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Les diagrammes suivants illustrent ?« mAthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 \_ReprintedJ\rom the PuAnHAOETTTiCAL JoUBirAL/or June, 1868.] OBSERVATIONS ON THE MEDICINAL AND ECONOMIC VALUE OF THE OULACHAN (OSMEBUS PACIFICUS, "Rich.), A FISH BELONGING TO THE FAMILY SALMONIDiE, FOUND ON THE NORTH-WEST COAST OF AMERICA. BY ROBERT BROWN, F.R.G.S., . PEfXOW 05 THB EOTAI. PDTBICAL AND BOTANICAL SOCIETIES, POKEION MEMBER OF a. S. EDIN., COBR. UEMB. ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, SAN FRANCISCO, LATE COU> MANDER AND GOVERNMENT AGENT OP THE VANCOUVKR EXPLORING EXPE- DITION, BOTANIST OP TUE BRITISH COLUMBIA EXPEDITION, ETC. ETC. ETC. The fish which forma the subject of this coram uuication may, if we consider its importance to the Indians, or the still more useful purpose; to which both the fish itself and its oil might be applied, without fear of contradiction be ranked as one of the most valuable products of the western shores of America. Many of the earlier fur-traders and adventurers refer to it in enthusiastic terms under its Chinook name of OulacJian or Eulachon,* and give accounts of its abundance in the Columbia River early in this century. All readers of Wash- ington Irving's charming • Astoria,' cannot fail to remember his description of it. It belongs to the family Salmonidm, and is usually classed in Gerard's genus Thaleicthys, but as I believe that that genus is separated from the older one of Osmertis on very insufficient grounds, I have preferred to designate it as Osmerus pacificus. The synonymy and specific characters will therefore stand as follows: — Osti^VLVS V xcivicvs {Salmo (Mallotus) pacificiis), Richardson Fauna Boreali- Americana; Thaleicthys Stevcnsi, Gerard, Gen. Rep. on Fishes; Thaleicthys pacijicus, " Grd." Cooper and Suckley Natural History of Washington Terri- tory, Plate LXXV. figs. 1-4 ; Osmerus pacijicus^ (Rich.), Ayres, Proceedings Cal. ^.cad. Nat. Science, ii. 64. Head subcouical and pointed. Mouth large ; posterior extremity of maxillar bone extending to a vertical line drawn posteriorly to the orbit. Eye rather small. Adipose fin placed opposite the posterior por- tion of the anal, which is rather elongated. The insertion of the ventral fins is situated considerably in advance of the anterior margin of the dorsal. Scales moderate, subelliptical. Dorsal region greyish-clive ; middle of flank yellow- ish-orange, dotted with black ; belly yellowish, unicolor ; upper sides and sur- face of head greyish ; fins unicolor. • Ross Coi calls it " tiie sweet little anchovy " (' The Columbia River,' etc., vol. i. p. 105). It is also s\)c\t hoolakan and Ulichan. Alexander Ross calls it the " fathom fish," because Rtrung on threads in their dried condition, they were sold by the fathom (' Adventures of First Settlers on the Columbia River,' p. 91). ±Z'4b(3u MEDICINAL AND EOONOMIO VALUE 2. Thr Oulachan, or Eulachon, is a small delicate-looking fish, about the size of a smolt, and not unlike it, semipcllucid, and with fine scales. On or about the 24th of March, — ^at nearly the same time eiMh year, — it enters the northern rivers, and the southern ones a little later. It was once abundant in the Co- lumbia, but that stream being now disturbed by. the traffic of steamers, it is only now in exceptional years that they are caught there in any q'untity. In Fraser Biver, and in most of the rivers on the coast of British Columbia, they are still found at that season (March) in greater or smaller quantities ; but it is in theNaas River, falling into the Pacific, in lat. 54° 40'^N., that the Eu- lachon is found in the greatest quantities, and it is to its capture in that stream that these notes chiefly relate. The fish comes up from the sea into the fresh water for the purpose of spawning, but, unlike most of its allies, — the salmon {)roper, — on that coast, returns to the sea again, and is not seen until the fol- owiug year. Daring that season they swarm in Inconceivable shoals, and I can well believe that the Indians indulge in no hyperbole when I have heard them say that their canoes have been lifted in the water by the countless swarms of fishes. Their arrival is at once heralded by flocks of Laridse and other marine birds swooping down to seize upon them, and during the whole of the fishing season the screams of the gulls vie with the shouts of the Indian fishers. 