Blaiwas Eagle
Kai Rabbit
Kaiutois Wolf (Gray)
Kékina Lizard
Kískina Beetle
Lok Bear
Snewédjas Married woman
Tskel Mink
Tusasás Skunk
Lok Snewédjas was a woman in the daytime and a bear at night. She lived
under the ground on the top of a high mountain; nobody could see her
either when she was a bear, or a woman.
A big chief lived in the lava bed country between that mountain and
Lake Klamath.
One day his son came home without game. The chief was mad and he
scolded. The young man felt badly. His mind told him to go to the
mountain and forget his troubles. As soon as he started, a great
snow-storm came and the wind blew so terribly, that he could hardly
walk. When he got to the foot of the mountain, he sat down under a
cedar tree and waited.
Once in a while the clouds went away and it stopped snowing; he could
see everywhere. Then it snowed again.
Once, when it was bright, the young man looked up and saw, on the
mountain, something hanging on a pole. Lok Snewédjas made him see it.
She had seen him when he was hunting and had heard him talk to himself
and say he had no friends and no place to go. That made her feel sorry
for him. She liked him; she wanted him to come to her.
When the young man saw the pole, he said: “I didn’t know that people
lived up there. I have been on this mountain many times, but I have
never met anybody or seen any house. I will go and find out who lives
there.” As he started, it stopped snowing; he could see everywhere.
When he got to the pole, he found a deer hide on it, and right there by
the pole was something that looked like the smoke hole of a house. He
stood around a while, then he went in. He found a beautiful house with
nice things everywhere. On the north side of the house sat Lok
Snewédjas. She was a good-looking woman; she had long black hair and
bright eyes. The young man sat down on the south side of the house.
Lok Snewédjas got up, took a pinch of yĕlalwek, a sweet seed that
nobody else in the world had, put it in the center of a straw plate,
and set the plate down by the young man.
He thought: “I wonder what I am going to do with that little bit of
seed?” He took up one seed and put it in his mouth. It melted and was
nice and sweet; he thought it was the best thing he had ever eaten. He
kept eating, ate fast, but the same amount of seed was always on the
plate. He was afraid to be in a strange house with such a powerful
woman.
Lok Snewédjas knew his thoughts; she could hear them as well as if he
spoke. She gave him pounded deer meat, and he thought: “Where does she
get this meat?” She laughed, for she heard him think.
When the young man couldn’t eat any more, he rested his elbow on the
ground and put his head on his hand. Right away he was asleep. Lok
Snewédjas thought: “I wonder why he is sorry that he came here;” she
waited to see if he would wake up and go home. When he woke up, he
reached to get a deerskin to put under his head for a pillow. Lok
Snewédjas said: “I have made a bed for you, you must lie on it.” He was
scared, but he lay where she told him to; then she made him go to
sleep. She was afraid if she went to sleep first, he would see her when
she was a bear.
In the night the young man woke up. The fire was burning. He looked
over to where the woman was sleeping and saw a big black bear; its
mouth was open and its long teeth were sticking out. He was terribly
frightened; he wanted to run away but he couldn’t move.
Lok Snewédjas woke up; she knew what the young man thought and she felt
sorry. She said: “I am this kind; I am a woman in the daytime and a
bear at night. I belong to the mountain. The earth is my mother, the
mountain is my father. They give me my food and keep me alive. I have
always seen you traveling around on the mountain. I saw your heart; I
was sorry for you. You felt lonesome; you said you had no kin who cared
for you. I liked you and wanted you to come and live with me.”
The young man didn’t speak, but he wasn’t afraid any longer. Just at
daylight Lok Snewédjas became a young woman; she was bright and nice to
look at. She gave him water to wash his face; she stirred the water
with her finger and it rose up like foam. She had everything ready to
eat. She never cooked; the mountain and the earth gave her food.
When the young man wanted to track deer, Lok Snewédjas said: “Don’t go
far; stay near the house.” Right away he saw a big deer. He killed it
and carried it to Lok Snewédjas. After that she only let him hunt once
in a long time. She was afraid he would go off and leave her.
“I never stayed at home; I hunted every day,” said the man.
“I know that,” said Snewédjas; “I saw you. You had to kill deer then,
but when we have plenty to eat, it’s not right to hunt. The mountain
and the earth feed us.”
Blaiwas, Kaiutois, Tskel, Kai, Kískina, Kékina, and all the people who
lived in the young man’s village, were out looking for him. They went
everywhere on the mountain, but they couldn’t find him. Sometimes they
were walking on top of Lok Snewédjas’ house, but they didn’t see it.
