IN 1895 I made a journey to California in consequence of an arrangement with the late Charles A. Dana, editor of “The Sun.” According to this arrangement, Mr. Dana was to publish on consecutive Sundays such myth-tales as I might think of sufficient value to appear in his paper. Those myths were to be found by me in California, Mexico, and Guatemala.

I began at the source of the Sacramento River, and worked down to the mouth, my last stopping-place being the extensive hop-fields in the lower valley.

In San Francisco I wrote the following short account of the Wintus. That done, I set out for Mexico.

In the city of Guadalajara I copied the myths obtained in California and sent them to “The Sun.” After that I worked at “Quo Vadis,” the greater part of which I translated in Guadalajara.

All the myths in this volume were published in “The Sun,” and appeared as a part of a series pertaining to Indians in California, Mexico, and Guatemala.

Only the California part has been published thus far.

After leaving Guadalajara I spent almost a year in Guatemala and Chiapas, the southernmost state of Mexico. Among the last places which I visited was Palenque. A view of one part of the ruins of this remarkable and mysterious city appears as a frontispiece to the present volume.

THE WINTUS

The Wintus are a nation or stock of Indians who before the coming of white men owned and occupied all that part of California situated on the right bank of the Sacramento, from its source near the foot of Mount Shasta to its mouth at the northern shore of San Francisco Bay. These Indians extended into Trinity County on the west, and still farther to the mountain slope which lies toward the Pacific. Only a small number of them, however, were on the western declivity. The great body of the nation lived on the eastern slope of the Coast Range and in the Sacramento Valley. Some of their finest mental productions are connected with the upper course of the Sacramento and with the MacCloud River, or Wini Mem.

It is difficult to determine what the Wintu population was half a century ago, but, judging from the number of houses in villages, the names and positions of which have been given me by old men, I should say that it could not have been less than 10,000, and might easily have been double that number. At present there are not more than 500 Wintus in existence.

The Wintus have suffered grievously; great numbers have been killed by white men, others have perished by diseases brought in by strangers; but those who remain are strong and are more likely to increase than diminish. Times of violence have passed, and the present Wintus are willing and able to adapt themselves to modern conditions.

It may be of interest to readers of these myth tales to know something of the present condition of the Wintus.

In 1889, when I was in California, commissioned by Major Powell for the second time to make linguistic investigations among various tribes of the Pacific coast, a few Wintus came to me in Redding, California, and complained of their wretched condition. There was not a spot of land, they said, where they could build a hut without danger of being ordered away from it. “This country was ours once,” added they, “but the white man has taken all of it.” I told them to bring their people together, and invite also the Yanas, who had suffered more than all other people of that region, and then explain to me what was needed.

The two peoples met on a little stony field in a brushy waste outside the inhabited part of Redding. There they made speeches and discussed matters for three hours the first day and as many the second. They gave me all the points of what they wanted, which was simply that the United States should give each man of them a piece of land, with help to begin life on it. I jotted down in brief form what they had told me, read it to them, and they were satisfied. Next day the paper was copied in the form of a petition from the two nations to President Harrison. They signed the petition before a Redding notary, and gave it to me with a request to lay it before the President.

Early in 1890 I was in Washington. Anxious to win the case of my poor Indian friends,—or “Diggers,” as some men are pleased to call them contemptuously,—I looked around for a Congressman of influence to go with me to support the petition before the President. I found no suitable person till I met my classmate and friend, Governor Greenhalge of Massachusetts, at that time a member of Congress. When he heard the tale of the Yana massacre and realized the sad plight of the Wintus, he offered at once to cooperate with me. He went to the President and explained the affair to him. Two or three days later he accompanied me to the White House. I gave the petition to President Harrison, who promised to favor it with his executive initiative. He did this so earnestly and with such emphasis that an agent was appointed very soon to find land for those Indians. The agent found land for them in various places, but within the radius of their former possessions. The condition of the Wintus at present is this: They have lands which are described, but in most cases the boundaries are not indicated by any material mark, or at least very few of them are; white men are trespassing, and it is impossible for the Indians to protect themselves till their boundaries are fixed tangibly. They will not have the means to begin serious work till they receive assistance. They are waiting now in hope that the Commissioner of Indian Affairs will have their lands surveyed, and that Congress will make a small appropriation for their benefit. This is the extent of their hopes and wishes. They are very glad to have land, and the majority of them will make fairly good use of it. When I met them in 1895, they were very grateful for the part which I had taken in settling them in life, adding that they could not have settled themselves unassisted. As to me, I cannot but make an emphatic acknowledgment of the generous and effective aid given by Governor Greenhalge. “Olelbis,” the first myth published in “The Sun” (March 29, 1896), was preceded by the following brief introduction:—

The Wintus, with whose creation-myths I begin this series, are a very interesting people. Their language is remarkably harmonious, rich, and flexible. It has great power of describing the physical features of the country in which it is spoken, as well as the beliefs and ideas of the Wintus themselves.

The picture of Olelbis, a being who lives in the highest and sees everything, is drawn more distinctly and with more realism than any character in other American religious systems, so far as I know.

The theory of creation evolved by the Indians of North America is complete, simple, and symmetrical. I have referred to it somewhat in the introduction to “Hero Tales of Ireland,” in “Myths and Folk-lore of Ireland,” and in “Myths and Folk-tales of the Russians, Western Slavs, and Magyars.” This theory is in brief as follows:—

There was a people in existence before the present race of men; in speaking of the present race of men, the tales have in view Indians only. This first people lived in harmony for a period of indefinite, unimaginable duration, without division or dissension,—undifferentiated, so to speak. This was the golden age of existence, a Nirvana preliminary to life as we know it at present, a Nirvana of the gods, as the Buddhist extinction of self is to be the Nirvana of just men when all shall be one in all and one in one. At last a time came when character appeared, and with it differences and conflicts. When the conflicts were past and the battles fought out, the majority of the first people were turned into all the animated things, walking, creeping, crawling, swimming, flying, that have ever been seen on the earth, in the water, or in the air. They were turned also into trees and plants of every kind,—some into heavenly bodies, others into remarkable stones and rocks, just as, in the Bible, Lot’s wife was turned into a pillar of salt.

According to this theory, every individual existence which we see in the world around us is a transformed or fallen god. Every beast, bird, reptile, fish, insect, or plant was at one time a divinity of high or low degree, an uncreated person who had lived in harmony with his fellows from the beginning till the time when variety of character, or individuality, appeared and brought with it difficulties, or perhaps we might say, penalty. With individuality came conflicts; when those conflicts were over, creation was finished.

At the end of each particular conflict the victor turned by means of a word the vanquished into that which embodied and expressed his character. The vanquished on his part had a similar compelling word, and changed his opponent into the beast, bird, or other existence which described him; in other terms, he gave his opponent the physical form, the outward personality, which corresponded to the nature of his hidden or at least his unapparent character. Besides these metamorphosed or fallen divinities, there is in the Indian mythologies a group, a small minority, which was not changed, but left this world going out under the sky at the west to live in harmony and delight; and they live in that way to this moment. Sometimes this group, or a part of it, went to live above the sky.

The Indian Creation-myths all relate to the adventures and exploits of the “first people,”—the gods; none relate to human beings, and none touch on anything done since man appeared on earth. They are the accounts of what took place when there was an order different from the present, and explain how the present order rose from the first.

Such, in substance, is the foundation of American religious systems, and the method of all of them, so far as examined. The Wintu is different from many others in its methods and details, but the result is the same in all cases. Olelbis, with few exceptions, disposes of the first people, retains with himself whomsoever he likes, sends to the earth and transforms those whom he thinks more useful below than above, and gives the example of a single ruling divinity which, without being represented as all-powerful or all-wise, manages through the knowledge and services of others to bear rule over all things.

OLELBIS

This myth contains a complete statement concerning the beginnings of Wintu belief. Olelbis occupies the first place in the estimation of Wintus. To understand the Wintu mind, it is indispensable to begin with Olelbis. Other myths illustrate this one, explain parts of the Wintu system, and help to explain the mental life of the people; but this tale of Creation is to Indians of the western half of the Sacramento valley what their sacred books are to historic races.

