CHAPTER XXX
THE MAKAH TRIBE
In the extreme northwestern portion of the United States outside of Alaska, around and about the base of that sightly headland Cape Flattery, where it has been said in a spirit of half jest, but worth taking most seriously, that never a day in the year passes without rain, dwells a small nation of men and women who will go down in history, in song and story perhaps, as a happy, contented people; a people doubly fortunate in the possession of a unique territory abounding with fruits of land and sea. Back of them are the mountains, their front door yard the rollicking, boundless expanse of frothy ocean; fish in the one, fowl and meat in the other. Under their feet are the white sands of the ocean beach, and over them seems continually to watch a most magnanimous providence. These people are the Makah Indians, robust, ruddy, big brothers and big sisters, whose other branch of the family undoubtedly exists on the further side of the Straits of Juan de Fuca, so much do the general characteristics of the one with the other seem to run together.
The Makah Indians are many generations advanced in civilization to that of some of the Sound tribes. Why this is so is—because it is so. They have enjoyed no greater privileges than other tribes. They are in fact further removed than most tribes from civilizing influences that have prevailed in the last generation. Perchance in this very fact lies their present condition. Association with whites generally brings the worst of moral results for the Indians whenever the Indian is permitted to be his own or his brother’s keeper to any great extent. He readily succumbs to the vices of the white man, but removed from these associations for the greater part of his time and under the guidance of a conscientious agent, the Indian should advance morally and mentally. The infusion of a great deal of white blood into the tribe of the Makah (for some of the earliest settlers went to the Straits to settle) has had a good effect. At present the leading men are largely half-breeds who have been to school and look very intelligent fellows. They are lively and smart in business. They know how to hunt and they know how to fish as no other Washington tribe does. In fact, since the issuance of the decree of pelagic sealing the Indian seal hunters of Neah Bay carry the palm of greatest success in that line. They own schooners but they are not sailors. Somehow the proprietorship of several well known sealing vessels has come to them without any effort on their part; it was something of a parental care on the part of a thoughtful government, and although the average Indian found on board does not know a rat line from a marlin spike they go to sea nevertheless, are blown out and blown in and always bring home seals. When off on long voyages they are usually accompanied by white men with more or less knowledge of sealing and navigation and are not so much at the mercy of their own ignorance of those things. When it comes down to hunting seal or fishing off the coast within sight of land, the Makah asks nothing better than his stout, roomy cedar canoe. He will chase a whale too, as quickly as he will a seal. They are great sea rovers, are the buccaneers of the northwest, and will start off on a three hundred mile voyage in light canoes, down the coast or up the Straits and Sound, with no more serious consideration than if they were going only as far as the nearest bight or inlet. They are a whole community of fishermen, industrious but not frugal. Without money they are contented, with money the reverse. An Indian knows nothing of the value of money beyond the spending of it. The first thing the Indians do after a successful sealing voyage or a trip to the hop fields where men, women and children unite in gathering the hops, is to repair to the cities and larger towns on the Sound and expend the proceeds in a thousand and one gaudy and useless articles that please the passing fancy of the native. They have however been taught to provide themselves with provisions and manufactured goods for household use, and there are some very comfortable homes upon the reservation.
Judge James G. Swan, of Port Townsend, who is a recognized authority on the Cape Indians recently wrote a very interesting chapter on the Makah Indians which appeared in the Post-Intelligencer, of Seattle, and is partially as follows:
“From Neah Bay to the Pacific coast in a southwest direction is a prairie through which runs a creek which empties into the Pacific ocean at the Indian village Wa-atch, four miles distant from Neah Bay. A few miles south of Wa-atch is another village called Tsoo-ess, and south of this is another village called Ho-sett or Osette. These three villages with the village at Neah Bay constitute the winter residences of the Makah tribe of Indians. During the summer months they move to villages nearer Cape Flattery, one of which is at Kiddecubbut, a few miles west of Neah Bay, another is on Tatoosh island, and a third at Archawat, on the coast near Wa-atch, so as to be near the halibut banks, the whaling grounds and the fine seal fishing. In 1859, when I first visited Neah Bay, the Makah tribe numbered 820 persons, 220 of whom were strong men or ‘braves,’ and the remainder women, children and slaves. Their means of subsistence were almost entirely drawn from the ocean, and at that time their principal food was dried halibut, dried whale blubber and oil, salmon, true cod, Gadus morhua, cultus cod, Ophiodon elongatus, black cod or beshow, Anoplopoma fimbria, with various other kinds of smaller fish, and shell fish of different kinds, such as mussels, crabs, clams, cockles, limpets, sea slugs and snales, octopus, squid and barnacles. Of late years they have accustomed themselves to some of the white man’s food, such as flour, hard bread, rice, beans and potatoes, and, like other Indians, are very fond of molasses or syrup, which they eat with their bread and rice; but all their other food is usually greased with a plentiful supply of whale oil. I have frequently eaten with them, and must confess that dried halibut dipped in fresh sweet whale oil is not an objectionable repast to a hungry man.
“The whale blubber is cut in strips, then boiled to extract the oil which is carefully skimmed off, and after being boiled again to expel the moisture, is put into receptacles for use as food. The blubber after being boiled is hung up in the smoke and dried and looks like bacon.
“The halibut is cut into thin flakes, which are dried in the sun without salt, and when well cured is nice, either eaten dry, dipped in whale oil or simply boiled or toasted before the fire.
“The Makahs are particularly dextrous in handling their canoes, and proceed in them fearlessly many miles from land in pursuit of whales or seals, or for fishing on the halibut banks fifteen miles northwest from the Cape. Their canoes are beautifully modeled, resembling our finest clipper ships. They are formed from a single log of cedar, carved out with skill and elegance. The best canoes are made by the Clayoquot and Nittinat tribes on Vancouver island, B. C., who sell them to the Makahs, but few being made by the latter tribe, owing to the scarcity of cedar in their vicinity.