento and commenced chop- 
ping wood on the banks, for which he received $16 a cord. Sometimes it 
was necessary to carry the wood a few rods to cord it up close to the water, 
and he had no trouble in getting Indians to do this work for him for a 
pittance of flour and bacon. The headman of the village, distinguished 
only by a feather or a green sprig in his hair, would lay three or four sticks 
on the back of each squaw or brave, to the number of thirty or forty, then 
take a stick himself, and with great importance and gravity march with 
the procession to the river. 
There are not lacking instances which show that the California Indians 
have a sense of humor that the grave, taciturn Iroquois did not possess. 
The Nishinam of Bear River have several cant or slang names for the 
Americans, which they use among themselves with great glee. One is the 
word boh, “road”, hence, perhaps, derivatively, “‘road-maker” or “roadster”, 
which they apply to us in a humorous sense, because we make so many 
roads, which to the light-footed Indians seem very absurd, indeed. Another 
is ka'-kim, ‘‘spirit”, which is given in compliment to the subtle and myste- 
rious power the American possesses of doing many things beyond their 
comprehension. Perhaps as common an appellation as any is chu'-pup, 
“red” or “red-faced”. Here we have a reversal of the traditional ‘“Pale- 
face” of the eastern dime-novel. _But.the most humorous name they give 
