17. The Hunter and His Wooden Wife
A hunter married a young woman. He loved her very much because the young woman knew how to make dancing-blankets, which were very dear to the people in olden times.
Not many days after their marriage the hunter made ready to go up the mountains for fall and winter hunting. One day they started, and he went with his young wife, taking all his woodworker’s tools and his traps and snares. They went on and on until they arrived at his camping-ground, and there they went into the hut. In the autumn the young man first hunted mountain sheep, whose wool the young wife needed for making dancing-garments. Therefore the man killed many. He took off the good wool, and the young woman took all the wool and washed it; and when it was dry enough, she spun it into yarn; and after she had spun it all, she dyed some: and when she was ready, she began to weave: and when one half of her weaving was finished, she became sick while her husband was away. When he came home, he found his young wife very ill.
When she was dying, she called her young husband to her side, and said, * My dear husband, keep your love for me after I am dead. Don’t go home too soon! Watch over my grave! Then she died.
The young man was in deep sorrow for her sake. He kept her dead body many days. Now the winter was nearly passed, and he still kept the body until it was decayed. Then he buried it. He carved an image of his wife out of red cedar.
His man never touched anything that his wife had made, and so it was with her dancing-garment which she was making when she died. It was still hanging there where it had been when she was working on it. When he made the image of his late wife, he seated it in front of her unfinished dancing-garment, and he made the fingers move as though they were weaving a dancing-garment. He made it turn when he opened the door, and he pretended that the image could speak.
Then he began to hunt again; and whenever he came home from hunting, he threw down his bear meat and fat outside the house. Then he would speak to his wife-image, Come out and look at this!’ Then he spoke to himself as though his image- wife were speaking: “Oh, I can not, because my yarn is twisted around my fingers! Therefore I won’t come out.” Then he went in and embraced his wooden wife. He talked to his wooden wife, and would say, “You are very handsome.”
Now many hunters were passing by. They looked into the house and saw a woman weaving a dancing-garment. Then some one said that the hunter’s wife was made of wood. He told about it in the village.
There were two sisters among some young men. One night their mother was angry with them. Therefore they ran away from their mother and crossed the mountains. They crossed the mountains, valleys, and rivers, and one day they arrived at the camp of the wooden wife. They looked in through a knot-hole, and there was a woman seated by the side of a dancing-garment, which she was weaving. They wanted to ask her if she could give them food, so they opened the door, and the woman that was weaving turned her head to look at them. They stood there and asked her to give them a little food, but she did not pay any attention; and the yarn was twisted around her fingers, and she just moved her fingers. Therefore the elder sister said to her younger sister, That is not a living being! I will go near and look.” So she went near and touched her shoulder, and said, “Will you give us a little food, elder sister?” However, she felt that it was not a human being, but wood. She called her younger sister, and they were surprised. Then they laughed at her, and they remembered what they had heard about the hunter’s wooden wife. They hid in a corner of the house among the dried meat and fat.
Soon they heard the hunter come down to his camp He whistled, for he was very tired because his load was heavy. He said to his wooden wife, “Come out, my dear, and look at this!” Then he said to himself, Not so, my dear, for my yarn is twisted around my fingers.” Then he came in, ran to his wooden wife, and embraced her and kissed her, and the two young women laughed at him secretly. The man heard them laughing secretly—He got up and looked around, and found the two young women who were hiding among the dried meat. He called them and spread a large grizzly-bear skin on one side of the house. The two young women sat down on the large grizzly-bear skin, and he cooked for them rich meat, tallow, and fat. They ate many things that night, but the younger sister was afraid to eat much. She ate only a little of each kind of food. The elder sister ate a great deal. She overate. At midnight they went to bed.
The man spread another grizzly-bear skin for their bed, and he gave them fur garments. They slept soundly that night; but the elder sister, who had overeaten, soiled her bed early in the morning. The hunter arose and made a fire. He cooked a meal for the two women, and then called them. The younger one arose, but the elder one was ashamed to get up. The man said, ‘Wake up, my dear, we are waiting with breakfast!” but she cried because she was very much ashamed. Then the hunter made fun of her.
