 |
vol. title: Miscellaneous Scraps from January 1st 1878 vol. period: 1875-1878 pages in vol.: 153 |
A Great Journey
New Westminster, B. C., September 5.—Leaving the Indian encampment, we had a beautiful moonlight boat-ride back to the mouth of the bay. The moon was so exceedingly bright that we turned aside before returning to the Douglas to visit the temporarily deserted Haida village on the shore. I do not think I ever experienced a greater sensation of astonishment than I had on our approach to and entrance into this mysterious place. At a short distance from the beach it looked like an ancient ruin, of which shattered pillars and scattered blocks remained. But the pillars, forty and sixty feet high, were irregularly placed, and some of them leaned a little out of the perpendicular. On a nearer approach the lower parts of the supposed ruins changed in appearance to wide, low, gabled houses, which indeed they were, and the pillars or columns appeared covered with fantastic devices. Frightful griffins glared at us in the moonlight, and above our heads the beaks of birds, more formidable than the fabled roc, threatened to descend and literally gobble us up. On the tops of some of the columns wild animals appeared to be crouching for a spring; the very projecting beams of the houses terminated in hideous masks; and altogether it was an uncanny place to wander in. We could make out nothing real about it, nothing but grotesquery, at that time; so we resolved to return and examine the village by early daylight.
At 6 this morning we went ashore, after receiving word from the Amethyst that Lord Dufferin and Commodore Chatfield were just about starting on a bear-hunt, accompanied by a party of Indians and the promised dogs. On this occasion I took a sketch-book along with me, and succeeded during our hurried examination of the Haida village in preserving some outlines of what are undoubtedly the most remarkable monuments of Indian skill and Indian mythology above Yucatan in North America. The village (now inhabited by a subdivision of the Haida tribe called the Skidegates), though built entirely of wood, bears evidence of considerable antiquity. Most of the wood used is cedar, the durability of which in these latitudes is exceptionally great. Captain Devereux tells me, for instance, of a Douglas pine tree, 150 feet high, near Burrard's Inlet, which stands with its roots astride of a fallen cedar. The pine is estimated to be at least 400 years old; yet the prostrate cedar beneath it was found, after an inch and a half of rime had been scraped from its surface, to be as sound wood as was ever marketed. Other instances are not wanting to prove the lasting qualities of the cedar, and for this and other reasons, including the little I could learn of the Haida traditions, the construction of the present village must be dated back several hundreds of years. The Haida tribe itself is not mentioned, I believe, by any Indian historian. None of the books which have been written on British Columbia and the north coast make any allusion to them. Living on these farthest western islands, which few vessels have an excuse for visiting, they had until the late period and circumstances of which I have spoken been isolated and unknown. For aught that I know to the contrary, this may be the firs; intimidation that the world at large will have received of their existence—the first sketch to go forth of the most striking memorial of their past.
The village is made up of some forty houses, of which number about one third are in partial ruin. But the ponderous frames remain, consisting of timbers three and four feet in diameter. No saws were used in shaping these beams; the marks of the Indian adze are visible on every inch of the surface, also on that of the solid planks which cover them. The joiner work by which the planks are affixed to the frames is curious and very effective dovetailing, and I could see no nails or marks of nails anywhere, except on a few modern side doors which had been imported and inserted in late years. The roofs are formed of rough-hewn planks projecting one or two feet beyond the eaves. The houses range in size from 20 by 30 to 30 by 40 feet, and they all stand in line on one street, near the edge of the forest, fronting the mouth of Skidegate Bay.
But the unique features of the village are the carved cedar pillars which adorn the fronts, and in some instances the rear gables, of the houses, and which are set, too, in isolated places between and before them. These pillars, from 5 to 7 feet in diameter and in height 30 to 60 feet, are of various forms, some larger at the top, some tapering upwards from the base. Those which form parts of the fronts of the houses stand exactly in the centre of the gables, rising high above the roof-trees, and being perforated within a foot of the ground by oval openings, which formed the only ancient entrances. These openings are generally 2½ feet wide by 3½ feet high, and it is plain that no foe could have made headway through such an aperture without having his head cut off at the interior side of it. All the pillars are profusely covered with bold, deep carvings, in which I am confident that a competent Indian archæologist might read far back into the history and the religion of the Haida tribe. I regret the insufficient knowledge of aboriginal history which does not allow me to venture on speculations concerning the meaning of most of the images exposed on these wonderful monuments. The accurate sketches which I have brought away of some of them show:
1. A post 6 feet thick and 50 feet high, carved with representations of deities—one above the other—so exactly resembling the figures on ancient Egyptian tombs that the comparison is startling. Below, the rude and saturnine faces, with their flat noses, thick lips and enormous eyes, arms and legs, but principally hands, crop out in multifarious profusion. The heads of birds appear, and the whole is surmounted by a fierce head wearing a mural crown, with shoulders beginning at its ears, knees beginning under its chin, and claw-like feet of insignificant proportions.
2. A post about 40 feet high, 6 feet through at the top, and 5 feet through at the bottom; a head at the top like the Sphynx's, with side-flaps, and arms and hands folded at various intervals below.
