John Keast Lord

“ One may journey a long way to witness a prettier or more picturesque sight than Round-fish harvesting on the Sumass prairie: the prairie bright and lovely; the grass fresh, green, and waving lazily; various wild flowers, peeping coyly out from their cosy hiding-places, seem making the most of the summer; a fresh, joyous hilarity everywhere, pervading even the Indians, whose lodges in great numbers lie scattered about. From the edges of the pine-forest, where the little streams came out from the dark shadow into the sunshine, up to the lake, the prairie was like a fair. Indians, old and young ”

“ Often tempted to wander and make excursions beyond the gateway of their rocky home, they are at once spied by predatory piratical salmon; seeking safety in flight, they dash headlong for their hiding-place, hotly pursued by their dreaded foe, and shooting easily through the cordy snare, laugh to see Master Salmon ‘run his head into the net;’ bob-bob go the floats beneath the surface, up paddles redskin, hauls up his net, clutches the silvery pirate, and with a short heavy club gives him a blow on the head, drops him into the canoe, lets go his net, and waits for the next. ”

“ Before me, stretching away for about three miles, is an open grassy prairie, one side of which is bounded by the Chilukweyuk river, the other by the Fraser. At the junction of the two streams, at an angle of the prairie, stands an Indian village: the rude-plank sheds and rush-lodges; the white smoke, curling gracefully up through the still atmosphere from many lodge-fires; the dusky forms of the savages, as they loll or stroll in the fitful night, give life and character to a scene indescribably lovely. ”

“ One would never imagine a fish clad in stiff unyielding armour could ascend rapid torrents and leap falls that puzzle even the lissom salmon but the strength of the sturgeon is immense, and the power it can exert with the tail would be almost incredible to those, who have never seen the rapid twists, plunges, and other performances this fish goes through, when it has a barbed hook in the jaws, or a spear between the joints of its mail. ”

“ I do not think, in its native element, an octopus often catches prey on the ground or on the rocks, but waits for them just as the spider does, only the octopus converts itself into a web, and a fearful web too. Fastening one arm to a stout stalk, stiffening out the other seven, one would hardly know it from the wrack amongst which it is concealed. Patiently he bides his time, until presently a shoal of fish come gaily on, threading their way through the sea-trees, joyously happy, and little dreaming that this lurking monster, so artfully concealed, is close at hand. ”

“ Gradually the sturgeon grows sulky and tired, obstinately floating on the surface. The savage knows he is not vanquished, but only biding a chance for revenge; so he shortens up the line, and gathers quietly on upon him, to get another spear in. It is done—and down viciously dives the sturgeon; but pain and weariness begin to tell, the struggles grow weaker and weaker, as life ebbs slowly away, until the mighty armour-plated monarch of the river yields himself a captive to the dusky native in his frail canoe. ”

“ My crew were kilted with pieces of scarlet blanket. Imagine, if you can, a dark swarthy copper-coloured figure leaning on a canoe-paddle, his jet-black hair hanging down nearly to the middle of his back, the front hair being clipped close in a straight line across the forehead. Neither beard, whisker, nor moustache ever adorns the face of the redskin, the hair being tweezered out by squaws in early life, and thus destroyed. A line of vermilion extends from the centre of the forehead to the tip of the nose, and from this ‘trunk line’ others radiate over and under the eyes and across the cheeks. ”

“ The grass is kneedeep, and the chimps of buck-eye (Esculus flava) and handsome oaks besprinkling the rounded hills and banks of the clear stream winding its way past the village to the Bay of San Francisco, like a lake glistening in the distance, reminded me of a park in fertile Devonshire. Completely shut in, and sheltered from the wind that blows nearly all the summer, withering up the vegetation exposed to its influence, everything round about this favoured spot grows in wild luxuriance. ”

