(3 a) INTRODUCTION OF SALMON.
(Continued)Meanwhile Coyote had put a sheep's-horn spoon on his head and was breaking the weir. It was nearly broken when the women arrived. The elder one said, "I told you so! We have been fooled by Coyote." They rushed at him, and beat him over the head with sticks; but he kept on working faster than ever. The horn spoon protected him from their blows. When the weir was broken, he ran up the opposite bank, and the king-salmon were ascending the river in great numbers. The sisters sat down on the bank and wept. They cried, "You have stolen our salmon for your Coyote people! You people of Coyotes! You are all Coyote people! You are bad people!" He answered, "You thought you had a little boy, a little brother. You thought he knew nothing, but he was greater than you!" Then he transformed them into birds (sandpipers), saying, "Henceforth you shall be we'lwel birds, and shall run by the water's edge. You shall no longer have control over salmon. Salmon shall henceforth run up the river." The place where the weir was is now a fall in the river.
Coyote walked along the river-bank, and the salmon followed him. He became hungry, and wanted to eat salmon. He said, "I wish the king-salmon to jump ashore!" A king-salmon jumped out; but it was a rocky place, and smooth, and the fish was so slimy that he could not hold it. Thus it slipped back into the water. Again he wished; but the shore was clayey, and the same happened. The fourth time the fish jumped on a sandy shore, and there he managed to catch it.1
He cooked the salmon, and, after eating his fill, wrapped the rest up and carried it on his back. As he went along,2 he asked a young girl at every camp to marry him; but they all refused. Their mothers advised them to take him, because Coyote had plenty of the new, fine kind of food. Then Coyote thought, "The Similkameen girls will have me. They are rather poor." He left the salmon at the mouth of the Similkameen River, and went up alone. He met the people above, and asked one of their daughters in marriage. All the old people gathered together to consider his proposal. He told them, "If I marry a girl here, I shall always give you plenty of salmon." They asked the girls one after another, but all refused him because he was so ugly. The old people did not like to offend him by telling him what the girls said: so they said, "You know that salmon is not our food. The back of the head of the mountain-ram is our food. We are afraid of strange food." Coyote said, "Very well, you shall have plenty of that, sheep shall be numerous here, but salmon you shall not have. You will have to travel long distances to obtain your salmon."
He returned, and made small, poor fish, such as suckers, to run up the Similkameen River. He said, "No salmon shall run up this river." So he made a barrier to prevent them from passing. Then he led the salmon up the Okanagon River to the falls. Above this place he asked to marry a maiden, but the people did not want him: so he made a rock barrier there at the falls, that the salmon should not ascend to the people above. He returned to the mouth of the Okanagon River, and ascended the Columbia. The salmon followed wherever he went. He came to a place called Kali'tcamen. Here all the old people wanted to marry their daughters to him. He was glad, and made a fine salmon-fishing place by contracting the river so that the rocks almost met in the middle. He smoothed and flattened the tops of the rocks, so that the children could play there. He also made a salmon-weir. When he had finished, he learned that the girls would not have him. Then he became angry, and kicked the weir, so that it broke and drifted downstream. Then he thought, "The girl alone is bad. It is not the old people's fault. They were good to me." So he left the place as he had made it, and people have always been able to capture salmon there.
Then he went up Nespe'lim Creek. Here the same happened as before. The people accepted him, and the girl refused him. He had pity on the old people, and said, "They were good to me. There shall always be some salmon here." His little daughter was walking with him at this place, and he transformed her into a stone.
Then he went to Spoke'in. At a place called Hi'tcox the same happened. He made a canyon, saying, "The girl was bad; but the old people were kind, and thought much of me. People shall always get salmon here during part of the summer."
Then he went to Snuxami'na.3 Here he asked a salmon to jump ashore. After cooking it and eating half, he threw the rest into the river. It was transformed into a rock which looks like the side of a king-salmon. There are outer rocks there which were made from scraps of the salmon.
Coyote went on, and came to Ski'tco, where the town of Spokane now is. Here he found a barrier across the stream, and began to dig it away. He had dug a large hole, when he thought, "Perhaps the people above are bad and will not give me a wife. Why should I favor them?" He went there and saw the people who refused him. Then Coyote left the hole the way it was. It forms now Spokane falls, and not many salmon go up there. Therefore the Coeur d'Alene have no salmon.
1 RBAE 31 :674; this volume, pp. 70, 102, 139, 141, 143.
2 For the following see BBAE 59 : 177, 301.
3 A place. The name is said to mean "King-Salmon."