No Wintu has been converted to Christianity; hence the faith of the nation is undimmed, and its adherence to primitive religion unweakened. I cannot explain their position better than by giving the words of one of the most intelligent Wintus whom I have met. After I had collected all that I could find, and had received needful explanations as far as was possible, I spoke some time with this man. Referring to their religion and ideas, he said: “When I talk of these things, I am afraid, I feel kind of scart” (scared).

That explains their position perfectly. Their faith is of the firmest; they are full of awe; they believe that Olelbis is up there now in the “Central Blue,” in his marvellous Panti Hlut, the most beautiful structure in the universe, and from there sees everything that happens. That heavenly house is framed of living oak-trees, which bear acorns continually, the Indian bread of life,—that house which has in and around it all the flowers that have ever bloomed, flowers whose roots can never die.

Winishuyat, mentioned in “Olelbis” and in other tales, is one of the most interesting personages in Wintu mythology. He is described as a little man, about the size of a thumb, and is always placed on the top of the head by the person whom he accompanies and aids. This person never fails to tie his own hair over Winishuyat, and thus conceals him from every stranger. Winis means “he sees;” the literal significance of huyat I have not been able to get at satisfactorily thus far. The essential meaning of the whole word is that he sees in mind the approaching danger before it is evident to the physical eye. Winishuyat means, therefore, the prescience of danger,—seeing danger while it is yet at some distance; not necessarily distance geographically, for the danger may be present, but concealed in the breast of a dissembling enemy, and some time, short or long, may be between it and actual happening.

The peculiar thing in the case is that foresight is separated from the hero, and is made the distinguishing quality of his little thumb-sized attendant, just as if each power had to be connected with a person,—no person having more than one great trait of character.

In the Yana mythology there is no name corresponding to Winishuyat, but the same office is filled by a maternal uncle.

In the tale of “Juiwaiyu,” Jupka, the uncle of the hero, makes himself as small as a thumb, and is tied in under the hair of his nephew. In the winning of Paiowa, at the house of Tuina, Igupatopa performs for his sister’s son the same kind of service rendered by Winishuyat,—with this difference, that he is more active; he is not merely an adviser, he is a helper, a strengthener; he gives counsel to make his nephew wise, and then enters into his heart to fortify him, to render him brave and strong.

It is curious and instructive to note in European Folk-tales the survival of Winishuyat and his approximate equivalent, the Yana uncle. In Slav tales this person is the mangy, miserable, neglected little colt which, when taken outside the town, shakes itself and becomes a marvellous magic steed, golden-haired, untiring, and wise, faithful to its master as the sun to his course in the sky.

This steed knows what is coming, knows exactly what to do, knows the mistakes that his master is sure to commit, knows how to correct them; and the cumulative effect of these corrections increases immensely the momentum of the final triumph.

The Tom Thumb of nursery tales, the mentor of his big brothers, gives also a striking reminder of Winishuyat.

MEM LOIMIS

This beautiful myth, in which wind and water are the moving characters, needs little if any explanation, save in one point, that relating to the Hlahi, commonly called doctor by white men. The word Shaman used in Siberia describes his position accurately. He is not the master of spirits exactly, but he is the favorite and friend of one or of more spirits; that is, of such spirits as promised him their co-operation at the time when he became a Hlahi. If this person observes the rules of life that are always imposed on him who enjoys the friendship of this or that spirit (these rules refer mainly to food agreeable to the spirit), and does what is needful when the spirit is invoked (the needful, in this case, includes smoking and dancing), together with chanting the song of this spirit (every spirit has its own song), the spirit will come at his call.

Sanihas Yupchi smokes and dances; the Tsudi girls sing or chant. The name Sanihas Yupchi means the archer of Sanihas; Sanihas means daylight or the entire light of day from dawn till darkness,—in other words, all the light that Sas the sun gives between one night and another,—though Sanihas, daylight, is always represented as a person, and not the product of Sas’s activity. This Sanihas Yupchi, the archer of daylight, the usher of the dawn, is no other than Tsaroki Sakahl, who has a white stripe on his back, the messenger who was sent by Torihas to invite Katkatchila to the hunt which caused the burning of the world in “Olelbis.” He appears also as the envoy who ran in darkness on the gleaming sand trail to invite Hawt to Waida Dikit’s green and red house, where the world concert was held, at which Hawt proved to be the greatest musician in existence.

In the note to “Kol Tibichi” will be found an account of how the Hlahi receives the aid and co-operation of spirits.

Most interesting beliefs are connected with Wokwuk, the son of Olelbis and Mem Loimis. The Wintus believe Wokwuk to be the greatest source of power and wealth. According to “Olelbis,” different bits of Wokwuk came down to the earth and were turned into elk and various valuable creatures; the tip of Wokwuk’s little finger became the earthly Wokwuk.

Wintus told me that if a man were to see the earthly Wokwuk, who was made from the tip of Wokwuk’s little finger, he would grow immensely rich from the good luck which the sight would bring him. The last Wokwuk seen appeared a little over a hundred years ago. The story of its appearance is as follows:—

One day an old woman at a village called Tsarken, about twenty miles north of Redding, went for wood. Soon she ran home almost breathless, leaving her basket behind.

“Oh, my grandson,” cried she to the chief, “I am frightened. My grandfather and grandmother used to say to me when I was a girl, ‘You will see a wonderful thing some day.’ I have just seen something wonderful on the hill. I believe it is a Wokwuk. Old people told me that if a Wokwuk is seen he will stay in one place a long time. I think this Wokwuk will stay, and wants us to see him.”

The chief made a beautiful shed of small fir-trees, covered it with fir branches, and placed sweetly smelling herbs in it; he sent for neighboring chiefs, and next day all went in their best array to the Wokwuk, bearing water in the finest basket of the village, and carrying a large oak slab and a rope. They found the Wokwuk facing north, and went near him. The chief lighted his pipe, blew the smoke toward every side, and said to the Wokwuk,—

“You have come to see us; we have come to salute you. You have come to show yourself. You are a great person, and all the Wintus in the country will hear of you; all the chiefs in every place will speak of you. I am glad that you are here. I am glad that you have come to my country.”

He talked more to the Wokwuk; spoke very nicely. Next he took water in his mouth and blew it around in every direction. After that the chief smoked a fragrant root instead of tobacco, blowing the smoke toward the Wokwuk, speaking to him with great respect.

“Now we will take you home with us,” said the chief. They carried the oak slab to the Wokwuk; he did not stir. They pushed him onto the slab, tied one leg to it, then took him home, placed the slab in the shed, and untied the Wokwuk. He remained two months there, never ate anything, never tried to escape.

Every morning they talked to the Wokwuk. During two months no one went to hunt, no one ate venison or sucker fish. Finally, all the Wintus were invited and all the Yanas,—a great assembly. They saluted the Wokwuk, each chief addressed him; last of all came a chief from Wini Mem, named TÓpitot, leading a black bear. This bear walked erect like a man. He had bands of porcupine quills around his fore and hind legs, and a buckskin band covered with the red scalps of woodpeckers around his head. The bear bowed down to the Wokwuk, and the chief addressed him. When other chiefs spoke to the Wokwuk during the two previous months, he never raised his head or gave a sign of answer; but when TÓpitot had finished, he raised his head and gave out a sound which was loud and long.

Next morning the chief of the village wished good luck to all, then he brought a rope, hung Wokwuk to a tree, and took his life. He plucked him, gave the quills to the chiefs, including himself, cut off the head, kept it; the body he carried to an ant-hill; when the ants had taken all the flesh, the bones were separated from each other and given to each chief.

When the chiefs went home, they spoke to the quills and bones as if praying, at first every morning, then once a week, then once a month, and continued this for a long time. After that each put away his bone or his quill in a triple covering. The bone or feather was wrapped first in a cover of the red scalps of woodpeckers sewed together; outside that were two mats made of reeds.

The owner of a Wokwuk bone or quill does not show it to any one, not even to his wife or children. When he dies he leaves it to a son, or, if he has no son, to a daughter. The possession of Wokwuk relics gives luck, but the owner must never eat venison or sucker; these are offensive to Wokwuk.

Five years after the quills were put away only the stems of them were left; five years later they were as fresh as if just plucked. If the quills were to be exposed before people, the people would all die; if to one person, that person would perish. The owner of a quill or bone unwraps it occasionally, places water near it, and talks to it, saying: “Give us good luck; make us well. I give you water, you give us strength.” If he points the relic and mentions a person’s name, saying, “Make him sick,” that man will die surely.

