Then all signed the treaty, and at a signal a salute was fired from the steamer in honor of the event.
Some hostile feelings having previously existed between the tribes, Governor Stevens now declared that they must drop them forever, and that their hearts towards each other should be good as well as towards the whites. Accordingly the three head chiefs, in behalf of their people, then shook hands. Then the presents were distributed to them. In the afternoon the party reëmbarked, Mr. Mason returning to Olympia on the steamer, and Governor Stevens with the remainder proceeding to Port Townsend in the schooner, on his way to Cape Flattery, the next point of meeting.
The tribes mentioned in the treaty as parties thereto are the Skokomish, To-an-hooch, Chem-a-cum, and S’Klallam, and the sub-bands of the last, viz., Kah-tie, Squah-quaihtl, Tch-queen, Ste-teht-lum, Tsohkw, Yennis, Elh-wa, Pishtst, Hun-nint, Klat-la-wash, and O-ke-ho, occupying lands on the Strait of Fuca and Hood’s Canal.
A reservation was set off at the mouth of the Skokomish River, of 3840 acres. $60,000 in the usual annuities, and $6000 for the improvement of the reservation, were provided, and the other provisions were the same as in the Tulalip and She-nah-nam Creek treaties. This treaty was witnessed by the same gentlemen who witnessed the preceding.
COUNCIL OF NEAH BAY, AND MAKAH TREATY.
From Port Townsend the schooner sped rapidly down the Strait of Fuca, running one hundred and twenty miles in two days,—no holiday voyage, in a small vessel in midwinter, along that exposed and shelterless coast,—and reached Neah Bay on the evening of the 28th. At this point, just inside Cape Flattery, the Makah Indians had their principal village. Messengers were immediately dispatched to call in the Indians of the other Makah villages, and of tribes farther south on the coast. The tents, goods, and men were landed on the 29th, and camp established. The following day the governor, accompanied by Mr. Gibbs, crossed the Cape Flattery peninsula to the Pacific coast, and examined the country for the purpose of selecting a suitable reservation. In the evening he called a meeting of the Makah chiefs on board the schooner, the other villages having come in during the day, and explained the principal features of the proposed treaty. The Great Father had sent him here to watch over the Indians. He had talked with the other tribes on the Sound, and they had promised to be good friends with their neighbors, and he had now come to talk with the Makahs. When he had done here, he was going to the Indians down the coast, and would make them friends to the Makahs. He had treated with the other Sound Indians for their lands, setting aside reserves for them, giving them a school, farmer, physician, etc., etc. When he concluded, Kal-chote, a Makah chief, spoke: “Before the big chiefs Klehsitt, the White Chief, Yall-a-coon or Flattery Jack, and Heh-iks died, he was not the head chief himself, he was only the small chief, but though there were many Indians then, he was not the least of them. He knew the country all around, and therefore he had a right to speak. He thought he ought to have the right to fish, and take whales, and get food where he liked. He was afraid that if he could not take halibut where he wanted, he would become poor.”
Keh-tchook, of the stone house: “What Kal-chote had said was his wish. He did not want to leave the salt water.”
Governor Stevens informed them that, so far from wishing to stop their fisheries, he wished to send them oil-kettles and fishing apparatus.
Klah-pr-at-loo: “He was willing to sell his land. All he wanted was the right of fishing.”
Tse-kan-wootl: “He wanted the sea. That was his country. If whales were killed and floated ashore, he wanted, for his people, the exclusive right of taking them, and if their slaves ran away, he wanted to get them back.”