Page:Tlingit Myths and Texts.djvu/87

After they had tested all of his spirits they started south to war. They were always warring with the southern people. They and the southern people hated each other. When they went down with this shaman they always enslaved many women and sometimes destroyed a whole town, all on account of his strength.

There was a brave man among the southern people, called Qloga , who liked to kill people from up this way. One time a little boy they had captured escaped from the fort where he was. He had a bow and arrows with him. The brave man discovered where he was, went after him, and pulled him out from under the log where he was hiding. But meanwhile the spirits in the canoes of the northern people had seen Q!oga . Then Q!oga took the little boy down on the beach and said to him, " Shoot me in the eye." He put an arrow in his bow and took such good aim that the arrow passed straight through it. The point of this arrow was made of the large mussel shell. The brave man fell just like a piece of wood thrown down. The little boy had killed him. Then all ran to the little boy and took off his head. The chiefs passed his dried scalp from one to another and wondered at what he had done. They named him ever after Little-head (Qaca/k! u ), and the man he killed was called One-Little-head-killed (Xuga wadjaget). Even now they relate how Little-head killed the brave man. Then the northern people came around the fort and destroyed everybody there, some of those in the canoes being also killed.

After that the southern people started north to war. They had a shaman among them. On the way they came to a man named Murrelet (Tclit). When this man was young, he had been trained to run up steep cliffs by having a mountain-sheep's hoof tied to his leg or neck, and being held up to the walls of the house and made to go through the motions of climbing. They said, "Is this the man they talk about so much who can run up any mountain?" This is what they said when they were chasing him. Then they caught him and took him into one of their canoes.

Now the war chief said to his friends, " Let us take him ashore to that cliff." So they took him to a place called Bell point (Gao litu ) where part of the town of Huna is, to try him there. They said to him, " Murrelet, go up this cliff." When he attempted it, however, he fell back into the canoe. All the people in the canoes laughed at him. They said, "Oh! you little thing. Why is it that they say you are the best runner up this way?" After he had fallen back the third time, he said, "This is not the way I am dressed when I go up a cliff. I always carry a stone ax, a staff, and a flint, and I always carry along a seal's stomach full of grease." They prepared these things for him and gave them to him. Then he