If the owner of a Wokwuk relic dies without heirs, the bone or quill is sunk in a sacred spring; if it were buried with the owner, all would get sick and die.

Both feathers and bones grow old in appearance, and later on they are as fresh looking and perfect as ever.

NORWAN

Next to “Olelbis” stands “Norwan,” both for value and interest. This remarkable myth recalls forcibly the Helen of Troy tale, both in its general plan and in many particulars.

The great war among the first people is caused by the woman Norwan. Norbis Kiemila, who claims to be her husband, is descended from the heavenly white oak which forms part of Olelpanti Hlut, the divine mansion in the “Central Blue.”

Norwan’s full name is Pom Norwan en Pitchen, that is, daughter of the land on the southern border. She has another name: Hluyuk Tikimit, which means the dancing porcupine. Her residence, or hlut, was Norwan Buli, Norwan Mountain. The Yana name of this mountain is Wahkanopa, which means the son of Wahkalu. Wahkalu is Mount Shasta, and Wahkanopa Lassen’s Butte.

Norwan, or Hluyuk Tikimit, the dancing porcupine, has still a third name, Bastepomas pokte, the food-giving or food-producing woman. In her quality of producer she occupies a position in Wintu mythology similar to that of the divine descendant of the earth and the sun in the Algonkin religious system. This Algonkin myth is one of the most beautiful and significant, not among creation, but among action myths. And here I beg to call attention again to the distinction which I make between the two classes of myths. Creation myths relate always to what was done among the “first people in the world which preceded this,” while creation was going on, or more correctly, perhaps, during the time of those transformations or metamorphoses from which resulted the present world and the order of things contained therein.

Action myths relate to ever-recurrent processes in nature which began as soon as the sun had his course marked out for him and the physical world around us received its present form and fashion; this happened before all the “first people” were metamorphosed. The vast majority had received the physical bodies which they have at present, but a few were left, and they remained in various places till they saw or heard the new race, the Indians. Action myths, therefore, relate to various processes in nature which never cease. For us the most important are those involved in the relations between the sun and the earth.

The great Algonkin sun and earth myth which has many variants and vast wealth of detail, describes those relations more profoundly and broadly than any other Indian myth devoted to the same subject.

The Algonkin myth in its most extended form describes the earth maiden as becoming a mother through being looked at by the sun. She gives birth to a daughter who is called Wakos ikwe, the fox woman; this daughter becomes the mother of a great hero, the highest benefactor of aboriginal man in America. He is the giver of food and of every good gift by which life is supported.

Of this myth there is a shorter version in which the hero is born of the earth directly; he is her son, not her grandson.

This benefactor and food-giver is no other than that warm air which we see dancing and quivering above the earth in fine weather. Descended from the sun and the earth, this warm air supports all things that have vegetable or animal existence.

This myth in its more extended form, the one to which I have referred first, is similar to that which Schoolcraft pieced together and which Longfellow took as the foundation of his beautiful poem “Hiawatha,” though not identical with it.

Schoolcraft, with his amazing propensity to make mistakes, with his remarkable genius for missing the truth and confusing everything with which he came in contact, gave the name Hiawatha to his patchwork.

Hiawatha is an Iroquois name connected with Central New York. The Iroquois were mortal enemies of the Algonkins, and the feud between these two stocks was the most inveterate and far reaching of any in America. It was, in fact, the only Indian tribal hatred that rose to historical importance, and it was by the adherence of the Iroquois, the “Five Nations” of New York, that English dominion in North America was established.

The Algonkin force of America was on the French side, but the Iroquois held all water communication between Lake Erie and Ontario, the greatest strategic position on the continent at that period. They cut the Algonkins in two, and prevented France from receiving their undivided assistance.

Had the whole Algonkin power aided the French, they would have had great chances of victory. Had the Iroquois been friends of the Algonkins and acted with them, there could have been no doubt of the triumph of France at that juncture. But the Algonkins and Iroquois were mortal enemies; the Algonkins were friendly to the French, the Iroquois to the English.

In the face of all this Schoolcraft makes Hiawatha, who is peculiarly Iroquois, the leading personage in his Algonkin conglomerate; Hiawatha being an Iroquois character of Central New York (he is connected more particularly with the region about Schenectady), while the actions to which Schoolcraft relates him pertain to the Algonkin Chippewas near Lake Superior.

It is as if Europeans of some future age were to have placed before them a great epic narrative of French heroic adventure in which Prince Bismarck would appear as the chief and central Gallic figure in the glory and triumph of France. The error and absurdity would be, as the Germans say, colossÁl, but not greater or more towering than in Schoolcraft’s Hiawatha. Longfellow, of course, could not free himself from the error contained in his material; but the error, which was not his own and which he had no means of correcting at that time, did not prevent him from giving his work that peculiar charm which is inseparable from everything which he did. In the original Algonkin myth the hero to which Hiawatha has been accommodated was a child of the sun and the earth. Whatever his names in the numerous versions found in the twenty-eight languages of this richest and most varied Indian stock of North America, he is always the bounteous benefactor of man, the kindest of all divine powers that have ever appeared upon earth. He is always in reality that warm light which dances and quivers before us in fine weather, and through which every man, beast, reptile, insect, fish, bird, and plant lives and flourishes.

This myth has received on the Pacific coast, or more correctly on parts of it, a different treatment from that given it east of the Rocky Mountains. There the benefactor is a female, a daughter of the earth. Nothing is said as to who her father was. It is significant that she dances all day, that she is called the quivering porcupine and the food-producing woman.

In Indian myths from New York to California the porcupine is ever connected with light; in some cases it is the sun himself. In “Tulchuherris” of this volume, Sas (the sun) carries a porcupine quiver, and is advised never to lay it aside, for as long as he keeps it on his shoulder he is safe from his children the grizzlies (the clouds) who wish to kill him.

In California Norwan, daughter of the earth, occupies in part the place of the Algonkin hero, the child of the sun and the earth. Her usual life is of the housekeeping order; she has great supplies of food in her hlut, or residence, and she goes on dancing each day until evening. The great and characteristic event of her life, her departure from the dance with her partner, is of the same scope and meaning as the last journey of Hiawatha when he sails to the west and vanishes in the regions of sunset. The hero of the Algonkin myth must go, he cannot stay; he must vanish in the ruddy glow of evening because he is the warm dancing air of the daytime. He must go whether he will or not. Before he goes, however, he cheers all whom he leaves behind by telling them that another will come from the east to take his place and comfort them. Next morning, of course, the comforter comes, for the life career of the Algonkin hero is included in the compass of a single day, and a successor is bound to come as surely as he himself is bound to go. Norwan dances, and then goes away with her partner, to the desperate vexation of Norbis Kiemila, her would-be husband, who wishes to have her to himself exclusively. She dances, as she says, without knowing it and goes away unconsciously. She dances with this partner because she cannot help it, and departs imperceptibly to herself.

Who are the rivals for her person?

Norbis means “living in the south;” he lives in the southeast, the land of greatest productiveness, in the region of Hlihli Piu Hlut Ton, that most beautiful of houses on earth, and second only to the divine mansion in the “Central Blue.” He is descended from one of the white oaks in the heavenly house.

The person who was metamorphosed afterward into the red wiu bird (Tede Wiu) is his rival, the person with whom Norwan left the dance, thus causing the first war in the world. Was this person the red of evening which became Tede Wiu afterward? If we acknowledge that he was, and if we are willing to admit Norbis as the representative of all people living east of the west, we have at once the two parties to an irreconcilable rivalry in the most vital of questions, the possession of warm sunlight, and that most vital of questions is embodied in the person of a woman. That was the cause of the first war in the world and of fell strife. A story substantially the same as this was, we may think, the ultimate basis of the Iliad. The mythic origin of the particular tale from which Homer constructed his epic had been forgotten, that may be granted, but there is little doubt that in rustic Greece men might have found a similar tale which was mythologic beyond peradventure; and the Helen of that tale, or her equivalent, was a person like Norwan. With the materials at our command even now, we have enough to indicate this, for was not Helen the daughter of Leda and the divine swan, a person to be fought for with all available energy in the world at that period, and to be fought for in a war which surpassed in importance all that have ever succeeded it?

