Nov. Page 6

• Language: unknown
• Subjects: Hudson; Hudson Bay; Indian; Stump; Thunderbird
• Online Access: http://cdm16786.contentdm.oclc.org:80/cdm/ref/collection/pioneerlife/id/4905

seizes it with his talons mid carries it home for food. The rustling of its wings causes the thunder. A Clayoquot who many yems since attempted to cross Vmicouver's Island on foot, to go to Nanaimo and the top of one of the mountains he found a nest or the home of the thunderbird of great logs, immense quantities of whalebones were scattered about. Captain John said that at Hosett there is a high steep rock in a meadow mid a man who lives in Hosett once passed there and saw quantities of whalebones lying around and on looking up saw the thunderbird like an immense eagle perched on the summit. John also told me that a Quinnault Indian nmiied Neshwarts, with whom I am acquainted, saw a thunderbird on a mountain nem Quinnault and creeping up behind it tied one of its wing feathers to a stump by a thong of elkskin - and when the bird flew off the feather pulled out which Neshwarts secured. It is 40 fathoms long. Neshwarts in consequence is a great tamanawas man and can kill more whales mid sea otters than anyone of his tribe. Captain John asked me if I had ever seen this mammoth feather of Neshwarts. I told him no. Well, said, he, it is Neshwmt's medicine and probably he would not show it to you for he never shows it to Indimis. He keeps it hid in the mountains where I think it will be difficult for him to find it again. A feather 40 fathoms or 240 feet long is rather too big for me to credit, but Capt. John mid the other Indimis believe it implicitly. Capt. John and Billy speaking of the Jargon said the Bostons did not spe^ correctly when they called it Chinook language; it is in fact the Nootka tongue. The Nootkmis formerly regularly traded with the Chinooks as also did the Makahs mid other coast tribes. The first white men who visited this Coast went to Nootka and some heard the language and used it at Chinook while trading there. When Astoria was settled, the Chinooks used the Nootka language with the traders,as their own Imiguage is so difficult and gutteral. From this fact the Astorians and afterwmd the Hudson Bay people called it Chinook, supposing it to be really the Imiguage of that tribe. The rest of the Jargon is made up from English and French words Indians used. This version of the jargon is just what I had concluded from my own observations was the fact, and this story of Capt. John corroborated by the others present, without any suggestions on my part has convinced me of the correctness of my views which I had expressed only a few evenings before to Mr. Webster. They further said that up the Sound the Jmgon was not spoken correctly, another fact that I had before spoken about frequently at Port Townsend. John as a general thing is a great liar, but he is well informed on all historical matters mid when I find he coincides with the published histories I have to give him credit. He gave a detailed account of the massacre of the "Boston" at Nootka and the capture and subsequent rescue of Jewitt mid Thompson. Size of Spanish tile at Neah Bay 10 inches long by 5 1/4 wide mid 1 1/4 inches thick. Friday, Nov. 25- Wind east n.e. clear mid cold. The Indians picked up a boat this morning drifting into the bay bottom up, painted white, square beam cedar plmik 20 feet long 5-8 wide. Though the thwart where the foremast stepped through was split in halves and the boat was badly chafed, her gunboard stmled and one or two other plmiks, she is a good model, has seen some service mid probably belonged to some lumber trader up Sound. I judge her to have been capsized, to have drifted on the rocks when she broke her mast off, as the wind has been blowing down the Straits directly from Race Point sayeast the past three days. I think she came from the English side. Went to the old Spanish fort to make some further excavations but did not find any tile. We did find, however, that the Indians some years ago threw the bricks into the brook mid planted potatoes where the