🧚 Myths and Folk-lore of the Timagami Ojibwa., part 3

Next morning Wemicus started out for home and left his mitten behind as he had done with Ninicip.1 Muskrat’s wife sent a child after him and told the child, “Don’t go too close to Wemicus.2 He’s always in mischief.”3 Everything happened as before.4 The child threw the mitten to Wemicus and Wemicus sent an invitation to Muskrat to come to his home the next day.5 As Wemicus went on his way he had some potatoes which Muskrat had given him for his family.6 Half way home he rested and thought he would eat the potatoes, as they looked very good.7 So he ate every one.8 “I am the one who works hard,” he said to himself.9 “My family can wait until Muskrat comes.”10 When he reached home he told his wife, “Muskrat is also starving.11 I brought nothing.12 Muskrat is coming tomorrow to see us.”13 Next day Muskrat came and they put him on the opposite side of the wigwam.14 Wemicus said, “We have nothing much, but, wife, make a fire in the hot sand.”15 The wife answered, “I suppose you saw somebody else do something.16 Don’t you try any more mischief.”17 But he made his wife make the fire.18 He then went out and returned with the sack full of ice, which he dumped on the fire.19 The sack blew up all over everybody and put out the fire.20 Then his wife said, “I suppose you saw someone do that again.”21 She made another fire and Muskrat said, “Give me that bag.”22 He went out and brought back the sack full of ice, dumped and buried it in the fire, and, after a while, they got the potatoes.23 All of them had a good meal.24 The next morning, before Muskrat left, he got them another bag of potatoes.25

Wemicus does not work, although his family is so large.26 Well, pretty soon the whole family was starving again.27 Then said Wemicus, “I must go and see Meme (pileated woodpecker), my son-in-law.”28 He went into the bush and when he reached Meme’s wigwam he found a large white pine in back of it.29 He noticed that Meme had a sharp pointed nose.30 He saw that Meme had not much to live on, but nevertheless Meme told his wife to get the cooking pail ready.31 Then Meme began climbing the pine tree, which was at the back of his wigwam, and began pecking in the trunk with his nose.32 Pretty soon he came down with a raccoon.33 [27] When Wemicus saw this, he thought, “That is a great thing; I must try it.”34 Meme burned off the hair and cleaned the raccoon, and shared the meat on a stick to each one.35 Wemicus received the best part, as he was the grandfather.36

The next morning they had another raccoon to eat.37 Then everything happened as before.38 Wemicus was given a raccoon to take home.39 He left his mitten behind, and sent an invitation to Meme to visit him the next day.40 On the way home Wemicus thought to himself, “I wonder how this raccoon tastes cold.”41 So he ate the entire raccoon.42 When he got home, he told his wife that Meme was starving but that he was coming to visit them the following day.43 They put the wigwam in order and Wemicus fixed up a big pine like that belonging to Meme and cut two pieces of wood, which he pointed and shoved into his nose to imitate Meme.44 When Meme came along he saw Wemicus sitting there with sticks in his nose.45 Wemicus told his wife, as usual, to prepare for supper, and she told him that they had nothing.46 When she had the water boiling in the pail, Wemicus climbed up the tree and pecked upon it in imitation of Meme.47 He fell down, however, and drove the sticks into his head.48 He fell into the fire, but after a while he gained consciousness.49 Then Meme stepped out of the wigwam, climbed the tree, and brought down a raccoon.50 And then the whole family had a good supper.51 Next morning Meme got another raccoon and left it for the family, and then went home.52

Still Wemicus did nothing and the family was again in a starving condition.53 Then said Wemicus, “I have some more sons-in-law and one is close.54 I will go and see him; he will help me until open water.55 [28] I will go and see Skunk.”56 So he set out to visit Skunk.57 Wemicus was pretty hungry and Skunk was farther off than the rest of the sons-in-law, but he finally reached his home.58 Wemicus found Skunk’s water hole [29] and saw a great quantity of oil in it.59 He knew that Skunk must have killed a great deal of game.60 So he went into Skunk’s wigwam and saw a great quantity of food.61 Skunk said, “We don’t have much.62 It is long since I hunted.63 But come outside.”64 There Wemicus saw a piece of ground fenced in.65 Skunk then produced a little birch bark horn [30] and said, “What will you have?”66 Skunk now blew on his horn and all kinds of game came inside the enclosure.67 Skunk deinde pepedit and killed whatever kind Wemicus wanted.68 They then skinned what he killed and fried it for supper.69

In the morning Skunk said to Wemicus, “I’ll give you three shots and a horn.70 You can make a fence for yourself.71 This horn will last forever, as long as you don’t lose it.72 If you do, it will be bad.”73 Then Skunk gave Wemicus three shots to be used in the future, and he did this urinando super eum to load him up three times.74 He did not give him any food, because he would be able to get enough for himself.75 Then Wemicus thought, “Now I am going to do something.”76 As Wemicus was on his way home he said to himself, “I wonder if it will go off!”77 So, just as he was passing a tree stump, pepedit at the stump and blew it up.78 “That’s fine, but I have only two more shots left,” said he.79 Later he tried the same thing and then only had one left.80 A little while after this he saw a big pine tree, and thought he would try a shot at this.81 So he blew up the pine tree, and so used up all his shots.82

When he reached his wigwam, he showed his wife the horn which Skunk had given him, saying, “Skunk gave me that.”83 Then he built a large fence of poles.84 He told his wife to hold the horn and stay near by, while he got a club to kill the game with.85 Then he blew on the horn and the fence was filled with bear, deer, and all kinds of animals.86 Although he had no shots left, Wemicus managed to kill one caribou, and his wife was very happy.87 He cut the fat from the breast of the caribou, made a fire, and got some grease from it.88 He then spilled the caribou grease in his water hole in order to deceive Skunk and make him believe that he had a great quantity of meat.89 Not long after this Skunk started out to visit Wemicus and, on his way, he passed the three stumps which Wemicus had blown up and knew that he had no more shots left.90 When he reached Wemicus’ water hole he said, “I guess he got one any way.”91 When he came to the wigwam, he found that Wemicus and his family had hardly any meat left, so he said to Wemicus, “Come out and let me see your fence.”92 They went out and Wemicus blew his horn, and inside the fence it became full of game.93 Skunk pepedit and killed all of them, and then Wemicus and his family had plenty.94 Skunk stayed over night and departed the next morning.95

Wemicus had another son-in-law who was a man.96 This man’s wife, the daughter of Wemicus, had had a great many husbands, because Wemicus had put them to so many different tests that they had been all killed off except this one.97 He, however, had succeeded in outwitting Wemicus in every scheme that he tried on him.98 Wemicus and this man hunted beaver in the spring of the year by driving them all day with dogs.99 The man’s wife warned him before they started out to hunt, saying, “Look out for my father; he might burn your moccasins in camp.100 That’s what he did to my other husbands.”101 [31] That night in camp Wemicus said, “I didn’t tell you the name of this lake.102 It is called ‘burnt moccasins lake.’”103 When the man heard this, he thought that Wemicus was up to some sort of mischief and was going to burn his moccasins.104 Their moccasins were hanging up before a fire to dry and, while Wemicus was not looking, the man changed the places of Wemicus’ moccasins and his own, and then went to sleep.105 Soon the man awoke and saw Wemicus get up and throw his own moccasins into the fire.106 Wemicus then said, “Say! something is burning; it is your moccasins.”107 Then the man answered, “No, not mine, but yours.”108 So Wemicus had no moccasins, and the ground was covered with snow.109 After this had happened the man slept with his moccasins on.110