Helen of Troy, the daughter of Leda and of Zeus, the overarching heaven, with all its light; Norwan, daughter of the earth, with Lassen’s Butte, California, for her residence; and the Algonkin hero whose place is taken by Hiawatha, are all different representatives of the same person, different expressions for the same phenomenon; and that person or phenomenon is the warm air which dances above the earth in fine weather. This air, in one case noted here, is conceived as the greatest benefactor of man, that being who gives the choicest and most necessary gifts to all, and, in the other two cases, as a priceless treasure, in the form of a woman who is to be fought for with all the valor that can possibly be summoned, and in a manner that in Helen’s case inspired the noblest epic known to the world thus far.

These three cases show clearly the methods of mythology, and prove the absolute need of knowing that we must deal (to borrow mathematical language) with constants and variables taken together,—knowing clearly, meanwhile, which are constants,—and not with variables only, supposing them to be constants, or with constants and variables mixed together without being able to distinguish which belong to one class and which to the other. Were some writer to deal with the prehensile capacity in animated creatures, and describe how it is exercised, he would find a variety in the organs used for grasping things which would represent very well the variety of methods employed by primitive man in mythology to represent the same phenomenon or force in nature.

If man be considered as standing on his hind feet, his fore feet (the hands) are his grasping instruments. With the elephant the nose is prehensile; with some monkeys the tail performs this office, in part at least. With tigers and lions, dogs and cats, the mouth and teeth are prehensile instruments of great force and precision. With the bear the forepaws are almost hands. The two feet with their talons, which correspond to the hind feet in quadrupeds, are the graspers with birds of prey, working instruments with domestic fowl, and weapons with some other birds, as, for instance, the ostrich.

Take another case, the teeth, one office of which is to reduce food to fine particles; with all mammals they serve this purpose, and, in many cases, others also. Birds have no teeth, but they have a substitute in the gizzard, which they line with gravel and other hard particles; and this second stomach, by contraction, grinds to pulp grain and other food already softened in the crop or first stomach. The boa-constrictor has no teeth and no second stomach; it chews by crushing between its body and a tree the beast which it is to swallow. The chewing mouth of the boa has for one jaw the tree, for the other its own body; between those two jaws it reduces to a soft mass the carcass of the creature to be swallowed.

In considering the various personages in mythology, it is all important to discover, first of all, what they are, and, next, what they do. The office filled by a certain personage in a group of myths belonging to a given race or tribe may be filled by an entirely different kind of character in a similar set of myths of another tribe. This results sometimes from different geographic and climatic conditions, and sometimes from looking at the phenomenon or process of nature in another way. There is as much variety in the treatment of one subject by various tribes as there is variety in prehensile members and the use of them among grasping creatures, or as there is difference in the manner of reducing food to fineness among quadrupeds, birds, and boa-constrictors.

TULCHUHERRIS

Tulchuherris resembles certain European tales more than any other in this collection. Apart from other merits, the value of such a tale in comparative mythology is evident.

The old woman, Nomhawena, is an earthworm now; the Indian tale-teller says that there is no doubt on that point. Pom Pokaila, her second name (Pom, earth; Pokaila, old woman) admits of two translations,—old woman of the earth, or old woman Earth. In the first case it would apply to Nomhawena, who digs the earth always, is a woman of the earth; in the second, it would mean the earth itself. The earth is, in fact, Tulchuherris’s mother. Nomhawena is his grandmother, in a titular sense at least. In more countries of the world than one, grandmother is the title of a midwife; and the office of midwife was performed by Nomhawena at the birth of Tulchuherris. We may picture to ourselves the scenes and circumstances of Tulchuherris’s birth. Root Flat is one of those level places where innumerable little piles of fine soil are brought to the surface by the labor of earthworms. Over this valley, as over so many others on the Pacific coast, fog is spread after sunrise,—fog which comes up from the earth dug in every direction by Nomhawena’s people. In this fog is Tulchuherris, the mighty son of the earth; in other words, lightning, electricity, that son of the earth who comes to maturity so speedily.

Kulitek Herit, brother of Tulchuherris, for whom Nomhawena mourned so deeply, is now the white feather which appears sometimes in the black tail of the black vulture. Komos Kulit is the Wintu name of this vulture. There were three great feathers among the Wintus, transformations of three great persons among the first people. The first of these is the white feather just mentioned, which is the metamorphosed Kulitek; the second is the longest black tail-feather of the black vulture, which is the present form of Hamam Herit, who fought in the Norwan struggle; the third is the longest wing-feather of the same vulture. This feather is the metamorphosed Tubalus Herit.

The first two feathers are used on great occasions in war; the third feather, only by doctors or Hlahis.

In Indian mythology there is a subtle, but close and firm, connection between the sunflower and the sun, which is illustrated strikingly in this story. The old woman, by her magic art, burns great piles of big trees in two or three minutes, while a handful of sunflower roots is beyond her power and keeps the fire alive for years. This illustration, in the material world, of the Indians, reminds one of the still, small voice in the spiritual world of the Hebrews. The sunflower root in this Tulchuherris tale is invincible from its connection with the sun, the one source of light and heat; the still, small voice is considered almighty because of its connection with the whole moral life and light that exists in the universe.

The two obsidian knives in Sas’s house are an interesting reminder of the Damocles sword.

In the case of Tichelis, now ground squirrel, and Hawt, the present lamprey eel, we have cases of personal collision resulting in transformation. In the Wintu mythology this is exceptional, and in this instance one-sided, for the vanquished make no attempt to transform Tulchuherris.

SEDIT AND THE TWO BROTHERS HUS

Sedit was in favor of death for men, and gives his reasons. It cannot be said that he brought death into the world, but he stopped the work which would have kept it out.

His discourse with the Hus brothers is curious; it represents the immortality and goodness of a weak and limited creature like man as barren and monotonous. The comparison of this conversation with the account of Adam and Eve before and after the Fall is not without interest.

The critical, unbelieving, disobedient Sedit, who is so willing to make life in the world varied and interesting through death, so long as the question stands apart from his own immortality, and his great concern and anxiety when he thinks that he must himself die, is brought out in good relief.

The earnest and honest Hus brothers stand in strong contrast to the sneering Sedit. The Hus character is a lofty one in Wintu mythology. This may seem strange to a new student of Indian ideas, when he remembers what a foul creature the turkey buzzard is.

The buzzard is considered as a purifier on earth, and surely in regions like Central America the service rendered by the bird in this regard is memorable. The buzzard is everywhere the most frequent and striking figure in Guatemala and Southern Mexico, both in city and country. In California there is a fine of five dollars for killing one.

The original Hus character is conceived by the Wintus as striving toward religious purification as strenuously as the earthly buzzard works at cleaning the earth of carrion of various descriptions. The following remarks accompanied this tale when published in “The Sun”:—

This tale of Sedit and the Hus brothers is a splendid bit of aboriginal American philosophy, and touches on topics which have exercised many minds besides those of primitive America. The subject of life and death is treated here so simply, and at the same time so well, that I believe few readers would ask for explanation or comment.

Some statements, however, touching Sedit are not out of place, I think. The coyote is very prominent in the mythology of every region where he is found. The basis of his character is the same in all myths that I have collected. He is a tremendous glutton, boastful, talkative, cunning, exceptionally inclined to the other sex, full of curiosity, a liar, a trickster, deceiving most adroitly, and is deceived himself at times. He comes to grief frequently because of his passions and peculiar qualities. He is an artful dodger, who has points in common with the devil of European folk-lore, being in many cases an American counterpart of this curious and interesting personage.

Of Northern Pacific coast tribes in the United States, the Modocs have given most distinction to the coyote. Among them the chief coyote is a trickster on the grandest scale, and has obtained possession of the indestructible disk of the sun, through which he is immortal, or, at least, is renewed every day to carry that luminary. Because of his vanity and boastfulness, the coyote undertakes various enterprises in which he fails through his passions.

Sacred springs and small lakes in the mountains are very prominent in the Modoc religion. A young man who hopes to be a magician or a doctor goes to these mountain springs before he is married or knows woman. There he fasts and watches a week or longer until he is nearly exhausted. If he is to be a magician or doctor, spirits appear to him in this interval. A coyote went to those mountains (in the time before men were on earth, of course), hoping to gain great magic power, but on the way he ate various kinds of food hateful to the spirits of the springs. These spirits were disgusted with the odor of food that came from him, struck him with mange, drove him away, made him hungry, foul, and wretched forever. He ran away, howling and lamenting, without hope of pardon. From this coyote are descended an especially bad breed of coyotes in Oregon. They are all foul and hungry to this day. In dark windy nights the mangy descendants of that glutton are heard bewailing the fault of their ancestor, their own fallen state and lost happiness.

