THE HOUND OF THE PLAINS. 365 



of his race as to give him the book-name Canis latrans, or " barking " 

 wolf. I can not picture this rattling concert (to which I have often 

 been an unwilling listener) of quickly repeated, infinitely varied, ven- 

 triloquial yelps better than it has already been done by Dr. Elliott 

 Coues, who confesses the difficulty of conveying in adequate words 

 the noisy confusion of these polyglot serenades : 



" One must have spent an hour or two vainly trying to sleep," says 

 this brilliant writer and naturalist, " before he is in condition to appre- 

 ciate the full force of the annoyance. It is a singular fact that the 

 howling of two or three wolves gives an impression that a score are 

 engaged, so many, so long-drawn are the notes, and so uninterruptedly 

 are they continued by one individual after another. A short, sharp 

 bark is sounded, followed by several more in quick succession, this 

 time growing faster and the pitch higher till they run together into a 

 long-drawn, lugubrious howl in the highest possible key. The same 

 strain is taken up again and again by different members of the pack, 

 while from a great distance the deep, melancholy baying of the more 

 wary lobo breaks in, till the very leaves of the trees seem quivering to 

 the inharmonious sounds." 



In the memory of this astonishing voice of his, it is amusing to 

 read the story told by the Kaibabits Indians, of Northern Arizona, to 

 account for the diversity of languages ; for what animal could better 

 figure in such a history than our polyglot wolf ? The old men of the 

 Kaibabits will tell you that in the beginning the grandmother, goddess 

 of all, brought up out of the sea a sack which she gave to the Cin-au-av 

 brothers, great wolf-gods. This sack contained the whole of mankind, 

 and the brothers were bidden to carry it from the shores of the sea to 

 the Kaibab plateau, and by no means to open the package on the way 

 lest, as with Pandora's box, untold evils should be turned loose. But, 

 overcome by curiosity, the younger Cin-au-av untied the sack, when 

 the majority of people swarmed out. The elder Cin-au-av hastened 

 to close it again and carry it to the Kaibab plateau, where the people 

 who had remained found a beautiful home. Those who had escaped 

 were scattered and became Navajos, Moquis, Dakotas, white men, all 

 the outside world in short — poor, sorry fragments of humanity, with- 

 out the original language of the gods. 



The nocturnal prowling, secretive disposition, and remarkable 

 craftiness of this animal, together with the annoyance it has the power 

 to inflict, cause it to figure prominently in the myths and religious his- 

 tories of the native races of the Far West. Some of these stories I 

 propose to recall, and I am sure they will suggest to every reader at 

 least the reynard of European folk-lore, if not any other interesting 

 parallels. 



In all the Mexican pantheon the most sublime figure is that of 

 Tezcatlipoca, creator of heaven and earth, sole ruler of the universe, 

 invisible and omniscient. To him, as presiding over darkness and all 



