form of a long cliff1 on the opposite or north bank of the river, west of the mouth of the Tahltan. Raven tried to make a large, fine, level place opposite his house on the north side of the river, just east of the mouth of the Tahltan, and attempted to build a bridge across the Stikine from this level tract to his house. The bridge always fell down or broke, and all that remains of it now is a rocky point extending out into the river. He tore up and destroyed all his work. The level place he had made with considerable labor he also tore up. This place is now all rough and cracked, and is known to the whites as the "Lava Beds." Raven was angry and disappointed. He told the Katce'de, "I am tired, for I have travelled and worked too much. I am not able to do any good work. I cannot make good houses and village sites for you, as I have done for the Tlingit." He made a brushhouse, and said to them, "You will live in this kind of house even when it is cold weather. Camp where there is plenty of dry wood, so that you can have good fires. There will always be plenty of dry wood in this country for you to use." This is why the interior Indians. (Tahltan and others) use brush-lodges, and camp in a different spot every winter, according to the supply of fire-wood to be obtained. Much fire-wood is required to keep warm in brush-houses during cold weather. Raven said that the country around the mouth of Tahltan River would be the headquarters of the Tahltan tribe (or of the Raven or Katce'de clan). To the west of the mouth of the Tahltan, near the trail, may be seen Raven's tracks, and also the place where he urinated, both transformed into stone.

(16) RAVEN AND KANU'GU.3- Now Raven returned to the coast the same way he had come, and took up his abode near Wrangell. He lived for a time there. He thought, "My work is finished, and I have managed to arrange everything better for the people." He went in his canoe out to sea, and there met Kanu'gu. He took hold of Kanu'gu's canoe and conversed with him. Raven said to him, "You are a very old man. How old are you?" Kanu'gu said that he did not know. Raven said, "Well, I am very old too. Do you remember very long ago, when all the rocks were rotten?" Kanu'gu said, "Well, you must be older than I am, for I do not remember that." Kanu'gu then put on his hat, and a dense fog came on. Raven tried to reach the shore, but paddled around in circles. He then called out to Kanu'gu, "Brother-in-law, you are older than I am." Kanu'gu was following him in the fog, but Raven did not know it.. Kanu'gu took off his hat; and the fog lifted, and the weather became 1 See RBAE 31: 575, No. 107 (Haida).

There is a Katce'de or Raven phratry, and also a Raven clan, among the Tahltan.. It is not clear whether the phratry or clan is meant here, but probably only the clan. * See RBAE 31: 666 (Comox, Haida, Nass, Tlingit, Tsimshian).

clear again. Kanu'gu said to Raven, "You have fooled people so much, that I thought I would fool you by making fog." Raven said, "I have fooled people, but always so that good should come. I have made things easier and better for the people. I stole water from you, but for the benefit of the people." Kanu'gu said, "Yes, what you have done has been of benefit to the people. It is good that you did these things. You obtained light, and this has been good for me as well as for others." Now Kanu'gu and Raven separated. The latter is said to have gone out to sea, and is said to live on a rock or island somewhere far away out in the ocean to the west. Kanu'gu is said to live in the same place.

(17) RAVEN AND THE HAIDA. Raven spent much time on the coast, instructing and teaching arts to the people there. The coast tribes were particularly his people and children. Therefore the Coast Indians have greater knowledge in many ways, and are better provided, than the Tahltan and other interior Indians. They have better houses, have boxes, and better tools, than the interior people. Raven had finished his work on the coast before he came to the interior. He was tired then, after his years of constant labor, and could not do much in the interior. However, he instructed the interior people sufficiently, so that they could get along. This is the reason why the coast country and interior countries are different now, also why the people are different. Their manners, customs, and beliefs are partly the same as on the coast, and partly different. This is because Raven was unable to do things well there.

Of all countries, Raven spent the longest time in the Haida country. He took great pains in teaching the people there. Therefore the Haida are more skillful than any other tribe. They can make all kinds of things even better than the Tlingit and Tsimshian. This is why the Haida are superior to all tribes in canoe-building, housebuilding, making of totem-poles, and carving.