The Shasta Indians have a long tale of a coyote whose fond grandmother tried to make him a great sorcerer. When the time came, she sent him to the sacred mountain and gave every instruction. He was not to stop, eat, or drink on the road, or to speak to any one. When about two-thirds of the distance, he passed near a house; inside was loud thumping and hammering; a frog woman was pounding seeds and singing; her house was full of food; coyote caught the odor of it, stopped, could not resist the temptation to go in. He went in, ate and drank everything put before him. In Indian mythology frog women are not vestals; so breaking his fast and gluttony were not his only offences. He had fallen past redemption. On leaving the frog woman’s house he went through a series of unmentionable adventures, at the end of which there was nothing left but his head, which was in a pool by the wayside, and just as much alive as ever.

Two sisters, afterwards ducks, who were going that way, found and pitied the unfortunate. It was not easy to carry him, but the younger promised to do so if he would shut his eyes and not open them till she set him down on his grandmother’s threshold. This condition was to prevent him from seeing how she carried him. When half-way home, curiosity overcame him. Though only a head, he opened his eyes and fell to the ground.

The duck woman had pity again, and took him to his grandmother. Loud was her wailing at sight of her lost and ruined grandson.

Sedit came to grief through peculiarities of character.

HAWT

This myth of Hawt is very curious and subtle; it is one of the best told tales that I have found anywhere. There is a largeness about it, and, at the same time, a perfectly firm grasp on the part of Waida Dikit, the master of the assembly, that produce a grand effect.

Though the story is long, it needs, I think, no explanation beyond what is stated in the introduction and in preceding notes, except some remarks touching the character of Hawt.

Hawt, the great musician, is identified with water; he is, as it were, the spirit of water made visible.

In this myth, only the musical powers of Hawt are exhibited; but in the Yana Tirukala, which means the same thing as Hawt (lamprey eel), we see the active side of the same personage, we see him as a worker. Original is Hawt indeed,—a living flute fingering his own body as he would an instrument; inhaling air and blowing it out through the apertures in his sides.

The present lamprey eel has marks, as it were, of holes in his sides.

NORWANCHAKUS AND KERIHA

This tale contains actions and a number of personages difficult to identify, because their names are merely epithets. Eltuluma means “he swims in;” but who it is that swims in we know not. Keriha seems connected with ducks, from the fact that he wore a duck-skin all his life on earth, and, when he threw off this skin, all ducks were produced from it.

Norwanchakus means the southern end of that staff or stick to which was attached the net with which these two brothers dragged Pui Mem and Bohema Mem, and named each place from the thing which came into the net in front of it.

Nodal Monoko (the little man who ate so many salmon and sturgeons, and carried so many away in his bag) means “sweet in the south.” He has another name, Nodal Wehlinmuk, which means “salt in the south.” At first he is hostile to grizzly bears, but later has intimate relations with them and marries one. His acts point strongly toward electricity or lightning. His bag, in which the whole world could be put away, may well have been a cloud bag.

Norwinte means “seen in the south;” but, again, we have no knowledge of the person seen. Poni Norwanen Pitchen, the full name of Norwan, is also an epithet meaning “daughter of the land on the southern border,” and would convey no information if it stood alone; but as Norwan, in addition to many other details, is also the dancing porcupine and the food-producing woman, we know who she is.

The existence of Puriwa and Sanihas (darkness and daylight) before the sun was in the world, is most interesting. This is one of many proofs that every phenomenon was considered to be independent. Daylight is a personage quite apart from the sun, who is merely that old Sas who fought with Tulchuherris, and who travels through the sky every day from east to west in utter loneliness. He carries that glowing torch which we see as he moves on his way through the sky; but the light of day is a separate personage. Similar considerations apply to Puriwa, darkness or night, who is also a distinct and independent entity.

The struggle between Keriha and Hubit has much charm for Wintus; they laugh heartily at the recital of it.

KELE AND SEDIT

Old Kele, the mountain wolf, is evidently one of the first people sent down from the sky by Olelbis; not in part, but in person. His sons and daughters were not his children, but his creation; he made them from sticks, just as Jupka made the Yanas at Jigulmatu.

In the note to “Kol Tibichi” is a Wintu account of the character and actions of Kele’s sons and daughters. A very interesting and valuable account this is; it explains the werewolf idea perfectly. The wolf man of Northern Europe, the Lykanthropos of the Greeks, must have been just such a person as Kele’s sons and daughters, who were people apparently when they went forth to harm Indians, but who turned into wolves when they were discovered and rebuked. At home, in their great sweat-house, those people are wolves; but when they go out on their travels up and down through the world, they are exactly like Wintus, save only the hairy foot.

KOL TIBICHI

In connection with this tale I add the following remarks about one of the two modes of making doctors, and about certain spirits. These remarks are given, as nearly as possible, in the form of the original Wintu narrative.

I have added, besides, the songs of four great existences, or gods. Every individual existence in Indian mythology has its own song. This song refers to what is most notable in the actions or character of that existence. The given song is sung by a doctor immediately after its spirit of that existence has entered him.

Kol Tibichi’s yapaitu (yapaitu is another name for one of the first people), the rainbow, would not leave him till he used a woman’s red apron as a headband, because the rainbow is connected with the catamenial periods of Sanihas (daylight).

The yapaitu dokos (yapaitu missile), mentioned further on, is a projection of the spirit itself of the yapaitu. Sometimes it flees from the patient; the duty of the doctor, in such a case, is to find the dokos. If he does not, it may return to the sick man after the doctor has gone; and in that case the last condition of the patient is worse than the first. Generally, however, it waits to be cast out.

THE MAKING OF DOCTORS AMONG THE WINTUS

The chief assists always in this ceremony, because a doctor can be made only in a sweat-house. Two chiefs may consult together and agree with old doctors in this matter, or one chief may do so if it suits him. If doctors begin, they must consult the chief, because he owns the sweat-house. The doctors and the chief or chiefs agree upon the time, and then give out the news that on a certain night they are going to create doctors. Young persons who wish to be doctors go to the sweat-house; most of the old people stay at home.

The men heat the sweat-house, shut it up closely, and sit down. Sweat pours from them like rain. When they have sweated sufficiently, all go to the river and swim. After that the people, men and women, go into the sweat-house. One doctor or two will begin to sing. Young unmarried men or women who are candidates present themselves. The doctors suck out of these all that is bad in them, all that is impure, unclean. They suck the forehead, breast, back, arms. At times they suck out blood; at times something sharp like a fine bone comes out. They suck out everything that is evil. When they have finished sucking, the doctor sings again, and puts a yellowhammer’s feather into each ear of the candidate. The feather may go in out of sight, or the doctor puts it on the person’s head, and the feather may sink through his skull. Now the people dance, and especially the candidates for the dignity of doctor. The chief goes out, stands on the housetop, and calls to all the yapaitu in the rocks, in the water, in Olelpanti, in the trees, in bathing springs, to come. “We are going to make doctors,” says the chief; “you must come and help my people.”

After this the chief goes in, and they close every hole, every chink in the sweat-house; close them all safely. There is no fire, no light, inside. When they have begun to talk in the sweat-house, one doctor calls to all the spirits of yapaitu in the east, west, north, south to come. Pretty soon a spirit may be heard on the housetop; spirits make a whistling noise when they come. That moment a man or woman falls down, and all know that the spirit has gone into that person’s head.

Now the doctor calls, “One more; one more!”

In a moment another whistling may be heard as the spirit touches the housetop and goes in. Another man or woman falls; the spirit has entered that one. The persons into whom spirits have entered know nothing. They become as if crazy, as if they had lost their wits. They try to go to the housetop. Some try to climb the central pole; some want to leave the sweat-house; they know nothing for half an hour perhaps.

One doctor keeps on calling spirits, and they come one at a time. Many doctors may be made in one night, or a few, or none. There are always many people in the sweat-house to whom spirits will not come. The spirits never go into people unless they like them. The spirit looks straight through a man and knows him immediately.

