Page:Kutenai Tales.djvu/319

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304
Bureau of American Ethnology
[Bull. 59

217 into Magpie's eyes. Therefore magpies eyes water. The people send Jack Rabbit (Dog?) and Hare to look for game. They reach a tent inhabited by two old women. They see the tracks of buffaloes. The one transforms herself into a pup ; the other one, into a stone. The dog lies down near a water hole. One of the old women wants to throw the pup into the water; the other one pities the pup and takes it home. The other woman takes the stone home in order to use it as an anvil. A bladder and a bunch of claws are hanging in the doorway. When the buffaloes come in, these two give notice by their noise. At night the one boy breaks the bladder with a stick; the other one steals the claws. When the boys are some distance away, they shake the

219 claws and sing, calling the buffaloes. The game runs out of the tent. The women find that the bladder is broken and the rattle taken away. The women with lifted hammers stand by the side of the trail of the game. The two youths hang on with their teeth to the testicles of a buffalo bull. The women strike it, and make its sides flat. All the pemmican in the house rolls out. Thus the game is secured by the people.

41. 31. The Deluge (2 versions: Nos. 27and66). First Version. — Chicken Hawk's wife picks huckleberries. A sea monster abducts her.* Chicken Hawk shoots the mon< monster, which drinks all the water. When Chicken Hawk pulls out his arrow, the water streams out,^ and there is a deluge. Chicken Hawk takes off his tail and puts it up, saying that if the water rises higher than the stripes on his tail the people will die. The water stops before reaching the last stripe, and then goes down again.^

219 Second Version. — Chicken Hawk's wife. Grouse, picks huckleberries. When swimming in a lake, the water monster threatens to kill her. She pours the huckleberries into its mouth. When she goes home, she pretends to have been unable to pick huckleberries because she felt ill . When she goes out again, she meets the sea monster, who becomes her lover. When going home, she pretends to be sick. Finally Chicken

223 Hawk goes out to watch her. He sees her with the sea monster. When his wife comes home, he tells her that the huckleberries are bad, and asks her to wash them. On the following day Chicken Hawk follows her, and shoots the water monster with one of his two arrows. With the other one he shoots his wife, whom he transforms into a grouse. The water monster goes back into the lake and drinks lake and rivers.

225. Then he dies. The people almost die of thirst. Chicken Hawk pulls out the arrow, and the people are able to drink again. The water rises, and the people climb the mountains. He places his tail upright, and says that if the water should pass the third stripe of the tail the world would come to an end. The water stops rising before reaching the last stripe, and goes down again.

1 Assinlboin (Lowie PaAM 4:177).

Bellacoola (Boas, Sagen 247).

Caddo (Dorsey CI 41:66).

Cheyenne (Kroeber JAFL 13:184 j.

Chippewayan (Petitot 407; Lowie PaAM 1:187).

Chukchoe (Bogoras JE 8:26).

Cree (Russell, Expl. in Far North 202).

Lillooet (Teit JAFL 25:334).

Ojibwa (Jones JAFL 29:379, 387; Schoolcraft, Hiawatha 265).

Passamaquoddy (Leland 273).

Shuswap (Teit JE 2:724, 725).

Sioux (Wissler JAFL 20:195).

Thompson (Teit MAFLS 6:83; JE 8:372).

Ts!Ets!a'ut (Boas JAFL 9:259).

Tungus (A. Schiefner, Baron Gerhard von Maydell's Tungusische Sprachproben [Mdtanges asiatiqnes tires du Bulletin de racad^mie imp^rialo des sciences St. Petersburg, 7:349]).

Yana (distantly related) (Sapir UCal 9:156). a Chilula (Goddard UCal 10:361).

Huron (Hale JAFL 1:181).

Luiseiio (Du Bois UCal 8:156).

Micmac (Speck JAFL 28:62 [frog keeps water in bladders]). 3 Kaska (Teit JAFL 30:439).

  • A Beaver story (Goddard PaAM 10:237) may refer to a similar deluge.