CHAPTER XXXIII.
FAIRY TALES
THE WOMAN OF SIN.
HUNDREDS of years ago a young man and his wife resided at what is called Tu-rep village, which is located on the south side of the Klamath River about six miles from its mouth. The Tu-rep bar on the river is very large, consisting of fifty or a hundred acres of rich and productive soil. This man’s wife before her marriage belonged at the Si-elth village, across the river from Tu-rep on the north side. They lived very happy together for a number of years, he being very kind to her in every way and never spoke in a cross manner at any time. As the years went by he began to drift away from her and their home, neglecting her more and more. It seemed that a soul affinity had come into his life, a woman at the Reck-woy village, at the mouth of the river, was enticing him away from his wife and home. He found a resistless charm in her serpent-like arms, and as the days went by he would tarry longer in her company and he would be loath to part with her at all. At last his wife was being left alone so much and neglected that she became suspicious that another woman had robbed her of his love. She found her suspicion to be true as her husband was now giving all of his attention to the woman at Reck-woy. The wife became very sad and broken hearted over her husband’s actions and unfaithfulness, and went about her work in a dispirited manner and her attitude and appearance became one of profound sadness. In company she always seemed down hearted, as the same sad look was always upon her face, making her appear to the visitors as wretched and lonely.
As the miserable wife spent the lonely days at Tu-rep village, the people decided to give a large entertainment a host of guests gathered to make merry. Among the crowd was a man from the Ur-ner village, which is nine or ten miles up the river at the mouth of Blue Creek. During the entertainment the Ur-ner man was attracted to the lonely Tu-rep wife who appeared to him to be very sad and lonely in the midst of such gaiety. He came over to where she was seated and began a conversation by exchanging a few remarks. He thought he might be wrong in addressing her so boldly, and started to walk away but something stirred his inner emotions strangely, so much so that he could not resist the temptation to return to her. This time after a few remarks he summoned up courage to inquire into her troubled life, as he said she seemed very lonely. Deeply impressed by his winning manner and kind words her confidence was easily won and she readily related to him her unhappy marriage and how unfaithful her husband had grown. He at once became more interested and listened patiently to her story of sorrow, and with his sympathetic words of comfort, strange emotions that had long been dead within her breast thrilled into life once more. She had become a victim of his beguiling words of comfort as he drew her into his arms of passionate love. Alone and together they planned a secret meeting place that her husband and the village folks might not know of their clandestine meetings.
When the Tu-rep husband would go down the river to Reck-woy to bask in the love of the woman of his affections, his wife would wait until the darkness of night had cast its gloom over the village, when she would creep carefully forth from her dwelling and meet her lover. She had a long way to go up the Tu-rep bar from her house, and each step she would take, she would cover her foot-prints with stones. In this manner she would cover her tracks over, for a distance of at least one mile along the river bar and when she reached the upper end of the bar she would step out into the water, and as before she covered over her tracks with stones until she stepped into her lover’s boat. The Ur-ner Indian would come across the river from the opposite bank and take her into his canoe and paddle back to what is known as Stah-win bar. This is also a large bar covered with huge redwoods. Together they would wander into the inky blackness of the huge redwoods where they would enjoy each other’s company until a late hour at night, when the Ur-ner man would again take his soul affinity into his canoe and return her to the upper end of Tu-rep bar, where she would leave him and proceed down the bar to her home, as before covering over her foot-prints with stones. She held these clandestine meetings with the Ur-ner Indian in that manner every time her husband would leave her and go to Reck-woy. After a while her husband became suspicious of her action, as when he returned home at night he never found her at home, yet he was very kind to her. He made every attempt to trace her footsteps but they were always lost upon the bar and all his efforts were futile. At last in desperation he made up his mind to try other plans to detect her mysterious whereabouts. He would start down the river on a pretence of going to Reck-woy, but would hide where he could see his wife’s movements around the house. This was kept up for sometime but he could not find out which way she had gone, but in his earnest endeavors to discover her whereabouts, one night he saw her covering over her foot-prints with stones as she went to meet her lover. Her shame and sin was at last discovered in spite of all her efforts and precaution to hide her disgrace from human knowledge. This covering of foot prints with stones is called in our language, “Way-nah-mah way-lap-po-lah hah-elth-werm-chelth,” which means covering the tracks of sin and shame with stones. To this day there can be seen at Tu-rep bar in the summer months when the waters of the river is low, the rows of stones that this sinful woman used to cover up her foot-prints of shame, and they stand out in strange relief along the waters edge where they were supposed to have been placed centuries ago by the woman of sin. The Indians point to these stones as a warning to all married women that no matter how secretly they sin against the marriage vows, they will be discovered sooner or later, and their sins will be reflected upon them throughout their lives. The moral of this story is to keep women from sinning and when they are tempted into sin that they are forever burdened with the heavy stones of disgrace that points to their sins and time cannot efface it.
