X. 



VICES AND DEMORALIZATION OF THE INDIANS— GAMBLING — RUM— 

 TOBA ceo— IMMORALITY. 



Before the advent of the whites gambling, immorality, and the use of 

 tobacco, although not unknown, were at least not such pronounced 

 vices as they have come to be under the stimulus of contact with civil- 

 ization. The use of liquor was, however, quite unknown. Langsdorff, 

 who was at Sitka in 1805, says of the Tlingit: "Brandy, which is some- 

 times offered them by the Russians, they reject as a scandalous liquor, 

 depriving them of their senses." * It would hav« been of great advan- 

 tage to them if they had continued to so regard it. Unfortunately the 

 example of the whites and the deliberate corruption of the Indians by 

 unscrupulous traders have made fchem in recent years only too well 

 acquainted with the evils of rum drinking. Just now they are begin- 

 ning to rally from the demoralization due to contact with the whites 

 and to adjust themselves philosophically to their changed environ- 

 ment. The former custom of chewing tobacco, in vogue from the earliest 

 times, has now given way almost entirely to that of smoking the weed 

 which they buy from the traders. In Chapter viii, " Rearing and Cul- 

 tivation," the production and preparation of the native tobacco has 

 been fully described. Although in one sense a vice, the use of tobacco 

 can hardly be said to have contributed much to the real demoralization 

 of the Indians. 



GAMBLINa. 



The Haida, Tsimshian, and Tlingit are inveterate gamblers. Dur- 

 ing the winter leisure or whenever, for any reason, they are gathered 

 together in considerable numbers, gambling is the invariable and con- 

 stant amusement, often continuing for several days on a stretch with- 

 out rest or intermission. These bouts are usually conducted on the 

 platform in front of the houses in good weather, but indoors in bad. 

 The gamblers sit on the ground or squat about the platform in a circle, 

 in the centre of which a clean mat of the inner bark of the cedar is 

 spread. Each man produces a bag containing from thirty to fifty round 

 sticks or pins about 5 inches long by three-eighths or one-half of an 

 inch in diameter, and beautifully polished and carved in totemic design 

 or painted in black, blue, and red rings. One of the players, selecting 

 a number of these pins from his bag, covers them up in a heap of finely 



* Langsdorff, Voyages, pt. ii, p. 131. 