The people dance all night. There is no light in the sweat-house; the place is very hot, though there is no fire there. Next day those to whom spirits have come tell the doctors and chief what spirits are with them. If not, the chief may give them food offensive to the spirits, and the spirits would kill them if they ate. Some spirits may stay two or three days with a person, who would then sit inside all the time. The old doctors have to ask this spirit what it wishes, and make it go away for a time, so that the person possessed may eat something. Each spirit has its own kind of food. If we give a man something that the spirit has never eaten, it will kill him right away if he eats. The old doctors ask his spirit what it wants, and it tells. The salmon spirit, for instance, likes leaves or water; a sucker of the mountains would eat mountain pine nuts, but a valley sucker needs nuts off the digger pine. If strange food is placed before a spirit, it is afraid; and if the man possessed eats this food, the spirit will kill him. Some spirits don’t like buckskin, and the man to whom they have come must not wear it.

The bad spirits are numerous; the sucker is one of these, and so is Kele (the mountain wolf). This wolf is dangerous; it may hurt you in this way: you may think that you see a good-looking man or woman on the mountain or in the woods. If you go toward this person or this person comes toward you, comes near you, speaks to you, and you agree with it, the next thing you know this strange man or woman turns into a wolf, runs away, and your mind is gone; the wolf has taken it. The sucker does the same, but disappears before your eyes or turns into something ugly.

There are three causes of sickness. The first is when a good yapaitu spirit is angry with a man and strikes him with his spirit point; second, when a bad spirit puts his missile in a man and makes him sick (the spirit in this case does it at his own instance); third, when an evil spirit sends his missile into a man at the request or prayer of a doctor.

When the dokos or missile that has been sent into a man is drawn out by the spirit which assists the curing doctor, the doctor forces the dokos to tell what yapaitu sent it, and at the prayer of what doctor. But the dokos does not tell the truth in every case, and sometimes accuses the wrong person. It is very difficult, therefore, to know surely what doctor is guilty of making a man sick. A doctor, if the spirit is in him when he comes to see a sick man, is able to look right through the body of the patient and see where the dokos lies. Sometimes he is not able to draw it out; he can see where the dokos is, that is all; but if his spirit were stronger than the one who put it there, he could draw it out and cure the patient.

There is danger, however, in drawing out a very powerful dokos by sucking, for when it is coming out of the sick man’s body it may be sent down through the mouth of the doctor into his body by the spirit who owns it, and the doctor is killed in this way.

A doctor may have twenty or thirty spirits, but he rarely calls on more than two or three, and it is seldom that any great number are fitted to work together in a given case.

The office of doctor is very dangerous, especially if the doctor is powerful. If he has many spirits to help him, each has to be pleased in its own special way; each has its own food, prefers certain kinds, and dislikes others. The doctor must not eat food hateful to his spirits: if he does, he is liable to be killed. A man who has twenty or thirty spirits is greatly limited, therefore, in his manner of living.

Some spirits do not like venison, others do not eat fish; the doctor who commands these spirits must eat neither venison nor fish, and so with other kinds of food in the case of other spirits.

The man who seeks to be a doctor cannot choose his spirits; they come to him; he cannot refuse to receive them, and must live in a way to please them.

Every dokos can be extracted from a sick man’s body by the aid of a spirit stronger than the one who put it in.

Among other spirits, doctors have the spirit of the sun, the spirits of stars and the clouds to help them. These are good spirits. Sedit’s spirit cannot help doctors much. They call it sometimes, but it doesn’t do much; it has not the power. Suku (dog) is very powerful and bad. If Suku wants to kill a man, he does it quickly. A doctor who has the Suku spirit in his service is great. If a man has been made sick by Suku, he will vomit blood, or bleed from his nostrils all the time. The Suku spirit is a good one to send to kill people. Chir (the sucker fish) is an evil spirit too. When Chir wants to kill a man, it makes him giddy and crazy right away. He becomes senseless and dies, unless some doctor cures him, and generally doctors can do nothing against Chir. The Chir sickness is the worst that spirits bring. It is called chiruntowi, sickness from the sucker. The man who has it dies; he cannot tell where he is troubled; he grows dizzy and senseless. No one can cure him unless by great luck. Something tried by some doctor may save him—just by chance, just because it happens so. Kele is also an evil spirit. He has a song, the same which his two daughters sang on the mountain top (see the tale “Kele and Sedit”), and which Sedit heard far away in the west. This is a poison song, and draws people after it. Kele is here now, suppose, in Cottonwood or in Tehama, and sees a man up at Yreka. Kele sings, and the song goes as straight as a string to the man. It draws him and draws him; he is drawn as water is when people pump it. The man must follow the song; he has got to do so, he cannot help himself, he is sick; his sickness is called lubeluntowi (sickness from lubelis). The man will keep going and going and going; he will not know what makes him go. Suppose I am listening to Kele’s song. I go, and it is the song that draws me. I hear it; but nobody else does. The spirits of the Kele girls drew Sedit to them; he couldn’t help himself, he couldn’t stop; he had to go, and he never went home again; he had to stay up at Kele’s. The spirits of Chir and Kele always make people crazy.

Many Wintu women lose their minds, and are killed by Kele’s sons. Many Wintu men have been lost through Kele’s daughters. Suppose I am out here in the wood, I see a woman coming, a nice woman. She stops and talks; I talk to her. If I have sense in me, I look at her toes to see if she is one of those Kele women. If she is, she has a bunch of hair on the tip of her foot, and if I see it, I say right there, “You are a Kele!” At these words she will leave me and run. When ten feet away, she will turn to a mountain wolf, and I shall see that Kele running away very fast.

Suppose some woman is out in the woods. She is thinking of some man that she likes, and right away she sees the very man she is thinking of. He is coming to meet her. He comes up and asks, “Where are you going?” The woman is glad to see him. She tells. He carries her to the mountain, and never again will that woman be seen by her friends or by others. It was one of Kele’s sons who took the form of the man she was thinking of, so as to entice her away and destroy her. If the woman has sense she will look down at the foot of the stranger, see the tuft of hair, and say, “You are Kele; go off.” He turns to a wolf on the spot, and runs away to the mountain. All Wintus went barefoot in old times, and this tuft could be seen, if a person had sense enough left to look for it. As every one wears shoes or moccasins now, it might not be easy to find it. But to this day the Keles lead people astray. All the Wintus know them, and are afraid.

They live on Wenempuidal, a high mountain near the left bank of the Little Sacramento. Dekipuiwakut, a small creek, comes down from Kele’s Mountain and falls into the Sacramento. White men call it Hazel Creek. The Keles live at the head of this creek. The whole mountain is their sweat-house. They are up there now, and almost any night you may hear them howling on the mountain when the evil brothers are going home.

The following four spirit songs are from my Wintu collection. Two I give in the original, with literal translation; the other two, in translation only. The lightning song, by referring to the connection between lightning and the sucker, which has one of the most formidable spirits, enables us to suspect why the sucker is so much feared by Wintus. In the Olelbis song, the great one above is the cloud-compeller, as in classic mythology. The tanning is described in “Olelbis.” In the Hau song, the celestial Hau is described as travelling along the Milky Way. This is the Wintu comment on the text. Many readers will agree, I think, that the Polar Star song, the fourth, is composed on a scale truly immense. The lightning song sounds wonderfully like an extract from the Sanscrit, “Rig Veda.”

SONGS OF SPIRITS

1. Walokin tsawi, Lightning’s Song.

2. Olelben tsawi, the Song of Olelbis.

3. Song of Hau (red fox).

4. Song of Waida Werris (the Polar Star).

THE YANAS

As a preface to the few myths of the Yanas which have survived, I beg to offer the following words touching this ill-fated people:

Previous to August, 1864, the Yanas numbered about three thousand, as I have been informed on the sound authority of reliable white men. Taking the names and population of villages given me by surviving Indians, I should say that this estimate is not too large.

During the second half of August, 1864, the Yanas were massacred, with the exception of a small remnant.

The Indians of California, and especially those of Sacramento Valley, were among the most harmless of human beings. Instead of being dangerous to settlers, they worked for them in return for fair wages. The Yanas were distinguished beyond others for readiness to earn money. White men occupied in tilling land knew their value, and employed them every season in haymaking and harvesting.

At the present day the Wintus, and the few Yanas that are left, go down the valley and labor during the season in hop-fields and vineyards.

Why were the Yanas killed?

