Coyote Stories

PREFACE

The Animal People were here first—before there were any real people.

Coyote was the most important because, after he was put to work by the Spirit Chief, he did more than any of the others to make the world a good place in which to live. There were times, however, when Coyote was not busy for the Spirit Chief. Then he amused himself by getting into mischief and stirring up trouble. Frequently he got into trouble himself, and then everybody had a good laugh—everybody but Mole. She was Coyote’s wife.

My people call Coyote Sin-ka-lip’ , which means Imitator. He delighted in mocking and imitating others, or in trying to, and, as he was a great one to play tricks, sometimes he is spoken of as Trick Person.

Our name for the Animal People is Chip-chap tiqulk (the k barely is sounded), and we use the same word for the stories that are told about the Animal People and legendary times. To the younger generations, chip-chap-tiqulk are improbable stories; that is a result of the white man’s schools. But to the old Indians, chip-chap-tiqulk are not at all improbable; they are accounts of what really happened when the world was very young.

My people are the Okanogan¹ and the Swhy-ayl’-puh (Colville), closely related Salishan tribes, and I also have relatives in the En-kob-tu-me-whob , or Nicola, band of the Thompson River Indians in British Columbia. My father’s mother was a Nicola, and his father was a Hudson’s Bay Company man, a hardy, adventurous Celt. My father, Joseph Quintasket (Dark Cloud), was born in the Upper Okanogan community near Kelowna, B. C., but has lived, since a boy, with the Lower Okanogan and the Colville, south of the international boundary. It is with the Lower, or River, Okanogan and the Swhy-ayl’-puh on the Colville Reservation in northeastern Washington that I am identified.

The Swhy-ayl’-puh—also called Schu-ayl-pk , Schwelpi and Shoyelpee—became known as the Colville following the establishment of Fort Colville by the Hudson’s Bay Company in 1825-26. The fort, named after Andrew Colville, a London governor of the Company, was built near Kettle Falls in the Columbia River, in the heart of the Swhy-ayl’-puh country.

My mother’s name was Lucy Stui’-kin . She was a Swhy-ayl’-puh full-blood. Her grandfather was See-whelh-ken , who was head chief of the tribe for many years. His nephew, Kin-kan-nawh , whom the white people called Pierre Jerome, was chief when the American government made the tribe give up its home in the Colville Valley in 1872 and move to poorer land on the other side of the Columbia. My mother was born at Kettle Falls—the Big Falls of these legends—and she and father were married in a log church at that location. The church was built by Indians who had accepted the teachings of the missionaries.

I was born in a canoe on the Kootenai River, near Bonner’s Ferry, Idaho, in the Moon of the Leaves (April), 1888. My parents were traveling with a packtrain, which my uncle, Louie Stui’-kin , operated between Walla Walla, Washington and Fort Steele, B. C. during the mining rush that year. My mother and grandmother were being ferried across the river when I arrived. The Indian who was paddling their canoe stripped off his shirt and handed it to grandmother, who wrapped me up in it.

It used to be the custom for storytellers to go from village to village and relate chip-chap-tiqulk to the children. How gladly were those tribal historians welcomed by busy mothers, and how glad were the boys and girls when one came to visit!

Vividly I recall old S’whist-kane (Lost-Head), also known as Old Narciss, and how, in the course of a narrative, he would jump up and mimic his characters, speaking or singing in a strong or weak voice, just as the Animal Persons were supposed to have done. And he would dance around the fire in the tule-mat covered lodge until the pines rang with the gleeful shouts of the smallest listeners. We thought of this as all fun and play, hardly aware that the taletelling and impersonations were a part of our primitive education.

Another favorite was Broken Nose Abraham. He was old and crippled. He came to our village usually on a white horse, riding double with his blind wife, who held the reins and guided the horse at his direction. It always thrilled us to see Broken Nose ride into camp; he had a stock of such fascinating stories. Broken Nose could not dance for us. He could not even walk without the support of his two canes. But he sang exciting war songs, and we liked to sing with him.

