A mysterious young man leads three companions to an underwater realm beneath a lake. There, they encounter a community living in skin tipis and are welcomed by the headman. After a brief stay, the headman provides them with a fragile canoe for their return. As warned, the canoe dissolves near the shore, but all four men manage to reach land safely.
Source:
The Beaver Indians
by Pliny Earle Goddard
The American Museum of Natural History – Anthropological Papers
Volume X, Part 4
New York, 1912
► Themes of the story
Journey to the Otherworld: The protagonists travel to an underwater realm inhabited by otherworldly beings.
Forbidden Knowledge: The men gain insight into a hidden underwater world unknown to others.
Sacred Spaces: The underwater realm serves as a significant and mystical location within the narrative.
► From the same Region or People
Learn more about the Dane-zaa people
While the people were sitting by the camp they suddenly saw a young man passing along carrying a blanket on his back. “Where are you going and what are you going to do?” one of them asked him. “I am going to become a young man again,” he replied. “How will you do that? We will go with you,” they said to him. “Do as you please,” the stranger replied. The young man who had spoken and two of his brothers-in-law went with him. They walked along until they came to a lake. Suddenly this man who had been walking ahead said “Xwui” and went through the ice to the bottom of the lake where he had a wife. “You do as I do,” he told his companions. There were many skin tipis standing there and many people walking about.
► Continue reading…
They went toward one of the tipis which was very large. The stranger walked ahead and the others did as he did according to the directions he had given them. Suddenly, someone jumped on the foot of the man who had suggested accompanying the stranger. It was a frog that did it, but he thought it was a man. The man who had gone ahead as the leader had a wife there and he used to go there to visit.
It seemed to them they had been there but a short time, when the head man of the underwater people said to them, “I do not like it that the minds of your relatives are so intent on us.” They started back in a canoe the head man made for them. “Take care how you use my canoe, for it is not very good,” he warned them as they started away. They came nearly to the shore in it when it melted as the owner of it had told them it would. Two of the men came ashore, but two of them were missing, one of the young men and his brother-in-law. The two who got ashore believed the others were dead, but as they were sitting on the bank they saw the head of a man appear and reappear. The man swam ashore and stood up. The other one was seen swimming as a jackfish. He turned into a man so that finally all of them came ashore and returned to their camp.
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Dreamtime Whispers 