Algonquin Legends of New England Part 21

And then the strong man said to his young bride, "I must return unto my village; then I'll come again to you; await me here." But she, as one to elfin magic born, replied, "I warn you of a single thing. When you again are at your wigwam door a small black dog will leap to lick your hand. Beware, I say; if he succeed in it, you surely will forget me utterly." As she predicted so it came to pa.s.s.

And so she waited in the lonely wood beside the mountain till a month was gone, and then arose and went to seek her love. All in the early dawn she reached the town, and found the wigwam of the sagamore. She sought a neighboring hiding-place, where she might watch unseen, and found a tree, a broad old ash, which spread its stooping boughs over the surface of a silent pool.

An old black Indian had a hut hard by. His daughter, coming, looked into the spring, and saw a lovely face. The simple girl thought it was hers, her own grown beautiful by sorcery which hung about the place. She flung away her pail, and said, "Aha! I'll work no more; some chief shall marry me!" and so she went to smile among the men.

Then came the mother, who beheld the same sweet, smiling, also girlish face. She said, "Now I am young and beautiful again; I'll seek another husband, and at once." She threw her pail afar and went away, losing no time to smile among the men.

And then in turn the old black Indian came, and looking in the spring beheld the face. He knew right well that it was not his own, for in his youth he never had been fair. So looking up above he saw the bride, and bade her come to him; and then he said, "My wife has gone away; my daughter, too. You were the cause of it; it is but right that you should take the place my wife has left. Therefore remain with me and be my own."

He fares but ill who weds unwilling witch. When night came on they laid them down to sleep, and then the bride murmured a magic prayer, begging the awful Spirit of the Wind, the giant Eagle of the wilderness, to do his worst. A fearful tempest blew, and all night long the old black Indian was out-of-doors, working with all his power to keep the lodge from being blown away. As soon as he had pinned one sheet of bark into its place another blew away, and then a tent pole rattling in the rain bounded afar. It was a weary work, but all night long the young bride slept in peace, until the morning came, and then he slept.

Then she arose, and, walking to the wood, sat down beside a stream and sang a song:-

"There are many men in the world, But only one is dear to me.

He is good and brave and strong.

He swore to love none but me; He has forgotten me.

It was a bad spirit that changed him, But I will love none but him."

And as she sat and sang, the sagamore her husband, paddling by in his canoe, heard the sweet song intoned in magic style, [Footnote: Not only the words, but the peculiar intonations of them, were essential to produce the proper effect of a magic song. An intelligent white man has left it on record that it required two years to learn one of these incantations of only a few lines.] and all at once recalled what had been lost,-the two strong giants, the cavern and the elf, the seven-headed monster and the fight, the sisters and the evil-minded men, and the black dog who leaped to lick his hand: it flashed upon him like some early dream brought out by sorcery. He saw her sit beside the stream, and still he heard her song, soft as a magic flute. He went to her, and in a minute he was won again.

And then she said, "This world is ever false. I know another, let us go to it." So then again she sang a magic spell, and as she sang they saw the great Culloo, the giant bird, broad as a thunder cloud, winging his way towards them. Then he came; they stepped upon him, and he soared away. But to this earth they never came again.

This very singular legend was obtained for me by Mrs. W. Wallace Brown. It is from the Micmac, and is in the original from beginning to end a song, or poem. For this reason I have given it a plain metrical form, neither prose nor poetry, such being quite the character of the original. But I, have not introduced anything not in the original.

This story consists of a very old Indian legend mingled with a European fairy tale drawn through a French-Canadian source. The incident of the Elf who eats the food of three men is to be found in another tale. In one version, the bride, finding that her husband, though utterly deprived by magic of his memory, has married again, sails away on the great bird, leaving him forever. I have naturally rejected this senseless termination in favor of one found in another form.

The calling on the Lightning to build a wigwam is probably a mistake. It is more likely that it was summoned to destroy the chiefs wigwam, but the narrator, confused with the subject of the hero's strength, changed the original. The invocations of Lightning, and subsequently of the Storm Bird are probably entirely Indian, though there are Norse invocations to Hroesvelgar, or the Eagle of the Northwest, as we read in Scott's Pirate.

The black whelp or small black dog is in this tale ominous of evil. It causes oblivion. In the Edda to dream of the same thing is the most evil of all Atli's bad dreams (vide the second lay of Gudrun, 41):-

"Seemed to me from my hand Whelps I let slip.

