272 TSIMSHIAN MYTHOLOGY [etii. ann. 31 



Before they left their camp, one of their princes w ent up into the 

 woods to refresh himself, for he was in deep sorrow. He went on 

 and on until he came to a plain. There he found a large lake. He 

 stood on the shore of the lake, weeping, on account of his brothers 

 who were swallowed by the supernatural halibut; and while he was 

 weeping there, he heard a noise. He looked up, and, behold! there 

 was a large beaver on the water, with copper eyes, copper ears, 

 copper teeth, and copper claws. It struck the water with its tail, 

 making a noise like thunder. Then the young man went back to 

 the camp, and told his people that he had seen a large beaver in the 

 lake above their camp. On the following morning they went to 

 hunt the large beaver. Soon they came to the lake, but they saw 

 nothing. Everything was quiet. While they, were still standing 

 there, they heard the sound of a drum, followed by a mourning-song; 

 and after a while they saw the large beaver come out of the water, 

 with copper eyes, copper claws, copper ears, copper teeth. They 

 agreed to kill it, for they needed the copper. Therefore they tried 

 hard to break the dam in the large lake. After many days they 

 succeeded. Before the lake was dry, the beaver came out. The 

 men killed it and skinned it, taking off the copper claws, the ears, 

 eyes, and teeth. 1 As soon as they had killed it, they went down and 

 took the beaver to be their crest, and therefore the Eagle Clan use 

 it now. No other clan can use this large beaver. When the head 

 chief LEg - e'°x makes a great potlatch, he wears it on his head, and 

 four head men take hold of the headdress, and one of each clan, so 

 that the people may know that he alone is the head chief of all the 

 Tsimshian. They always kept the beaver hat hi their family. 



42. The Water Being Who Married the Princess 2 



(There are a great many stories of human beings who made wonder- 

 ful marriages, telling how a prince or princess was taken away from 

 the old town of Metlakahtla, where, after the great Flood, all the 

 villages of all the tribes took their beginning.) 



A great chief lived there, who had a very beautiful niece, a young 

 princess, whose name was Sagapgia. This princess was very much 

 beloved by the young women of her uncle's tribe. One day in 

 summer, when the salmonberries were ripe on Skeena and Ksdal 

 Rivers, many young women of one tribe, of a Raven town, took a 

 large canoe. The canoe was full of young women, and the princess 

 Sagapgia was among them. She was sitting in the center of the 

 large canoe. They have to pass a slough (?) near the mouth of 

 Skeena River, and there is a great sandbar which they saw in front 



1 In a letter, Mr. Tate says that the beaver's mourning-sou^' contains only one word— " beaver- in-h ; s- 

 house-of-the-lake." 

 = Notes, p. 834. 



