476 Wampum and its History. (May, | 
At this time and later, wampum was valued both as ornament 
and money by the Canadian Indians. Kalm saw it among the 
Hurons and also below Quebec. So slow, in fact, were the red- 
men to relinquish this currency, that wampum continued to be 
fabricated until within fifty years in several towns of New York 
State (chiefly at Babylon, Long Island) to meet the demand for it 
by western fur-traders. Glass beads were substituted at a very 
early day, but although they were acceptable to the savages every- 
where as a trimming, they never acquired the significance and 
circulation as money, enjoyed by the genuine beads of shell. 
v4 
Though with the tribes of the central region of North America, — 
commercial transactions were all a matter of barter, and the : 
standard of value, if any existed, varied with the especial local ; 
. commodity, like buffalo-robes on the plains, blankets among the 
Navajoes and Puebloans, or otter-skins in Alaska, yet the coast 
tribes of the Pacific had a true money when white men first bè- 
came acquainted with them. 
This currency seems to have been confined nearly or por ) 
within the present boundaries of the United States and British 
Columbia, and it comprised a variety of forms, one of which in 
the northern and another sort in the southern part of this area 
approached in solid and widely recognized value the substantial | 
wampum. : 
The northern and most celebrated of these varieties was the 
hiqua, hikwa, hiaqua or iogua—for all these forms of the Chinook 
jargon word are found. Agua consisted of string 
of a mollusk (Dentalium) called by conchologists 
S of the shell 
“ tusk-shells. , 
‘These were gathered off the shores of Vancouver's and QU 
Charlotte’s islands by prodding into the sea-bott 
pole with a spiked board at the end, upon the point 
the slender shells were caught. None were quite two 
length, many much smaller ; and among all the Indians nO 
om 4 long : 
inches it 
rth of 
the Columbia river, the unit of measurement was a string a a | 
a fathom’s length, or as much as could be stretched betwee™ = 
extended hands of the owner. The larger the ot Er oa 
their value; forty to the fathom was the standar i 
fathom being worth scarcely half so much. Early in the 
century a fathom was worth ten beaver-skins 
whites in Oregon. With the advent of the Hudson Bay 
pany’s traders, the %igua disappeared to a great extent, 
in dealing "a pi | 
