Alaskan and Mackenzie Delta Traditions 47 a 



is a piece of meat in exchaDge." The loon without hesitation handed over the 

 tail and greedily swallowed the lure. It tried to fly away, but could not. Then 

 it wept, saying, tdmoktotdka, "I broke my jaw in swallowing it;" and it lay dow 

 and died. The little squirrels danced on its body. 



Cf. No. 43. 



20. The Raven and the Loon 

 (Told by Unalina, a Mackenzie river Eskimo woman) 



Long ago the raven and the yellow-billed loon met and conversed together. 

 They agreed to make each other look beautiful, and the raven began on the loon. 

 He marked him all over with black dots, drew the lines on his body and painted 

 the bill yellow. When he had finished the loon began on the raven, and as a 

 preliminary painted him black all over. But before he could proceed any 

 further a man came along and frightened them both away, so the raven was 

 never finished and has remained black to this day. 



Cf. No. 45. 



B. MAN AND THE ANIMAL WORLD 



21. The Caribou's Spell 



(Told by Fred, an Eskimo of Nome, Alaska) 



There once lived a man, his wife, and their only son. The man and the 

 boy spent their days in hunting caribou; in their neighbourhood all the caribou 

 were very large. One day the boy saw an exceptionally large one, and eagerly 

 set out after it. The caribou fled, but presently turned round and allowed the 

 boy to approach. Just as he was about to shoot his arrow, however, it pushed 

 back the hood from its face and said, "Don't shoot me; go and look for other 

 caribou; you will soon find plenty of big ones." But the boy said, "No, it's 

 you I want. You are a fine big one." "No," said the caribou, "Don't shoot me; 

 if you do you will never return home." "I don't care," replied the boy, "I am 

 going to shoot you;" and he shot and killed it. After he had skinned it and 

 gathered up the meat he started off home. Suddenly it became so dark that he 

 was quite unable to see his way. "How is this," he said, "It is all dark. Shall 

 I ever find the road home? Perhaps I can feel my way along." So he groped 

 along, sometimes knocking against sharp rocks, sometimes plunging into water. 

 Soon he grew very tired and hungry and thirsty. He lapped up water with his 

 hand and tried to drink it — it tasted like blood. He staggered on, growing more 

 and more weary at every step. "Alas!" he said, "It is no use. I shall never 

 reach home now. I shall never see father and mother again. I had better kill 

 myself." So he took a sharp rock and tried to cut his throat, his face, his body 

 and his limbs, but he only succeeded in gashing himself without inflicting any 

 fatal injury. He took another rock, and another, but it was all in vain. He 

 struggled on in the darkness, growing thinner and thinner till at last his limbs 

 wasted away and he died. 



22. The Black Bear's Spell 

 (Told by Fred, an Eskimo of Nome, Alaska) 



Long ago, near Cape Prince of Wales, there lived a woman and her young 

 son, all alone. Often they were starving, for there was no man to hunt for them. 

 Sometimes the woman would say to her son: "Are you hungry?" and when 

 he replied "Yes," she would give him a small piece of seal meat. In time the boy 

 grew bigger and stronger. One day he said, "To-morrow I shall go and look 



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