“ Garnering the herring-crop is the Coast Indian’s best ‘sea-harvest;’ lodges spring up like mushrooms along the edges of the bays and harbours; large fleets of canoes dot the water in every direction, their swarthy crews continually loading them with glittering fish; paddling ashore, they hand the cargo to the female part of the community, and then start again for a similar freight.
Indians have various plans for catching herrings. ”

“ Even in streams where a successful deposition of the ova has been accomplished, there never appears, as far as my observations have gone, any disposition in the parent-fish to return to the sea. Their instinct still prompts them to keep swimming up-stream, until you often find them with their noses worn quite off, their heads bruised and battered, fins and tail ragged and torn, bodies emaciated, thin, and flabby; the bright silvery tints dull and leaden in hue, a livid red streak extending along each side from head to tail, in which large ulcerous sores have eaten into the very vitals. ”

“ Spending the greater part of its time buried about two feet deep, the long syphon, reaching to the surface, discovers its whereabouts, as the ebbing tide leaves the mud, by continually squirting up small jets of water, about six or eight inches high. The sand flats dry, out marches an army of squaws (Indian women) , as it is derogatory to the dignity of a man to dig clams. With only a small bit of skin or cedar-mat tied round the waist, the women tramp through the mud, a basket made from cedar-root in one hand, and in the other a bent stick about four feet long. ”

“ This eagle is by far the most abundant of the falcon tribe in British Columbia, and always a conspicuous object in ascending a river; he is seated on the loftiest tree or rocky pinnacle, and soars off circling round, screaming like a tortured demon, as if in remonstrance at such an impudent intrusion into its solitudes. ”

“ The smoke of my camp-fire has barely reached above the trees, when Indians are seen coming from all directions, some on horseback, others on foot; and canoes in fleets dot the lake, that stretches away until lost in the distance, like a fresh-water ocean. I feel very uneasy. The two Sis-ky-oues have gone, vanished mysteriously. Hastily collect dry wood and light a circle of fires, within which I enclose my mules. I am mobbed by ugly half-naked demons, who are evidently doubtful whether to be friends or foes. ”

“ In a canoe thus equipped, favourable fishing-grounds are sought, the Indian having the long spear being also provided with a small hollow cone of wood, trimmed round its greater circumference with small feathers, much like a shuttlecock; this he places on the end of the longer spear, and presses it under water, until down the full length of the handle; a skilful jerk detaches this conelike affair from the spear-haft, when it wriggles up through the water like a struggling fish. The savage with the short spear intently watches this deceiver; a salmon runs at it, and it is speared like magic. ”

“ The scenery is romantic and beautiful beyond description. Towering up into the very clouds,342 as a background, are the mighty hills of the Cascade range, their misty summits capped with perpetual snow—their craggy sides rent into chasms and ravines, whose depths and solitudes no man’s foot has ever trodden, and clad up to the very snow-line with mighty pine and cedar-trees. The Chilukweyuk river already referred to washes one side of the prairie. ”

“ There are no snug breeding-ponds, no cosy little aquariums or water-nurseries, where the baby-salmon may be watched and carefully tended until, honoured with a badge, it is sent away to travel through pelagic meadows, deep-sea forests, and ocean gardens, where, growing rapidly, bigger if not wiser, it returns to tell how long it has been away, and how rapidly it has grown. Assistance such as this falls not to the lot of the hunter-naturalist, who with prying eye peers, searches, and grubs about on the banks and into the depths of the lakes and mountain-torrents, in this far-western wilderness. ”

“ They were all male birds, and two species were plainly discernible. Chasing each other in sheer sport, with a rapidity of flight and intricacy of evolution impossible for the eye to follow—through the bushes, and over the water, everywhere—they darted about like meteors. Often meeting in mid-air, a furious battle would ensue; their tiny crests and throat-plumes erect and blazing, they were altogether pictures of the most violent passions. Then one would perch himself on a dead spray, and leisurely smooth his ruffled feathers, to be suddenly rushed at and assaulted by some quarrelsome comrade. ”

