14. The Protracted Winter

p. 43

14. THE PROTRACTED WINTER

One time some boys pulled a piece of drifting seaweed out of the water on one side of their canoe and put it in again on the other. It was almost summer then, but, for having done this, winter came on again and snow was piled high in front of the houses so that people began to be in want of food. One day, however, a blue jay perched on the edge of a smoke hole, with elderberries in its mouth, and cried, "KîlnA'xe." This was the name of a neighboring town. So the people took all the cedar bark they had prepared to make houses out of and went to KîlnA'xe where they found that it was already summer and the berries were ripe. Only about their own town was it still winter. This happened just beyond the town of Wrangell.

I tell you this story to show how particular people used to be in olden times about things, for it was only a piece of seaweed that brought winter on.