3. By long custom made and provided for, certain northern tribes have a vested right of fishing the Eulachan on the banks of the Naaa, and certain other equally numerous and powerful tribes are prohibited from enjoying this privi- lege, and are compelled to buy their oil from their more fortunate neighbours. Accordingly, some days before the expected advent of the fish in the river, the Indians assemble from far and near to the number of several thousands, in order that they may take up their proper camping-grounds on the banks. Men, women, and children come, — it is the herring-fishing of the Indians, and all can be employed. A general holiday prevails, and tribes vie with tribes, families with families, in dress and feasting, and show their joyousness in a thousand different ways. Families who have not met for twelve months now meet, and the Eulachon or Yghuh (almost uuspellable, and certainly unpronounceable) fishing is looked forward to from one year's end to the other as a time of gos- siping, courting, and general merry-making. In a few days, however, the fish begin to make their appearance, and now all are on the alert and all idling is at an end. The first shoal, as I have said, come into the river, from the 24th to the 27th of March, and stays three days. These are so exceedingly fat that they cannot be cooked in a pan, for they will ''blaze up" like a mass of oil. Out of these the best portion of the oil is made. In about three days these begin to disappear, and are succeeded by a second shoal, not so large or so fat, and these again in a day or two by the third and last shoal, which is poorer, and are dried for winter use, being sufficiently free from oil to permit of this. So fat are these last even, that if lighted during the dry state they will burn like a candle, and are often used as such by the natives, hence they are sometimes called the " candle-fish." The river during the time of fishing presents a busy scene, covered with canoes sweeping the fish in, while others filled are landing and being unloaded by the women and children, again wildly to rush back to share in the harvest. Ashore the scene is not less vivid. Fires are blazing and pots boiling, and boxes being filled with the oil, while in and around and all over, prevails an amount of unctuousness indescribable, — a greasiness of which it is impossible to conjure up the faintest idea I The fish are chiefly taken by nets (in the Naas) but myriads get washed ashore and are caught by the old women and children and kept as their per- quisite. In Fraser lliver they are principally captured by means of a flattened cedar pole, the edges of wliich for a couple of feet or so near the end being set with shurp teeth or nails, which act like so many spcar-points. The Indian, x>ut the size On or about bbe northern t in the Co- eamers, it ia lantity. In umbia, they es ; but it is at the Eu- that stream tto the fresh -the salmon intil the fol- hoals, and I : have heard bless swarms 3 and other ffhold of the lian fishers, ribes have a lertain other J this privi- neighbours. le river, the ids, in order nks. Men, ans, and all bes, families a thousand V meet, and lounceable) ^ime of gos- ret, the fish 1 all idling r, from the exceedingly like a mass about three loal, not so ] last shoal, ee from oil ng the dry the natives, Dg the time the fish in, id children, cene is not filled with Qctuousness the faintest get washed * their per- ' a flattened id being set rhe Indian, OF THE OULACHAN. P> standing in his canoe, sweeps this through the water, and so numerous are they that there is no fear but that a number vrill be impaled on the points. These are swept behind him into the canoe as a mower u^es a scythe, until the canoe is full. Herrings and shoals of all other small fishes are caught likewise in this ingenious mode. Besides those kept for drying or from which oil is made, vast quantities are used in the fresh state for food, and the sudden arrival of the fish, occurring generally just at a time when the Indians' winter stores are nearly finiehed and they are rather pressed for food, the plethora often proves fatal by producing surfeit. 