The answer is as follows: Certain Indians lived, or rather lurked, around Mill Creek, in wild places somewhat east of Tehama and north of Chico. These Mill Creek Indians were fugitives; outlaws from various tribes, among others from the Yanas. To injure the latter, they went to the Yana country about the middle of August, 1864, and killed two white women, Mrs. Allen and Mrs. Jones. Four children also were left for dead by them, but the children recovered. After the murders the Mill Creeks returned home unnoticed, carrying various plundered articles with them.

Two parties of white men were formed at once to avenge the women and four children. Without trying in any way to learn who the guilty were, they fell upon the Yanas immediately, sparing neither sex nor age. They had resolved to exterminate the whole nation. The following few details will show the character of their work:—

At Millville, twelve miles east of Redding, white men seized two Yana girls and a man. These they shot about fifty yards from the village hotel. At another place they came to the house of a white woman who had a Yana girl, seven or eight years of age. They seized this child, in spite of the woman, and shot her through the head. “We must kill them, big and little,” said the leader; “nits will be lice.”

A few miles north of Millville lived a Yana girl named Eliza, industrious and much liked by those who knew her. She was working for a farmer at the time. The party stopped before this house, and three of the men entered it. “Eliza, come out,” said one of them; “we are going to kill you.” She begged for her life. To the spokesman, who had worked for her employer some time before, she said: “Don’t kill me; when you were here I cooked for you, I washed for you, I was kind to you; I never asked pay of you; don’t kill me now.”

Her prayers were vain. They took Eliza, with her aunt and uncle, a short distance from the house and shot the three. My informant counted eleven bullets in Eliza’s breast.

After this murder the party took a drink and started; but the leader, in killing Eliza, said, “I don’t think that little squaw is dead yet.” So he turned back and smashed in her skull with his musket. The man who counted the bullet holes in her bosom, himself a white man, saw her after the skull was broken. He knew the girl well, and gave me these details.

Another party went to a farm on Little Cow Creek where they found three Yana men threshing hayseed in a barn. The farmer was not at home. They killed the three Indians, and went to the house. The three wives of the men killed in the barn were there and began to scream. The farmer’s wife hurried out with a quilt, threw it around the three women, and stood in front of them, holding the ends of the quilt. “If you kill them you will kill me,” said she, facing the party. The woman was undaunted, and, as it happened, was big with child. To kill, or attempt to kill, under those conditions, would be a deed too ghastly for even such heroes; so they went away, swearing that they would kill the “squaws” later. These three Indian women were saved and taken beyond the reach of danger by two white men.

And so the “avengers” of Mrs. Allen and Mrs. Jones continued. At one place they killed an Indian woman and her infant, at another three women. In the town of Cottonwood they killed twenty Yanas of both sexes. The most terrible slaughter in any place was near the head of Oak Run, where three hundred Yanas had met at a religious dance. These were attacked in force, and not a soul escaped. The slaughter went on day after day till the entire land of the Yanas was cleared. The few who escaped were those who happened to be away from home, outside their country, and about twelve who were saved by Mr. Oliver and Mr. Disselhorst, both of Redding. The whole number of surviving Yanas of pure and mixed blood was not far from fifty.

Some time after the bloody work was done it was discovered that the Mill Creek outlaws had killed Mrs. Allen and Mrs. Jones, and that the Yanas were innocent. The Mill Creeks were left unpunished.

My inquiries as to how civilized men could commit such atrocities found the following answers:—

In 1864 there was a large floating and mining population in Northern California, which “had no use for Indians,” and was ready to kill them on slight provocation. In distinction to these people was a small number of settlers who lived among the Yanas in friendship, and hired them to work on land. The killing was done by men who did not know the Yanas. Those settlers who did know the Yanas were overawed, and were unable to save them, except secretly, as in the case of the two men who rescued the three women on Little Cow Creek by conveying them beyond danger. Oliver and Disselhorst, who saved twelve, were at the edge of Redding, where support was possible. At first the rage of the killing parties was boundless; they swore that white women would not be murdered again in that country, and that not an Indian should be left alive in it. An intense feeling of indignation at the murder, coupled with an unspeakable contempt for Indians, was the motive in the breasts of most of the white men. Had they looked on the Yanas with ordinary feelings of justice, they would have tried to find the guilty instead of slaughtering a whole nation. There was another element among the slayers of the Indians,—a vile one, an element which strives to attach itself to every movement, good or bad in all places—a plundering element. That year the Yanas had worked a good deal, and it was not uncommon for single persons of them to have from $40 to $60. One informant told me that a man showed a friend of his $400 which he had taken from murdered Indians. Money and everything of value that the Yanas had was snatched up by these robbers.

Nearly all the men who killed the Yanas have gone out of the country or are dead. A few are in Northern California yet, and the children of some of the dead ones are living there now. Though one’s indignation at the deeds of 1864 be great, there is no use in mentioning names at this hour. All that is left is to do for the poor remnant of an interesting people that which we have done for Indians in other parts: give them land properly surveyed and the means to begin life on it.

THE WINNING OF HALAI AUNA

The Yanas were fond of astronomical myths, or myths of the upper world. The morning star and the moon appear in them frequently. The great sweat-house of the sun is the dome of heaven.

The name of the mysterious and mighty old uncle, Igupa Topa, seems to me to be derived from Iguna, chief sweat-house, and Tuina or Toina, the sun. Tuina is the prevailing pronunciation, but Toina is used also. Igupa is the regular form of son of Iguna, as is Topa of Toina. He is a person whose strength is well known to the sun, who has evidently a clear perception of how dangerous a person he is.

The shooting of Wakara into the sky is a curious variant of the tree-bending by Tulchuherris and Sas in the Wintu myth.

THE HAKAS AND THE TENNAS

This myth describes a deadly feud between the people who were turned into flint, that is, fire, presumably lightning, and the grizzlies or cloud people. After I had prevailed on him to give me the story, the narrator told it with unfeigned delight. His sympathy with the old woman Tsuwalkai was great, and his enthusiasm for Tsawandi Kamshupa, who rose from the spittle of Tsawandi Kamshu, evident and striking. The origin of Ilhataina in this myth and in the following called “Ilhataina,” which is the usual name for lightning, strengthens my view that the Wintu Tulchuherris, a name which is merely an epithet, meaning “dug up,” is the same person as Ilhataina of the Yanas. The regular acknowledged lightning of the Wintus is called Walokit, who is a child of Wima Loimis, grizzly bear maiden, and the sun.

ILHATAINA

In this myth lightning is “dug up,” as in the preceding one. Electricity is one of the earth’s children.

The putting on of Gowila’s skin by Ilhataina is one of the curious acts frequent in Indian mythology. In the Aztec worship of Mexico, in Montezuma’s time, the sacrificing priest put on the skin of the victim as far as the waist.

The wish of Ilhataina to get the old rabbit-skin robe is worthy of attention.

HITCHINNA

Among the Iroquois the cyclone was represented as a great head, the name of which in Seneca is Dagwa Noenyent. This head would pass through a forest and tear up the greatest trees by the roots. The method used by the deceitful Metsi to rid the world of Hitchinna might remind one of the way of cooking oysters at the waterside in Virginia near the places where they are taken.

TIRUKALA

I have referred to Tirukala in the Wintu myth “Hawt.” The battle described in this myth and the child which rises from the spittle of Burnt Face and reaches maturity in one day, are very striking.

Tirukala gives the active, the working side of water as a personage, the widener of valleys, the pusher apart of mountains, the maker of all streams and rivers. Tirukala works without ceasing, he sings as he labors, and never eats food of any kind.

Hawt (in the Wintu myth) gives the artistic, the poetic side of the same person, whose voice is that of Niagara and the raging ocean at its loudest, that of the tiniest rivulet or of the raindrop at its gentlest.

SUKONIA’S WIVES AND THE ICHPUL SISTERS

It is noteworthy that in Indian myths whenever two sisters are sent somewhere, as in the present case, and warned by father or mother against some deceiver who is likely to meet them on the way, the elder sister is generally ready to become a victim, the younger is the wise and obedient one, as in this myth.

We have again a case of putting on the skin of a slain person to become like him or her.

The test of bringing water was perfect, since no one who was not of the household could know where it was.

THE FINDING OF FIRE

In this, as in all Indian myths of the bringing of fire, it is procured by stealing. The pursuit in all cases is most strenuous.

