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82 ANCIENT WARRIORS

canoe as steamers were rarely available. It was an
adventurous and perilous undertaking as the writer
found to his cost in March, 1883, when he and his wife
made their first journey across Hecate Straits. This
particular voyage was made in a canoe only thirty-five
feet long, a gale sprang up half-way across, all the
baggage had to be jettisoned to keep the craft afloat, and
it was only after five days battling with the sea that the
party reached Massett in an exhausted condition.

The Indians living on these islands are known as the
Haidas. They call themselves the Ou Haadé, i.e., the
Inlet People. They were formerly the most powerful
and warlike nation on the Pacific coast. Antiquarian
literature concerning them is very meagre. Transient
visitors have made sketches of their houses and totem
poles and taken photographs of the natives, and that is
the sum knowledge that has gone abroad about them
since exploring navigators first visited them one hundred
and forty years ago.

No systematic effort has been made to study their
characteristics or works. The works of the ancient
Haidas are fast falling into decay, and a few years hence
will be numbered among the things of the past. The
Indians on these islands are undoubtedly the finest and
most intelligent race on the coast. They were once a
powerful nation and the terror of all the surrounding
tribes. One hundred years ago they were numbered by
tens of thousands; now only about one thousand can be
found. Where are they now? Some of the Gi-hangs
or tall carved columns are still in existence, but the
people are gone. The boxes in which they buried their
dead (fixing them on two large posts planted in the
ground) are decaying and fast disappearing, and a few
mummified remains are all that are left of these skilful
and fierce warriors. Their villages are in ruins, their