Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/192

 i So Journal of A merican Folk-Lore,

rose from the ground until they reached the sky. They now live in the sky, in a double house having but one entrance (qarcaring). In one house lives Aningana or Aningan, the moon, with his wife Akoq, or Aqong ; in the other, Serxineq, the sun. In front of the house stands Aningan's sledge, piled full of seal-skins. He has a number of large spotted dogs, with which he often drives down to the earth.

XXVII. ANINGAN.

1. A girl lived with her grandmother. One day, Aningana, the moon- man, came down, importuning her to allow him to cohabit with her. She first asked her grandmother for permission, who granted it. Then she went out with Aningana. When they came in again, they found there was nothing to eat. Aningana, however, did not go out to get food, but said, " For the cohabitation I shall cause to present themselves to you a great number of foxes." Having said this, he went away, while the grandmother and grandchild remained in the house. Soon a fox entered the house of his own account, and then another, and still another ; and a fourth came into the house, and a fifth, and a great many, so many, in fact, that the house was crowded, and the old woman almost smothered. Thereupon the women said, " Sh ! " thus driving out part of the foxes. The rest they killed and ate. The foxes thereafter did not come in again. 1

2. Aningan drove down to earth and brought back a woman, whom he put into his house. He cut or stabbed the soles of her feet, so that she could not leave him. Aqong (his wife) desired Aningan, and panted, " ax, ax." He, however, did not desire her, and threw her away from him toward the window (that is, off the bed). He forbade the woman he had brought to look into another house. She, however, disobeyed him, and in consequence the side of her face was burnt. She looked down from the sky, and saw a poor little boy in ragged clothes wandering about, unable to find his mother, and she wept to see him. 2

XXVIII. IRDLIRVIRISISSONG.

Irdlirvirisissong has a house in the sky, and sometimes visits her cousin, Aningan. Her nose is turned up on the sides, and she carries a plate called qengmerping for her dogs, of whom she has a number. She waits for people who die, so that when they come she can feed her dogs on their intestines. She dances about, saying, " Qimiti- aka nexessaqtaqpaka " (" I look for food for my dear dogs "). If

1 Compare Rink, T. and T. p. 441. The moon-man carries off a barren woman, and has a son by her. The moon frequently is said to have seduced unmarried girls (Cranz, p. 295). Compare, also, Holm, Sagn, pp. 72, 75.

2 The whole tale seems mangled.

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