I will here relate a personal experience which occurred in
September, 1857, while out with a large party of Indians on a
deer hunt in the mountains.
One day, after a long tramp, I stopped to rest by the side of a
small lake about eight miles from the present site of Wawona, and
I then named it Grouse Lake on account of the great number of
grouse found there. Very soon a party of Indians came along
carrying some deer, and stopped on the opposite side of the lake
to rest and get some water. Soon after they had started again for
their camp I heard a distinct wailing cry, somewhat like the cry
of a puppy when lost, and I thought the Indians must have left
one of their young dogs behind.
When I joined the Indians in camp that night I inquired of them
about the sound I had heard. They replied that it was not a
dog--that a long time ago an Indian boy had been drowned in the
lake, and that every time any one passed there he always cried
after them, and that no one dared to go in the lake, for he
would catch them by the legs and pull them down and they would,
be drowned. I then concluded that it must have been some unseen
water-fowl that made the cry, and at that time I thought that the
Indians were trying to impose on my credulity, but I am now
convinced that they fully believed the story they told me.
Po-ho´-no Lake, the headwaters of the Bridal Veil Creek, was
also thought to be haunted by troubled spirits, which affected
the stream clear down into the Yosemite Valley; and the Indians
believed that an evil wind there had been the cause of some fatal
accidents many years ago. The word Po-ho´-no means a puffing
wind, and has also been translated "Evil Wind," on account of the
superstition above referred to.