33. Owl and Tsa'au'z.
(Lower Uta' mqt.)
(cont)When every one was ready, they all departed to hunt, Tsa'au'z being carried by his wife behind the other hunters who joked and made fun of him, saying, "It is a poor kind of hunter that has to be carried by his wife !' As the other hunters were walking fast, they left Tsa'au'z and his wife far behind. When they were out of sight, the woman deposited Tsa'au'z in the snow, saving she could not carry him farther, and would return for him III the evening. -Now, he took off his garment of sores and hung it up on the branch of a tree. Then, putting on his snow-shoes, he ran, and, making a circuit, soon got ahead of the other hunters. He gathered all the deer together in a gulch, where he ran them down on his snow-shoes and killed them. Then, taking his two pairs of gloves, he filled one pair with the flesh of the deer, and the other pair with their fat, returned to where he had hung up his skin, put it on and sat down in the snow.
of the other hunters, and, coming to the tree where Tsa'au'z had hung up his skin, recognized it as being the outer covering of their brother-in-law. They hid themselves close by (until he should arrive), and watched him don his sores. His wife arrived shortly afterwards, took him on her back and carried him and his gloves home. Here his father-in-law took the gloves, and, to and behold! when he emptied them out, the house became full of deer meat and fat. He sent a lot to each house for the people to eat, because the hunters had all returned empty-handed and the people were hungry.
Again they all went out hunting, but with the same result, for Tsa'au'z did the same as on the previous occasion. The brothers-in-law pretended to go hunting with the others, but soon turned back, and, reaching the tree where Tsa'au'z's skin was hanging, they took it down, burned it, and then hid themselves near by. Tsa'au'z returned with his gloves full of meat and fat. He missed his skin, and, learning that it had been burned, he searched in the ashes, where he found some small pieces which still remained. These he put on; and he became a man of sores, as before.Again the people all went hunting, but with like result. This time the brothers-in-law took Tsa'au'z's skin, blew on it, and made it into fog ; that is the reason why fog can be smelled at the present day: it is the smell of the sores and of the burnt skin. When Tsa'au'z returned to get his skin, he found that it had been turned into fog. He tried in vain to collect it, for the fog moved up and down on the distant mountains, therefore he had to remain as he was; in his natural shape, that of a handsome young man.
The people were surprised when they beheld Tsa'au'z walking home alongside of his wife, and when they saw the form he had taken. They all became jealous of the good-looking hunter who could kill so many deer, and Raven wished that he had married his daughter to him.
