292 EEPOKT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1888. 



line. The hooks are somewhat on the pattern of those just described, 

 but no pegs are used. Fig. 141 represents an Indian trawl line for the 

 ocean fisheries of the northwest coast. The ground-line is made of 

 cedar roots, the snoods or gaugings of whalebone and cedar, and the 

 hooks of steamed and bent cedar wood, with barbs of iron. Except in 

 the use of an iron barb the whole device is a very primitive pattern. 



It should be noted here, however, that the use of whalebone is found 

 extensively amongst the southern coast Indians (especially of Vancou- 

 ver Islands), and the Kenai, Aleut, and Eskimo, but rarely amongst 

 the Tliugit, Haida, and Tsimshian. For superstitious leasons the whale 

 has never been hunted in this last named locality, and the eating of 

 whale's blubber has been prohibited to them by tradition and custom. 

 Where whalebone is found in use amongst them it has reached them 

 in the way of trade from the north or south. 



Fish-rake. — A rake consisting of a long thin lath with sharp spikes of 

 bone, copper, or iron on one edge, like a comb, as shown in Fig. 139, 

 Plate XXIX, is used in herring and eulachon fishing. With these in- 

 struments the Indians beat the surface of the water, during the "run" 

 of these fish in enormous shoals, seldom failing to bring uj) two or three 

 at a time, transfixed on the sharp teeth. 



FisJi-haskets. — These differ little from the open mesh type of basket 

 hereafter described. They are used for dipping out fish during the 

 " runs" and in this sense are simply dip-nets. 



Fishing-lines . — These are either made from the stems of the giant 

 kelp, which grows so abundantly on the coast, or from vegetable fiber, 

 such as bark, spruce, and cedar roots, etc. Sinew and whalebone are 

 little used amongst the northern coast Indians. The vegetable fiber is 

 neatly twisted into two or three strand cord, as shown in Fig. 144, Plate 

 XXX, although sometimes plaited with threads of wild hemp or shredded 

 sea-weed. The stems of the giant kelp are cured in the smoke or sun 

 and simply knotted together, the usual knot being that shown in detail 

 in Fig 143, Plate xxx. This kelp grows in from 3 to 30 fathoms, or 

 deeper. At the root it is about one-fourth inch in diameter, and 

 solid, expanding upwards and becoming hollow about half way up. 

 Its upper end is surmounted by a large hollow bulb, from which floats 

 long, streamer-like, or lanceolate leaves. These are great rock or shoal 

 indicators, and are invaluable " notices to mariners." Judge Swan says : 

 " The Indians cut these stems close to the bottom with a simple instru- 

 ment formed of a V-shaped branch, across the smaller portion of which 

 a knife blade is secured ; this is lowered over a kelp plant in 20 or 30 

 iiathoms, and the stem easily cut off by a sudden pull of the line at- 

 tached to the cutter." The solid stems are used for fishing-lines and 

 the bulbs for oil bottles, both being cured by soaking in fresh water 

 and drying in the smoke or sun. The smoke-dried lines are black, and 

 the sun-dried of a light yellow or neutral color. It should be noted 

 here that the Yakutat and other Tlingit of the extreme North have 