3. A post 30 feet high, surmounted by a monster apparently intended to represent a bear, whose countenance is at once comical and ferocious. The surface of this column is plain below.
4. A column with a huge plank, reminding one of a sign-board, at the top, from which the carved head and beak of a bird project in bas-relief four or five feet.
5. A similar column, with the heads of serpents represented with open mouths, teeth and fangs.
Many of the carvings on these columns are colored with black and vermilion, no other paints being used. The painting is renewed from time to time, according to the wealth, taste and inclination of the householder, and is for the most part ingeniously done, so as to produce an effective display. The broad fronts of two or three houses are covered with deeply graven devices, and the ends of the rafters, which usually project a foot or two from the gables, are ornamented with the heads of animals, reptiles and birds. This latter fashion is common among some of the British Columbian tribes who have permanent lodges, where it is very usual to find representations of the same creatures painted over the front of the lodge. The animals, in fact, are those selected by the Indians for their crests. These crests, which are commonly adopted by all the tribes, consist of the whale, the porpoise, eagle, raven, wolf, bear, frog, &c. In connection with them are some curious traits of the domestic and social life of the red men. The relationship between persons of the same crest is considered to Turn the upper leaflet.
Fairies
The results of this séance are undoubtedly more personal than general, but I venture to think that the following account of a sitting with Miss Mancell, at which Mrs. Boreham and myself were present, on September 17, 1877, will have a more extensive significance, and serve to show that notwithstanding the marvels of the materialization and dematerialization of the human form, other phases of life phenomena at times manifest themselves, and open up to the mind reflections that all our present spiritualistic knowledge is yet in a preparatory stage.
When about three or four years of age, she was one night a-bed, looking at the rushlight burning in the holder, which was a cylinder of tin, about nine inches in diameter by one foot high, and perforated with holes. While looking at it, all of a sudden she saw some twenty or more beautiful little creatures capering round the light within the tin holder. They were in two circles, and danced (holding each other’s hands) in contrary directions; they were dressed in bright-colored clothing, red, blue, and so on; their countenances most animated, and among them, and much taller than the rest, was one whose face had a great resemblance to the face of Punch, as depicted on the cover of the journal of that name; in short, they were those beings popularly known as fairies. The tall one kept looking in all directions, and his dark eyes sparkled like diamonds. She, child as she was, got frightened at him, lest he should spy her, which at last he did. She then screamed out, and the fairies vanished. She was taken down stairs, and told, as well as she was able, what she had seen. Ever after the said tin holder was taken care of, and is now hers.
This narration is necessary, in order to illustrate Miss Mancell’s powers. On the evening of September 17th, we had been trying in semi-darkness, whether she could discern any flames from magnets, which she said she could, when all at once it occurred to me to try her powers with the tin light-holder, and to see what would come of it. I accordingly brought it out, and set it before her in subdued light. After a short time she said that she saw small figures hovering about it; some were seated in the inside; they looked like fairies. One of them she mentioned as having bells on his head, and all had bright-colored dresses. On the outside of the tin shade the figures were of a different kind; Miss Mancell called them pigmies, partaking more of the forms of satyrs, centaurs, fays, and cyclops. She also saw the word “magi” in letters of light over the shade. I then placed a light therein, and the appearances were quite different. Miss Mancell then saw a human face, with blue eyes, and widow’s head-dress; next a disagreeable and witch-like face; then flowers and other objects.
I make no comment on what I have written, desiring that my tale should be as unvarnished as possible, but respectfully invite the remarks and experiences of your readers in relation to these phenomena.—London Spiritualist.
Occasionally clairvoyants see creatures designated as fairies, and we venture to say that they are mere pictures presented to them in the same manner that flowers and symbols of various kinds often are, by our spirit friends. We are not prepared to believe in the existence of a class of infinitesimal people, that would require at least a million to make a person as large as the average man.
<Untitled> (Jehovah is the idol of a Syrian mountain tribe)
Jehovah is the idol of a Syrian mountain tribe that has been foisted upon the rest of mankind under the penalty of eternal torments, and modified from age to age, but his worst features retained even to our own day. I arraign him in the name of the millions who are held by him in spiritual bondage; in the name of the freemen of America, whose enslavement is sought by the incorporation of this tyrant’s name into the charter of our liberties. Away with you, hideous monster, in whom meet the worst vices of the barbarous people who made you, and the ignorant and fearful who still believe in you! You may do for God of the wolves that prowl over our Western prairies and hunt down sick buffaloes, or the hyenas that make night hideous in your Holy Land. You may properly be inserted on the black flag of every pirate vessel, between the death’s head and the cross-bones. Infinite tyrant, king of miscreants, woman-curser, soul-tormentor, destroyer of the world, architect of hell, and supplier of its eternal fires, go with your co-partner, the Devil! You belong to the ignorance, brutality and lust of an long past. Go to the hell to which you have so long consigned the best representatives of our race! and may your name and history alone remain for a warning and a lesson to all generations.—Wm. Denton.
Editor's notes