494. THE ESKIMO ABOUT BERING STRAIT [ETH. ANN. 18 
before. When the memory of his unfaithful wife had become faint, he 
took a wife from among the maidens of the village and lived happily 
with her the rest of his days. 
ORIGIN OF THE YU-GI-YHIK’ OR I/-TI-KA-TAH’ FESTIVAL 
(From Ikogmut, on the lower Yukon) 
[This festival is observed by the Eskimo of the lower Yukon from 
about Ikogmut (Mission) up to the limit of their range on the river. 
Beyond that the festival is observed by the Tinné at least as far as 
Anvik, they having borrowed it from the Eskimo. The festival is 
characterized by the placing of a wooden doll or image of a human 
being in the kashim and making it the center of various ceremonies, 
after which it is wrapped in birch-bark and hung in a tree in some 
retired spot until the following year. During the year the shamans 
sometimes pretend to consult this image to ascertain what success will 
attend the season’s hunting or fishing. If the year is to be a good one 
for deer hunting, the shamans pretend to find a deer hair within the 
wrappings of the image. In case they wish to predict success in fish- 
ing, they claim to find fish scales in the same place. At times small 
offerings of food in the shape of fragments of deer fat or of dried fish 
are placed within the wrappings. The place where the image is con- 
cealed is not generally known by the people of the village, but is a 
secret to all except the shamans and, perhaps, some of the oldest men 
who take prominent parts in the festival. An old headman among the 
Mission Eskimo informed me that the legend and festival originated 
among the people of a place that has long been deserted, near the 
present village of Paimut, and that thence it was introduced both up 
and down the Yukon and across the tundra to the people living on 
lower Koskokwim river. The names of this festival are derived, first, 
Yu-gi-yhik from yw-gik, a doll or manikin, and J’-ti-kd-tah’ from ¢-tikh- 
tok, ‘“‘he comes in,” thus meaning the doll festival or the coming-in 
festival, the latter referring to the bringing in of the doll from the tree 
where it is kept during the year. | 
At the foot of the mountains below Paimut, near where a small sum- 
mer village now stands, there was in ancient days a very large village 
of iskimo, which was so large that the houses extended from the river 
bank some distance up the hillside. 
In this village lived two young men who were relatives and were also 
noted shamans and fast friends. For along time they remained unmar- 
ried, but at last one of them took a wife, and in the course of time had 
a daughter who grew to womanhood, was married, and to her was born 
ason. As soon as this child was born its grandfather killed it and 
carried the body out into the spruce forest and hung it to a tree, where 
it remained until it was dried or mummified. 
Then the old man took it down, placed it in a small bag, which he 
hung about his neck by a cord, and wore it secretly under his clothing 
