TEACHINGS OF THE KLAMATH INDIANS ON CHILD-BIRTH.
The Klamath Indians say that a child born at the time the sun is at
the farthest north and on the point which it is to turn back south,
or as the white man counts time, would be in the month of December
and which we count the tenth month, and call Cah-mo, is the worst and
most objectionable time we have for a child to be born, most of them
die young or in infancy, and if they live they are of little use to
themselves or the tribe. A child born in the time in which the acorns
fall, which would be from the tenth of October to the twentieth of
November, and which time or month we call Can-na-wal-at-tow, is the
best or one of the best times, as these children are nearly all bright,
healthy and prosperous, and make the leading ones. While children born
in April, May and June, as we count the time, also make good, healthy
and bright men and women, and also the leading ones. Children born
between the twentieth of July and the first of September, which we call
Cher-wer-ser-a, are weakly and do not live long, most of them dying
young, but if they do live they are foolish and not of any use to their
people. Those that are born in the time the white man designates as
October, May and June, are the ones that receive the prayers of the
mother, grand parent and wise old heads of the tribe, and all look
forward to their being useful to the tribe, particularly those that
are of the high families. The Klamath Indians are a people that are at
any, and all times, praying to the great father of all, and are pleased
when a new baby is born. They take the best of care of the mother in
child-birth, but if a woman brings into the world a child that is dead
or still-born, she is looked down upon and is almost cast aside, and
has a hard time to pull through. If she dies in the struggle, there is
but little sympathy for her loss, and if she lives, she is ever after
called Cam-ma-gay, so that any and all may know her, and if she is
a married woman and has had children and saved them, and afterwards
brings one into the world dead, she is always afterwards called
Quirk-ker-alth.
In all my life among them I have never seen but few of these women, but
do know some that have met with this misfortune. The Klamath Indians
are the best in the world at handling their women in child-birth, in
the old Indian way.