4. The oil is obtained by putting the fish into water in boxes — generally hol- lowed out of a solid block of cedax (Thuja gigantea, Nutt., T. Menziesii, Dougl.), or so closely made as to be water-tight — and then throwing in red-hot stones. This ingenious method of boiling is practised by all the Indians on the north- west coast of America. The oil is then skimmed off the surface and set aside in vessels to cool. The oil is never made by suspending iron vessels (after the more familiar manner of the whites) over the fire, for in that case the fishes would be destroyed, and it would be difficult to separate the broken fragments from the oil. The quality, however, greatly depends upon the care employed, and the amount of heat used to extract the oil from the fatty tissues of the fish. An inferior description is also made by squeezing the fishes out of which the finer oil has alreaidy been extracted in the method described, in a cloth against a board.* Properly prepared, the oil is, at a temperature of 60° Fahi'., '^mber- coloured and liquid. At a lower temperature it becomes thick and .opaque, in- creasing in solidity according to the degree of cold ; in this state it is whitish in colour and resembles soft lard. TIk; northern tribes keep it in boxes of their own making, but the more southern Indians — such the Quakwolths, at Fort Rupert (lat. 50° 42' 36" N., long. 127° 25' 07" W.)— preserve it in bottles, made out of the stem of the giant seaweed, Macrocystis pyrifera, Ag., squeezing out a little, when required, as a painter does his colours out of the tinfoil tubes. 6. The fish, cooked fresh, is most delicious, and, when salted, is also a very palatable article of food, and held in much request among the Hudson Bay Company's traders and other old residents on the coast. The Indians dry vast • I haye given the general rationale of the process of manufacture. There are, however, Tarious superstitions connected with the oulachan (as with everything else which the Indian has to do with), which entail various minute ceremonies. Mr. William Duncan, the excellent missionary at Metlakatlah, thus refers to it in a letter addressed to the Church Missionary Society : — " .... The process " (of extraction) " is as follows : Make a large fire ; place three or four heaps of stones as big as your hand in it ; while these are heating, fill a few baskets with rather stale fish, and get a tub of water into the house. When the stones are redhot, bring a deep box, about eighteen inches square, near the fire, and put about half a gallon of the fish into it and as much fresh water, then three or four hot stones, using wooden tongs. Repeat the doses again, then stir up the whole. Kepe'^t them again, stir again : take out the cold stones and place them in the fire. Proceed in this way till the box is nearly full, then let the whole cool, and commence skimming off the grease. While this is cooking prepare an- other box full in the same way. In doing the third, use, instead of fresh water, the liquid from the first box. On coming to the refuse of the boiled fish in the box, which is still pretty warm, let it be put into a rough willow-basket, then let an old woman, for the purpose of squeezing the liquid from it, lay it on a wooden grate, sufficiently elevated to let a wooden box stand under ; then let her lay her naked chest on it, and press with all her weight. On no account must a male undertake to do this. Cast what remains in the basket, anywhere near the house, but take the liquid just saved and use it over again instead of fresh water. The refuse must be jillowed to accumulate, and though it will soon become putrid and changr> into a heap of maggots, and give out a smell almost unendurable, it must not he removed. TL altli contracted by those engaijed in the work, must not be washed off until all is over ; that is, till all the fish ore boiled, and this will take about two or three weeks. All these plans must be carried out without any luldition or change, otherwise the fish will be ashamed" (the Indians think), "and perhaps never come back again." MEDICINAL AND ECONOMIC VALUE uumbers for winter use, and carry them with them in strings, during their annual migrations south, and for sale to other tribes who come to purchase them aa well as the oil. The Tsimpsheans say that the Noas river clothes them and the Skeena river feeds ihem, because the Hydahs^ from the Queen Charlotte Is- lands, and other tribes who are prohibited from fishing for the Oulachan in the Noas, come and purchase the oil from them, paying blankets for it, while the salmon of the Skeena supplies them with abundant supplies of food. I cannot but think that these &m would form a most valuable and lucrative