Passamaquoddy texts / by John Dyneley Prince.

  • John Dyneley Prince
Date:
1921
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Passamaquoddy texts / by John Dyneley Prince. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Then his friend starts towing him (pulling); the chief begins to tire; a little he opens one eye; he sees that they are very near. He does not have faith. He thinks: “We shall never reach land.” He says: “We shall never arrive.” The fox says to him: “Do not believe it.” But he thinks it very far. Pogumk thinks that he is scarcely strong enough, but so far as eye can reach (go), it is very stormy. The water indeed runs high. Pukjinskwes made it bad weather. All day they swim; not before it is dark do they land. “My good friend,” says Fox, “you may go.” He runs to the blackcats’ camp. When he comes to where they had been, only ashes are there and it is cold. The people had gone away. Then indeed he begins to follow them. In one day he comes near, he overtakes his mother carrying his younger brother, the Sable, on her back. She is looking ahead, but he (Sable) is looking backward. As Pogumk comes out from the leaves, Sable sees him. Pie says: “My elder brother is following.” When she turns, she does not see anything. Pogumk hides himself in a tree. Then they go on. Again Sable calls out: “Certainly my mother I see my elder brother.” Then once more she turns; she catches him and they rejoice much and laugh. Then she throws Sable down on the leaves like a piece of wood. Kuloskap instructs sable: “Run to camp; when you come there, make a big fire, a hemlock bark fire, and throw into it Pukjinskwes’s child; then do you come away quickly to me when you have done it.” What he had ordered, that was done. When the fire was hot, he throws the child into it; he burns it to death. Pukjinskwes is angry. Then she pursues him, as a wolf which is starving chases a rabbit. Sable, very frightened, cries out: “My elder brother; my brother.” Pukjinskwes then screams out: “You must go as far as the island where Pogumk is, in order to save yourself.” When this was said, Pogumk steps out to her from hiding; she sees him; then at once she is frightened. Then she loudly laughs; she says: “I was only chasing him in jest, because I like Sable.” But Pogumk answers her; he says: “I know you, and we know your devices, you evil demon.” Then as his magic comes to him,
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