The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-06-17

rocks, sharp and cruel in spite of the
everlasting beat of the surf against
them, extend down to the water edge
ana under the surface hidden rocks and
reefs IN many places, extend out for
miles, On these the staunchest ships
ever quilt are quickly ground to pieces
ana the unfortunate crew, seeking in
the log or darkness to effect a landing
on the adjacent shores, meets with
similar fate. Occasionally a wreck
oooges the rocks which guard the en-
trance TO most of these harbors or
coFeS, and gets in where she can be
1oentiHed before she is pounded to
pieces In great many cases, how
ever, there is just enough wreckage
leIt intact to excite speculation as TO
ITS identity. but not enough to offer a
satisfactory clue to the vessel it came
from.
The Vancouver Island Indian seems
to have suffered worse by contact with
the civilization of the whites than any
other coast tribe. The advent of the
white man found this island populated
by many thousands of healthy, we'll
developed Indians, but bad whiskey
and greater evils that follow in its wake
have caused the destruction of the
race; and today there are certain tribes
notably along Quatsino Sound, where
the cry of native papoose will never
again be heard, the youngest Indian
in the district being or years old
Large numbers of the males have been
lost in seal hunting in recent years,
and as the seal hunters have always
been the flower of the tribe from
physical standpoint, the loss to Indian
posterity has been severe. In every
Indian village on the island are numer-
Gus vacant huts that will never again
be tenanted by the red man, and de-
serted villages are by no means infre-
Quently met with.
The destruction of the race, which is
so largely due to the adoption of the
white mans vices, cannot be regarded
otherwise than with regret In perhaps
almost any other part of the west this
regret would be softened by the knowl-
edge that the passing of the red man
presaged the advent of a higher civil
lization. Here there is no recompense
for the disappearance of the race which
even in its picturesque squalor added
interest to a section of the country
where Nature was lavish in her gifts of
scenery, but wofully stingy in passing
out resources of greater intrinsic value.
When the last west coast Indian passes
over to the Great Beyond, his place
will not be filed by a superior order
of being. The respectable white traders
and missionaries who now lead lonely
lives among them, having no more tim
Der to work on, will return to civiliza-
ton, and the few remaining specimens
of man will be the cultus squawmen
Io% IN, I,afr-
development retaining all of the evil
OF both white and red men and none
of the good of either.
In justice to a scattering few hard
working prospectors and mine owners
now trying to discover what the west
coast of Vancouver Island was made
for, the above statement should per-
haps be qualified. There are numerous
mines along the west coast, and several
hundred thousand good American dol
lars have been lost forever in an en-
deavor to make producers of them.
One of the finest of these Col. Sellers
propositions was largely financed by
Portland people. It is a copper mine
located on one of the numerous Off
shoots of Barclay Sound. The wharf
buildings and, bucket tramway are all
in excellent condition, but the mine is
oreIess and the promoter is in the peni-
Tertiary.
The Government, the Catholics and
the Presbyterians have spent cons1d-
cradle money in schools and churches
for educating and Outstanding the
West Coast Indians, but the results
have been far from satisfactory. All
of the religion that can be forced on
an Indian in this country does not seem
to diminish his love for lying or steal
ing, and the morals of both sexes are
shocking. The girls, born into the
world with a handicap of environment
and blood, are taken up by the we'll
meaning but misguided church people
and taught just enough to make them
understand that there is higher civil
Iization and a better life than that
which they are leading. Their intel
Iects, not exactly dwarfed, but through
centuries of tradition and breeding d.
verified into channels which run not
with ours, soon enable them to under
stand that an impenetrable wall or
caste forever bars them from mingling
closely with the better civilization OF
the outside world.
Education has nomentarily drawn
back the curtain revealing to them the |
Joys of a civilization which is rAot Tor
them. 1t has created in their hearts !
a. deep longing for something better,
which they know full well can never be |
theirs They return from the school TO |
the smoke and dirt and squalor in |
which they were bred, and realizing the t
nopelessness of ever in their brief life
time improving conditions there, ana
also realizing the equal hopelessness OF
breaking into the society of the pale
faces and living as they do, their weak
minds do not wrestle long with the
problem, and they generally go to the
levil on the run.
Perhaps, after all. it is a blessing that
hey are dying off as rapidly as they
ire, for the civilization and religion OF
he white man have shattered many an
dol for them, and left nothing in re-
urn but deep unsatisfied longing