WHAT HAPPENED TO TWO MA-REEP GIRLS
A number of generations back there lived in Ma-reep village a man and his wife with their three girls. The oldest of them was a good dutiful child, helped her mother in every way she could, while the other two were naughty, idle, cross and pouty. When it came time for their meals the oldest would eat and act like a perfect lady but the other two girls always kept up their naughty ways. They would go away in a corner and pout for more of this or that thing, and their mother kept telling them that if they did not stop being naughty, and act in a better manner and eat their meals properly, that a big owl would come and carry them off. They kept on until one night sure enough, a large owl came and took them and carried them about a mile down the river and placed them on a large, high rock, where they could not get down. They sat there and turned to stone, and are sitting there to this day and look like two little girls sitting up there. This rock we call Hoaks-or-reck and Klamath Indian mothers have been pointing to these two little stone girls, telling them this fairy tale to keep them from being naughty and to have them conduct themselves in a good, mannerly way. This rocks is close to the river on the north bank at the lower end of Ma-reep Rapids.
THE ADVENTURES OF A COYOTE.
Long ages ago a Coyote with his family resided at He-melth, which is a place on the Klamath River that is famous in Indian lore. One lovely day in early spring Mr. and Mrs. Coyote with all their children journeyed over the hills of the Klamath from He-melth to a place on the mountain side known as On-a-gap. This was a place where they went annually to gather green grasses upon which they would feast during the spring months. The family was camping out and having a good time. They kept on moving toward the mountain top when there suddenly came quite an unexpected snow storm, the weather turned freezing cold and Mr. and Mrs. Coyote did everything possible to save the lives of their children, but of no avail. One by one they perished in the cold snow as it kept snowing and falling very fast. The fond parents were left desolate and grief-stricken in the gloom of the storm, as they never could call back their loved ones. (The Coyote we call Say-yap.) As they laid the little bodies in their graves of snow, Mr. Coyote grew desperate over his great loss, and determined to seek revenge against the Sun. The Sun, he argued, heartlessly murdered his children, because it had refused to shine and give them warmth, so he started out at once upon one of the longest journeys ever made by any living animal. He chased the Sun over mountains, hills, through canyons, across vast plains and valleys, and past rivers and lakes, until he at last came to the ocean. Here he lost it, for it sank into the waves with a mocking laugh and left him standing alone upon the shores of darkness. Darkness closed around him with its mighty arms and he stood there on the shores of the restless ocean for several minutes in utter despair. Weary in body and limbs, and sad at heart for his great loss, the truth flashed upon him that he could never in this world get his revenge, as the being of his wrath was swift in its flight through space. Thus on the shore he stood, when he suddenly turned his back on the west with a kick of contempt in that direction, where the Sun (his great enemy) had sank. In silence he gazed towards the east and then away towards the northern horizon, and there in the far north he saw a more pleasing scene where he buried his great burden of sorrow. While he still stood there gazing he saw the seven stars winking down through the heavens at him, and they kept winking for him to join them. Suddenly he felt himself rising from the earth as if he had been transformed into an Angel with wings, and he rose far away to the Kingdom of Heaven. Up he soared, ever up, until he was at last flying among the seven stars and when he reached them, he began to dance and sing, as they were all girls and also sisters. They asked him not to keep on singing as they said he did not know how to sing properly and said they would teach him how to sing, so he could join them in some of their songs. So he became flattered to think that the sisters were taking so much interest in him and he became very vain at once, as some narrow minded people do, when they become associated with a superior circle. He was rather enthusiastic now, to think what a good escape he had made from the cruel earth to a beautiful abode in Heaven. He flattered himself so much in his wild enthusiasm that he thought himself very wise, and he would display some of his talent before the sisters. As they offered to teach him he replied to them, “I can sing beautifully; I used to sing for my wife and children down on the earth, they always said my voice was good and I believe I know a good deal about singing, and do not need any training. So never mind girls about teaching me for my voice is just splendid and I can sing perfectly.” The sisters looked at each other and felt very disappointed to think that the Coyote persisted in knowing all about the fine arts, when he practically did not know the first step. After some persuasion they decided they would never be able to