468 PICTURE-WRITING OF THE AMERICAN INDIANS. 
through the interior of which the people passed up to the surface. The twins sang as 
they pulled the people out, and when their song was ended no more were allowed to 
come, and hence many more were left below than were permitted to come above; 
but the outlet through which mankind came has never been closed, and Myuingwa 
sends through it the germs of all living things. It is still symbolized by the pecu- 
liar construction of the hatchway of the kiva and in the designs on the sand altars 
in these underground chambers, by the unconnected circle painted on pottery, and 
by devices on basketry and other textile fabrics. 
SECTION 2. 
MYTHS AND MYTHIC ANIMALS. 
Among the hundreds of figures and characters seen by the present 
writer on the slate rocks that abound on the shores and islands of Ke- 
jimkoojik Lake, Queen’s county, Nova Scotia, described in Chap. 1, 
Sec. 1, there appears a class of incised figures dlustrating the religious 
myths and folk lore of the Indian tribes which inhabited the neighbor- 
hood within historic times. Itis probable that in other parts of America, 
and, indeed, in all lands, the pictographic impulses and habits of the 
people have induced them to represent the scenes and characters of 
their myths on such rocks as were adapted to the purpose, as they are 
known to have done on bark, skins, and other objects. But these exhi- 
bitions of the favorite or prevalent myths in the shape of petroglyphs, 
though doubtless existing, have seldom been understood and deciphered 
by modern students. Sometimes they have not originally been suffi- 
ciently distinct or have become indefinite by age, and frequently their 
artists have been people of languages, religions, and customs different 
from the tribes now or lately found in the localities and from whom the 
significance of the petroglyphs has been sought in vain. The condi- 
tions of the characters at Kejimkoojik, now mentioned, are perhaps 
unique. They are drawn with great distinctness and sufficient skill, so 
that when traced on the rocks they immediately struck the present 
writer as illustrative of the myths and tales of the Abnaki. Many of 
these myths had been recently repeated to him by Mrs. W. Wallace 
Brown, of Calais, Maine, the highest authority in that line of study, and 
by other persons visited in Maine, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and in 
Cape Breton and Prince Edwards Islands, who were familiar with the 
Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Amalecite, and Micmac tribes. A number 
of these myths and tales had before been collected in variant forms by 
Mr. Charles G. Leland (a). It is a more important and convincing fact 
that the printed impressions of the figures now presented were at once 
recognized by individual Indians of the several Abnaki tribes above 
mentioned to have the signification explained below. It is also to be 
noted that these A bnaki have preserved the habit of making illustrations 
from their stories by scratchings and scrapings on birch bark. The 
writer saw several such figures on bark srnaments and utensils which 
exhibited parts of the identical myths indicated in the petroglyphs but 
not the precise scenes or characters depicted on the rocks. The selection 
