an inferior fruit which seldom ripens.

* * * * *

Inhabitants--Physical Characteristics.

These islands are inhabited by about 800 Hydah Indians, a very
remarkable race of people. The most common type of the adult unmixed
Hydah is about five feet, seven inches in height, thick-set,
large-boned, with fairly regular broad features, coal-black hair and
eyes, and a bronze complexion. They have generally--both men and
women--finely developed breasts and fore-arms, caused by their almost
daily use of the canoe paddle from infancy. A few have well-formed
legs, though the greater number are defective in this respect,
resulting from much sitting, or rather squatting in their, canoes, in
and around their lodges, with but comparatively little walking. Their
feet are so short, broad and thick through the instep, that shoes are
made by the manufacturer, expressly for them. Some of the young men
wear a moustache, and a scanty beard is occasionally seen upon the
face of the old men, though both generally eradicate such hair as it
grows. Only the women and medicine men permit the hair of the head to
grow long. They walk with a springy light tread and agile step,
though I easily outran a young Indian of Massett, who matched himself
against me. Some of them are very strong in the arms, an Indian of
Skidegate beating me at "tug of war." Many are expert swimmers,
sometimes diving from their canoes into the rough sea, and bringing
out wounded seal which have sunk to the bottom. One of my men
performed such a feat, springing from the top of a great rock, where
the ocean was breaking. They are intelligent and quick to learn from
observation.