teach him any of the fine arts of singing, for the stars of Heaven were much different from those on earth. They reasoned too, that perhaps he was out of his natural mind, after traveling so many millions of miles through space. The sisters replied as good naturedly as they could: “very well kind sir, we are deeply grieved to find that by our billion of years of experience and knowledge we are not able to teach you anything, and you may proceed as you like.” The Coyote began to dance and sing again among his friends until he grew very tired and when he could no longer sing and dance he began to talk to them in a broken tone. His head grew dizzy as his mind wandered from the songs and drifted into thought about himself. He kept repeating the words as he danced until he lost his pipe, tobacco pouch, belt and deer skin trousers, which caused the sisters to smile and wink among themselves. They tried to persuade him not to talk so much but he kept right on and would not heed them. They became very weary and bored over this stupid nonsense and the elder sister said they would join him in his revelry. One on each side of him took his hand in theirs, formed one large circle and began to dance and sing around him. They dragged him faster and faster until they whirled him as fast as they could go. His poor head was in a dizzy whirl and he began to fear for his safety, not knowing when they would let him rest, as it seemed they had been whirling him for centuries. They might go on whirling him for a thousand years, and he felt so famished and weak that he could not endure this treatment much longer. “Ouch!” he exclaimed in a terrible voice, “I say girls I cannot glide your fast whirls any longer, I am afraid I will fall down in a heap and die, or else my bones fly to pieces.” “So you shall fall in a heap Mr. Coyote,” exclaimed the girls in a loud chorus, “down with you to the earth from whence you came, as you are not a bright pupil here in heaven. Up here you must be very brilliant and you have always been stupid enough to think that you knew it all. We are weary of your revelry, so farewell, we wish you many happy days down on the earth and again we say farewell,” and they pushed him down from his place in Heaven. He fell so rapidly through space that he found it impossible to keep himself together and the bones of his body fell to pieces and went flying and whizzing in each direction, but some how they managed to fall in a heap at Ca-neck, which is a very ancient village and the most famous among my people for stories, as so many wonderful tales begin there. The Coyote’s bones laid bleaching in the sun for a short time near this village when a heavy rain storm caused the river to overflow its banks. The rising waters of the river took the Coyote’s bones and carried them down to the mouth of the river at Reck-woy where they were washed upon the sand beach. After being planted there in the sand for several days, a slender shoot sprang up and unfurled its green foliage above the sand. In time this slender shoot grew into a tall alder tree and the Coyote and his bones were now transformed into a tree. One day an old woman with her wood basket on her back and a stone hatchet in her hand came along the beach looking for some wood. She took a great fancy to this alder tree as she thought it would make good wood for the fire, it was just the kind of a tree she had been looking for, for some time, and was pleased upon finding it. So she began to chop it and to her great surprise the tree sprang from the earth and vanished in a flash and then took up the shape of a Coyote which stood before her. “Ouch!” he yelled in a loud voice, “go away, old woman, how dare you cut me to pieces like that?” The old woman became more frightened than ever, as she dropped her hatchet and ran for her life back to the village. She could not find any reason for such a strange encounter and came to the conclusion that it was some of the Indian devils trying to frighten her. The Coyote, to his great relief, was once more in his own natural body and he set out to travel upon the earth again. He ventured to the rabbits as he had a desire to visit them. Upon reaching the rabbit’s home he found Mrs. Rabbit away and only her small children there, upon entering the house he asked the children to give him something to eat as he was very hungry, not having had anything to eat for a long time. The children were too young to understand what he was saying and all of them became frightened and ran out of the house. When they were all safely outside they set fire to the house in hopes of burning the Coyote to death, and he was busy inside, going through the shelves looking for something to eat. But as fortune favored him this time he heard the flames crackling in time to make his escape from a dreadful death. After his narrow escape he decided to go and stay with his grandmother at Weitchpec and he journeyed slowly up the river until he reached her home. As soon as he arrived there he had a long story to tell her, he said he was almost dead from hunger, as he had been on a long journey without any food and asked her to cook the best she could afford as he needed it to build up his strength again, and he also informed her that many of his cousins were coming