UNITY AND CONTINUITY. 325 



to age. Accordingly, ifc is named the Bear among the 

 Algonquin tribes. The Greek fable explains the name 

 by the story of Callisto, one of the attendants of 

 Artemis, who is the equivalent of Atahensic, the first 

 mother. Through the jealousy of Juno, Callisto is 

 changed into a she-bear, and Zeus, fearful that the 

 hunters would destroy her, transferred her to the 

 heavens as the magnificent constellation still named 

 the Great Bear. Whatever the origin of the story, it 

 has a very archaic aspect. The Greek Bear, however-, 

 comes down to us without the hunters, and conse- 

 quently, in our maps of the stars, it is furnished with 

 a preternaturally long tail, which has apparently led 

 to other names being given to it. The Micmacs, 

 however, who call it the bear (Mouin), name the stars 

 of the tail the three hunters, and these have as their 

 totemic names, Pules (the pigeon), Chigogeck (the tit-- 

 mouse), and Chipchawitch (the robin) ; all of which,, 

 by the way, are onom atop oe tic, and recall similar 

 names in more familiar tongues. A small star near 

 one of the hunters is the Kettle which he carries, and 

 Berenice's Hair is the Bear's Den. We can scarcely 

 doubt that this myth and its astronomical application 

 belong to a time when the root-stocks of the Hellenic 

 or Pelasgic populations were still one with those of 

 the Algonquins, that the importance of the Great Bear 

 as a mark in the sky has caused its name to be per- 

 petuated, and that among the Americans the tradition 

 survives in a more complete and less corrupt form 

 than among ourselves. 



