CHAPTER XXXIV

MYTHOLOGY AND NATIVE HISTORY

The column with the great heads on top, shown in the illustration, tells quite an interesting story. It is variously told in different localities, however, the versions differ only in the minor details.

The top group represents the head of an European with whitened face and long black beard, flanked on either side by children wearing tall hats, and represents the following legend:

A very long time ago a chief’s wife left the temporary camp used by the Indians during the summer season, and taking her two small children with her she went in a small fishing canoe across the narrows to get some spruce boughs on which salmon eggs could be collected. She drew up her canoe on the beach and warned her children not to wander off. On her return nothing was seen of the children, they having disappeared. Many times she called to them, and they always answered her from the woods with voices of crows. Always when she sought them, two crows mocked her from the trees. The children never returned and it was said that a white trader kidnaped them and carried them off in his ship. The face with the beard represents the European, and the figures on either side are the kidnaped children which he is taking away with him.

Whether or not this story was founded on facts cannot be learned definitely. However, some form of it is found in nearly every Haida village, and as a nursery tale to frighten refractory children it is a great favorite.

Next proceeding down the column is Hootzy, the wolf, and the children, and below it is the mother bent over and weeping bitterly. The woman, Kitsinao, of the crow totem, had many children and was very proud of them (many with the Haida means more than four). She scoffed at the woman of the wolf totem who had but one puny child. The feelings of the woman were wounded so she appealed to her totem for protection and aid. A band of huge Siberian wolves at once descended from the woods that line the borders of those great hills and killed all of the sons and daughters of the crow mother. The mother was very sad and sat down on a rock and wept bitterly all the days of her life. In time she became incorporated with it and to this day a traveler on the Prince of Wales island who chances to call into American bay will see this modern Niobe bent over and weeping bitterly. The Haida asks no questions as to the authenticity of these stories, the fact that they have been carved on wood and slate, and that the said rock is in existence is conclusive proof to him.

Next comes the story of the seagull, the beaver, and the beaver’s daughter.

At one time there lived on the solitary shore of Daal island a beaver with his only daughter, Cawk. His wife had long been dead and the two had led a quiet life together. Cawk grew to be a handsome girl and all the youths of Houkan, as well as others from far and near came to sue for her hand, but none of them could touch her proud heart. Finally, at the thawing of the snow in the spring, a great seagull flew over the sea to the beaver’s house and wooed Miss Cawk with his enticing song:

Come to me! Come into the land of the birds where there is never hunger, Where my house is made of the most beautiful woods, You shall rest on soft bear skins. My companions, the gulls, shall bring you food. Their feathers shall clothe you, Your fire shall always be supplied with fuel. Your basket shall always be filled with meat.

Cawk could not long resist such wooing and they went together over the vast sea. When at last they reached the country in which the gull had his home, Cawk discovered that her spouse had shamefully deceived her. Her new home was not built of beautiful woods, but was only a tent of fish skins, which were full of holes. It was a most wretched place that gave free entrance to wind and snow. Instead of soft bear skins, her bed was made of miserable hard hair-seal hides, and her only food was the disgusting, half rotten fish which the birds brought her. Too soon she discovered that she had thrown away her opportunities when, in her foolish pride, she had rejected the Houkan youth. In her woe she sang:

Sung! Oh, Father: If you knew how wretched I am you would come to me and we would hurry away in your canoe over the waters. The birds look unkindly upon a stranger in their camp. Cold winds roar about my bed. They give me miserable food. Oh, come father, and take me home again.

When a year was passed all the sea was again stirred by warmer winds, the father left his home opposite Houkan to visit his daughter Cawk. His daughter greeted him joyfully and begged of him to take her back home. The father hearing of the outrages wrought upon his daughter determined upon revenge. He killed the gull, took Cawk into his canoe and quickly left the country which had brought so much sorrow to the daughter. When the other gulls came home and found their companion dead and his wife gone, they all flew away in search of the fugitives. They were very sad over the death of their poor murdered comrade and continue to mourn and cry until this day.

Having flown a short distance they saw the canoe and stirred up a heavy storm. The sea rose in immense waves and threatened the pair with destruction. In this mortal peril the selfish father determined to offer Cawk to the birds and flung her overboard. She clung to the edge of the canoe with a death grip. The cruel father then took a knife and cut off the joints of her fingers. The joint of the first finger falling into the sea was transformed into a whale, and the nail became whale bone. The joints of the second finger became grampuses, or killers, while the nail was transformed into those great fins which are so conspicuous in the Haida’s representation of the killer. The remainder of the joints swam away as salmon, herring, codfish, sea otters, hair seals, and fur seals. In the meantime the storm had abated for the gulls thought Cawk was drowned. The father then allowed her to come into the boat again. But from that time she cherished a deadly hatred against him and swore bitter revenge. After they got ashore she called her totem guardians, the wolves, and let them gnaw off the feet and hands of her father, while he was asleep. Upon waking the beaver cursed himself, his daughter and the wolves which had thus crippled him; whereupon the earth opened and swallowed the hut, the father, the daughter and the wolves.

Upon the whole, the column just described may be said to be purely legendary, yet it seems quite generally to refer to the wolf totem.

In front of the residence of Chief Schooltka is also a column that is full of interest. It was erected by himself and the carvings were executed with steel instruments, so that superior designs and neater workmanship have been obtained.

At the top of it is his crest or sub-totem, the eagle. The various carvings trace in a general way the history of family for several generations back, such as marriages of one totem with another. For instance, the bear to the eagle, the wolf to the raven, etc. It also indicates the number of children in each family, and the manner of death that ended their lives by some conventional means that is readily understood by the Haida. About midway down the pole is a rude representation of a Russian priest of the Greek church with his hands folded across his breast in reverential manner, with crude images of angels around him and beneath it is the only legend carved on the column, it is the bear and butterfly story, which is worth repeating: