398 



WALLAWALLA. 



become quarrelsome and turbulent when they are provided with fire- 

 arms. On these trips they are accompanied by about thirty warriors, 

 well armed. 



The men are usually clothed in blanket coats ; but, notwithstanding 

 this slight approximation to civilized habits, they have the air of the 

 Indian, strongly marked, about them. 



MALE COSTUME. 



The number of Indians now collected was two hundred. The 

 women were employed in drying salmon and the cammass-root. Some 

 of them are employed in cooking, while others are engaged in dressing 

 skins. 



The mode of removing the hair from the skins, is with a round and 

 broad chisel, fixed on a handle, like an adze : the skin, while yet green, 

 is laid on a log or board, and the hair chopped off. The smoking 

 process differs from that already described, at the Cowlitz. A large 

 hole is dug in the ground, in which a fire is made ; the skin is sewed 

 on the inside of a bag, which is suspended immediately over the fire, 

 so that little of the smoke can escape, and the process goes on rapidly. 

 This process is necessary, otherwise it would, on becoming wet, and 

 drying afterwards, be hard and stiff. 



There were many children among these people. The young Indian 

 women as well as the wives of the Company's servants, who have 

 married half-breeds, invariably use a long board as a cradle, on which 

 .he child is strapped, and then hung up on a branch, or to the saddle. 



