L'^92-'j3.j notes on the westkrn denes. 79 



in times past was passionately played by the Carriers, but is now 

 altogether forgotten except by a few elder men. It necessitated the use 

 of a quantity of finely-polished bonesticks, perhaps four or five inches 

 long, of which a correct idea may be gathered from fig. 336, illustrating 

 Niblack's "The Indians of Southern Alaska."* These bones w^-re 

 called alte, a root word of the second category, implying much greater 

 antiquity than that of the na'ta 



Speaking of atlih. a tradition which has some bearing thereon c^mes 

 up for a share in the reader's consideration. If of no interest to the 

 archaeologist, it will serve a sociological purpose and may have the 

 advantage of furnishing us with a peinture de niceurs, as the French have 

 it. Here it is. f 



" A young man was so fond of pla)'ing atlih that, after he had lost 

 every part of his wearing apparel, he went so far as to gamble away his 

 very wife and children. Disgusted at his conduct, his fellow villagers 

 turned away from him and migrated to another spot ol the forest, taking 

 along all their belongings, and carefull)' extinguishing the fire of every 

 lodge so that he might perish. 



" Now this happened in winter time. Reduced to this sad fate, and in 

 a state of complete nakedness, the young man searched every fireplace 

 in the hope of finding some bits of burning cinders, but to no purpose. 

 He then took the dry grass on which his fellow villagers had been resting 

 €very night and roughly weaved it into some sort of a garment to cover 

 his nakedness. 



" Yeti without fire or food he could not live. So he went off in despair 

 without snow-shoes, expecting death in the midst of his wanderings. 



" After journeying some time, as he was half frozen and dying of 

 hunger, he suddenly caught sight in the top of the tall spruces of a 

 'glimmer as that of a far-off fire. Groping his way thither, he soon 

 perceived sparks flying out of two columns of smoke, and cautiously 

 approaching he came upon a large lodge covered with branches of 

 conifers. He peeped through a chink and saw nobody but an old man 

 sitting by one of two large fires burning in the lodge. 



" Immediately the old man cried out: ' Come in, my son-in-law ! ' The 

 }-oung man was much astonished, inasmuch as he could see nobody 

 outside but himself 'Come in, my son-in-law; what are you tloing out 



* Rep. U. S. Museum, 1888, jilate Ixiii. 



+ It must be remarkeil that in the version the most in vo^ue anionj^ the Carriers, the beginning 

 ■of this legend is very different from that adopted here after Julian ^letsa-niya (he walks aheail) 

 ■of this place, Stuart's J,^ake. 



