CREATION OF THE WORLD
Athapascan (Upper Yukon)
A LONG time ago, water flowed all over the world. There was one family and they made a big raft. Then they put animals on the raft.
Now there was no land but all water, so the people wanted to make a world. The man tied a cord around a beaver and sent him down to find the bottom of the water. But the beaver got only half-way and drowned. Then the man tied a string around a muskrat and sent him down. Muskrat drowned, but he reached the bottom and got a little mud on his hands. Then the man took the mud out of the muskrat’s hands into his palm. He let it dry and then crumbled it to dust. Then he blew the dust out of his palm all over the waters. This made the world.
ORIGIN OF MANKIND
Eskimo (Bering Straits)
LONG, long ago, a man and a woman came down from the sky and landed on one of the Diomede Islands. They lived there a long while, but they had no children. At last one day the man took some walrus ivory, and from this he carved five dolls, just like people. Then he took some wood and made from it five more dolls. Then, one night, when all were finished, he set them off to one side, all ten in a row. The next morning the dolls had become people. The ivory dolls became men, therefore they are brave and hardy; but the wooden dolls became women, therefore they are soft and timid. From these ten dolls came all the people of the Diomede Islands.