SMITH] PICTOGRAPH ON LOWER SKEENA RIVER 613

with seven radiating lines on its upper outline. In the third and sixth “‘coppers” instead of this ring there is a horizontal line with five little lines nearly perpendicular to its upper edge. In the fourth ‘‘copper” only three lines could be discerned. There is a horizontal line also in the fragment of a ‘‘copper.”’ These “‘copper”’ figures are characteristic of the North Pacific culture and the style of the painting of the face is found only in the art of this culture area. In the ears, the shading of the lines and the eccentricity of the figure are particularly characteristic.

This pictograph was probably made in honor of an individual or family and certainly has to do with great wealth as the repre- sentation of even one “‘copper’’ would refer to considerable wealth.

“‘Coppers” were represented in various ways on this coast. A board or form made of boards fastened together was shaped like a “copper” and this was sometimes both painted and carved. Paintings of “coppers” were made on leather and stone as well as on wood. Pieces of shell were cut to the proper form and carved, and ‘“‘coppers” are also indicated by pecked figures of the same unique form made on rock surfaces.

The antiquity of this pictograph is unknown to us. A number of white people and a few Indians of the vicinity were consulted in regard to this but those who knew the pictograph said it had been made long ago and that they had no knowledge of who made it or what it meant. However, it is quite likely that there may be some Indian still living who knows when it was made and all about it. The knowledge of its meaning among Indians of this region is likely to be a family secret.

Its preservation as a provincial or national monument would seem well worth while, especially because it can be seen from the railway. It can also be visited from boats on the river.

There is another group of pictographs in a similar situation, a mile upstream from this one. It is a short distance below the site of Aberdeen, which was one of the oldest, if not the oldest, regular boat landing and the location of perhaps the first salmon cannery on the northern coast of British Columbia. To be more exact, these pictographs are on the more or less vertical, jagged, granitic cliffs, and on the fragments fallen from them, from near