“ Like a skilful workman, he knows how to economise labour. Having to back the earth out of the mouth of the hole he is digging, the farther he gets in the harder grows the toil; and so he digs up through, and starts afresh. They seldom come out in the daytime, and I have but rarely heard them whistle until everything was still, and the twilight merged into night.
The female has from four to six young at a birth, and she has about two litters in a year. The nest for the young is much like that of the rabbit, made of grass and leaves, and placed at the end of a deep burrow. ”

“ There are many species frequenting the lakes and rivers of British Columbia, during the summer months, for the purpose of spawning. On their return to the sea, swarms of young bullheads, of various species, regularly follow the ebb and flow of the tide; and in rough weather every breaker, as it rushes up the shelving shingle, carries a freight of tiny fish, that are left struggling amid the pebbles in thousands, to be dragged back and floated out again by the succeeding wave, or to find a last home in the stomachs of the sea-birds. ”

“ At the mouth of the river, I saw the village of the Nimkish Indians, situated on a table-land overhanging the sea, and inaccessible save by ascending a vertical cliff of smooth rock—a feat nothing but a fly could manage, unaided; but the redskins have a ladder, made of cedar-bark rope, which they can haul up and lower at will. The ladder up, the place is impregnable. Safe themselves, they can quietly bowl over their enemies, and sink their canoes. ”

“ Standing at the ford, and looking straight up the valley, the scenery is wild and beautiful in the extreme; on either side sharp pinnacle-like rocks shoot up into all sorts of fantastic shapes, dotted with the sugar-pine, scrub-oak, and manzanita in front; and blocking up, as it were, the end of the valley, stood Mount Shasta, at this time covered to its base with snow. ”

“ During the time the Fraser and Columbia rivers are rising,—and the rise is very rapid, about thirty feet above the winter level, owing to the melting snow,—sturgeon are continually leaping. As you are paddling quietly along in a canoe, suddenly one of these monsters flings itself into the air many feet above the surface of the water, falling back again with a splash, as though a lit rock had been pitched into the river by some Titan hand. It appears to be only play, as they never leap for insect-food ”

“ I saw the bird, not only on this occasion but dozens of times afterwards, pick the insect from off the tree, often killing it in the act; and found the stomach, on being opened, filled with various species of winged insects.
The habits of the three species differ widely. The Red-backed Hummingbird loves to flit over the open prairies, stopping at every tempting flower, to catch some idler lurking in its nectar-cells. Building its nest generally in a low shrub, and close to the rippling stream, it finds pleasant music in its ceaseless splash. ”

“ In May and June this prairie is completely covered with water. The Sumass river, from the rapid rise of the Fraser, reverses its course, and flows back into the lake instead of out of it. The lake fills, overflows, and completely floods the lower lands. On the subsidence of the waters, we pitched our tents on the edge of a lovely stream. Wildfowl were in abundance; the streams were alive with fish; the mules and horses revelling in grass kneedeep—we were in a second Eden! ”

“ I had been for some time sitting on a log, admiring the sublime beauty of the scene, spread out before me like a gorgeous picture; the sun was fast receding behind the hilltops, the lengthening shadows were fading and growing dimly indistinct, the birds had settled down to sleep, and the busy hum of insect life was hushed. A deathlike quiet steals over everything in the wilderness as night comes on—a stillness that is painful from its intensity. ”

“ Close in their rear, as camp-followers hang on the skirts of an army, come shoals of dogfish, salmon, and fish-eating sea-birds.
I have often seen a shoal of herrings, when hotly pursued by the dogfish, dash into a little102 rock-bound nook, the water lashed into white spray by a thousand tails and fins, plied with all the power and energy the poor struggling fish could exert to escape the dreaded foe. A wall of rocks, right and left, ahead the shelving shingle—on they go, and hundreds lie high-and-dry, panting on the pebbles. ”