One day the woman said: “I hear people crying. Your mother and sisters
are mourning for you. Do you want to go and see them?”
“No,” said the young man, “my father abused me. I don’t care for him
any longer. I want to stay here with you.”
Lok Snewédjas was glad. She said: “If you are going to stay here, I
will tell you about my father and mother. When you walk on the
mountain, you are walking on my mother. Don’t harm a tree, or a bush,
or a leaf, or anything. Put your mind on the deer you are tracking, and
don’t listen to anything. When a deer leads you to the other side of
the mountain, you must not touch a plant or even a leaf there. If you
do, it will cut your body. On the trail you will see a little animal;
then right away you will see a great many of them. If you turn your
head to look at them, you will lose your mind; you will wander off on
the mountain and get lost. Don’t think of those animals; follow the
deer. The animals are there because the mountain doesn’t want you to go
where they are. My father doesn’t know you yet, but he knows that you
are here with me.”
Once, when the young man was out hunting, he heard a great noise, then
he saw a deer standing on the edge of a high rock. He shot at it. The
deer reached out its head. The arrow hit one of its horns and bounded
back to the bow. The young man said: “Lok Snewédjas forgot to tell me
about you.” He didn’t shoot again; he went home. When he got there, he
said: “I didn’t kill a deer to-day. I shot at one, but the arrow came
back to the bow. The deer stood in the same place, but I didn’t shoot
again. I thought I knew the place well, but I never saw that kind of a
deer before.”
Lok Snewédjas said: “You saw it because the mountain didn’t want you to
kill deer where that deer was. The mountain always whoops and makes a
great noise if a stranger goes there. If you had shot a second time,
the mountain would have twisted your mouth and body. You must not go
there again.”
The young man was afraid now; he said: “My mother and sisters are
lonesome; that is why they cry all the time.”
“Why don’t you go and see them?” asked Lok Snewédjas.
“I don’t want to, but I’m going to stay in the house with you.” He
stayed in the house a whole year. Lok Snewédjas had a little boy. As
soon as he was born, she rubbed him with red paint; after that she
rubbed him three times each day; in the morning, in the middle of the
day and just as the sun went down. It made the child grow fast.
One night, when the boy was crying, his father said: “I will take him
off the board and let him sleep on the mat.”
“We might roll over and kill him,” said the mother.
“No,” said the father, “I will take care of him.” And he took the baby
off the board and put it on the mat with its face up against his own
face. In the night he woke up and looked at the baby. It was a little
bear. The father was frightened. He thought: “Maybe some time my wife
or child will kill me, and eat me.” He wondered if his son would be a
bear when he was grown up. He was sorry that the child was like its
mother.
The mother bear knew what he was thinking about; she turned over, and
said: “Uh! uh!” in her sleep. The next morning she asked: “What did you
think about in the night?”
“I thought how nice our boy looked when he was a bear. In the daytime
he is like both of us, but in the night he is like you.”
The child grew fast. Soon he was walking around. One day the woman
asked: “Why don’t you go and see your father and mother?”
“How can I? The boy is too little to go with me.”
“He won’t cry,” said the woman. “When you are half-way he will forget
me.”
“If we go to-day, will you go with us?” asked the man.
“I will go to-morrow. I am going to look over my beads to-day,” said
the woman. “You can go to-day, but when evening comes don’t let anybody
touch our boy, and don’t let him play with the children. At two
different times he will turn to a bear,—in his sleep, and toward night,
when he plays. There is a Tusasás in that place. In the evening he may
play with the child and tease him. If he should, the boy would turn to
a bear; then somebody might kill him.”
“I will take care of him,” said the father.
Lok Snewédjas put a handful of yĕlalwek seed in a piece of deerskin,
and said: “When you get home put five deerskins on the ground; then,
with three of your fingers, take five pinches of the seed and put on
each one of the five skins. You will have plenty to feed your father
and mother and all the people in the village, but don’t let them carry
any of the seed away. If they do, it will spoil this food; we can never
use it again.”
The man took the little boy on his back and started. As soon as he was
away from the house, he forgot all that his wife had told him. When he
got to the village he stood around a good while; then his youngest
sister saw him and called out: “My brother has come!” She cried, she
was so glad to see him. He left the little bundle of seed on top of the
house and went in.
When Tusasás saw the man and child, he said: “That is just what I
thought!”
The women pounded Tusasás; told him to keep still, and not make the
young man feel badly.
The young man said to his sister: “Go out and get what my little boy
brought.”
