Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 43.djvu/849

Rh down after a time and found that he could not even see the earth. So he went on climbing till at last he reached another country above, which was very pleasant and populous, and there he remained. The old stump by the wayside is the remnant of that tree.

Another curious story relates to a mosquito gorged with blood, which flew up where the thunder is. The thunder asked the mosquito where it got the blood, and the insect falsely replied that it was sucked from the buds at the very top of the trees below. Hence the reason that the thunder (or lightning) strikes the tops of the trees.

Some curious myths are associated with particular places. The lakes are supposed to be occupied by peculiar beings called "water people," who are alleged to have remarkable powers and to use them in performing strange acts. It is dangerous for canoes to pass Battle Bluff, on Kamloops Lake, because of the water people, who in this instance are described as of human shape, but hairy in the upper half, with fishlike tails below. It is also told of this bluff that some hostile people, once coming by land to attack the Kamloops Indians, looking down over the front of the bluff as they passed, saw a woman or witch dancing in a niche part way down the cliff. They sat down on the edge of the cliff to watch the woman dance and were turned to stones. "Little men" are reported to exist in several places, to hunt with bows and arrows, to be only two feet high, and yet able to carry a deer easily. In contrast to this, when a squirrel is killed, they skin it and take only a part, as the whole is too heavy for them. The Indians are very much afraid of them. The Indians aver that unknown beings sometimes throw stones at them, particularly at night, when stones may be noticed occasionally falling into the fire. A Kamloops Indian, long since dead, once saw a white object following him by night. He drew back from the trail and shot an arrow at it as it passed. In the morning he returned and found his arrow buried in a human shoulder-blade. It is believed that burning wood from a tree which had been struck by lightning brings on cold weather. This appears to be based on the fact that cold follows a thunderstorm. Thus, in the spring, when Indians may be traveling over the snow on high ground, splinters of such wood are thrown on the fire to reduce the temperature, in order that the crust may remain unmelted on the snow. A small splinter of such wood wrapped up with the bullet in loading a gun is supposed to increase the deadly effect of the bullet. The plant Parnassia fimbriata, worn in the hat or rubbed on it and on the soles of the feet, is believed to make it certain for the deer-hunter that the deer will be seen and caught. The rattle of a rattlesnake is worn as a preventive against headache.