294 ACCOUNT OF THE INDIANS. 



Toward the middle of April, and sometimes 

 sooner, they leave their villages, to go and pass 

 about two months at the small lakes, from which, 

 at that season, they take white fish, trout, carp, 

 &c. in considerable numbers. But when these be- 

 gin to fail, they return to their villages, and sub- 

 sist on the small fish, which they dried when at 

 the lakes, or on salmon, should they have been so 

 provident as to have kept any until that late sea- 

 son ; or they eat herbs, the inner bark or sap of 

 the cypress tree, berries, &c. At this season, few 

 fish of any kind, are to be taken out of the lakes 

 or rivers of New Caledonia. In this manner the 

 Natives barely subsist, until about the middle 

 of August, when salmon again begin to make 

 their appearance, in all the rivers of any consid- 

 erable magnitude ; and they have them at most 

 of their villages in plenty, until the latter end 

 of September, or the beginning of October. For 

 about a month, they come up in crowds ; and 

 the noses of some of them are either worn or 

 rotten off, and the eyes of others have perished 

 in their heads ; and yet, in this maimed condition, 

 they are surprisingly alert, in coming up the rap- 

 ids. These maimed fishes are generally at the 

 head of large bands, on account of which, the 

 Natives call them Mi-u-ties, or Chiefs. The In- 

 dians say that they have suffered these disas- 



