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Updated: April 30, 2025
It seems that any one who aspires to be a chief must first give a potlach to his tribe, at which he dispenses among them all his possessions. This afternoon, as I sat at my window, my attention was attracted by a little noise. I looked up; and there was a beautiful young Indian girl, holding up a basket of fruit, of the same color as her lips and cheeks.
Winter was on, stiff and crisp, and I was back to Juneau, when the word came. 'Come, the beggar says who brought the news. 'Killisnoo say, "Come now." 'What's the row? I asks. 'Chief George, says he. 'Potlach. Killisnoo, makum klooch.
I sat by the full pots of the potlach feast, and raised my voice in song, and danced to the chanting of the men and maidens and the booming of the walrus drums. And Passuk held my hand and walked by my side. When I laid down to sleep, she waked me. When I stumbled and fell, she raised me. When I wandered in the deep snow, she led me back to the trail.
It is not given the world to know what promises he made and what lies he told the Sisters never gossip; but when he returned, upon his swarthy chest there was a brass crucifix, and in his canoe his niece Madeline. That night there was a grand wedding and a potlach; so that for two days to follow there was no fishing done by the village.
There may be more of the true old Indian in him than I imagined; or perhaps this is a political movement to consolidate the friendship of the tribes. When they landed, they formed a procession, bearing a hundred new blankets, red and white, as a potlach to the tribe. They brought also some of the much-prized blue blankets, reserved for special ceremonies and the use of chiefs.
To the Saghalie Tyee, the chief above, they also prayed to potlach kloshe to them, and guard them from the evil chehahs hovering round. After the relief of prayer, their spirits rose, and once again the splashing of their paddles marked their onward progress. Soon they glided by Hy-wach-es Creek and rounding Wak-ah-nit they came in view of the great valley where the Tsomass flows.
Then he mingled with the men and maidens, and that night gave a potlach. The snow was beaten down in the form of an oblong, perhaps a hundred feet in length and quarter as many across. Down the center a long fire was built, while either side was carpeted with spruce boughs.
'Never mind, Tommy, she'd say, day after day, that weak she could bare lift a snow- shoe and her feet raw with the work. 'Never mind. I'd sooner be flat- bellied of hunger and be your woman, Tommy, than have a potlach every day and be Chief George's klooch. George was chief of the Chilcoots, you know, and wanted her bad. "Great days, those. Was a likely chap myself when I struck the coast.
I used to wonder, when we first came here, what their interests were, and what they were thinking about all the time. Little by little we find out. To-night he came in to tell us that there was going to be a great potlach at the coal-mines, where a large quantity of iktas would be given away, tin pans, guns, blankets, canoes, and money. How his eyes glistened as he described it!
He started as if to proceed after the others, then paused long enough to add: "It was that feller that used to be watchman here; the feller that tried to shoot Bill that night. Found him in that old, deserted cabin near the Potlach. Had the shoe on him, and at last said he did it, and was sorry for just one thing, that he didn't get all of us.
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