[Told by Walter McGregor of the Sealion-town people]
She was a chief’s daughter at Djū. [21] Her father had a slave he owned
watch her. Then she said to the slave: “Tell a certain one that I say I
am in love with him.” And, when she went out with him to defecate next
day, she asked the slave if he had told him. And he said to the chief’s
daughter: “He says he is afraid of your father.” He had not told him,
and he lied.
She told the slave to tell another that she was in love with him, and
again he did not tell him. He told her he feared her father. When she
was unable to get any of her father’s ten nephews she went with the
slave. And her father discovered it.
Then they abandoned her. Only the wife of her youngest uncle left some
food for her.
She went down on the beach to dig. After she had worked for some time
she dug out a cockleshell. In it a baby cried. Then she looked at it. A
small child was in it. Then she took it to the house. She put something
soft around it, and, although she did not nurse it, it grew fast. Soon
it began to creep. Not a long time after that it walked about.
One time the child said: “Here, mother, like this.” He moved his hand
as if drawing a bowstring. When he said the same thing again she
understood what he meant. Then she hammered out a copper bracelet she
wore into a bow for him, and another she hammered into arrows. When she
had finished [the bow] she gave it to him along with the two arrows. He
was pleased with them.
Then he went out to hunt birds. When he came back, he brought his
mother a cormorant. His mother ate it. The day after he went hunting
again. He brought in a goose to his mother. His mother ate it. And next
day he again went hunting. He brought in a wren. Then he skinned it. He
dried [the skin]. He treasured it. And next day also he brought in a
kꜝu′tcꜝix̣u. [22] That, too, he skinned. That too, he dried. And the
next day he brought in a blue jay. He skinned and dried that also. The
day after that he brought in a woodpecker. That he also skinned. That
he also dried.
One time some one was talking to his mother. The house creaked
moreover. And when day broke he awoke in a fine house. The carvings on
the house posts winked with their eyes. [23] Master Carpenter let
himself become his father. He got up and said to him: “Come, chief, my
child, let me dress you up.” Then he went to him and he put
fair-weather clouds [24] upon his face. “Now, chief, my son, come and
sit idle seaward.” As soon as he did so, the weather was good.
One time he asked to go fishing with his father. “We will pull out
Devilfish-fished-for.” And on their way to fish they pulled it out.
[25] Then they stopped at House-fishing-ground. [26] He seated his
father in the bow. After he had looked at the rising sun for a while he
said: “Now, father, say ‘The chief among them thinks he will take it.’”
This his father said. “Say ‘The one who comes around the island thinks
he will take it,’ father.” And he said so. “Father, say ‘The shadow
increases upon Tcꜝi′nła-i; hasten, chief.’” And so he said. “Father,
say ‘The great one coming up against the current begins thinking of
it.’” So he said. “Father, say ‘The great one coming putting gravel in
his mouth thinks of it.’” So he said. And again, “Father, say ‘You look
at it with white-stone eyes (i.e., good eyes).’ Father, say ‘Great
eater begins thinking of it.’” So he said. [27]
After he had finished saying these things it seized the hook. At once
it pulled him round this island. He struck the edges of the canoe with
his hands. He said to it: “Master Carpenter made you. Hold yourself
up.” The thing that pulled him about in the fishing ground again pulled
him round the island.
And when it stopped he tried to pull in the lines. He pulled out
something wonderful, head first. Broad seaweeds grew upon its lips. It
lay with halibut nests piled together [around it]. [28] He began to put
the halibut into the canoe. When the canoe was full he pulled the canoe
out to make it larger. After he had put them in for a while longer his
canoe was full, and he released it.
Then they went away. He brought halibut to his wife. She dried them.
Then he again called for his son, and when he had finished painting him
up he said to him: “Now, chief, my son, go over there and see your
uncles.” So he started thither. He came and sat down at the end of the
town. After he had sat there for a while they discovered him. They came
running to him. They then found out who he was. And they again moved
over to where his mother lived.
After they had lived there for a while he went out wearing his wren
skin. He said: “Mother, look at me.” Then his mother went out after
him. He sat as broad, high, cumulus clouds over the ocean. [29] His
mother looked. Then he came in and asked his mother: “Did I look well?”
“Yes, chief, my son, you looked well.” Then he also took the blue-jay
skin, and he said to his mother: “Look at me.” Then she went out after
him. Her son sat blue, broad, and high over the sea. Then he came in
and said: “Mother, did I look well?” “Yes, chief, my son, you looked
well.” And he also went out with the woodpecker and said: “Mother, look
at me.” Then she went out after him. He sat over the sea, the upper
part of him being red. She smiled at her son, and when he came in he
said: “Mother, did I look well?” “Yes, chief, my son, the supernatural
beings will not tire of looking at you.”
Then he said: “Mother, I shall see you no more. I am going away from
you. When I sit in front of Qꜝanᴀ′ñ [30] in the morning, there will be
no breeze. No one can touch me. [31] When the sky looks like my face as
my father painted it there will be no wind. In me (i.e., in my days)
people will get their food.” [32] “Now, chief, my son, when you sit
there in the morning I will send out feathers for you.”
Then he started off from his mother. His father also went off from her,
and said: “I also am going away from you. Settle yourself at the head
of the creek. I shall see you sometimes and I shall also see my son.”
Then he, too, went off.
And at evening she called for her youngest uncle. She said to him:
“When you go fishing to-morrow wear a new hat and have a new paddle.”
And early next day they went fishing. Then she sat down at the end of
the town with her knees together. And when she pulled up her dress the
wind blew out of the inlet. Every time she raised it higher more wind
came. When she had raised it to a level with her knees a very strong
wind blew. And she stretched her arm to the thread of life [33] of him
only who wore the new hat, and she saved him, because his wife left
something for her. That was Fine-weather-woman, [34] they say.
Then she took her mat and property and started into the woods up the
bed of the creek. And she fixed herself there. And a trail ran over
her. She said that they tickled her by walking upon it, and she moved
farther up. There she settled for good. When her son sits [over the
ocean] in the morning, she lets small flakes of snow fall for [him].
Those are the feathers.
This is one of the most important of all Haida stories, telling as it
does of the incarnation of the sky god, the highest deity anciently
recognized by them. Sîñ, the name by which he is known, is the ordinary
word for day as distinguished from night and from an entire period of
twenty-four hours, which also is called “night;” but it seems to be
more strictly applied to the sky above as it is illuminated by
sunshine. Hence I have chosen to translate the word “Shining-heavens.”
A similar conception is found among the Tsimshian of the neighboring
mainland, where the sky god is known as Laxha′. It would be interesting
to learn whether it also obtains among the related Tlingit of Alaska.