swANTON] HAIDA TEXTS AND MYTHS 101 



u dish. To tlu'ir surprisi' instead of doiii*;- so she bent over the tia\'. 

 The youths came hack in a crowd with the empty trays. They were 

 astonishcMl at wliat she did. It was not the chief's wife that tliey saw. 



Next day, very carl}', he (the elder brother) launched one of his 

 father's canoes and put his ^^oun^er brother in the ))ow. He paddled 

 oH' aindessly out of Nass iidct, away froju tlie town of (xu'nwa. After 

 he had gone down with the title for a while a woman leaned halfway 

 out from a certain house and said: "Come hither." The house had a 

 front sewed too'cthcr with cedar limbs. '■' It was paint(^d. 



Then he directed his course toward it. After he had landed she 

 said to him: ''Stop with me. To-morrow you shall go on." She 

 spread out mats woven in many colors for them. The chief-woman 

 sat on one side, the elder brother next to her, and the j^ounger la}' on 

 the other side of him. Then she said to him: "Let your younger 

 brother sit next to me." He picked him up and made him sit next to 

 her. 



For a long time he had ha<I nothing to eat, since the time when they 

 were astonished at the actions of his mother. He was going to eat for 

 the lirst time with this woman. She turned round. Then she looked 

 into her box, took a dish out of it with the carving of a mouse on it, 

 and ])laced l)efore him a single piece of saliuon. 



He bent down his head and thought: "'After I. have gone hungry for 

 so long this is very little for me to eat. A\'hat part will my brother 

 eat? " She was looking at his face and said to him: " Why, just as it is, 

 the supernatural beings are never able to pick it up and eat it." He 

 picked it up, and his j'ovmger brother also picked it up. Yet it was 

 still there. After they had eaten it for a while they had enough and 

 put [the dish] back. 



After the drj' fish was finished she put down a cranberry for them 

 as well. As soon as he thought al)out that, too, she looked into his 

 face again and said to him: "Eat it. T'he supernatural beings are 

 unable to consume it." Then he picked it up with a spoon and ate it. 

 WluMi they were filled she put it back. 



After it became dark she spread out the mat. There the chief - 

 woman la\' down. The elder brother was going to lie next to her, but 

 she said: "Lay your 3'ounger brother next me." He picked him up 

 and laid him next her. As soon as he laid him down he lay as still as 

 one killed by a club. For the first time after he had cried so long he 

 slept. 



While he (the elder brother) was asleep he heard a woman laugh, 

 and it awoke him. To his surprise his 3^ounger brother was playing 

 with the chief-woman. \\'hen his younger brother did a certain thing 

 to the chief woman [she exclaimed]: "Yu-f, now see how He-who 

 came-to-have-Panther-woman-for-his-mother plays with me." As soon 

 17137— No. 29—05 ^^11 



