Chapter XI: Part 11

Just as Ckūˊwu-yēł came to the ʟǃūkǃnᴀxᴀˊdî town, a man ran down toward the canoe, making believe that he was going to kill him, but one of the Kāˊgwᴀntān caught him and said, “Why do you want to kill that chief? You are not as high as he.” He said, “It isn’t because I am anxious to kill him, but because I was always so afraid of him when he was warring.”[102]

Then they seized Ckūˊwu-yēł to make him a deer and took him into Sleep house, the house of his father-in-law. When she saw him going in there, his wife came out of the canoe, carrying the raven hat he had captured. Eagle down was upon it. So they, in turn, brought out the ānkᴀx̣wāˊî with eagle down upon it. They also painted the face of the deer and the face on the corner post representing Sleep. This was because they had so much respect for this post. The painting of its face was the end of their troubles.

It was against the deer’s rules to eat devilfish or any kind of fresh fish, but they thought, “If he still feels badly toward us, he will refuse to eat it.” So he said to them, “Bring that devilfish here. I will eat that devilfish.” They did not want him to eat it, but they wanted to see what he would say. As soon as he asked for it, therefore, all shouted and put it back from him. They said, “It is so. He has come to make peace.” Then they danced for him.

After this all of the G̣ānᴀxteˊdî came over and carried away his father-in-law to be deer on the other side.

They said to Ckūˊwu-yēł, “Have you your canoe ashore with all of your people in it?” He said, “I have it ashore.” This was their way of asking whether there would be any more war. Then they would say to the deer again, “My deer, we are going to camp in a nice sunny place, are we not; and we are going to come in in a sheltered place where there are no waves, are we not?” He would say, “Yes, we are going to camp in a good place.” Then they would say to him, “You are going to sleep well hereafter, are you not?” And he answered, “Yes.” When they were moving about, warring people could never sleep well. That is why they said this to him. By the waves and wind they meant the troubles they had had, and by saying that they were going to camp in a calm place they meant that they were not going to war any more.

The opposite deer, taken from Sleep house, was asked similar questions. If the deer did not have his mind fixed on making peace people knew it by his songs, therefore they noticed every word he uttered. A high-caste person was always selected as deer, because through him there would be a certain peace. The man that came to another village to be taken up as deer brought food with him on which to feast the people there. The other side gave a feast in return.

After they had made peace Ckūˊwu-yēł danced on the beach just before he set out. Łdahīˊn, the owner of Sleep house, danced on the other side. This is the only way in which people made up with each other after having been enemies for years. It happened years and years ago, and to this day those people are friends.

FOOTNOTES:

[100] According to Katishan, he belonged to the ʟǃūkǃnᴀxᴀˊdî. But see story 104.

[101] Probably erroneous. Cf. story 104.

[102] See p. 71.

33. ORIGIN OF THE G̣ONAQADĒˊT

In a village somewhere to the northward a high-caste person had married a high-caste girl from a neighboring village. His mother-in-law lived with them, and she disliked her son-in-law very much because he was a lazy fellow, fond only of gambling. As soon as they were through with their meal she would say to the slaves, “Let that fire go out at once.” She did not want her son-in-law to have anything to eat there. Long after dark the man would come in, and they would hear him eating. Then his mother-in-law would say, “I suppose my son-in-law has been felling a tree for me.” Next morning he would go out again very early. His wife thought it was useless to say anything. The same thing happened every evening.

When summer came all the people went after salmon, and the gambler accompanied them. After he had hung up quite a lot of this salmon and dried it, he took it up into the woods beside a lake and made a house there out of dry wood. Then he began chopping with his stone ax upon a big tree which stood a little distance back. It took him a very long time to bring it down. After he had felled it into the lake he made wedges out of very hard wood and tied their thick ends with roots to make them strong. He tried to split the tree along its whole length. When he had accomplished this he put crosspieces between to hold the two sections apart. Then he baited his line with salmon, with the bright part turned out, and let it down between. He had been told that there was a monster in that lake, and he was going to find out. By and by he felt his line move, but when he pulled up quickly it broke. The next time, however, he pulled it up still more rapidly and the creature followed it to the surface between the two halves of the tree. Then he pushed the crosspieces out so that the halves of the tree sprang together and caught its head while he jumped ashore. He stood on a grassy spot near by to watch. Then the monster struggled hard to get away, and it was so strong that it kept dragging the tree clear under water, but at last it died. Now the man spread the cedar apart by means of his crosspieces, dragged out the monster’s body and examined it. He saw that it had very sharp, strong teeth and that its claws looked like copper. Then he skinned it with the claws, etc., entire, dried it very carefully, got inside, and went into the water. It began to swim away with him, and it swam down to the monster’s house under the lake, which was very beautiful.