Pie wanted to marry the younger one. She replied, “You may marry me if you promise to destroy your wooden wife.” He promised to destroy it, and she asked him to promise not to tell any one what had happened to her elder sister. lie also said that he would never do so, and he also said to her, “Don’t tell any one what I have done to the wooden figure!” and she promised not to do so. Then they were married.
The young woman was better than his former wife. He taught her to weave dancing-garments, and she learned the art quickly, and she made them better than his first wife. The hunter came to be richer than ever. He sent his sister-in-law back to the village; and at the end of the next autumn they moved back to the village. He gave a great. feast to all the people, and built a large house, and became a head chief in his generation. His new wife was a wise woman and kind to all the people. That is the end.
18. Plucking Out Eyes
There was a great town, and many people lived in it. A large lake was behind the town, and a good trail led from the town to to the lake. The people used to walk up to the lake to enjoy themselves— young and old, and also children—because there was a good sandy beach all around the lake. The young people would swim there— young men, young women, and children.
The town had a very good chief, a very kind man, and the chieftainess also was kind to all the people. Their son was a nice young man, whom they loved very much, because he was their only son. The mother had many brothers, who also loved her only son. His young man was as gentle as his father and his mother; and the prince had a young man, nice like himself, for his friend. They loved each other like brothers. Often they would sleep in one bed.
The young man’s parents were very anxious that he should marry one of his father’s relatives; and all his uncles came and assembled around him, and said that he must marry the girl, as his father wished. However, he refused. He did not want to get married so soon. He said he was still too young, but his parents urged him to marry soon.
Now we will see what happened to this young man who did not want to marry. It was in the evening, when all the young people went home from playing on the shore of the lake. The young man went up along the trail behind his father’s house. Before he reached the lake he saw a beautiful girl coming down along the trail on which he was walking. She looked at him and smiled, and the young man looked at her and also smiled. He asked her, “Where do you come from?” and they were both standing side by side. Then the girl said, “I come from over yonder.” The young man continued, “Which way are you going?” She said, “I am just taking a little walk farther down, young man.””—“Shall I go with you?”—“Yes, come on!”
Thus they walked on the trail side by side, and they began to talk together while they were going along. Then the young man said, “I love you. Now I want to marry you.”! The girl said, “If you will promise me that you will not take any wife beside myself, then you may marry me.” The young man promised that he would not marry another woman beside herself, and he married her. Then she said, “Come and go with me to my house!’ So they went up the lake. She said, “Any time you want me, shout four times, and I will come to take you to my house, by day or by night; but let nobody know what you have done, lest you die. Don’t marry another woman!” He promised her again that he would not do it. The girl said again, “Don’t tell any one!” Then they separated.
His was the reason why the young man did not want to marry. Sometimes when lying down in the night, his friend would say to him, “You must do what your parents want you to:” but the prince always said that he was still too young to marry. His friend noticed that the prince would often come in just before daylight and lie down again by his side, and that his body then was quite cold and a little wet.
The prince had done so many times, and more than two years had passed this way. One night his friend made up his mind to watch the prince. He pretended to be asleep; and when the prince thought that his friend was asleep, he arose from his bed and went out secretly. Then his friend arose also. He went out, and, behold! the prince was going along the trail behind his father’s house. His friend followed him secretly, and also went along the trail. The prince did not know that his friend was following him. As soon as the prince came to the shore of the great lake, he shouted, and shouted again, while his friend was standing a little farther back in the woods, keeping very quiet. After the prince had shouted four times, behold! a beautiful girl came up from the water. She came ashore to where the young prince was standing, and she took him and dived with him to the bottom of the lake.
After his friend had seen this, he went home and lay down again. hist before daylight the prince came in secretly and lay down again.
