32 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [ Vou. V.

told his brothers and they looked down. Then they also felt their hearts
falling down at this. After a little time, they held consultation together
as to the best means of returning to the earth. Then, on the advice of
the eldest but one, they dropped down the little packages of dried salmon!
which each of them had carried so far as provisions for the journey. They
hung underneath a grey jay, and carefully cautioned the bird not to look
up until they had all got back to their country. They expected to be
taken down to the earth along with the flying bird. But the jay could
not resist the temptation of taking a look at the salmon which he con-
sidered as his prospective prey. Therefore the whole assemblage of the
three brothers with their packages of salmon underneath was fixed for-
ever in the sky, men and salmon being changed into stars.

These we now see every clear night. The three brothers we call
Em tz or the Pursuers?. Their sister underwent a like transforma-
tion, and we can also see her a short distance off under the shape of
a solitary star. Ahead of the whole is Samijynu*® which is nothing else
than the herd of caribou chased by the three brothers. Those stars are
always scintillating as if constantly on the move. This is because the
caribou are fleeing from the three brothers. In a straight line beneath
the hunters are three smaller stars; they are the packages of salmon
changed into stars by the curiosity of the jay. As for the bird, he flew
away, and therefore he cannot now be seen.

When the mother of the three brothers and of the she-dog saw that the
sun had disappeared below the horizon without their coming back, she
became very anxious; for they used to return home by daylight* At
last, having accidentally looked up to the heavens, she beheld them there
stationary under the form of stars. Mad with sorrow and guessing that
this was due to the witchcraft of the old woman, she ran out to her and
loaded her with a coiled-root basket® full of burning coals which she
placed on her back, constantly to pack thereafter. Then she thrust a
roasting-spit through her and hurled her up to the East, saying, “Hence-
forth you shall be she after whom daylight comes®.” The old woman

1The daily bread of the Carriers.

2 Orion. /

5 The Pleiades. Their Carrier name is an old word, the nearest equivalent of which would
be ‘‘star island.”

‘In Carrier legends, hunters are very generally supposed to return before night, unless they
meet with some accident.

5There are no such baskets among the Carriers, but they are very common among the
Tsipyoh’tin, the southern neighbours of the sub-tribe to which my narrator belongs.

8 (’kwe-yayath ovilé, The morning star.