(18) RAVEN INSTITUTES THE KUWEGA'N CEREMONIES.1 Once the animals were in two groups, living in different places.2 The Moose, Caribou, Deer, and others, numbering very many people, lived together; and the Goat, Sheep, Bear, and others formed the other group. The latter group of people made war on the former, and, surprising them, killed them all excepting Weasel (or Ermine), whom they spared. She was a very light-skinned woman, and they

1 Kuwega'n is the Tlingit word meaning "deer." The custom here referred to has been described by Swanton (RBAE 26 : 451), and is referred to in Swanton, BBAE 39: 128. It is also referred to in the peace procedure between Tlingit and Tsimshian described by Boas (RBAE 31: 378). The custom is also practised by the Tahltan.

• For stories in which the animals are in two groups and make peace with each other, see Lillooet (Teit, JAFL 25 : 358–360), Shuswap (Teit, JE 2: 658, 659).—J. A. TEIT.

made a slave of her. After they had brought her to their country, they treated her very badly and abused her. At last they took her to an islet in the sea, which was always covered over at high tide, and left her there. When she was nearly drowned, Raven came in a canoe and took her off. She became his wife, and told him of the fate of her kindred. He determined to go to her country and see for himself. When they reached there, he saw the bodies of the slaughtered people still lying intact. He asked his wife to point out the bodies of those who had been slaves. She did as directed, and he separated them. He skinned all the slaves, and wrapped their skins around the paddles of his canoe. The corpses of the other people he arranged in a row along the shore. Now he went in his canoe with the woman, and took the steering-place. He told her to put her paddle in the water; and when he cried "Kuk!" she was to lift it up out of the water at once. "Then," he said, "all the corpses will come to life, and will stand up." In no case was she to bear down on her paddle; for, if she did this, the people would be killed more dead than they were now. His wife did as directed; and when he called the word, she lifted up her paddle, and all the corpses arose. The people were glad, and said, "You made us alive. You shall be our chief. We will give you presents and slaves. You may keep our daughter the Weasel, whom you have, and we will give you others for your wives if you wish." Raven said that he did not care for more than one wife.

The people all went aboard their canoes to go and take revenge on the enemy. Raven and his wife went ahead of them in their small canoe, which was very strangely and prettily carved and ornamented on the prow. The people of the enemy village saw a great fleet of canoes coming, and thought it must be a war-party or some great party of strangers coming to visit them. They all gathered on the shore and watched the ornamented canoe, which was in the lead. Raven told his wife to hold her paddle in the water, and, when he called "Kuk!" to push it down. She did this, and immediately all the people fell down dead where they stood. Raven was sorry, and said, "It is not good that I should make all the people die in this way. If people keep on killing one another, soon there will be no people left." The Deer people said, "What you have done is right. If they become alive, they will attack us again, for there are many bad people among them." Raven called one of the dead men, made him stand up alive, and asked him to point out the bodies of those people who were good. Raven then called all of the latter to life, and left the others dead.

Now he told the two groups of people to make friends. They talked a long time, and tried to agree. At last the chief of the Deer

1 Said to be a Tlingit word or exclamation.

people proposed that his side give a certain number of warriors to the other side as hostages, and the other side give to them the same number for hostages. "Then we will feast each other's hostages and dance, wearing eagle-feathers.1 Afterwards we will exchange the hostages again, thus making kuwega'n and peace." Raven said this would be a good plan, so they exchanged men. Moose, Caribou, and Deer, on the one side, were willing to dance; and Deer made the best kuwega'n. The men of the other side were not so willing to dance, especially Sheep and Goat, who refused to use the eaglefeathers emblematic of peace. Raven then became angry, and, taking four eagle tail-feathers, he stuck two of them in the head of Goat, and two in the head of Sheep. They became horns. He said to them, "Now you will always wear feathers. Other people will be able to take off their feathers (i.e., antlers) when night (i.e., winter) comes, and put on new ones in the daytime (i.e., summer), and thus always have clean feathers; 2 but you will always wear yours, and they will get old and dirty." All the people now danced and made peace. For eight days they danced.

