Haida texts and myths

by Unknown

He drove the thing he had in his hand into her forehead, and, when it stuck out at the back of her head and he had raised her arm, all of her flesh dropped off. Then he sat down and entered it (her skin). And he picked up her flesh and buried it in the sand at the foot of the tree. After he had seated herself in the place of the chief’s wife, they came down to her in crowds with the cedar bark.

All of them pulled their cedar bark apart. Among the crowds of people that were there the chief woman did it. “Woman, I am hungry.” “Well, there is a piece of white food in [my box].” “In mine, too.” “In mine, too.” This [they said] because they wanted to have her eat.

The one who was quickest broke up the piece of food and placed it in front of her. She ate all of the little they gave her. While she was doing it, at which they were very much pleased, they started out. Later than the usual time for going to sleep they reached home. They explained that they had started back in the night because the chief’s wife had begun to eat.

The chief commanded wood to be put on the fire. Then he called the people. One of her children had nearly cried itself to death when she reached home. When they handed it to her she pulled her teats out and put one into her child’s mouth, but it ran away from her. It was sucking a man. That is why it ran off crying.

The town people came in and sat down in a circle. After they had roasted the salmon, had broken it up into small pieces, and had placed some in a dish in front of the one sitting next to her she emptied it all [into her mouth]. She did not chew it. When she emptied it into her mouth the town people looked at her instead of eating. They were astonished at the way in which she handled the food. But it was the chief’s wife [they thought].

Next day his wife was again hungry, and again he called the people. While they were in astonishment at her [actions], the elder brother carried his younger brother along in front of the town. Both went crying along. He called the people. Then they let her pour the berries into [[161]]a dish. To their surprise instead of doing so she bent over the tray. The youths came back in a crowd with the empty trays. They were astonished at what she did. It was not the chief’s wife that they saw.

Next day, very early, he (the elder brother) launched one of his father’s canoes and put his younger brother in the bow. He paddled off aimlessly out of Nass inlet, away from the town of Gu′nwa. After he had gone down with the tide for a while a woman leaned halfway out from a certain house and said: “Come hither.” The house had a front sewed together with cedar limbs.[23] It was painted.

Then he directed his course toward it. After he had landed she said to him: “Stop with me. To-morrow you shall go on.” She spread out mats woven in many colors for them. The chief-woman sat on one side, the elder brother next to her, and the younger lay on the other side of him. Then she said to him: “Let your younger brother sit next to me.” He picked him up and made him sit next to her.

For a long time he had had nothing to eat, since the time when they were astonished at the actions of his mother. He was going to eat for the first time with this woman. She turned round. Then she looked into her box, took a dish out of it with the carving of a mouse on it, and placed before him a single piece of salmon.

He bent down his head and thought: “After I have gone hungry for so long this is very little for me to eat. What part will my brother eat?” She was looking at his face and said to him: “Why, just as it is, the supernatural beings are never able to pick it up and eat it.” He picked it up, and his younger brother also picked it up. Yet it was still there. After they had eaten it for a while they had enough and put [the dish] back.