spirits. Having covered the body with
sand and flints, they kneeled along the grave in a double row, with
their faces turned to the east, while one who officiated as a priest
sprinkled them with water from a hat. In so doing he recited a kind of
prayer or invocation, to which, at intervals, the others made responses.
Such were the simple rites performed by these poor savages at the grave
of their comrade on the shores of a strange land; and when these were
done, they rose and returned in silence to the ship, without once
casting a look behind.

CHAPTER VIII.

Mouth of the Columbia.--The Native Tribes.--Their Fishing.--
Their Canoes.--Bold Navigators--Equestrian Indians and
Piscatory Indians, Difference in Their Physical
Organization.--Search for a Trading Site.--Expedition of
M'Dougal and David Stuart-Comcomly, the One-Eyed Chieftain.--
Influence of Wealth in Savage Life.--Slavery Among the
Natives.-An Aristocracy of Flatheads.-Hospitality Among the
Chinooks--Comcomly's Daughter.--Her Conquest.

THE Columbia, or Oregon, for the distance of thirty or forty miles
from its entrance into the sea, is, properly speaking, a mere estuary,
indented by deep bays so as to vary from three to seven miles in width;
and is rendered extremely intricate and dangerous by shoals reaching
nearly from shore to shore, on which, at times, the winds and currents
produce foaming and tumultuous breakers. The mouth of the river proper
is but about half a mile wide, formed by the contracting shores of the
estuary. The entrance from the sea, as we have already observed, is
bounded on the south side by a flat sandy spit of land, stretching in
to the ocean. This is commonly called Point Adams. The opposite, or
northern side, is Cape Disappointment; a kind of peninsula, terminating
in a steep knoll or promontory crowned with a forest of pine-trees, and
connected with the mainland by a low and narrow neck. Immediately within
this cape is a wide, open bay, terminating at Chinook Point, so called
from a neighboring tribe of Indians. This was called Baker's Bay, and
here the Tonquin was anchored.

The natives inhabiting the lower part of the river, and with whom the
company was likely to have the most frequent intercourse, were divided
at this time into four tribes, the Chinooks, Clatsops, Wahkiacums, and
Cathlamahs. They resembled each other in person, dress, language, and
manner; and were probably from