Raven and
Mink
Raven and Mink decided they would go
where the fish spawn. They wanted to kill a grizzly bear. So
they went. They each had a canoe. They finally reached there
when they saw a bear walking in a trail. But they did not do
anything to it. They were too scared to spear it.
Then Raven told Mink to make a hole
inside a fish tail. "I will go inside it. Maybe the one that
is walking in its trail will swallow me. When it swallows
me, I will cut through its chest and jump out. When it comes
towards me, watch closely. When I jump out, you should spear
it too. Maybe it will die then," he said. Mink agreed and he
put the fish tail on the trail with Raven inside. After a
while, something came. But when the grizzly opened its mouth
to eat the fish tail, Raven cawed and flew up. He became
scared and did not stay inside the fish tail. The grizzly
ran into the brush, too.
Mink came to Raven and said, "What did
you do? How come you let it go when it finally came? When
the sun goes down, I will do it instead." So Mink went
inside the fish tail. Raven told him he would spear the
grizzly when Mink jumps out. A grizzly finally came along
and swallowed the fish tail. When he swallowed it, he
started thrashing around. Mink cut through its chest and
jumped out. While this was going on, Raven had his spear
stuck between two trees. He tried to get it unstuck. Soon
the grizzly fell dead from the wound that Mink had made.
Mink said to Raven, "What happened? You were supposed to
spear it when I came out. Why did you have the spear across
your stomach so you had to lunge against it?"
Raven said, "The spear got stuck
between the trees with me. That is why I didn't
help."
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They skinned and cut it up. They got
the fat too. Raven said that they will cook the fat to get
grease out of it. "Like our forefathers used to do it. They
would take the intestine and string it through a portage.
Then they would pour the grease into it. I will show you how
it is done," he told Mink.
Mink went to work cooking the fat
while Raven strung the intestine through the portage. The
intestine must have been really long. There was a knot tied
at the end so that the grease would not run out on the
ground. Then Raven said, "I will go walking in the woods
while you are cooking the fat and filling the intestine. It
will get full soon. That is the way our forefathers used to
do it."
Mink, therefore, kept working. He kept
filling the grease into the intestine. Raven went into the
woods. He circled and returned to the portage where the
intestine ended. Mink kept on working but the intestine
never filled up. The grease kept flowing on down into the
intestine. Then he started to wonder if Raven was at the end
of it. He stopped and stole away down there (to the end of
the intestine). When he got there, Raven was there drinking
the grease.
Mink got really mad and he picked up a
burned stick that was there. He ran to Raven and hit him on
the forehead. Raven fell backwards and was knocked
unconscious. Mink tied up the intestine again and went back
through the portage. Finally, Raven got up and went into the
brush. Mink was working again. This time, it, the intestine,
filled up. Raven returned when the sun went down. He had
soot on his forehead. Mink asked him, "What happened to you
that caused you to have soot on your face?" Raven told him,
"I was pushing a burned tree which my forefathers had left
when one fell on me. That is why I have soot on my
face."
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Marshall
Cultural Atlas