[119] The E-cha-chets are not at present recognised as a separate tribe. But there is a large village in Clayoquat Sound on the south end of Wakenninish Island which bears that name. Like many now all but extinct tribes, who have become absorbed into greater ones, the E-cha-chets seem in Jewitt's time to have been more numerous. In Meares's narrative, "Lee-cha-ett" is mentioned as a village of Wakenninish, but this could not have been the same place, for Maquina and Wakenninish were at this period on good terms. The river which the expedition ascended to reach the summer salmon fishing village of the tribe was probably either the Bear or the Onamettis, both of which flow through some swampy ground into the head of Bedwall Arm. But as usual Jewitt exaggerated the distance up which the canoemen paddled. There is no river in Vancouver Island navigable for twenty or thirty miles, and few, even when broken by rapids and falls, quite that length.
[120] This is an exaggerated estimate.
[121] This is one of the best descriptions of West Coast warfare with which I am acquainted.
[122] "Quiaotluk," Jewitt, with innate cockneyism, inserting an r after a wherever this is possible. No Indian can pronounce r, any more than a Chinaman can.
[123] Klahosahts.
CHAPTER XIII
MARRIAGE OF THE AUTHOR—HIS ILLNESS—DISMISSES HIS WIFE—RELIGION OF THE NATIVES—CLIMATE
Soon after our establishment there, Maquina informed me that he and his chiefs had held council both before and after quitting Nootka, in which they had determined that I must marry one of their women, urging as a reason to induce me to consent, that, as there was now no probability of a ship coming to Nootka to release me, that I must consider myself as destined to pass the remainder of my life with them, that the sooner I conformed to their customs the better, and that a wife and family would render me more contented and satisfied with their mode of living. I remonstrated against this decision, but to no purpose, for he told me that, should I refuse, both Thompson and myself would be put to death; telling me, however, that if there were none of the women of his tribe that pleased me, he would go with me to some of the other tribes, where he would purchase for me such a one as I should select. Reduced to this sad extremity, with death on the one side and matrimony on the other, I thought proper to choose what appeared to me the least of the two evils, and consent to be married, on condition that, as I did not fancy any of the Nootka women, I should be permitted to make choice of one from some other tribe.