This is one of the numerous and popular land-otter stories and the only
type of story in which that animal appears in a rôle at all benevolent.
Usually he is represented as trying to steal away some human being and
make a slave of him, to deprive one of his senses or turn him into a
gā′gix̣īt (see story of Supernatural-being-who-went-naked, note 19).
Nevertheless, his peculiar nature brought him into intimate relations
with the shamans, especially among the Tlingit.