58 Field and Forest Rambles. 



that the squirrel had been an enormous animal, but that one 

 day an old man of the tribe was asked by the Great Spirit 

 what he should most desire, and he replied, " To reduce the 

 size of this giant squirrel!" Whereupon he received the 

 divine mandate, and going forth from the council chamber, 

 stretched out his hand, when the squirrel shrank to its present 

 proportions : " therefore the result has been that the little crea- 

 ture has ever since been querulous at the sight of man!" 



But there were other monster animals, according to their 

 legends, besides this great miko, or squirrel. Stories are told 

 of huge moose, beavers, and "the wonderful Great Turtle"!* 

 How the snowy owl still laments the Golden Age when man 

 and all animals lived in perfect amity, until it came to pass 

 they began to quarrel, when the great immortal Glooscap, 

 or Clotescarp, got disgusted, and sailed across the seas, to 

 return when they made up their differences. So every night 

 the owl repeats to this day his "Koo koo skoos" — "Oh, I 

 am sorry! oh, I am sorry!" Thus, whatever was strange or 

 uncommon in the habits and appearances of animals, either 

 in the production of fear, or calculated to excite curiosity in 

 the savage's mind, was sure to be utilized in one way or 

 another : for example, the passenger pigeon was their ideal of 

 "rapidity in movements;" the ungainly bear, jet black excepting 

 a white mark on its chest, elicited a story of how the "beauty 

 spot was produced." The amphibious musk-rat was associated 

 with "good actions," as it furnished food and fur for winter. To 

 this day fabulous tales are told of the " Lhoks," or " Indian 

 Devil," and its ferocity, but unless the puma had at one time 

 ranged over the New Brunswick forests, there is no other feline 

 animal formidable enough to attack man. 



* The gigantic tortoise of the Hindoo mythology is a strange contrast 

 to this myth of the American Indians, and whether in either case a chimera 

 or not, it is remarkable that the imaginations of the two races were so 

 concordant. For the above and other Indian traditions in connection 

 with New Brunswick, see the interesting " Wilderness Journeys," by the 

 Hon. H. Gordon, "Vacation Tourists" for 1862-63. 



