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.