CHAPTER X. _COURTSHIP AND MARRIAGE._ “Thus it is our daughters leave us, Those we love, and those who love us! Just when they have learned to help us, When we are old and lean upon them, Comes a youth with flaunting feathers, With his flute of reeds, a stranger Wanders piping through the village, Beckons to the fairest maiden, And she follows where he leads her, Leaving all things for the stranger!” --_Longfellow’s “Hiawatha.”_ An An-ko-me-num courtship, and the marriage which followed, differed entirely from that with which we are most familiar. One heathen wedding, which I witnessed early in my stay at Nanaimo, very perfectly illustrates the difference between their customs and ours. Chief Tsil-ka-mut lived in a large old heathen house about 150 feet long by 40 feet wide. Tsil-la-meah, his eldest daughter, by his eldest wife--for he had two wives--was a modest Indian maiden, who had been strictly kept, as a chief’s daughter, according to heathen law. On one occasion, when one of H. M. ships of war was anchored in the harbor, a number of bluejackets were allowed out on leave. They filled up with liquor in the town, and then marched down through the woods, over a mile, to the Indian village, cutting clubs as they went. When they reached the village they shouted and swore and acted like demons, and began to drive the people out of their houses and insult their young women. Among them were two professedly petty officers, who made their way into Tsil-ka-mut’s big house, where his daughter, Tsil-la-meah, was busy with her needle, while her mother sat near her on the floor working at a mat. These rough men sat down, one on each side of the innocent maid, and began to push her. The child, for she was little more than that at the time, became afraid of them, and the anxious mother cried, “Klata-wah! klata-wah!” (“Go away! go away!”). They paid no attention and still persisted in their insults, until finally the mother, in her own language, called out for the chief, who was at the other end of the long house, taking a meal with some of his clan. Leaping over the floor Tsil-ka-mut dashed around the corner of the partition which enclosed his family room, and in a trice was facing these ruffians. Immediately he shouted, pointing to the door, “Klata-wah! klata-wah!” which in this tone of voice meant “Get out, and hurry about it.” “Oh, no! oh, no!” said the poor fools, grinning like gaping idiots as they spoke. With that he seized a paddle and smashed it over their heads, repeating in a towering voice, “Klata-wah! klata-wah!” Then these big fellows, who had been sent out with others from the Home Land to help keep peace among the Indians, scampered out of the house and away without further ceremony.