FABLE AND FOLKLORE 237 



tree. Ictinike was wearing 'coonskins, and when 

 presently some persons came along he thrust their tails 

 through cracks in the trunk. Three women, thinking 

 that raccoons had become imprisoned in the tree, cut a 

 hole to capture them, whereupon Ictinike came out and 

 the women ran away. Then Ictinike lay down wrapped 

 in his furs as if asleep, and an eagle, a crow, and a magpie 

 came and began pecking at him. The buzzard, thinking 

 this meant a feast, rushed down from the sky, and 

 Ictinike jumped up and tore off its scalp, since which the 

 buzzard has been bald. 



But many explanations of why birds are now so or so 

 make no mention of Ravens or Ictinikes, but just tell you 

 the fact. Thus the Eskimos of northwestern Alaska re- 

 late that one autumn day very long ago the cranes pre- 

 pared to go southward. As they were gathered in a great 

 flock they saw a beautiful girl standing alone near a vil- 

 lage. Admiring her greatly, the cranes gathered about 

 her, and lifting her on their wide-spread wings bore her 

 far up and away. While the cranes were taking her aloft 

 their brethren circled about below her so closely that she 

 could not fall, and with hoarse cries drowned her screams 

 for help. So she was swept away into the sky, and 

 never seen again. Always since that time the cranes have 

 circled about in autumn, uttering loud cries. 



The Hudson Bay Eskimos tell their boys and girls 

 when they see the funny little guillemots by the sea-cliffs 

 and ask about them, that once a lot of children were play- 

 ing near the brink of such a precipice. Their noisy shouts 

 disturbed a band of seal-hunters on the strand below; 

 and one of the men exclaimed, "I wish the cliff would 

 topple over and bury those noisy children !" In a 

 moment the height did so, and the poor infants fell 