Thus was the Kuwega'n ceremony instituted. Raven told all the people, "Thus will you make peace after fighting. I have done much for you, and have often nearly lost my life trying to benefit you. I obtained for your use light, fire, water, and other things. It is not good if you fight all the time and kill one another."

(19) RAVEN MAKES THE WOLF WOMEN GOOD-LOOKING. - Raven made figures of men and women, an equal number of each. He divided them by sexes. Then he divided them in groups. There were four groups, Raven men, Raven women, Wolf men, and Wolf women. Now he said, "Raven men will mate with Wolf women, and Wolf men will mate with Raven women." A woman of the Wolf phratry happened to be outside the house at the time, and, hearing Raven talking, she listened to what he said. Raven said, "I have made the Raven women the best-looking. They are really very good-looking." Raven had to go outside. The woman at once ran inside, and changed the group of Wolf-women figures to where the Raven-women figures had been.

When Raven returned, he pronounced his decree on the groups, saying, "I have already established the relationship of the sexes and of the phratries. Now I decree that people shall take after the characteristics of these figures I have made. Having made the women of one side better-looking than those of the other side, henceforth they 1 The tail-feathers of eagles which have mottled plumage and are slow of flight are the kind used in the Kuwegan ceremony as emblematic of peace. — J. A. TEIT.

ΤΕΙΤ.

With reference to the shedding of the antlers of moose, caribou, and deer. - J. A.

will be better-looking." The Wolf figures, having been changed to the Raven side, they were thus made the best-looking. Raven did not find out his mistake until after he had uttered his decree; and thus the Wolf women were made good-looking, whereas it was his intention that the Raven women should be the best-looking. This is why women of the Wolf phratry are so good-looking at the present day.

(20) RAVEN CONSIDERS HOW TO PROVIDE FOR THE PEOPLE. Raven thought very hard, and tried many ways of making conditions such that people would always have plenty to eat without needing to work. He failed, however, to devise any method by which this could be effected. Had he succeeded, things would have been easy for people in the world to-day; but, because he failed, people have to work hard to obtain their food. Sometimes, even when working hard, they manage to live merely from hand to mouth, and some of them at times have no food at all. Even Raven himself did not always have food, and therefore people sometimes starve at the present day.1

(21) THE ORIGIN OF BIRTH AND DEATH.2-Once the Tree and the Rock were pregnant and were about to give birth. The Tree woman held on to a stick or bar, as Indian women do, while the Rock woman used nothing to hold on to. Her child, when half born, turned into a rock and died. Raven came along shortly afterwards, and found the women. He said, "I am very sorry. I have come too late. Had I been here, this would not have happened. Now people must die, because Tree gave birth, and Rock did not." If Rock had given birth, and Tree had not, people would never die. People would then have been like rocks, and lasted forever. As it is now, people are like trees. Some will live to be very old, and decay and die, as some trees do; while others, when only partly grown, will die like young trees that die without decay and fall down. Thus death comes to people at all ages, just as among trees, and none lives very long.

(22) RAVEN CURTAILS THE Powers of Game.3.

1 See p. 221.

The game-mother

4

2 See also Emmons, Tahltan Indians, p. 119: "Then Raven told the little birds that he was going to make man, but they did not believe him; and as he asked each one, ‘Have you young inside?' they all answered 'No.' Then he turned to the rocks and the trees, and asked them the same question, and they both answered affirmatively; whereupon he told them the young first born would be man, and they each told him that at the break of day a child would be born. And so in the morning the tree first gave birth, and the offspring became man: therefore as the tree springs from the seed, lives, and dies, so human life is but for a season. Following the birth of the tree, the rock brought forth its offspring, which was of stone, and which was rejected by Raven as having everlasting life." See RBAE 31: 663 (Haida, Nass, Tlingit, Tsimshian; also Rivers Inlet).

See BBAE 59: 302 (Blackfoot, Caddo, Cheyenne, Kutenai, Menominee, Pawnee, Shuswap, Thompson).

The Tahltan believe in a woman who is mother and controller of all the game-animals. See "AtsEntmā, or the Meat-Mother," No. 9, p. 230. — J. A. TEIT.