to visit her. He explained to her that he had left them a few miles down the river to camp for the night and they had sent him ahead to tell her they were coming and for his grandmother to prepare a feast and be ready for them. She told him there was nothing to eat except Tur-perks, which are blighted acorns that fall to the ground and are worm eaten, that she was sorry for her guests but it was the best she could do. She at once set about cooking great basket-fulls of the tur-perks, as she never doubted but what her grandson was telling the truth. When these were cooked she placed the baskets on the table before the Coyote, never doubting but what he would leave plenty for his cousins to eat. She never dreamed that one small being could eat so much at one time, and was greatly disappointed and humiliated when she found that he had eaten all the acorns, even licking the baskets clean and dry. As he finished this large meal he heaved a sigh of relief, as it was the first meal he had eaten for over a hundred years, just how long ago he first left the earth to go to Heaven he could not remember. His cousins were not coming, he just wished to deceive his grandmother, that she might cook a great quantity so he could feast by himself. He deceived her for the first time very cleverly as she did not doubt the story of his cousins coming. After this meal the Coyote called to her and said, “I am going to fish tonight and if my luck is good our baskets will be filled by day-break, now my dear you may cook tonight another large quantity of tur-pecks and tomorrow I will help you prepare the fish for cooking as I think my cousins will arrive at sunset. His grandmother still believed his story to be true but she was very tired and after he had gone to fish she decided to go to bed, thinking she would have plenty of time on the morrow to cook the tur-pecks for the cousins, as they were not coming until evening of the next day. When the Coyote reached the bank of the river he did not even pretend to fish but jumped from boulder to boulder and bruised his head and face as much as he could. Some time in the night he returned and repeated to her a pitiful tale of how some one had attacked him and given him a severe beating—of how some of the other people would not allow him to fish, etc. She listened patiently to his tale of woe and realized for the first time that he was telling her falsehoods. After he had finished his story she became very angry and gave him a severe scolding for being so deceitful. The Coyote did not stay with her very long as he wearied and annoyed her so much she planned to get rid of him. One day she hired a young man to take him across the river to the village of Peck-toolth where she instructed him to camp for the night. That night after dark the young man asked the Coyote to sleep at his feet, which the Coyote gladly did as he was somewhat tired from tramping through the woods that day and he was soon fast asleep. Then the young man quietly left the bed and rolled a log in the place he had been lying in. He did this to deceive the Coyote when he awoke, as he would most likely see the log and think he was still sleeping there, then he hurried away and left him asleep and alone at Peck-toolth. The Coyote woke up during the night and looked about him and soon discovered the log and that the young man had left him alone. He jumped to his feet hastily and ran down to the banks of the river, and when he arrived there he saw the young man standing on a high rock on the opposite side of the river, he yelled until he was hoarse for him to come over in his canoe and take him across to his grandmother’s. The young man refused to help him which made him very angry and he called him all the names he could think of and begged him in a pleading manner, but of no avail. At length the Coyote became so enraged that he yelled at the top of his voice that he would murder him if he ever reached him and he seized a sharp stone and ran up and down the river for a long time, swearing as fast as he could utter his words. The man stood still on the rock with a mocking smile on his face and watched the frantic efforts of the Coyote, when he thought he was getting pretty tired the young man called out to him to swim across the river, he dared him and said it was easy to swim across. The Coyote at once took up the dare and plunged into the river and began to swim with all his might as he was compelled to swim against the current. He was almost successful in getting across when the young man shouted to him to look back across the river as there was something coming down the bank. The Coyote was foolish enough to look back over his shoulder, and as he did so the strong current swept him back on the same side he started from. He immediately made another desperate attempt to swim the river. He swam and swam, fighting against the strong current until he became exhausted and it was impossible for him to swim any longer. Realizing he would soon drown he called again and again to the young man to rescue him a boat, but the other stood immovable on the rock and calmly replied, “I cannot help you for your last day on earth has ended.” The Coyote, crying the mournful wail of death, sank into the waters of the river to rise no more.