After this man had come up again, he left his skin in a hole in a dry tree near by and went home, but did not say a word to anybody about what he had discovered. When winter came all went back to their village, and the following spring there was a famine.

One morning the man said to his wife, “I am going away. I will be here every morning just before the ravens are awake. If you hear a raven before I get back don’t look for me any more.” Then he again got into the monster’s skin and swam to his house. He found that from there he could go out into the sea, so he swam along in the sea, found a king salmon and brought it back. He took off his skin and left it where he had put it before. The salmon he carried to town and left on the beach close to the houses.

Next morning this man’s mother-in-law got up early, went out, and came upon a salmon. She thought that it had drifted there, so she took it home. Then she came in and said to her husband, “I have found a fine big salmon.” They cooked it for all the people in the village and distributed the food, as was formerly the custom. Next evening her son-in-law did the very same thing, only he caught two salmon. Then he went to bed. He told his wife that it was he who was getting these salmon, but she must not say a word about it.

The third time he brought salmon in and his mother-in-law found them she considered the matter very deeply. Her son-in-law would sleep all day, not getting up to eat until it was almost evening. Before this he had been in the habit of rising very early in order to gamble. When he got up next day, the old woman said to him, “The idea of starving people who are sleeping all day. If I did not go around picking up dead salmon the whole village would be starving.” He listened to what she said, and afterward he and his wife laughed about it.

Next evening he went out again and caught a very large halibut, which he also put in front of his mother-in-law’s house. By this time the woman thought, “I wonder what this is that is bringing me luck. It must be a spirit. I believe I am going to become the richest person in the world. That is why this is happening to me.” When she went out this morning, as was now her custom, and saw the large halibut, she called to her husband and her slaves to bring it up. She felt very proud. Then the chief sent word all through the village, “No one is to go out early in the morning. My wife has had a bad dream.” She had not really had such a dream, but she told her husband so because she did not want anybody to get ahead of her. In those days everyone listened to what the chief said and obeyed him. Next morning the young man got a seal and laid it down before the houses.

Meanwhile his mother-in-law treated him worse and worse. She said, “I will never go out again in the morning to find anything. I know that the people in this village would starve if I did not find things.” After that she found the seal. Then they singed the hair off, scraped it in water to make the skin white, and cooked it in the skin. The chief invited everyone in the village to his house to eat it. He made speeches and listened to speeches in return which told how his wife had saved all of them. Her son-in-law lay in bed taking everything in. Also when a canoe landed in front of the town his mother-in-law would say, “I suppose my son-in-law has brought in a load of seal,” and he listened to her as he lay there.

In the middle of that night the old woman pretended that she had spirits. The spirit in her said, “I am the spirit that finds all this food for you.” Then she said to her husband, as she lay in bed, “Have a mask made for me, and let them name it Food-finding-spirit. Have a claw hat[103] made.” So her husband sent for the best carver in town, and he made all of the things she had asked for. Her husband had an apron made for her with puffin beaks all around it.

After that spirits came to her and mentioned what she was going to find. She rattled her rattle, and her spirits would say that she was rattling it over the whole village. Her son-in-law lay abed listening. The whole village believed in her and thought that she was a wonderful shaman.

The first time the woman went out she found one salmon, the next time two salmon, the third time a halibut, the fourth time two halibut, and after that a seal. Now she said her spirits told her that she was going to find two seals, so, her son-in-law who had heard it, went out the following night and found the two seals. His wife felt very badly for him because her mother nagged him continually. She talked more and more of her spirits all the time, and the high-caste people invited to their feasts spoke very highly of them. She would sing how high her spirits were, and the village paid her a great deal of attention. But she called her son-in-law Sleeping-man. She gave him to eat only a few scraps left over, and would say to the people, “Leave some scraps there for Sleeping-man.”

Next morning she found a sea lion which her son-in-law had caught that night, and again she felt very proud. Her son-in-law kept saying to his wife, “Always listen for the ravens. If you hear the ravens before I come you may know that something has happened to me. If you hear one before I come get right out of bed.” When his mother-in-law invited all the people for this sea lion the people would say, “It has been this way from olden times. The chiefs in a village are always lucky.” Then the woman acted like a shaman and said, “The people of the village are not to go over that way for wood, but over back of the village.” Although she had not a single spirit she made the people believe she had them.

Next morning the son-in-law went out again, caught a whale, and left it in the usual place. The village people were very much surprised when the chief’s wife found it, and she was very proud. She filled a large number of boxes with oil from what was left over after the feast. She had boxes full of all kinds of food, which the town people were buying. They looked up to her as to a great lord.

But her son-in-law said to his wife, “Don’t help yourself to any of that food. Whatever she gives us we will take.” She was treating him worse every day. The son-in-law also said to his wife, “If you see that I am dead in the skin I have, which has been bringing us good luck, do not take me out of it but put me along with the skin in the place where I used to hide it, and you will get help.”

This went on for a long time, but he thought he would not get another whale because he had had such a time with the first. Meanwhile his mother-in-law continued to say spiteful things about him, things to make the village people laugh at him, and now that she had spirits she was worse than ever. Quite a long time after this, however, he did catch two whales and tried to swim ashore with them. He worked all night over them, and, when he got near the place where he used to leave things on the beach, the raven called and he died.

When his wife heard the raven’s cry she remembered what he had said, and began dressing herself, crying as she did so. Still she remained in doors, knowing that the whole village would go down to see the monster. Then her mother walked out as usual and saw two whales lying there with a monster between them. It had two fins on its back, long ears, and a very long tail. All of the people went down to look at it and said to one another, “There is a terrible monster there. Come down to look at it. It is something very strange.” They did not know what it was, but supposed that it was the old woman’s spirit.

At last, when she heard all this racket going on, the chief’s daughter started down the steps from the high foundation such as they used to build on in those days, and she wept very loudly as she descended so that all the people could hear her. They looked at her and wondered what was wrong with her, thinking, “What does that high-caste girl mean by calling the monster her husband?” Nobody would go near, for they were afraid of the chief, of the chief’s daughter, and of the monster. But, when the girl had come down, she said to her mother, who was still looking at the monster, “Where are your spirits now? You are a story teller. You say that you have spirits when you have not. That is why this happened to my husband.” Now the interest was so intense that people had crawled up on the roofs of the houses and on other high places to look at the monster. As the girl also stood there looking, she said, “Mother, is this your Food-finding spirit? How is it that your spirit should die? Spirits all over the world never die. If this is your spirit make it come to life again.”

Then the girl went close to the monster and said to the village people, “Some of you that are very clean come and help me.” Her husband had died in the act of holding the jaws of the monster apart to come out, one hand on each. When the people saw this they were very much surprised and said, “He must have been captured by that monster.” From that time on this monster has been known as the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt.

The people helped to take the woman’s husband and the monster’s skin up to the edge of the lake and put them into the hollow in the tree. There they saw the log, broken hammers, and wedges lying about where he had killed it, and reported to the rest of the people so that everyone went there to look. But the old woman was so ashamed that she remained in doors and died. When they found her body blood was coming out of the mouth.

Every evening after this the dead man’s wife went to the foot of the tree which contained his body and wept. One evening, however, she perceived a ripple on the water, and looking up, saw the monster flopping around in the lake. Then the creature said to her, “Come here.” It was the voice of her husband. “Get on my back,” it said, “and hold tight.” She did so, and he swam down to the monster’s former house. This monster is the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt that brings good luck to those that see him. His wife also brings good luck to those who see her, and so do their children, “the Daughters of the Creek,” who live at the head of every stream.

FOOTNOTES:

[103] A hat imitating the claws of some animal.

34. A STORY OF THE G̣ONAQADĒˊT

The head chief of the people living at the head of Nass river once came down to the ocean and on his way back tied his canoe to a dead tree hanging from a cliff. At midnight he felt the canoe shaking very hard. He jumped up and was terrified to see foam breaking almost over his canoe. Then he thought of a sea monster, and climbed up to the cliff by means of the dead tree. His nephews, however, went down with the canoe. A G̣onaqᴀdēˊt had swallowed them.

Along with this canoe had come down another, which stopped for the night at a sandy beach right opposite. They had seen the chief’s canoe there the night before, and, observing next morning that it was gone, supposed the chief had started on ahead and continued their journey. They had also felt the motion of the sea, although it was previously very calm. When they reached home the canoe chief asked whether the head chief had returned, and they said, “No.” Then he told them how strangely the sea had acted and how he missed the chief’s canoe and thought that it had gone on ahead.

