The men also wear bracelets of painted leather or copper and large ear-rings of the latter, but the ornament on which they appear to set the most value is the nose-jewel, if such an appellation may be given to the wooden stick which some of them employ for this purpose. The king and chiefs, however, wear them of a different form, being either small pieces of polished copper or brass, of which I made many for them in the shape of hearts and diamonds, or a twisted conical shell about half an inch in length, of a bluish colour and very bright, which is brought from the south. These are suspended by a small wire or string to the hole in the gristle of the nose, which is formed in infancy by boring it with a pin, the hole being afterwards enlarged by the repeated insertion of wooden pegs of an increased size, until it becomes about the diameter of a pipe-stem, though some have them of a size nearly sufficient to admit the little finger. The common class, who cannot readily procure the more expensive jewels that I have mentioned, substitute for them, usually, a smooth, round stick, some of which are of an almost incredible length, for I have seen them projecting not less than eight or nine inches beyond the face on each side; this is made fast or secured in its place by little wedges on each side of it. These "sprit-sail-yard fellows," as my messmate used to call them, when rigged out in this manner, made quite a strange show, and it was his delight, whenever he saw one of them coming towards us with an air of consequence proportioned to the length of his stick, to put up his hand suddenly as he was passing him, so as to strike the stick, in order, as he said, to brace him up sharp to the wind; this used to make them very angry, but nothing was more remote from Thompson's ideas than a wish to cultivate their favour. The natives of Nootka appear to have but little inclination for the chase, though some of them were expert marksmen, and used sometimes to shoot ducks and geese; but the seal and the sea-otter form the principal objects of their hunting, particularly the latter.