In his early life he mingled much with the whites. He lived with a good white family some of the time; worked in a cook-house at a saw-mill for a time, where he gained his name; and once went to San Francisco in a ship. Thus he learned to speak English quite well, and he knew more about civilized ways, and even of religion, than any of the older Indians at Jamestown. He entered willingly into the plan to buy land, and soon after the people there first began to hold some kind of services on the Sabbath, they selected him as the one to pray, hardly because he was better than all the rest, though he was better than all with two or three exceptions, but because he had been more with the whites, and knew better how to pray. Soon after this, and long before he joined the church, a report, which was probably true, was in circulation that he had once or twice secretly drank some. Thereupon the chief took him and talked strongly to him about it. The chief did not wish him to be minister to his people if he was likely to do in that way, and at last asked him if he thought he had a strong enough mind to be a Christian for one year. The reply was, Yes. Then the questions were successively asked if he was strong enough to last two years, five years, ten years, all his life, and when he said Yes, he was allowed to resume his duties as leader of religion.
After this he remained so consistent that he was one of the first two in Jamestown to unite with the church, in December, 1878, when he was supposed to be about thirty-three years old. The road supervisor in his district sent his receipt for road taxes to him one year, addressing it to Rev. Cook House Billy.
When the church was organized at Jamestown in 1882, he was unanimously elected as deacon, and he has ever since filled that position.
Once, five or six years ago, when in Seattle, he was asked by a Catholic Indian of his own tribe, belonging to Port Gamble, to drink some whiskey, but he declined. When urged time and again to do so he still refused, giving as his excuse that he belonged to the church. “So do I,” said his tempter “but we drink, and then we can easily get the priest to pardon us by paying him a little money.” “That is not the way we do in our church,” said Billy.
But afterward, two years ago, he was very strongly tempted, and yielded, while at Seattle. It was known, and soon after his return home he made his acknowledgement to the church. On my next visit to them in the fall he was reprimanded, and suspended as deacon for five weeks. He often spoke of this fall of his, and seemed to be very sincere in his repentance. In 1883, just before he and nearly all the Indians of his village were going to Seattle again, either to fish or on their way to pick hops, he sent me a letter in which was written: “One day I was talking in meeting to them and said I hoped they would none of them follow my example last summer about drinking, for I had never got over it. I feel ashamed and feel bad every time I think about it, and hoped none of them would have occasion to feel as I did.”
He is of a bright, sunny disposition, always cheerful, and has done more for school and church than any of the rest of his tribe, unless it may be the head chief, Balch. Sometimes he has boarded three children free of cost, so that they might go to school, whose parents, if alive, lived far away.
In 1881 two of his children died, a fact of which the opponents of religion made use against Christianity, and he was severely tried, but he stood firm. In 1883, with two others, he went to Clallam Bay with me to preach the gospel to those Indians, the first actual missionary work done by either Indian church. When he left his wife was sick but, as he had promised to go, she would not keep him back, and he was willing to trust her with God. When we returned she was well.
His wife is a true helpmeet to him. She did not join the church for a year and a half after he did; but he afterward said that she was really ahead of him, and urged him to begin and to stand fast. When I examined her for reception into the church, I noticed one expression of hers which I shall always remember. In speaking of her sorrow for her sins, she said that her “heart cried” about them. An expression was in use, which I also often used, that our hearts should be sick because of our sins; but I had never used her expression, which was deeper. She is the foremost among the women to take part in meeting, often beseeching them with tears to turn into the Christian path.
XXXIII.
LORD JAMES BALCH.
A FEW years previous to the appointment of Agent Eells, in 1871, this person was made head chief of the Clallams, although, until about 1873, he could get drunk and fight as well as any Indian. At that time he took the lead in the progress for civilization near Dunginess, as related in Chapter V.; and, although once after that, on a Fourth of July, he was drunk, yet he has steadily worked for the good of his tribe. He has had a noted name, for an Indian, as an enemy to drunkenness, and his fines and other punishments on his offending people have been heavy. He gave more than any other one in the purchase of their land, and, in 1875, it was named Jamestown in honor of him. He has taken a stand against potlatches, not even going six miles to attend one when given by those under him. For a long time he was firm against Indian doctors, though a few times within about three years he has employed them when he has been sick, and no white man’s remedies which he could obtain seemed to do him any good. He was among the first three Indians to begin prayer, a practice which he kept up several years. But when in 1878 the other two united with the church, Balch declined to do so, although I had expected him as much as I had the others. He gave as his excuse that as he was chief, he would probably do something which would be used as an argument against religion—an idea I have found quite common among the Indian officers. In fact, a policeman once asked me if he could be a policeman and a Christian at the same time. Balch said that whenever he should cease being chief, he would “jump” into the church. He has continued as chief until the present time, and his interest in religion has diminished. At one time he seemed, in the opinion of the school-teacher, to trust to his morality for salvation. Then he turned to the Indian doctors, gave up prayer in his house, and now by no means attends church regularly. Still he takes a kind of fatherly interest in seeing that the church members walk straight; and the way in which he started and has upheld civilization, morality, education, and temperance will long be remembered both by whites and Indians, and its influence will continue long after he shall die.