After he had remained in the village for five days the canoe chief began to think seriously about the chief’s absence. Then he got into a large canoe along with very many people and set out to look for him. Four men stood up in the canoe continually, one at the bow, one at the stern, and two in the middle, looking always for the chief from the time that they left their village. They camped very early that night and arrived next morning at the dead tree where the chief’s canoe had been tied. As they passed this place they heard somebody shout, and the man in the stern, looking up, saw the missing chief standing on the very top of the cliff. They saw also signs of the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt and knew what had happened. Then they took him in, but he would say nothing until they had gotten back to the village. There he spoke, saying, “I did not have time to awaken my sisters’ children. I could not have saved myself if I had done so. That is why they are gone.” He felt badly about them.

Then all the people in the village began bathing for strength, sitting in the water and whipping each other, so that they might kill the monster. The chief, however, was very quiet, and, when they asked him what they should do, he told them to do as they pleased. They were surprised at this. When he saw that they really meant business he was very silent, and they could see that he was thinking deeply. Finally he said, “Boys, you better not punish yourselves so much. You are injuring yourselves, and you are all that I have left now. Let us treat this monster kindly. Instead of having destroyed my sisters’ children, he may have taken them to live with him, and, if we were to kill him, we might kill my sisters’ children as well. Instead I will give a feast and invite this G̣onaqᴀdēˊt to it.” They all told him to do so if he thought he could get his nephews back thereby.

Then they talked this whole matter over in the chief’s house, and the chief said, “Who will go to invite this G̣onaqᴀdēˊt?” And many of the brave young men answered, “I will; I will,” so that he got a canoe load very quickly. After that the chief said, “Which one of my brothers-in-law will go to invite him?” “I will,” answered one of them who was also brave. Then all got into the canoe, traveled that night and encamped just before dawn on a sandy beach close to the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s cliff. About noon they put on their best dancing clothes and paddled to the cliff. Then the chief’s brother-in-law arose in the canoe and shouted out as loudly as he could, “The great chief has invited the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt to a feast.” He repeated these words four times, and the fourth time he did so the water began to act as on the night when the chief’s nephews had been lost. The foam became very thick finally, and the cliff opened, revealing at some distance a very long town. They were invited to come nearer, and, although they thought that the cliff would close upon them, they did so. There were many men about this town, and out of one large house came the chief (the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt), who said, “Our song leader is out after wood. Therefore, my father’s people, you will have to stay out there quite a while. We must wait for our song leader.” Then the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt said, “A long time since I heard that I was going to be invited to a feast by that great chief.” While he was so speaking there came people into the town with a load of wood, and they knew that it was the song leader himself. The G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people were now so impatient that all rushed down to the song leader’s canoe and carried it up bodily. Then the streets became empty, because everyone had gone in to dress, and in a little while they came down on the beach again and danced for the people in the canoes.

As soon as this was over the visitors asked to come ashore, and immediately their canoe with everyone inside was carried up to the house of the chief. One of the visitors was sent to all the houses in the town to invite them to the chief’s house, and there they gave them Indian tobacco and watched very closely to see what they would do with it. They seemed very fond of it.

After this tobacco feast was over the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt said, “Let us have a dance for these people who have come to invite us. Let us make them happy.” They went away and dressed, and that evening they had a dance for their visitors. Then the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt said, “These people that come to invite me have to fast.”[104] Early next morning, therefore, the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt sat up in bed and said to the people in the house, “Make a fire and let us feed these people who have come so far to invite me.” He sent one of his men through the village to announce that he was going to have a feast for the people who had come after him. When this was over, he said to his visitors, “You will stay here with us for four days.”

Many people had volunteered to go on this expedition, because they thought that if they were swallowed they would see those who had been lost before, and they looked for them all of that time, but in vain. At the close of the fourth day the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt said, “We will start off very early in the morning.” When they got close to the host’s village, however, it rained hard, and they thought they would not be able to dance in it. Seeing that it did not let up, they said to the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt, “Haven’t you a shaman among you! Now is the time to get help from your shaman. He ought to make it stop raining.” They employed him, and he made the rain stop by summoning his spirits. All this time the people who had invited the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt were very silent, and only he knew what was the matter with them. As they were now very close to the town, they sent one canoe thither to make it known that the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people were encamped close by, ready to come to the village. The chief told his people to get a quantity of wood and take it to those he had invited, because they were to stay there another day. All in the village were anxious to do this, because they thought that they would see the chief’s nephews. As they went along they said to one another that they would look for the chief’s eldest nephew, whom they expected to see dressed in his dancing clothes. But, when they arrived at the camp, they were disappointed.