Lacking cause of joy;"

and in the very same song (24) be takes a potion which causes oblivion. But there is even a third point in the Atlamal in Groenlenzku, which resembles one in the Indian tale. It is where the half enchantress Kostbera warns Hogni against leaving her:

"From home thou art going: Give ear to counsel; Few are fully prudent; Go another time."

In the Norse lay we are told that to dream of a white bear indicates a storm, but here it means a strange and terrible event. Long before I met with this, I observed that the introduction, or mention, of a white bear-skin in these Indian stories invariably intimates some strange magical change.

But it is most remarkable of all, that, while the poems of the Edda have nothing but a very few incidents in common with the traditions of the western tribes, they are inspired throughout with a strange and mysterious sentiment or manner wonderfully like that of the Wabanaki. As regards literal resemblance the following coincidences may here be noted.

In a widely spread Norse tale a very small goblin sustains a long and obstinate contest with an immense white bear.

The Nors.e.m.e.n invoked the Eagle Giant of the Winds, as Scott has shown in his song of the Reimkennar. The same being is invoked in this legend.

The whelp, as an omen of evil, is mentioned in the Edda. In this tale he causes forgetfulness. A potion of oblivion is also mentioned in the Norse poem in close connection with the omen of the dog.

If we accept the termination of this tale as given in the Micmac poem it amounts to this: A certain woman causes the whelp to lick the hero's hand. This causes forgetfulness. The hero marries her, and thereby loses his first wife. In the Edda, Brynhild, who has morally the first claim to Sigurd, says of Crymhild, "She presented to Sigurd the pernicious drink, so that he no more remembers me." In the saga of Thorstein, Viking's son the hero, is made by the witch Dis to utterly forget his bride Hunoor.

The Kalmuk tale of How the Schimm-Khan was Slain contains striking a.n.a.logies to this of the Three Strong Men. [Footnote: Sagas from He Far East, London, 1873.] In it the hero a.s.sociates with three men, who take turns to cook. Their food is devoured, as in this tale, every day by a little old witch who is very strong. He overcomes her by craft. His companions, instead of drawing him up by the rope, as agreed on, leave him to perish, in order to possess themselves of a treasure. There can be no doubt as to the Hindoo origin of this and many more plots found among the red Indians. But a careful study of the Norse story convinces me that the tale did not come to the Wabanaki through any other than a Norse source.

Since writing out the foregoing poem, with the comment, I have received from Louis Mitch.e.l.l the Pen.o.bscot version of it. It is about twice as long as the Micmac story, and differs from it very materially. In it the hero conquers the goblin by getting possession of his red cap. In the Norse tales the same incident occurs in different forms. He then fights with a copper demon; also with one of silver and another of gold. Each devil, while he is sharpening his sword, exclaims, "Hurry! hurry! I am hungry!" The last of the three, the Kche mitche-hant, or great devil, has three heads, which replace themselves when cut off; but the hero summons a lion (pee'tahlo) and an eagle, who devour each a head, when the demon, to save the last, surrenders. There are old "aboriginal" incidents in this Pa.s.samaquoddy tale, but the European elements predominate to such an extent as to call for the following remark from the Indian writer:-

"This story is ended. When Indians in it, as they do in many others, speak of kings and queens or ships and ivory, I think they got it all from Europe. But perhaps when the Indians came here from Asia they brought these stories with them. Thus they very often mention ivory, calling it white bone. They also mention cities. But these things are not new, for they were handed down from one generation to another."

I have to add that, while the story agrees with an universally spread Aryan fairy tale, it is very remarkable that it should add to these, several strictly Eddaic details, such as the white bear.

THE WEEWILLMEKQ'.

I. How a Woman Lost a Gun for Fear of the Weewillmekq'.

There was a man and his wife who had got together all they had for the fall hunt. They went up the St. John's River; they left the village of Foxerbica; they went twenty-five miles beyond it. They pa.s.sed the falls on the upper side to get some game. They cooked and ate. They got ready to start again; they launched the canoe. [Footnote: This story and the preceding are taken word for word from the Indian narration. The singular precision of minute details is very characteristic of many of these legends.] They shoved the canoe twenty-five feet from the sh.o.r.e. The woman turned, and upset it. It went like lightning down the rapids. They had hard work to get ash.o.r.e, and lost their gun, traps, kettle, and everything. They escaped with great trouble; they had trouble to save their canoe.

The man was in great grief at the loss of his gun. He sat down and sang:-

"Nici sigi psach ke-yin, Dich m'djel mieol wagh nuch'."

I am sorry, I am in great trouble.

