swANTON] HAIDA TEXTS AND M^fTHS 329 



Then they asked each other: '" What shall we give him to eat?" 

 "Give him the fat of bullheads' heads." And they gave him food. 

 In the night he awoke. He was h'ing upon some large roots. And 

 in the morning he heard them say: "There are fine [weather] clouds." 

 Then the}^ went fishing, and, when it was evening, they built a large 

 Hi'o. He saw them put their tails into the fire, and it was quenched. 

 And next da}^, after they had gone out fishing, he ran awa3^ 



Then they came after him. And he climbed up into a tree standing 

 ])V a pond in the open ground. They hunted for him. Then he moved 

 on the tree, and they jumped into the pond after his shadow. 



Then they saw him sitting up there, and they called to him to come 

 down. "Probabh",'" drop down upon my knees." And the}" coidd 

 not get him. They left him. 



Then he started off. He came in to his parents. He came in aftei" 

 having been lost, and his mother gave him a ground-hog blanket to wear. 



Then he went out to play with the others one da}", and 'something- 

 said to him from among the woods: "Probably is proud of his ground- 

 hog blanket. He does not care for me as he moves about." He did 

 not act ditferentl}' on account of this." Those who took him away 

 were the Land-otter people. 



The Pitch-people (Q!as la'nas) occupied much of the northwestern coast of 

 Moresby island between Tas-oo harbor and Kaisun, but, when the Sealion-town peo- 

 ple moved to the west coast, they seem to have driven the Pitch-people out of their 

 northern towns. They were always looked upon as an uncultivated branch of Haida, 

 and are said not to have possessed any crests. Later they intermarried with the 

 Cumshewa people. Some of the Cumshewa people claim descent from them, but 

 none of the true Pitch-people are in existence. The relationship of their culture to 

 that of the other Haida would be an interesting problem for archeologists. The 

 following stories regarding these people were obtained from a man of the Sealion- 

 town people who supplanted them. 



1 There were several Haida towns so named. This stood near Hewlett bay, on 

 the northwest coast of Moresby island. 



HlJiven at length the name means "putting rocks into fire to steam food." He 

 was chief of the town of Kaisun before the Sealion-town people came there. 



•' By destroying his kelp line he cut off their only source of food supply, and, as a 

 result, the fort was destroyed. 



■*A11 excei)t one jnan, who was found there by the Sealion-town people on their 

 arrival, and of whose strange actions and unusual abilities many stories were told. 



^ A similar story occurs in my Masset series where the old woman was used as a 

 kind of bugaboo to frighten children. The same was probably the case at Skidegate. 



•^ HtVmaiya, the Haida word employed here, is one used to indicate very great terror. 



"This was the usual jjicnicking place of Kaisun children. 



^'The Haida word, Fldjao, used here is said to have a similar meaning to "gentle- 

 man " and "lady" in English. 



^ Perhaps another playground. The last syllable, q!et_^ means "strait." 



'"Or, more at length, "that is probably it." Haida, Udjiga^-i. 



^^ That is, he did not lose his senses, as usually happened when one was carried off 

 bv a land otter. 



