WINTER CEREMONIAL DANCES 115

myths connected with the first people. The following tale
explains the reputed genesis of the biting prerogative embodied
in the name Nunugwalaiuts.

Many years ago, a number of lads were playing near the village of
Snuite t? when they were alarmed by the howling of a wolf and ran back
to their homes. Next day the sound was repeated, and again they
discontinued their play in fear. The third day the same thing happened,
while on the fourth the boys not only heard the howling, but saw an
enormous white wolf on the mountain above them. Fascinated, they
forgot to flee, even when the animal drew near with phenomenal rapidity.
It rushed up to a lad named Nunugwalaiuts, and vanished. At once he
became mad and ran to and fro, biting people; the beast had entered
into him, and he had become a Cannibal.

His frightened comrades attempted to restrain and confine the lad,
but they could not prevent him from escaping at times and biting people.
That night he vanished from their sight, though they knew he had gone
aloft because they heard his growling as he ascended. For two months
he was absent, then suddenly reappeared among them, even wilder and
hungrier than before, while his whole appearance had altered owing to
the loss of his hair and emaciation. Again the people endeavoured to
restrain him, but Nunugqwalaiuts had demoniac strength and could not
be tied down. That evening a shaman was called upon, and he used the
frenzied beating of sticks in hopes of curing the lunatic, for such he
appeared to be. To the amazement of all, in this way he succeeded in
expelling the head of a wolf, the cause of Nunugwalaiuts’s anthropo-
phagous tendencies. Thus restored to sanity, he told of what he had
seen in the land above, whither he had been carried. Some time after
the return of Nunuqwalaiuts it was discovered that the repository of
his name was behind a waterfall near Swuife-i7.

Another myth explains the origin of the dog-eating prerogative em-
bodied in the name Hai-a/akila. Long, long ago, soon after the first
people had reached this earth, a chief of that name lived in Bella Coola.
One day his slave, Qdsmus, set out to hunt ducks which were resting on
a small pond near the base of the mountains on the south shore of the
Bella Coola River, not far from its mouth. Before reaching his destin-
ation he heard many people beating time with sticks and, judging that
the noise could not have been caused by mortals, returned to tell his
master. Hai-alakila at once set off for the spot, taking his slave with

“Since that time the kukusiut have imitated this rite with the assistance of
skilled carpenters, and have been able to deceive the uninitiated.