Next morning all of the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people started for the village, and, when they arrived, they were asked to stop their canoes a few feet off so that the village people could dance for them. Then the village people came down close to their canoes and danced. Afterward the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people danced. The G̣onaqᴀdēˊt himself always led, wearing the same hat with jointed crown.

Next day the village people danced again, and, after they were through, the chief said that his guests would have to fast. So they fasted all that day, and very early in the morning the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt got up and told his people that they must sit up in bed and sing before the raven called. This they had to be very particular about. Then the village chief sent to the different houses to announce that the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt and his people were to eat, and he gave them food that day. They danced for three days and feasted for the same length of time. The fourth day the village chief invited the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people in order to give them property. He gave more to the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt than to all the rest. That was his last feast. The evening he finished it he felt sad, and he and all of his people were very quiet because they had not yet seen his nephews. He said to himself, “I wonder why this G̣onaqᴀdēˊt did not bring my sisters’ children. That is just what I invited him to the feast for.”

Soon after this thought had passed through the chief’s mind the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt called loudly to one of his men, “Bring me my box from over yonder.” This box was beautifully carved and painted, and it was from it that the Tsimshian came to know how to carve and paint boxes. Then he took out a chief’s dancing hat with sea lion bristles and a rattle, and just as soon as he had done so the chief’s eldest nephew stood beside him. He put the headdress upon him and gave him the rattle, and the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt’s people sang songs for him. They sang four songs, and the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt said, “This hat, this rattle, and these songs are yours.” The village chief was happy when he saw his nephew.

Then the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt went through the same actions as before. There had been twenty youths in the chief’s large canoe, and he gave each a hat, a rattle, and four songs, making them all stand on one side of the house. Now the village chief felt very happy and was glad that he had invited the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt to him instead of doing as the village people had planned.

Next morning, when the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt was preparing to start, it was very foggy. He and his people left the village singing, and their canoes went along side by side until they passed out of sight in the fog. They returned to their own home.

It is from this story that people do not want to hear the raven before their guests get up. The chief’s headdress with sea lion bristles also came from the G̣onaqᴀdēˊt, and so it happened that the Nass people wore it first.

FOOTNOTES:

[104] See _Twenty-sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology_, p. 440.

35. ORIGIN OF THE LǃÊˊNAXX̣ĪˊDAQ[105]

A boy at Auk (Ākǃᵘ) heard that a woman lived in the lake back of his village. He heard this so often that he was very anxious to see her. One day, therefore, he went up to the lake and watched there all day, but he did not see anything. Next day he did the same thing again, and late in the afternoon he thought that he would sit down in the high grass. The sun was shining on the lake, making it look very pretty.

After some time the youth noticed ripples on the water, and, jumping up to look, saw a beautiful woman come up and begin playing around in it. After her came up her two babies. Then the man waded out into the lake, caught one of the babies, rolled it up in his skin coat, and carried it home.

All that night he had to watch the child very closely, for she kept trying to get away, but at last he became so sleepy that he rolled the child up once more and fell asleep.

Now the child got up, dug out the eyes of everybody in that house, beginning with the man who had captured her, and went from house to house throughout the entire village doing the same thing.

There was a sick woman in that place for whom they had made a small house back of her own, and, when this child came in to her, she tried to make out whose it was. She said to herself that she thought she knew every child in the village, yet she did not recognize this one. The child had the people’s eyes rolled up in some leaves. As it sat close to the fire eating them the woman thought, “What is that child eating?” She would throw them into the fire and then take them out and eat them. Finally the woman sat up, looked to see what the child was devouring, and discovered they were human eyes. After she was through with what she had the child would go out again after more. The woman watched her closely.

Now the sick woman felt very sleepy but she did not dare to sleep for, every time she began to doze off, she felt the child coming toward her face. She had a little child beside her. Finally the sick woman determined that she would stay awake, so she placed her walking stick very close to her, and, as soon as the child came too close, she would strike it and make it run away. This continued until daylight when the child disappeared.

Now the woman was surprised to hear no noises about the town and wondered what was wrong. She thought she would go out to look. First she went to her own house and saw that all the people there were dead, with their eyes gouged out, and she saw the same thing in all the other houses. Then the woman felt very sad. She threw her marten-skin robes about herself, took a copper plate on each side, placed her baby on her back and started off. She is the ʟǃêˊnᴀxx̣īˊdᴀq, which a person sees when he is going to become very wealthy. (The ʟǃêˊnᴀxx̣īˊdᴀq is therefore one of the ʟǃenēdî.)

