Tlingit myths and texts / recorded by John R. Swanton.

  • John R. Swanton
Date:
1909
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Tlingit myths and texts / recorded by John R. Swanton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    run after liiiu or he will take your life.” It was Dry-cloud that he meant. ‘ ‘Don’t mind me,” said Fire-drill’s son, ‘ ‘I know what he is. I only plav with him. I know that this fellow can t be killed, and I know that he can not kill anybody else, but I have to follow him. That was my father’s advice to me.” So they kept on after Dr}’^- cloud and the wolf had to run with all his might, but it did not seem to Fire-drill’s son that he was going rapidly at all. Whenever the wolf got his tail wet in crossing a stream he was too much tired out to shake it, so he simply yelped and Fire-drill’s son shook it for him. By and by they saw smoke far ahead of them and presently came to where an old woman lived alone by herself. They stayed with her for some time, and could see Dry'-cloud as long as they were there, for he lived in the neighborhood of her house. Then they helped the old woman and collected a quantity of wood for her. After that she said to the boy, ‘ ‘Grandson, there is a big fish over yonder. It killed all of mv friends in this town. That is why I am all alone here.” Fie went to the place where she said the monster lived and found a red cod. He said to her, ‘ ‘Grandmother, that is not a monster fish. It is good to eat.” So^he took his bow and arrows and told his fi-iend to watch him. Then he went to the red cod and killed it, and, seeing that there were numbers of sharp spines upon it, he took off its skin and dried it. He saitl to the wolf: “My friend, do you know this woman ? She is really Daughter-of-the-calm (KayeT. !i-si). She is a veiynice, pretty girl.” Afterward Fire-drill’s son married Daughter- of-the-calm and had a child by her named LAkitcine'. He gave this boy his dog and put the red-cod skin upon him as a shirt. Then he said to lus wife: ‘ ‘This is going to he a very hail l>oy.” “ LAkitcine' lived at Sitka.* He had a wife from among human beings, and eyer}^ day, while he went out halibut fishing, she dug clams. The dog, GAnt, that his father had given him he renamed CAq!. LAkitcine' had several children, hut he killed all of them. He would take a child up, pet it, and sing cradle songs to it, and at the same time make his red-cod spines stick into it so that it died. order to kill him, so a bad person says whatever he chooses to a good one. Butthey tell their children, ‘This will not kill you. They are doing themselves injury instead of you. So turn and walk away from them.’ “If a poor person has self-respeet, he will have good fortune sometime, just as in the case of the two old women to whom Raven brought fortime. “The example of Fire-drill’s son is commended because ho did not use his power meanly. He knew that he was very powerful, but when all the animals tried his power he did not do them any harm. He did not want to show his strength at once. If ho had been a mean man he might have killed the old woman that lived back in the woods instead of helping her and getting her food.’’ (From the writer’s Informant.) a Katishan added that once while Fire-drill’s son was chasing Dry-cloud he was pulled into a village in the sky tor some offense and punished there. Since then people have believed that the stars are Inhabited. They wore thought to be towns and the light the reflection of the sea. I> Near the site of the Presbyterian School.
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