In one myth relays are posted along the road at short intervals; these deliver the fire to one another in great haste. At last the pursuers are very near, when the fire is given to him who afterward becomes the turtle; he places the treasure in his mouth and rolls into a deep river, where he hides till the baffled masters of fire turn homeward sorrowing.

HAKA KAINA

Here we find another myth of a flint people.

In the Hakas and Tennas we have a struggle between the lightning and the clouds. In Haka Kaina the myth represents the advance of spring to colder regions. The swan-maidens go north with the early lightning of the year. Hence Haka Kaina, the war chief of Wahkalu, the great residence of Jupka, is represented as stealing them. In another myth, of which, unfortunately, I have only a fragment, these same swan-maidens are borne away north by Haka Kaina with great pomp and circumstance. The chief is attended by an immense escort, in which all the personages are phenomena of springtime. His regular force, his trusty warriors do not migrate; they stay all the year at Wahkalu, unless when absent on some expedition. The most characteristic person in the escort is a species of poplar-tree, the leaves of which tremble like those of an aspen. This hero dances all the time from his point of starting in the south till he reaches Mount Shasta. This gives a fine picture of that kind of tree putting forth leaves which quiver with gladness at the approach of the swan-maidens.

The marshalling by Haka Kaina of forces so numerous that they surround the immense base of Mount Shasta, the enormous dust which they raise, dust which goes up to the sun, their death by fire at the hands of the Mini Aunas, their resurrection and return home with the swan-maidens and all the spoils of Hwipajusi’s people, are conceived on a scale truly grand.

TITINDI MAUPA AND PAIOWA THE YOUNGEST DAUGHTER OF WAKARA

Paiowa is the evening star. Wakara’s most interesting daughters are always Halaia, or Halai Auna, and Paiowa. The first is the morning, the second the evening star.

Halaia’s sister, Pahnino, in this myth became afterward a shell, or rather a creature which lives in a shell, as did also her mother. I do not know which kind of shell Pahnino is; it has bright colors.

The increase and decrease of food, the magic power of weapons, the jealousy and hostility of the husbands of other sisters, are usual in Yana myths of this kind.

THE TWO SISTERS HAKA LASI AND TSORE JOWA

Love of this sort, of a sister for a brother, is found in European lore occasionally, and is, of course, a survival from a very remote past. In this myth it is the love of one of the first people, a female, afterward turned into a loon, for her brother, who was afterward turned into a wildcat.

Bringing to life is one of the most familiar performances in American mythology as well as in Keltic. In Yana it is done by kicking or turning over a corpse with the foot; by boiling in water, sometimes one hair, sometimes the heart; or by striking the corpse with a twig of the red rose-bush. In Keltic it is most frequently done by the stroke of a Druidic or magic switch, which resembles the Yana method with the rose twig. The red rose has significance, no doubt. In Keltic we are not told the kind of wood from which the Druidic switch was taken.

In Seneca myths raising from the dead was very impressive. Sometimes the dry, fleshless bones of hundreds and hundreds of the first people were found lying in a heap or close together. The hero, another of the first people, pushes a hickory-tree as if to throw it on them, crying at the same time, “Rise up! or the tree will fall on you.” That moment all the dry bones sprang up, took on flesh, and assumed their old forms immediately. Indian humor creeps out sometimes by giving us two lame people of the uprisen company. In the hurry and rush, while the dry bones are arranging themselves, two legs get astray; two personages have each one leg which is his own and one which belongs to his neighbor.

JUIWAIYU

This myth has many and very valuable elements,—the importance of dreams, the stopping or slackening the course of the sun, the music of Juiwaiyu as he moves, the choice of the right road, the storm of vermin, Jupka as monitor and helper, the summons to send Damhauja’s daughters to meet him, the inexhaustible venison no larger than a walnut, Juiwaiyu’s marvellous music on the mountain, the bringing home of countless deer in the body of a fawn, the race with Damhauja’s sons-in-law, the meeting with the poison spider, the rattlesnake and the grizzly bear, the storm, the drowning of Damhauja and his resurrection,—make this one of the richest of Yana tales.

Playing with two bones was very much like playing ball. Near both ends of the field barriers were set up, and each side had to put the bones past the barrier toward which they faced.

The starting-point was in the middle of the field, at an equal distance from both barriers. At the opening of the game all the players gathered at this middle point; the bones were thrown up, and all struggled for them. Whoever caught the bones on his stick either hurled them toward the barrier beyond which he wished to put them, or he ran toward it, bearing them on the point of his stick. If there were swifter runners than he, they took the bones from him, or if he hurled them ahead, they ran and threw them or carried them toward one barrier or another. The bones were fastened together by a string some inches long.

In Yana tales, Damhauja, the moon during the last quarter, plays or rather played, a great part. I say played, since, unfortunately, we have but a fragment of Yana lore left after the events of 1864. Damhauja’s sons-in-law on the west side of the river, in this tale, were various Mapchemaina people,—that is, beings who somewhat later became beasts, birds, plants, rocks, and insects on earth. All the stars were his children. His daughters, stars, were married to Mapchemaina people, except the two of whom Juiwaiyu had dreamed. His sons, stars also, lived near him, and were at enmity with his sons-in-law.

THE FLIGHT OF TSANUNEWA AND DEFEAT OF HEHKU

It is not so easy to decide who Hehku is. Her most usual, if not her regular and normal, form is that of a horned serpent; but she changes herself into various forms. When angry, or rather when raging, she becomes a Putokya,—that is, a skull person, like Hitchinna. These Putokyas seem to be the cyclone or tremendous wind which moves in a narrow path and makes a clean sweep of everything.

The gambling scene in Jupka’s sweat-house is good. Hehku has easy work till she meets the master, who to his incomparable power adds deceit.

The game, connected here with Jupka’s sweat-house, is played by two persons sitting opposite each other. One of these holds a small “Jupaiauna” bone or stick in one of his closed hands, and the other guesses which hand it is in. The process of playing is as follows:— Each person has ten little sticks or counters at the opening of the game. One holds the “Jupaiauna,” and begins action by placing his hands behind his back and deciding in which hand to hold the bone for that time; next, he closes his hands firmly, and brings them out before his breast. He holds them back downward, the little finger of each hand touching that of the other. The person sitting opposite guesses where the bone is; the other opens both hands then, and shows his palms. If this bone is in the hand indicated by the guesser, he wins; if not, he loses. A game is finished when one side holds the twenty counters; that is, when one side has won the ten little sticks given to the other at the opening of the game.

As Hehku sat with her back to the west, her right hand was south and her left north. When her opponent guessed south, if the bone was in her right hand she sang it into her left (the north),—literally, enchanted it north. If the bone was in her left hand, she let it stay there, and thus she won in every case.

Jupka, by limiting the game to one guess, and by his quibble of words, proved himself a keener trickster than Hehku, whose predicament is described fairly well by the Russian saying, “KosÁ nashlÁ na kÁmen,” the scythe met a stone; or the biter bitten, as we might say.

THE FIRST BATTLE IN THE WORLD AND THE MAKING OF THE YANAS

The beginning of this myth is somewhat similar to that of “Olelbis.” A messenger is sent to invite the Master of Flint to come and show the Mapchemaina, or first people, how to kill deer. Kaltsauna, the owner of flint, is like Katkatchila of the Wintus; he is transformed later into a lizard. In character he is different, being old and testy though liberal, while Katkatchila is affable, but wonderfully tenacious of his weapon, and prizing it so highly that when the flint is stolen he does not hesitate to set the whole world on fire. Kaltsauna put the various kinds of flint in places where they are found to this day, and taught the first people how to make arrow points.

These hunts of the first people or gods are, for the Yanas, the great prototypes of hunting. To this day all sorts of game are under the control of certain spirits of the first people, whose favor is essential to success in hunting.

The story of Howichinaipa’s change into a little bird gives a good case of forced metamorphosis, and also a good picture of the stern spirit of Indian vengeance inherited from the first people.

Vengeance is a sacred duty which they were not free to neglect under any consideration. “Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, and I will have it.”

Machperkami, the tiny dog in the hair of Tuina (the sun), is an exact substitute for Winishuyat of the Wintus.

The descent of Tuina to the lower side of the earth, his night journey from west to east on the road made by Jupka, is described with clear and precise brevity. There is no doubt as to the nature of the water grizzlies who rise out of the ocean and go to the mountains at the approach of Tuina.

The account of the creation of the Yanas is as concise as possible, and at the same time complete.