One time after this a man of the Wolf clan named Heavy Wings (Kîtcîłdᴀˊłqǃ) was out hunting and heard a child cry somewhere in the woods. He ran toward the sound very rapidly, but, although the child’s voice seemed to be very close to him, he could not see what caused it. Then he stopped by the side of a creek, tore his clothes off, and bathed in the cold water, rubbing himself down with sand. Afterward he felt very light and, although the voice had gotten some distance away, he reached it, and saw a woman with an infant on her back. He pulled the child off and started to run away with it, but he did not escape before the woman had given him a severe scratch upon his back with her long copper finger nails. By and by he came to a tree that hung out over the edge of a high cliff and ran out to the end of it with the child in his arms. Then the woman begged very hard for her baby saying, “Give me my baby.” As she spoke she put her hand inside of her blanket and handed him a copper. When he still refused to give her the child she handed him another. Then he gave the child back, and she said, “That scratch I made on your back will be a long time in healing. If you give a scab from it to any one of your people who is poor, he will become very rich. Do not give it to anybody but your very near relations.”

And so in fact it turned out. The sore did not heal for a long time, not even after he had become very rich. Everything that he put his hand to prospered, and the relations to whom he had given scabs became the richest ones next to him.

FOOTNOTES:

[105] See story 94 and close of story 105.

36. THE THUNDERS

A high-caste girl who had four brothers went out of the house one morning and stepped on a snail. Then she said “Oh! this nasty thing. There isn’t a time when I go out but that snail is around this house.” The evening after a youth of about her own age came to the girl, and she went off with him.

When the people found that she had disappeared they searched for her everywhere. They did not know what had become of her. Her brothers also hunted everywhere, but for a long time without result. Some distance behind the village was a high, perpendicular cliff without a tree or a bush on it, and half way up they at last saw their sister with a very large snail coiled around her. They ran about underneath and called to her to throw herself down, but she could not. She was stuck there.

After this the four brothers tried to find some way of flying. They tried one kind of wood after another and also bone for wings but in vain. After they had flown for a short distance they always dropped down again. Finally they employed yellow cedar. The first time they used it they got half way up to the place where their sister was, but the second time they reached her and dragged her down, leaving the snail still there.

But the four brothers now left their own village, because they said that their sister had disgraced them, and they became the Thunders. When they move their wings you hear the thunder, and, when they wink, you see the lightning.

At the time when these brothers first went away the people at their father’s village were starving, so they flew out over the ocean, caught a whale and brought it to the town that it might be found next morning. So nowadays people claim that the Thunder is powerful and can get anything, because they know that it was powerful at that time. After the famine was over they left the world below, went to the sky to live, and have never been seen since.

The Taqêstînaˊ claim the Thunder, because those brothers belonged to that family.

37. ORIGIN OF THE SCREECH OWL[106]

There was a certain woman at Sitka living with her husband and her husband’s mother. One evening she got hemlock branches, made strings out of red-cedar bark, tied them together, and put them around herself. Then she went out to a flat rock, still called Herring rock, where herring are very abundant, just as the tide was coming over it, and, when the fish collected in the branches, she threw them up on the beach. Every day during the herring season she did the same thing, and after she reached the house she put her apron carefully away until next time.

One day her old mother-in-law heard her cooking the herring and said, “What is that you are cooking, my son’s wife?” “Oh!” she answered, “a few clams that I have collected.” “Will you give me some?” said the old woman, for she was hungry, but, when she reached out her hand for it, her daughter-in-law dropped a hot rock into it and burnt her.

When her son came home that evening the old woman told him what had happened. She said, “She was cooking something. I know that it did not smell like clams. When I asked her for some she gave me a hot rock and burnt my hand. I wonder where she got that fish, for I am sure that it was some sort of fish. Immediately after you leave she is off. I don’t know what she does.”

When the man heard that, he and his brother who had been hunting with him started out at once before his wife saw them. They pretended that they were again going hunting, but they returned immediately to a place where they could watch the village. From there they saw the woman put on her apron of hemlock boughs, go out to the rock, and come home with the herring. As soon as she had gone in they went out themselves and got a canoe load of the fish. Then the woman’s husband went up to the house and said to his wife, “I have a load of herring down there.” So she ran down to the canoe and saw that it was loaded with them. She began shouting up to them, “Bring me down my basket,” for she wanted to carry up the fish in it. The people heard her, but they felt ill-disposed toward her on account of the way she had treated her mother-in-law, so they paid no attention. She kept on shouting louder and louder, and presently her voice became strange. She shouted, “Hadeˊ wudîkāˊt, wudîkāˊt, wudîkāˊt.”[107] She also began hooting like an owl.