There came two Indians down to the portage where the man and his wife sat. They asked him why he was so sad. He told them all. One of them was a m'teoulin. He asked of them, "Could you tell your gun if you saw it?" The woman cried quickly, "I could!" He was not pleased at her forwardness, but put the question again; when she as pertly answered, "Yes," for her husband. He looked sternly at her, and said, "Are you sure?" To which she cried, "Yes, yes!" Then he said, "If you are very bold, and not afraid of anything, you may get it again." And this, too, she took on herself, saying, "Oh, yes, I'm not afraid; I'll get it," making no account of her husband.

Then, by the order of the man, she went to a ledge just below the falls, where they are seventy-five feet high. There was a little projecting rock on which she could just sit,-a horrible place. Below it was a dreadful eddy, in which nothing could live. He helped her down to it, and she was in mortal terror, as such glib-tongued women generally are when there is the least danger. Then the man went away.

And as she sat there, trembling and half dead with fright, she saw Something come up out of the eddy,-even out of the worst of it. It rose; it was an awful sight,-a kind of monstrous head, with great forked horns and terrible eyes. She was stiff as a stone with fear. The lost gun lay crosswise on the p.r.o.ngs of the horns. It moved slowly on through the eddy, glaring at her. It came nearer and nearer; the gun was within her reach, but she was too frightened to touch it. Then the monster pa.s.sed by and sank into the water, and was seen no more, nor was the gun.

They got her back with trouble from the place where she sat. The m'teoulin was furious with rage at her, that he had taken such pains for nothing. He said, "This serves you right for your impudence and forwardness. Learn your proper place, and never undertake to do what is none of your business." He then condoled with the husband, but said, "If you could give me all you could think of, I could never get your gun again."

By this women may learn not to speak too quickly, or propose to do men's duties, "Hu 'sami n'zama wiuch wee lel n'aga samee n'gamma wiool petin'l." (P. "Too quick with the tongue, slow with the hands.") [Footnote: Though the Weewillmekq' is a worm inhabiting the forest and found in dry wood, it is certainly identified, or confused, by the Pa.s.samaquoddy Indians with the alligator, or some kind of a horrible water-goblin, which appears to have many points in common with the Chepitchcalm, or dragon of the Micmacs. This story was related to me by Tomah Josephs, now Indian governor at Princeton, Maine.

Among various notes I find the following:-

"The weewillmekq' becomes human at times, even now."

"Six years ago," said T. J., "I was in the woods collecting boughs, and I saw a weewillmekq' on a tree. The thunder kept approaching the tree on which it was, and finally struck it. It seemed to me as if the worm had attracted the lightning." (August 26, 1883.)

"The Weewillmekq' is a small worm, sometimes two or three inches long. It is seen sometimes in the water as large as a horse. Then it has horns. It is a very horrible-looking little worm."]

II. Muggahmaht'adem, the Dance of Old Age, or the Magic of the Weewillmekq'. [Footnote: This mysterious being is called Wee-wil-li-ah-mek in Pen.o.bscot The correct p.r.o.nounciation is very nearly Wee-wil-'l-mekqu' for both Pen.o.bscot and Pa.s.samaquoddy, but this would be a difficult utterence for any one who has never listened to the Algonquin soft gutturals.

Mrs. W. Wallace Brown informs me that "the Weewillmekqu' is a snail." This would account for its being thought to inhabit both land and water.]

(Pa.s.samaquoddy.)

Of old times. There lived in a village many Indians. Among them was a handsome young man, very brave, a great hunter. And there was a beautiful girl. What was her name? Mahli-hahn-sqwess, or Kaliwahdazi,- I don't remember which. But she was proud and high-tempered, and, what was worse, a great witch, but n.o.body knew it. She wanted the young man to marry her, but he was very busy getting ready for the fall and winter hunt, and had no time to attend to such a thing; and told her so very plainly.

Yes, he must have been very plain with her, for she was very angry, and said to him, "You may go; but you will never return as you went." She meant that, he would be ill or changed. He gave no heed to her words; he did not care for her nor fear her. But far away in the woods, far in the north, in midwinter, he went raging mad. The witch had struck him, when far away, with her magic.

He had with him an elder brother, a great brave, a very fierce man. He, not being able to do aught else, did the most desperate thing a Wabanaki Indian can do. He went down to the river, and sang the song which calls the Weewillmekq'.

"We que moh wee will l'mick, We que moh m'cha micso, Som'awo wee will l'mick!

Cardup ke su m'so wo Sawo!"

I call on the Wee-will-l'mick!

I call on the Terrible One!

On the One with the Horns!