234 BIRDS IN LEGEND 



changed by magic into a bird with a long bill, and became 

 so frightened that she sprang up and flew off in an erratic 

 way until she struck the side of a house, flattening her 

 beak and face so that she became just as the owls are seen 

 to-day." 



Raven made woodpeckers (red-shafted flickers) out of 

 the blood that gushed from his nose after he had bruised 

 it ; and Haida fishermen now tie scarlet flicker feathers to 

 their halibut hooks "for luck." Their neighbors, the 

 Clalams, thought it better to use a piece of kingfisher skin 

 — and in my opinion their reasoning was the sounder of 

 the two. Perhaps it was Raven whom the Tshimshian 

 Indians of Nass River meant when they spoke of 

 "Giant's" treatment of the gulls. The Giant, as Pro- 

 fessor Boaz heard it designated, had some oolachans 

 (smelts) and stuck them on sticks to roast by his fire. 

 "When they were done a gull appeared over the Giant. 

 Then the Giant called him 'Little Gull/ Then many 

 gulls came, which ate all the Giant's oolachans. They said 

 while they were eating it qana, qana, qana! Then he was 

 sad. Therefore he took the gulls and threw them into 

 the fireplace, and ever since the tips of their wings have 

 been black." 



The culture-hero of the Twana Indians of the Puget 

 Sound region was Dokibat, as has been mentioned, who 

 had a habit of changing things, turning men into stones 

 or birds, and so forth. A boy hearing that he was com- 

 ing, and fearing some unpleasant transformation, ran 

 away, carrying with him a water-box (used in canoe- 

 journeys by sea) with water in it. The water shaking 

 about sounded somewhat like pu-pn-pu when repeated 

 rapidly ; but as the boy ran wings came to him and he be- 

 gan to fly, and the noise in the box sounded like the cooing 