As she kept on making this noise her voice seemed to go farther away from the village. The people noticed it, but paid no attention. After she had asked for the basket right behind the village, she sounded still more like an owl, and finally she ceased to ask for the basket, and merely hooted (hm, hm). She had become the screech owl. She left them altogether.

Nowadays, when a young girl is very selfish, people say to her, “Ah! when you get married, you will put a hot rock into your mother-in-law’s hand, and for punishment you will become an owl.”

FOOTNOTES:

[106] Story 98 is another version.

[107] This way with the basket (kāt).

38. LITTLE FELON

A certain man had a felon (kwêq) on his finger and suffered terribly, so that he could get no sleep. He did not know what to do for it. One day somebody said to him, “Hold it under the smoke hole of the house and get some one to poke it with something very sharp through the smoke hole. You will find that it will get well.” He did so, and the two eyes of the felon came right out. Then he wrapped them up and put them away. Late in the evening he looked at it and saw a little man there about an inch long. It was the disease from his finger. He took very good care of this little man and he grew rapidly, soon becoming large enough to run about. He called the little man Little Felon (Kwêqkǃᵘ).

Little Felon was a very industrious little fellow, always at work, and he knew how to carve, make canoes, paint, and do other similar things. When he was working his master could not keep from working himself. He simply had to work. They thought it was because he had come from the hand. Little Felon was also a good shot with bow and arrows, and he was a very fast runner, running races with all the different animals. Finally he started to run a race with the heron, and everybody said the heron would prove too much for him. They raced all the way round Prince of Wales island, and, when they were through, Little Felon said to the heron, “I have been way back among the mountains of this island, and there are thirty-three lakes.” The heron answered, “I have been all along the creeks, and there are fifty creeks.”

By and by a youth said to Little Felon, “There is a girl living with a certain old woman. She is a very pretty girl and wants to marry, but she hasn’t seen anybody she likes. Her grandmother has the dried skin of an animal and she has been making all the young fellows guess the name of it. Those that guess wrong are put to death. You ought to try for her.” But Little Felon said to the boy, “I don’t care to marry, and I don’t want to guess, because I know. You tell her that it is the skin of a louse. It was crawling upon the woman, and she put it into a box and fed it until it grew large. Then she killed and skinned it. You will get her if you tell her. But be careful. That old woman knows a lot about medicines. When you are going toward her, go with the wind. Don’t let the wind come from her. Don’t go toward her when the south wind is blowing. Go toward her when the north wind is blowing. Nobody goes directly to her. People talk to her from quite a distance. A person goes to her house only to be put to death. Those persons who guess stand a great way off to do it. When they don’t guess right they go to that house and are put to death. She has a large square dish in which she cooks their bodies.”

After that the boy went toward the old woman’s camp and remained at some distance from her for a very long time, for the south wind was blowing continually. She seemed to know that he was there, and said to her granddaughter, “There is a fellow coming who has been around here for a very long time. He is the one who is going to marry you.” The little man had said to the youth he was helping, “Don’t tell about me. That old woman has all kinds of dangerous things with which to kill people.”

As soon as the north wind began to blow, Little Felon told him to go on, so he approached the old woman unnoticed and stood looking at her for a long time. Finally she looked up, saw him, and said, “Oh! my grandson, from how far away have you come?” He told her, and she invited him in to have something to eat. She gave him all kinds of food. Then, when they were through, she showed him the skin and said, “What kind of skin is this?” He answered, “That is a louse skin, grandma.” She looked at him then for some time without speaking. Finally she said, “Where are you wise from, from your father?” “Oh!” he said, “from all around.” Then she said “All right, you can marry my granddaughter. But do you see that place over there? A very large devilfish lives there. I want you to kill it.”

The youth went back to Little Felon and told him what she had said. “Oh!” he answered, “there is a monster there. That is the way she gets rid of boys, is it?” So Little Felon made a hook, went to the place where the devilfish lived, made it small, and pulled it right out. He put the stick over his companion’s shoulder and said to him, “Carry it this way.” The youth did so and, coming to the old woman’s house, he said, “Is this the devilfish you were talking about?” He threw it down, and it grew until it became a monster again that filled the entire house. The old woman felt very badly, and said, “Take it out of this house and lay it down outside.” He did so, and the moment he picked it up it grew small again.

