“I am a snipe, and I can make your eyes see if you will let me.”
“Well,” said the boy, “I have always been blind, and I don’t think a snipe could give me my sight, but I could not be worse off than I am now, so you might try, if you want to.”
No sooner had he said this than the snipe hopped on his shoulder and began brushing his eyes very lightly with the tip of her pretty spotted wing. This she did gently back and forth many times, until at last he shouted gladly that he could see.
The little snipe did not let him go just then, but made him keep very quiet until she had polished his eyes so bright that he could see the tiniest speck of sand in the bottom of the ocean; then she sent him home.
Thanking his little new-found friend, the boy ran back as fast as his feet could carry him. When he got near the house, he dropped down on his hands and knees again, and closing his eyes, came crawling in. As he entered he detected the odor of bear meat.
“Grandmother, what is that good smell that makes me so hungry?” said he; but the old woman spoke harshly, and scolded him for not bringing back any willow weed. He still kept asking for food, hoping she would give him some of the bear, but she placed the muskrat before him again, while she ate the bear steaks. When she was too busy eating to notice him, he peeped at her with one eye, and saw her devouring greedily. When she was too well filled to eat any more, she went down to the sea to wash the bear grease off her hands and face, but she was so heavy with food that when she leaned over she fell into the water head first.
The boy heard a shriek and ran to the shore just in time to see her rise to the surface, turn into a white whale, and swim away.
Ever since then the Eskimos have believed that all white whales were once old women. Indeed, to this day, they insist that a bunch of white hair is found inside the brain of a white whale, which makes them all the more sure of it.
A GIANT AND HIS DRUM