Then he told his mother to put down five white skins. As soon as they
were spread out, he put five pinches of seed on each skin, and right
away the skin was covered with nice, white seed. Tusasás put a whole
handful in his mouth. It increased and spread, till it came out of his
ears and his eyes and his mouth. It made his stomach so big that he
thought he was going to die.
The young man said: “You thought nothing of me when I was here; now you
see what kind of a wife I have. She has all kinds of roots and seeds
and meat, but she never digs or hunts.”
When the sun was going down, the children wanted to play with the
little boy. He was pretty, they liked him and tried to be nice to him,
but the boy didn’t want to play.
Blaiwas said: “Let the child alone. He is a little fellow; he might get
hurt, and then he would cry for his mother.”
The children were playing and shouting, but the child paid no attention
to them. His aunt carried him around; she liked him, she wanted to keep
him in her arms all the time.
The mother didn’t feel happy. She knew what was happening at her
father-in-law’s house. She wanted her husband to take care of the child
himself, as she had told him. When she heard the children whooping and
running, she got frightened and started off to save her child.
The young sister began to play with the children. She put the boy down,
and he ran around, too, but he began to run the way a bear runs. He
slapped one child, then another. He pushed them down and drove them
around. The children screamed, they thought he was a real bear.
When the mother was half-way, she began to cry. She knew harm would
come to the boy before she could get to him.
There was a great noise among the children. Tusasás screamed. “People!
People! A bear is eating your children!” The boy was just playing as a
little bear plays. Tusasás got his bow and arrow and shot the child
under the arm. That minute he was a little boy again. The father
thought his sister had the child in her arms. When he heard the noise
he knew what had happened. He called to the people: “That is my child!
That is my child!” but he was too late; the boy was dead.
The mother came with a terrible roar. The earth trembled. When she
shook herself, it was as if the earth was turning over. She tore up the
ground, pulled up trees; tore big rocks from under the earth and threw
them around like little stones. When she got near, she shook herself;
the earth moved and the houses fell. A terrible storm of dirt and wind
came with her. She was in the middle of the whirlwind. It was dark and
nobody could see her. [15]
There were two orphans, a boy and girl, in the village. They were
little people; they didn’t grow any, but the girl was strong and she
knew things. She always carried a long stick, sharp at both ends. When
the people thought they were going to be killed, the girl told her
grandmother to paint her stick red. Then she painted red lines across
her forehead, breast, and stomach, and on the top of her arms, and went
and sat down in front of where Lok Snewédjas was coming, twisting and
tearing up the earth. Lok Snewédjas turned and passed on the right
side. Just then the girl punched her stick into the middle of the
whirlwind. The storm stopped that minute, and there on the ground lay a
beautiful young woman in a dress covered with beads and porcupine
quills.
The young man cried. He knew that he had killed his wife and child by
not doing as she had told him to. He got Gäk’s medicine basket and put
it on the boy, then he stepped over him and the child came to life. But
he couldn’t bring Lok Snewédjas to life in that way. Everybody felt
sorry. They didn’t know who lived in the world that could make the
woman alive again.
The young man said: “If we can bring her to life, she will never be a
bear again.”
Blaiwas said: “I will give nice things, deerskins, shells, and
porcupine quills to anybody who will bring this woman to life.”
The young man stepped over her five times, then ten times, and twenty
times; she only moved a little.
Some of the people said: “There is an old woman among the rocks by the
lake, Skoks is her medicine, maybe she could make the woman alive
again.”
They sent a man after her; when she came, she said: “I want somebody to
scream for me. This woman’s spirit has got near where the sun goes
down; but maybe we can make it hear.”
Skoks went into a man and screamed loud.
Then the old woman said: “Her spirit has turned around. It is coming
back!” Soon she said: “The spirit is here! It is going into its body.”
Right away the young woman stood up. She was beautiful and bright and
well. When she saw the orphan girl, she said: “You don’t look strong or
powerful. If I hadn’t had that storm with me, you couldn’t have killed
me.”
She stayed three days at her father-in-law’s house, then she went back
to the mountain with her husband and child.
Before they started, the young man said to his mother and his sister:
“You will never see me again. I will stay with my wife always. I don’t
want to kill her spirit by coming back here where I forget all she
tells me.”
They left and nobody ever saw them again.
The young man’s friends hunted for them and got other people to help,
but they could never find their home or see them.
Lok Snewédjas took back all her seeds; she didn’t leave one of them, so
no one has ever tasted of that kind of food.
To this day people can hear voices on that mountain. They are the
voices of Lok Snewédjas and her children, but nobody ever sees them.