A shaman is a medicine-man who is popularly supposed to be possessed of supernatural powers. A certain mystery, or mysticism, is connected with him. He spends much time in the solitudes of the mountains, working himself into a highly emotional mental state. The shaman has his special masks, carved ivory diagnosis-sticks, and other paraphernalia. The hair of the shaman was never cut; at his death, his body was not burned, but was invariably placed in a box on four high posts. It first reposed for one whole night in each of the four corners of the house in which he died. On the fifth day it was laid to rest by the sea-shore; and every time a Thlinkit passed it, he tossed a small offering into the water, to secure the favor of the dead shaman, who, even in death, was believed to exercise an influence over the living, for good or ill.
Slavery was common, as—until the coming of the Russians—was cannibalism. The slaves were captives from other tribes. They were forced to perform the most disagreeable duties, and were subjected to cruel treatment, punished for trivial faults, and frequently tortured, or offered in sacrifice. A few very old slaves are said to be in existence at the present time; but they are now treated kindly, and have almost forgotten that their condition is inferior to that of the remainder of the tribe.
The most famous slaves on the Northwest Coast were John Jewitt and John Thompson, sole survivors of the crew of the Boston, which was captured in 1802 by the Indians of Nootka Sound, on the western coast of Vancouver Island. The officers and all the other men were most foully murdered, and the ship was burned.
Jewitt and Thompson were spared because one was an armorer and the other a sailmaker. They were held as slaves for nearly three years, when they made their escape.
Jewitt published a book, in which he simply and effectively described many of the curious, cruel, and amusing customs of the people. The two men finally made their escape upon a boat which had appeared unexpectedly in the harbor.
The Yakutats belong to the Thlinkit stock, but have never worn the "little trough," the distinguishing mark of the true Thlinkit. They inhabit the country between Mount Fairweather and Mount St. Elias, and were the cause of much trouble and disaster to Baranoff, Lisiansky, and other early Russians. They have never adopted the totem; and may, therefore, eat the flesh and blubber of the whale, which the Thlinkits respect, because it figures on their totems. The graveyards of the Yakutats are very picturesque and interesting.
The tribes of the Tinneh, or interior Indians, will be considered in another chapter.
Behm Canal is narrow, abruptly shored, and offers many charming vistas that unfold unexpectedly before the tourist's eyes. Alaskan steamers do not enter it and, therefore, New Eddystone Rock is missed by many. This is a rocky pillar that rises straight from the water, with a circumference of about one hundred feet at the base and a height of from two to three hundred feet. It is draped gracefully with mosses, ferns, and vines. Vancouver breakfasted here, and named it for the famous Eddystone Light of England. Unuk River empties its foaming, glacial waters into Behm Canal.
CHAPTER VI
Leaving Ketchikan, Clarence Strait is entered. This was named by Vancouver for the Duke of Clarence, and extends in a northwesterly direction for a hundred miles. The celebrated Stikine River empties into it. On Wrangell Island, near the mouth of the Stikine, is Fort Wrangell, where the steamer makes a stop of several hours.
Fort Wrangell was the first settlement made in southeastern Alaska, after Sitka. It was established in 1834, by Lieutenant Zarembo, who acted under the orders of Baron Wrangell, Governor of the Colonies at that time.
A grave situation had arisen over a dispute between the Russian American Company and the equally powerful Hudson Bay Company, the latter having pressed its operations over the Northwest and seriously undermined the trade of the former. In 1825, the Hudson Bay Company had taken advantage of the clause in the Anglo-Russian treaty of that year—which provided for the free navigation of streams crossing Russian territory in their course from the British possessions to the sea—and had pushed its trading operations to the upper waters of the Stikine, and in 1833 had outfitted the brig Dryad with colonists, cattle, and arms for the establishing of trading posts on the Stikine.
Lieutenant Zarembo, with two armed vessels, the Chichagoff and the Chilkaht, established a fort on a small peninsula, on the site of an Indian village, and named it Redoubt St. Dionysius. All unaware of these significant movements, the Dryad, approaching the mouth of the Stikine, was received by shots from the shore, as well as from a vessel in the harbor. She at once put back until out of range, and anchored. Lieutenant Zarembo went out in a boat, and, in the name of the Governor and the Emperor, forbade the entrance of a British vessel into the river. Representations from the agents of the Hudson Bay Company were unavailing; they were warned to at once remove themselves and their vessel from the vicinity—which they accordingly did.
This affair was the cause of serious trouble between the two nations, which was not settled until 1839, when a commission met in London and solved the difficulties by deciding that Russia should pay an indemnity of twenty thousand pounds, and lease to the Hudson Bay Company the now celebrated lisière, or thirty-mile strip from Dixon Entrance to Yakutat.
In 1840 the Hudson Bay Company raised the British flag and changed the name from Redoubt St. Dionysius to Fort Stikine. Sir George Simpson's men are said to have passed several years of most exciting and adventurous life there, owing to the attacks and besiegements of the neighboring Indians. An attempt to scale the stockade resulted in failure and defeat. The following year the fort's supply of water was cut off and the fort was besieged; but the Britishers saved themselves by luckily seizing a chief as hostage.
A year later occurred another attack, in which the fort would have fallen had it not been for the happy arrival of two armed vessels in charge of Sir George Simpson, who tells the story in this brief and simple fashion:—
"By daybreak on Monday, the 25th of April (1842), we were in Wrangell's Straits, and toward evening, as we approached Stikine, my apprehensions were awakened by observing the two national flags, the Russian and the English, hoisted half-mast high, while, on landing about seven, my worst fears were realized by hearing of the tragical end of Mr. John McLoughlin, Jr., the gentleman recently in charge. On the night of the twentieth a dispute had arisen in the fort, while some of the men, as I was grieved to hear, were in a state of intoxication; and several shots were fired, by one of which Mr. McLoughlin fell. My arrival at this critical juncture was most opportune, for otherwise the fort might have fallen a sacrifice to the savages, who were assembled round to the number of two thousand, justly thinking that the place could make but a feeble resistance, deprived as it was of its head, and garrisoned by men in a state of complete insubordination."
In 1867 a United States military post was established on a new site. A large stockade was erected and garrisoned by two companies of the Twenty-first Infantry. This post was abandoned in 1870, the buildings being sold for six hundred dollars.
In the early eighties Lieutenant Schwatka found Wrangell "the most tumble-down-looking company of cabins I ever saw." He found its "Chinatown" housed in an old Stikine River steamboat on the beach, which had descended to its low estate as gradually and almost as imperceptibly as Becky Sharpe descended to the "soiled white petticoat" condition of life. As Queen of the Stikine, the old steamer had earned several fortunes for her owners in that river's heyday times; then she was beached and used as a store; then, as a hotel; and, last of all, as a Chinese mess- and lodging-house.
In 1838 another attempt had been made by the Hudson Bay Company to establish a trading post at Dease Lake,