STORIES 403

he cooked and gave to his guest. Raven was delighted at this simple
method of obtaining food, and when he returned home planned how to
circumvent the halibut fisher.

A few days later Raven returned to Worm’s home.

“Do you know your mother?” he asked.

“No,” replied Worm, “my mother is dead.”

“Do you know your father?” next asked Raven.

“No,” answered Worm, “I have no father.”

“Oh, you are mistaken,” said Raven. ‘J have just been talking to
your father and mother, they are over yonder.”

“No,” again replied Worm, “I do not believe you, I have no parents.
I just appear without being born.”

“No indeed,” continued Raven. “It is you who are mistaken, please
give me the pleasure of introducing you to your parents. Let me carry
you to them, they will be delighted to see you.”

Worm was most unwilling.

“No, you must be mistaken,” he said. “Besides I am no ocean
traveller.”

But when Raven insisted, Worm at last consented to the wily fellow
taking him on his back to visit his parents. Croaking happily, Raven
with his passenger flew away towards the other side of the ford. When
they were in mid-channel, he began to turn sideways in his flight.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!” cried Worm in fear. “I will fall and be killed, I
cannot swim. Oh! Oh! Oh! Please don’t do that. I know I should
fall like a stone.”

Raven paid no attention to his appeals and Worm presently slipped
from his back and fell into the ocean.

Raven flew back at once to Worm’s house where he found the halibut
line, baited it, and let it down through a hole in the floor as he had seen
the fisherman do. Soon he hauled up a small fish which gave him little
satisfaction, then he felt what seemed to be a strong bite, but when he
drew up his line it was only asnag. He swore fluently and threw it into
a corner of the house. He did not know that this “‘snag”’ was really
Worm who had adopted that form for the occasion. The little fellow got
up quietly and, without attracting Raven’s attention, shut the door and
closed all apertures in the house, then caused the tide to rise through the
floor. As the water became deeper, Raven floundered about frantically
trying to get out, but in vain, until as it continued to surge upwards, he
was carried to the roof of the house where he could do nothing but croak
pitifully. Then Worm appeared.

“T nearly drowned you,” he said, “‘because you tried to hurt me. If
you try any more of your nefarious tricks J shall kill you.”