This myth has many and very valuable elements,--the importance of
dreams, the stopping or slackening the course of the sun, the music of
Juiwaiyu as he moves, the choice of the right road, the storm of
vermin, Jupka as monitor and helper, the summons to send Damhauja's
daughters to meet him, the inexhaustible venison no larger than a
walnut, Juiwaiyu's marvellous music on the mountain, the bringing home
of countless deer in the body of a fawn, the race with Damhauja's
sons-in-law, the meeting with the poison spider, the rattlesnake and
the grizzly bear, the storm, the drowning of Damhauja and his
resurrection,--make this one of the richest of Yana tales.
Playing with two bones was very much like playing ball. Near both ends
of the field barriers were set up, and each side had to put the bones
past the barrier toward which they faced.
The starting-point was in the middle of the field, at an equal
distance from both barriers. At the opening of the game all the
players gathered at this middle point; the bones were thrown up, and
all struggled for them. Whoever caught the bones on his stick either
hurled them toward the barrier beyond which he wished to put them, or
he ran toward it, bearing them on the point of his stick. If there
were swifter runners than he, they took the bones from him, or if he
hurled them ahead, they ran and threw them or carried them toward one
barrier or another. The bones were fastened together by a string some
inches long.
In Yana tales, Damhauja, the moon during the last quarter, plays or
rather played, a great part. I say played, since, unfortunately, we
have but a fragment of Yana lore left after the events of 1864.
Damhauja's sons-in-law on the west side of the river, in this tale,
were various Mapchemaina people,--that is, beings who somewhat later
became beasts, birds, plants, rocks, and insects on earth. All the
stars were his children. His daughters, stars, were married to
Mapchemaina people, except the two of whom Juiwaiyu had dreamed. His
sons, stars also, lived near him, and were at enmity with his
sons-in-law.