Indians of North America -- Folklore; Modoc Indians -- Folklore; Modoc Indians -- Religion; Modoc mythology
Nada said: “We will go again. This time we will take hold of hands.”
They started in the morning, got the water and Nada flew back. Skakas
didn’t get back till midday.
Isis drank the water Nada brought, and said it was good, but he
wouldn’t drink the water Skakas brought. Kumush tore Skakas in pieces
and threw the pieces over the cliff into the lake. The pieces are in
the lake now; they became rocks.
Isis and Kumush didn’t want to live where people could come, so they
left their home and traveled toward the northeast. Not far from the
house they put down their baskets, fish-spears, canoes and everything
they had used in fishing. Those things turned to stone and are there on
the cliff to-day. Kumush and Isis traveled for a long time before they
came to the river that is now called Lost River. Kumush made a basket
and caught a salmon in it. Then he said: “I want salmon always to be in
this river, and many of them, so people will have plenty to eat.” At
Nusâltgăga he made a basket and caught small fish, and said the same
thing, so that there should always be plenty of small fish in the
river. He multiplied the histis, a kind of fish which Klamath Indians
like.
When Isis and Kumush got to the third camping place, Kumush called it
Bláielka and the mountain he called Ktáilawetĕs. He said to Isis: “You
must swim in the swimming pond on this mountain, and pile up stones,
and talk to the mountain.”
Isis went to the pond and while he was in the water he saw nice
gambling sticks and felt them touch his body. When he was through
swimming and was coming out, Gäk flew by. He saw Isis standing in the
water, and he thought: “I wonder where that bright thing in the water
came from. It won’t come here again!” That minute Isis was turned to
stone, but his spirit escaped, and went to his father’s camping place.
Isis and Kumush stayed a long time at Bláielka, then Kumush said: “I
must travel around and work; you can stay here.” Kumush left Isis on
Dúilast, a mountain on the eastern side of Tula Lake and he started off
for the west.
While Kumush was gone, many women came to live with Isis. Among his
wives were Tókwa, Wéakûs, Djakkonus, Tcíktcikûs, Kládo, Tseks, Dohos,
Dúdûte, Tcíkas, Kols, Nada and Wálwilegas. The first wife to have a
child was Tcíkas, who had a little boy. Tcíkas was uneasy about Kumush;
she was afraid something had happened to him.
Isis said: “Nothing can hurt Kumush. He will be here soon. He can go
around the world in two days.”
The next morning Kumush came, bringing in his hands little bundles of
seeds of every kind. He threw those seeds in different directions, and
talked to the mountains, the hills, the rivers and springs, to all
places, telling them to take the seeds, to care for them and keep them
forever. And he told them not to harm his grandson.
Isis’ wives were so nice to look at that Kumush fell in love with them
and began to think how to get rid of Isis.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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