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Updated: June 3, 2025
"As the crew boarded the sealer, the women watching from the shore observed strange contortions seize many of the men; some fell on the deck; some crouched, shaking as with palsy; some writhed for a moment, then fell limp and seemingly boneless; only the two Frenchmen stood erect and strong and vital the Squamish talisman had already overcome their foes.
Then the Iroquois will conclude his tale with, "You know well that the otter has greater wisdom than a man." So much for "mine own people" and our profound respect for the superior intelligence of our little brothers of the animal world. But the Squamish tribe hold other ideas. It was on a February day that I first listened to this beautiful, humane story of the Deluge.
I here quote the legend of "mine own people," the Iroquois tribes of Ontario, regarding the Deluge. I do this to paint the color of contrast in richer shades, for I am bound to admit that we who pride ourselves on ancient intellectuality have but a childish tale of the Flood when compared with the jealously preserved annals of the Squamish, which savour more of history than tradition.
"What glorious men," I half whispered as the chief concluded the strange legend. "Yes, men!" he echoed. "The white people call it Deadman's Island. That is their way; but we of the Squamish call it The Island of Dead Men." The clustering pines and the outlines of the island's margin were now dusky and indistinct.
The boy was already dressed in the brilliant buckskin costume his mother had spent so many hours in making, and his precious wolfskin was flung over his arm. The great Squamish chief now took him by the hand and led him towards the blazing fires round which the tired dancers, the old men and women, sat in huge circles where the chill of dawn could not penetrate.
"'It is our father's lodge, they told each other, for their childish hearts were unerring in response to the call of kinship. Hand-in-hand they approached, and entering the lodge, said the one word, 'Come. "The great Squamish chief outstretched his arms towards them, then towards the laughing river, then towards the mountains. "'Welcome, my sons! he said.
Through my mind raced tumultuous recollections of numberless articles in yet numberless magazines, all dealing with the recent "fad" of motherhood, but I had to hear from the lips of a Squamish Indian Chief the only treatise on the nobility of "clean fatherhood" that I have yet unearthed.
You will hear the tale from those that gather at Eagle Harbor for the fishing, from the Fraser River tribes, from the Squamish at the Narrows, from the Mission, from up the Inlet, even from the tribes at North Bend, but no one will volunteer to be your guide, for having once come within the "aura" of the lure it is a human impossibility to leave it.
"With his hunting-knife the banished Squamish chief stripped the bark from the firs and cedars, building for himself a lodge beside the Capilano River, where leaping trout and salmon could be speared by arrow-heads fastened to deftly shaped, long handles. All through the salmon run he smoked and dried the fish with the care of a housewife.
Some of the traditions concerning this vast whim of Nature are grotesque in the extreme; some are impressive; some even profound; but of all the stories of the Deluge that I have been able to collect I know of not a single one that can even begin to equal in beauty of conception, let alone rival in possible reality and truth, the Squamish legend of "The Deep Waters."
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