Then the old woman said, “Do you see that cliff that goes right down into the water? A monster rat lives there. If you kill it, you shall have my granddaughter.” The youth went away again and told Little Felon about it, who said, “I told you so. I knew that she would give you a lot of things to do.” So they got their bows and arrows ready, went to the hole of the monster, and looked in. It was asleep. They began shooting it. They blinded it first by shooting into its eyes and then they shot it through the heart. They ran in to it to shoot, but, as soon as they had wounded it fatally, they rushed out again, and it followed them. It ran right into the ocean, and they could hear it splashing the water about it with its tail. It sounded like thunder. Finally the rat died and drifted ashore.

Then Little Felon told the young man to take it up and carry it to the old woman, and, as soon as he had grasped it, it was very small and light. He carried it in to her and said, “Is this the rat you were talking about?” Then he threw it down, and it filled the house. So she said, “Take it up and put it outside.”

Now the old woman spoke again. “Way out there in the middle of the ocean is a sculpin. Go out and fish for it, and you shall get my granddaughter.” So he and Little Felon went out there and caught the sculpin, which Little Felon made very small. He threw it into the bottom of the canoe and left it there. When they reached land the youth took it up to the old woman and threw it down inside. Lo! it was an awful monster with great spines.

Now the old woman did not know what to do. She thought, “What kind of boy is this?” Then she said, “Do you see that point? A very large crab lives out there. Go and kill it.” When they got out there they saw the crab floating about on its back. It looked very dangerous. Little Felon, however, told the crab to get small, and it did so. He killed it, put it into the canoe, and carried it to the old woman, who exclaimed, “Oh! he has killed everything that belongs to me.”

Then the old woman said, “Go far out to sea beyond the place where you got that sculpin. I dropped my bracelet overboard there. Go and get it.” So he and Little Felon set out. But first they dug a quantity of clams and removed the shells. They took these out to that place and threw them around in the water, when all kinds of fish began to come up. Then Little Felon saw a dogfish coming up and said to it, “A bracelet was lost over there. Go and get it for me.” He did so, and the youth took it to the old woman.

Then the old woman was very much surprised and said, “Well! that is the last.” So she said to her granddaughter, “Come out. Here is your husband. You must have respect for him always.” So he married her. After that he went over to Little Felon and asked how much he owed him. “You don’t owe me anything,” said Little Felon. “You remember that at the time I was suffering so badly you pricked me through the smoke hole.” And the youth answered, “Oh! yes, this is the fellow.” Little Felon (Kwêqkǃᵘ) is a slender fish that swims close to the beach.

After that the young man and his wife always traveled about together, for he thought a great deal of her. By and by, however, they had a quarrel and he was cruel to her. So she went away and sat down on a point, after which she disappeared and he did not know what had happened to her. He went out on the point and hunted everywhere. He is a lonely beach snipe, called ayᴀhīỵiỵaˊ, which is often seen hunting about on the points to-day, and when they see him the Tlingit say, “There he is looking for his wife.”

39. ORIGIN OF THE FERN ROOT AND THE GROUND HOG[108]

The girls of a certain place were playing house under a cliff back of their village, and each of them took some kind of food there. Among them were two very poor little orphans who had no food to bring, so the elder went home and brought up the bony part of a dry salmon and the younger a fern root named kǃwᴀłx. Then the older girls took these from them and threw them away, so that they began to cry very hard.

While the girls were crying, the cliff behind them fell over in front and imprisoned them all. They began to cry from fright. After that they began to rub on the cliff the tallow and salmon they had with them, and the little birds that had also been imprisoned began to peck it off, so that at length they began to make a hollow in the rock. In course of time the birds pecked a hole entirely through, and, when it was large enough, the girls began to crawl out. Finally all of the girls were taken out except one poor little girl who got stuck half way. The walls had in reality closed in on her, and they continued to do so until they had cut her quite in two. Her head became the fern root (kǃwᴀłx) and her body became a ground hog.

FOOTNOTES:

[108] Evidently fragmentary.

40. THE HALIBUT THAT DIVIDED THE QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS

Formerly there was but one village on the Queen Charlotte islands (Dekīˊ qoan āˊnî, Town-far-out). Every day the people used to go out from this village to fish for halibut, and all were successful except one man. Though the people all about his canoe were pulling in fish he caught nothing day after day, and he became angry.

One calm day, however, he had a bite. Pulling at his line he found that something very strong was attached to it. After he had pulled it up a short distance it would pull the line away from him, and each time he let it go for fear of losing it. When he at last got it up, however, it was only a little halibut about as big as a flounder. He could not catch anything else.