Some of the women were noted storytellers, but they never made it a business to go from village to village to tell them. We children would go to them. I particularly remember Ka-at-qhu (Big Lip), Old Jennie, Tee-qualt (Tall), or Long Thresa, and my maternal grandmother, Soma-how-atqhu (She-got-her-power-from-the water). I loved these simple, kindly people, and I think of them often. And in my memory I treasure a picture of my dear mother, who, when I was a very little girl, made the bedtime hours happy for me with the legends she told. She would tell them to me until I fell asleep. Two that are in this collection, Why Marten’s Face Is Wrinkled and Why Mosquitoes Bite People, she told over and over again, and I never grew tired of hearing them.

My father always enjoyed telling the old stories, and he does still. He and Ste-heet-qhu (Soup), Toma Martin and Kleen-ment-itqu are among the few men and women left who can tell chip-chap-tiqulk . I thank them for helping me. And I must acknowledge my debt to a blue-eyed Indian, Lucullus Virgil McWhorter, whom the Yakimas adopted many snows ago and named He-mēne Kā‘wan (Old Wolf). His heart is warm toward the red people. In him the Indians of the Pacific Northwest have a true friend. But for his insistence and encouragement, these legends would not have been set down by me for the children of another race to read.

Mourning Dove

1. Okanogan—variously spelled Okanagon, Okinagan, Oknacken, Oakinacken, Okinakane, etc .—has the native pronunciation Okan-nock-kane. Its translation has puzzled more scholarly heads than mine. Some white writers have said that the word means rendezvous, applying originally to the head of the Okanogan River at Osoyoos Lake, where the various tribes often gathered. But only the last syllable, gan (more properly kane or kain) has been interpreted. Like our words kan and kin , it means head, tip, or top.

Now, there is a word, wickan , that means seeing, and wickanakane means seeing-the-head (top or tip). It is quite possible that okan is an ancient variation or contraction of wickan . Hence, we could have Okan-nock-kane interpreted as Seeing-the-top. The top of what? Of Chopaka (Sticking), a snow peak to the west of the Okanogan Valley. That is what some of the older Indians believe, although they are not positive as to the accuracy of the reference.

Chopaka is visible from a long distance. It is an outstanding topographical feature of the tribe’s ancient stamping grounds.

In the beginning the Okanogan may have designated themselves, or been described by other tribes, as People living-where-you-can-see-the-top (of Chopaka), or as People-seeing-the-top, the phrase becoming shortened to Seeing-the-top (Wickanakane).

This explanation I have not seen in print, have never seen it advanced by any of the white people who have investigated. I cannot claim that it is correct, but I consider it as logical and as near the truth, if not nearer, as other guesses that have been submitted.

I

THE SPIRIT CHIEF NAMES THE ANIMAL PEOPLE

Hah-Ah’ Eel-Whem , the great Spirit Chief ², called the Animal People together. They came from all parts of the world. Then the Spirit Chief told them there was to be a change, that a new kind of people was coming to live on the earth.

"All of you Chip-chap-tiqulk—Animal People—must have names, the Spirit Chief said. Some of you have names now, some of you haven’t. But tomorrow all will have names that shall be kept by you and your descendants forever. In the morning, as the first light of day shows in the sky, come to my lodge and choose your names. The first to come may choose any name that he or she wants. The next person may take any other name. That is the way it will go until all the names are taken. And to each per son I will give work to do."

That talk made the Animal People very excited. Each wanted a proud name and the power to rule some tribe or some part of the world, and everyone determined to get up early and hurry to the Spirit Chief’s lodge.

Sin-ka-lip’—Coyote—boasted that no one would be ahead of him. He walked among the people and told them that, that he would be the first. Coyote did not like his name; he wanted another. Nobody respected his name, Imitator, but it fitted him. He was called Sin-ka-lip’ because he liked to imitate people. He thought that he could do anything that other persons did, and he pretended to know everything. He would ask a question, and