792 TSIMSHIAN MYTHOLOGY [eth. ann. 31 



furs. The box lands on Queen Charlotte Islands, and is found by a chief and his wife 

 who have lost their daughter. They open the box. Many mice run out. They 

 discover the young woman, and adopt her, saying that she is their daughter returned. 

 She marries the chief's nephew and has several children. The children fall against 

 their father's mother's back and are scolded (see p. 428). The mother tells them her 

 story, and the children decide to go back. They cross the sea, pole up the river, and 

 land in front of the mother's father's town. Their canoe is transformed into a hill. 

 They live in their grandfather's house. The woman married among the Haida goes 

 inland and meets some young people, who tell her that they are her children. She is 

 taken to their town, and sees the dance of the Mice. The children, after some resist- 

 ance, allow her Haida husband to visit them, and he is taught the dances of the Mice. 

 This is the origin of the Mouse dance among the Haida. 



The incident of the sending-adrift of a youth occurs in other con- 

 nections, particularly in the story of the jealous uncle or brother, 

 who puts a young man into a box and sends him adrift. The youth 

 finally lands in an Eagle town, where he marries, Kodiak 90, : 

 Tl 201, Sk 277, Ne 10.365, 370 (see also Ri 5.228). 



34. The Young Chief who Married his Cousin (p. 238) 



A chief who is married to his cousin takes a second wife. The first wife is jealous. 

 She leaves her husband, and goes back to her father. One day while she is picking 

 berries a supernatural being appears to her, asks what troubles her, and she tells him. 

 The woman marries the supernatural being. She stays in the woods and has a son. 

 The supernatural being gives presents to her lather. In winter the woman gives birth 

 to a boy. The supernatural being tells his wife to go picking crabapples. She spreads 

 mats under the trees, and they are filled by the Codfish, who is the slave of the super- 

 natural being. The boy is taken to the supernatural being's father, who makes a 

 cradle for him. The supernatural being is given presents; and the child is returned 

 in a cradle, and is given a cradle-song. The supernatural being sends home the 

 woman and her child, and kills the second wife of the chief by upsetting her canoes 

 Neither the woman nor her son marries again. The young man provides plenty of 

 food. 



35, 36. Asdi-wa'l 



(3 versions: Ts 1.71; Ts 5.285; N 225) 



This story consists of three parts: I. The meeting on the ice; 

 II. Marriage with the daughter of the Sun; III. The sea-lion hunters. 



I. THE MEETING ON THE ICE 



A woman lives at G'itsIata'sEr; her daughter, in a town farther up the river. During 

 a famine each decides to visit the other in order to obtain food. They meet between 

 the two towns on the ice. Their husbands have died of starvation. They camp at 

 the foot of a large tree, make a house of branches, and start a fire. The young woman 

 finds a rotten hawberry, which she divides with her mother. At night a man visits 

 the young woman. In the morning the bird of good luck is heard, and the young 

 woman goes to gather bark. She finds a squirrel among the bark. The following 

 day a grouse, then a porcupine, beaver, mountain goat, a black bear, a grizzly bear, 

 a caribou. After finding the last, she turns round and sees a youth standing behind 



' F. A. Golder, TaleSfrom Kodiak Island (Journal of American Folk-Lorc, vol. XVI). 



