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After that they took all kinds of things to make the frog tribe feel good so that they would let the woman return to her parents, but in vain. By and by her father determined upon a plan and called all of his friends together. Then he told them to dig trenches out from the lake in order to drain it. From the lake the frog chief could see how the people had determined, and he told his tribe all about it. The frog people call the mud around a lake their laid-up food.
After the people had worked away for some time, the trench was completed and the lake began draining away fast. The frogs asked the woman to tell her people to have pity on them and not destroy all, but the people killed none because they wanted only the girl. Then the water flowed out, carrying numbers of frogs which scattered in every direction. All the frog tribe then talked poorly about themselves, and the frog chief, who had talked of letting her go before, now had her dressed up and their own odor, which they called "sweet perfumery," was put upon her. After a while she came down the trench half out of water with her frog husband beside her. They pulled her out and let the frog go.
When anyone spoke to this woman, she made a popping noise "Hu," such as a frog makes, but after some time she came to her senses. She explained, "It was the Kikca (i. e., KiksA di women) that floated down with me," meaning that all the frog women and men had drifted away. The woman could not eat at all, though they tried everything. After a while they hung her over a pole, and the black mud she had eaten when she was among the frogs came out of her, but, as soon as it was all out, she died. Because this woman was taken away by the frog tribe at that place, the frogs there can understand human beings very well when they talk to them. It was a KiksA di woman who was taken off by the frogs, and so those people can almost understand them. They also have songs from the frogs, frog personal names, and the frog emblem. All the people know about them.
23. HOW THE FROGS HONORED THE DEAD
One time, when they were afraid of being attacked, all of the Kiks A di and Ka gwAntan encamped on KAnAsqle (St. Lazaria island). There are two parts to this island separated at high tide, and the KiksA di encamped upon one, while the KagwAntan lived upon the other. On the same island there is also a small salt water pond at the bottom of which was a creature called L!ln, and, being pressed for food on account of their fear of the enemy, the allies often tried to bail out this pond when the tide left it, to get at the sea animal.
While the people were there, a chief of the Ka/gwAntan died, and, after he had been in the house among his friends for eight days, one of his friends said to the KiksA di, Take care of his dead body. All the