article of commerce either in the salt or dried condition, and that in either of these forms, or preserved in ice, or in their own or olive oil, like saidines, they would command a ready market, especially in the Roman Catholic countries along the Pacific coast, in China, and even in Europe and the Atlantic States of America. A small joint stock company was indeed formed in Victoria, in 1864, for that pur- g>8e, but failed for want of capital and in ignorance of the habits of the fish, efore they could get their affairs settled to fetart north, the season was past, and nothing further was ever done. The Indians, no doubt, declare that no white man shall ever cast a net in the Nuas, but independently of this somewhat futile threat, supplies could be purchased from the Indians to almost any amount, and, if sufiicient inducement were held out to them, tiie present cateh could perfectly easily be increased tenfold. 6. The oil is of even greater value than the fish itself, aa usually seen in the opaque lard-like condition, and after having undergone no other preparation than the rough trying out just described, its taste is not unpleasant and the odour by no means disagreeable. Even in this condition it has been used by the whites for culinary purposes, and the Indians use it in all their meals, much after the same way as we do butter, using it also as a sauce to their dried salmon. So fond are they of it, and so essential to their health is it (as I shall presently refer to), that the Hydahs and other tribes, as I have already said, come over to purchase it eagerly, and the Hydahs, Stekius, Tsimpsheans, and other northern tribes who winter in Victoria and Puget Sound, will come on board the Met- lakathlah mission schooner to purchase it. They complain of the price, but still cannot do without it. An old Tsimpshean once said to me, '• I can buy beef and bread cheaper, but my heart never feels good until I have got t! m giease. There are just two sweet things in food, — mm and oulachan oil !" However much we may be inclined, from a civilized stand-point of view, to doubt the soundness of this summation of a lifetime's experience, there is no doubt t.'ia't this oil, both in an edible and mediciiiul liglit, is of the utmost value. It is tht latter property wliich the readers of the present article will be most interested in and which I desire most earnestly to press upon their attention. Its effect? on pthisical patients is most wonderful, and, from the moist climate of the northern portions of the Pacific coast, the natives are very subject to pthisis, hsemoptysis, and other forms of pulmonary disease. As it is, many die annually of these complaints, and I believe that I only speak the opinion of all who know these people or who have thought over the subject, that were it not for this oulachan oil, these northern tribes, once so powerful, and still so courageous, intelligent, and physically fine, would be decimated, and already enfeebled in constitution through vices learnt from the whites, their extermination would soon be un/ait accompli. It relieves violent coughs in a most remarkable manner, and equally conduces to the accumulation of flesh. In a word, it has all the properties of cod- liver and other fish oils in an intensified degree, without their nauseous taste, — a taste which is found even in the best and most carefully prepared oils, and prohibits many availing themselves of their valuable qualities. I have known delicate ladies who would have vomited at the smell of the ordinary cod-liver oil, put the bottle of oulachan oil (slightly heated in order to liquefy it) to their mouths and drink it without the smallest nausea ! If the oil thus rudely prepared T luring their rchase them 68 them and charlotte Is- chan in the t, while the I cannot ve article of these forms, Id command the Pacific imerica. A or that pur- of the fish. as past, and lat no white ewhat futile imount, and, lid perfectly seen in the preparation nd the odour used by the nieals, much tried salmon, all presently come over to her northern ird the Met- rice, but still can buy beef this giease. " However to doubt the ubt t.'ia't this t is the latter ?sted in and bs effect? on the northern hsetnoptysis, ally of these know these his oulachan , intelligent, constitution m be unfait and equally srties of cotl- jous taste, — red oils, and bave known ry cod-liver a/f^/i..r^,.^^ ^i^!>sf^^i^t" ere I V44,\ib^ ■ t.