Night came on again. When the prince was fast asleep, and his friend noticed that he was sleeping, he arose secretly and went up to the lake, stood at the same place where the prince had been standing the night before, and shouted as the prince had done. He shouted four times. Then the beautiful girl came up from the water. She went toward the young man who stood on the shore. She took him and plunged down to the bottom of the lake!) Then he saw a good-looking boy creeping around the house. So the man took the boy and ran away with him; and at midnight, while the prince was still asleep, the friend came in with the boy. He threw him on the prince who was sleeping, and said, “What- makes you so patient with your child?”
The prince awoke. and said, ‘You have done a great wrong. I am sorry for what you have done.” Then they all went to sleep again. His child was the son of the prince and of the woman of the lake. Then the child arose and plucked out the eyes of the man who had taken him up. He went around the house and took out the eyes of all the people, and strung them on a line of red-cedar bark. He went all around the village and took out the eyes of all the people.
The sister of the prince lived at the end of the village. She had given birth to a child a few days before, and a slave-girl was staying with her, taking care of the newborn child.
Before daylight the child of the princess was crying on the lap of the slave-woman. The princess said to her, “Look after the child!” Still the slave took no notice of what her mistress had said. Therefore the child’s mother took the child from her. She looked at the slave’s face, and, behold! her eye-sockets were empty. She saw the child creeping on the ground at the door, with a long line in his hand, on which the eyes of the people were strung.
Now the father of the child which had taken the eyes of the people woke up, and, behold! his friend who had taken the child up from the lake had no eyes. The prince went to the place where his father, the chief, was sleeping, and he saw that his father had no eyes. He went around in his father’s house, and all the people were dead, and their eyes were gone. He went to another house, and there also the people had lost their eyes. He went on from house to house, and he found that in every house the people were all dead, their eves having been plucked out.
So he went to his sister; and there he met his child, dragging along the line full of the eyes of the people. The child was dragging the line along the street when he-passed him. He went to his sister, who had just given birth to a child, and saw that she was still alive. He told her that their parents were dead, and, further, that all the people in the village were dead. Therefore the young man asked her to leave the village. His sister took up her own child, and they went along the street. Again they met the child who was dragging along the street the line with the eyes. He took up the child, and threw away the line with the eyes of the people.” They went together on the trail behind the house of the chief, which led to the lake. The prince shouted four times, and, behold! the beautiful woman came up. and went ashore to the place where the prince was standing. When she came near him, he threw the child at her, and said. “Why didn’t you take notice to whom you gave your child His child has killed everybody in my village.”
The woman stood there silent, and the prince and the princess were crying. They remained there a little longer, and the woman of the lake felt very sad. She spoke kindly to her husband and to her sister-in-law. She said to her husband first, “Come to me, my dear!’ So the prince went near her, and she gave him gamblingtools, She sent him away to the south, and said to him, “Go there! You shall be richer than any one you meet.” Then she gave him a set of gambling-sticks.[1]
Then the young prince took them and went southward. He always shook his gambling-sticks, and he always won, and became richer than all his fellow-men, as the woman of the lake had said.
She also called her sister-in-law to her, and gave her a garment of wealth. She put around her an ever-new belt, and she put the princess’s own child on her back, and said to her, “Whoever meets you, or whoever hears your child cry, shall be richer than any one else.” She sent her toward the northwest. The child was always crying as she went along. Therefore it is that whoever meets her becomes rich among the people.
Now these two people parted. The young man went southward, and the young woman went northward. Then the woman of the lake took up her own child and went down to the bottom of the lake. She wept there, and at the end of her mourning-period she came up with her child on her back. She went ashore and came down to the seashore. There she stood on the beach and went into the salt water.
She plunged to the bottom of the sea, and left her home in the lake, and went way out. She became a being part fish, part woman, and had her new home in the sea. Sometimes the people will see her coming up, and they call her Hak!ulâ’q.