INDIAN TRIBES OF WASHINGTON TERRITORY. 
411 
mg him boot. In conclusion, he added that the great white chief had instructed him, when he 
met with friendly chiefs among the Indians, to give them a present as coming from him. A quan¬ 
tity of Indian goods were thereupon given him. Kam-ai-ya-kan made a suitable reply, in which 
he referred to a subject previously mentioned by'Skloo—the negotiations of "white men pretend¬ 
ing to be chiefs, who were not, particularly in regard to the purchase of their lands. He had 
heard they would give a few presents, and then pretend they had purchased the land. Captain 
McClellan informed him who were the persons having the power to make these purchases, or 
to treat with them, with which he expressed himself satisfied. 
At Ketetas, on the main Yakima, we were visited by Ow-hai, one of the two principal chiefs 
of the northern band of this tribe. Ilis elder brother, Te-eh-yas, had gone to Puget sound, and 
we did not see him. Ow-hai appears to be forty-five or fifty years of age, and has a very pleasant 
face, with a high but retreating forehead, of which he is somewhat vain. In speaking of Kam ai- 
ya-kan, he remarked that he had a big head, and thought much; adding, as he touched his own, 
“ like myself.” 
He remained with us during our stay, and afterwards accompanied the party as far as the 
Pisquouse. In a talk with him the same information was communicated, in substance, as that 
given to Kam ai-ya-kan. This band trades much more with the Sound than Kam-ai-ya-kan’s, 
and is, therefore, better acquainted with trails; the one which proved on examination the best, 
leading directly up the river from our camp. After the usual custom of seeking wives in adjoin¬ 
ing tribes, they are much intermingled with the Snoqualme on the western side of the Cas¬ 
cades, as well as the Pisquouse to the northward. The latter, in fact, speak indifferently the 
Yakima and their own languages. We found the people here much better dressed than those 
below. The young men and women affected more of their native costume than the old. Ow- 
hai’s two sons, both tall, handsome men, had their blankets and dress profusely ornamented, and 
the wife of one of them, a very pretty woman, wore a dress stiff with bead-work and por¬ 
cupine quills. Ow-hai himself, on the other hand, appeared in a full American suit, and touched 
his hat by way of salutation—a compliment which he clearly expected to be noticed and 
returned. He, like Kam-ai-ya-kan, has adopted some of the forms of Catholicism, and professes 
to pray habitually, but there seemed to be a shadow of hypocrisy in his devotion. He is, how¬ 
ever, a man of very considerable understanding and policy, and inclined to profit by the example 
of the whites. 
On striking the Columbia after passing the mountains, between the Yakima country and the 
Pisquouse, Ow-hai pointed out to us one of the lions of the country, in the shape of two columns 
of sandstone standing together, but apart from the bluff, which was of similar material. These, 
he told us, were “ Ahn-cotte or, in the language of the fairy tales, “ once upon a time” two 
women of the race of “ Elip Tilicum,” who lived here, and were very bad, being in the habit of 
killing those who passed by, the Indians begged the Great Spirit to destroy them, and 
He granting their prayer, sent an enormous bird which picked out their brains, and then turned 
them into stone. In proof of which, the narrator pointed out a hole in the top of one of the 
columns, from which a boulder had fallen, as the aperture broken by the bird in extracting his 
meal. A short distance beyond, he turned a little off the trail to point out to us another curiosity. 
It was a perpendicular rock, on the face of which were carved sundry figures, most of them 
intended for men. They were slightly sunk into the sandstone and colored, some black, others 
red, and traces of paint remained more or less distinctly on all of them. These also, according 
to their report, were the work of the ancient race; but from the soft nature of the rock, and 
the freshness of some of the paint, they were probably not of extreme antiquity. 
Nothing could, in this connexion, be ascertained from the Indians, whether they had any tradi¬ 
tions of their own migration from another country. 
With the exception of the district occupied by the Flatbows and Kootenaies, the remaining 
country north of the forty-seventh parallel is occupied by different tribes of the iSelish or Flathead 
