[Told by Walter McGregor of the Sealion-town people]
The town children were knocking a woody excrescence [689] back and
forth. After they had played for a while they began saying “Haskwä′.”
[690] The niece of the town chief was menstruant for the first time.
She sat behind the screens. [691]
After they had played for a while a red feather floated along in the
air above them. By and by a child seized the feather. His hand stuck to
it. Something pulled him up. And one seized him by the feet. When he
was also pulled up another grasped his feet in turn. After this had
gone on for a while all the people in the town were pulled up.
Then the one who was menstruant did not hear them talking in the house.
She was surprised, and looked toward the door. There was no one in the
house. Then she went outside. There were no people about the town. Then
she went into the houses. She saw that they were all empty.
Then she began to walk about weeping. She put her belt on. Then she
blew her nose and wiped it on her shoulder. And she put shavings her
brothers had been playing with inside of her blanket. Feathers and wild
crab apple wood, pieces of cedar bark, [692] and mud from her brothers’
footprints she put into her blanket.
By and by, without having been married, she became pregnant. Soon she
gave birth. Again she became pregnant. Again she bore a boy. After this
had gone on for some time, the youngest came out with medicine in his
mouth. He had a blue hole in his cheek. With a girl they were ten.
And she started to rear them. She brought home all kinds of food that
was in the town. She gave this to her children to eat. Very soon they
grew up. They began playing about the house.
By and by one of them asked their mother: “Say! mother, what town lies
here empty?” And his mother said to him: “Why! my child, your uncles’
town lies here empty.” Then she began telling the story. “The children
of this town used to go out playing skîtqꜝ′ā′-ig̣adañ. Then a red
feather floated around above them. I sat behind the planks. There I
discovered that the town lay empty, and I was the only one left. There
I bore you.” Like this she spoke to them.
Then they asked their mother what was called “skîtqꜝā′-ig̣adᴀñ.” Then
she said to them: “They smoothed the surface of a woody excrescence,
and they played with it here.”
Then they went to get one. They worked it, and, after they had finished
it, they played about on the floor planks of the house with it. While
they were still playing daylight came. And next day they also played
outside. The feather again floated about above them. Their mother told
them not to take hold of the feather.
After they had played for a while the eldest, who was heedless, seized
the feather. His hand stuck to it. When he was pulled up he turned into
mucus. After it had been stretched out five times the end was pulled
up. Another one seized it. He became a shaving. After he had been
stretched out five times he, too, was pulled away.
Another one grasped it. He became a feather. After something had pulled
him up five times he also left the ground. Another one seized it. He
became a strip of cedar bark. After something had pulled him up five
times he also left the ground. And again one seized it. He became mud.
After he had been stretched out five times he left the ground. And
another seized it. The same thing happened to him; and after this had
gone on for a while they were nearly all gone.
Then again one seized it. He became a wild crab-apple tree. He was
strong. And, while he was being stretched up, his sister went around
him. She sharpened her hands. “Make yourself strong; [be] a man,” she
said to her brother. When he had but one root left his sister climbed
quickly up upon him. After she had reached the feather, and had cut at
it for a while, she cut it down. A string of them fell down.
He who had medicine in his mouth stood over his elder brothers. Upon
his elder brothers he spit medicine. Then they got up. And the bones of
those in the town who had been first pulled up lay around in a heap. He
also spit medicine upon them. They also got up, and the town became
inhabited.
They played with the feather. They went around the town with it. By and
by it began to snow. Then they rubbed the feather on the fronts of the
houses of the town, and the snow was gone. [693] After they had done so
for a while the snow surmounted the house.
After some time a blue jay dropped a ripe elderberry through the smoke
hole. By and by they went out through the smoke hole. They went to see
Bill-of-heaven. [694]
After they had gone along for a while, they came to a djo′lgi [695]
walking around. Then he who was full of mischief tore the animal in
pieces and threw them about. After they had gone on some distance from
there, they came to a woman living in a big house. Her labret was
large. When she began to give them something to eat the woman asked
them: “Was my child playing over there when you passed?” And one said
to her: “No, only a djo′lgi played there. We tore it in pieces, and we
threw it around.” “Alas! my child,” said the woman. “Door, shut
yourself.” Xō-ō, it sounded.
Then he who knew the medicine became a cinder, and he let himself go
through the smoke hole. When he got outside, “Smoke hole, shut
yourself” [she said]. That also sounded Xō-ō. Then he ran quickly to
the place where they had torn up the djo′lgi and, gathering up the
pieces, put them together and spit medicine upon them. The djo′lgi
shook itself, and started for the house with him.
The djo′lgi tapped upon the door. “Grandmother, here I am.” And when
she had said “Door, unlock yourself; smoke hole, open yourself,” so it
happened. Then she began giving them food. She gave them all kinds of
good food to eat. That was Cliff’s house, they say. She is the
djo′lgi’s grandmother.
And they stayed all night in her house, and next day she again gave
them something to eat. Then they started off. After they had traveled
for a while, they came to where another woman lived. And, after she had
given them food, they stayed in her house all night as well.
And, after he who was full of mischief saw that the woman was asleep,
he went to her daughter who lay behind the screen. And he put her belt
around himself. After he had lain for a while with her her mother saw
him. Then she took out the man’s heart and swallowed it. [696] Then he
put her belt around her, went from her, and lay down.
Next morning, after she had given them something to eat there, she
called her daughter. She paid no attention to her, and she went to her.
She lay dead. Then she began to weep. She composed a crying song, “My
daughter I mistook.” Then they left her.
After they had gone on for a while they came to where a big thing
stood. When they pushed it down it fell upon two of them. Seven escaped
and went off.
After they had gone on for a long space of time they came to a small
dog lying in the trail. One jumped over it. Right above it it seized
him with its teeth. Another jumped over it. He was treated in the same
way. It killed three and four escaped.
After they had gone on for a while longer they came to the edge of the
sky. It shut down many times. Then they ran under. Two of them were cut
in two and two escaped. They, however, saw Bill-of-heaven.
Gunwa being one of the Nass towns, this story would appear to be an
importation. It is paralleled, however, by a Masset myth, the scene of
which is laid in a Haida town.