In conclusion to this Appendix, it must finally be observed also that the want of forests or of real trees in nature has nowhere diminished the force or plenitude of the Two Trees’ pattern in oral traditional fable. No people on earth has been without knowledge of live trees and hewn wood, no matter how great the exiguity of real wood in their own immediate environment. The valley of the Kobuk River in northern Alaska, emptying (when it is not frozen solid) into the lower Chukchi Sea north of the Bering Straits, lies entirely in tundra. The Eskimo native to the valley of the Kobuk accordingly had less choice as to their nominal motifs of trees than did the Tangu in New Guinea or the Apinayé in the Amazonian rain-forest, where trees of multitudinous species were until the end of the twentieth century still more firmly in possession of the land than mankind had ever been. Thus any standing wood frequented by a preternatural in Eskimo fable was likely to be some variety of Salicaceae, while wood for hafts and other hewn artifacts came mostly (and plentifully enough) from the sea as driftwood.
A Bering Strait Eskimo man named Ohyahock told Clark Garber the following tale, which Garber gave the title “The Lost Sons of the Kobuk.”182
Far up toward the headwaters of the Kobuk River, many sleeps from the ocean, there lived a man and wife who had one child, a little son. Near them lived a man who had neither wife nor child. At the time of this story, the little boy was about eight winters old. Being the only son and only child in the little colony, he was greatly loved by his father and mother and all the other people of the village. If no more children came to them, they would at least have one son to place offerings on their graves when they should go beyond this world to the “Land of Happiness.” When the little boy was about ten winters old, his proud father made him a small kayak, an exact model of the one he used for hunting seal. With the help of their kindly neighbor, the little boy was taught how to balance himself in it and paddle the little kayak swiftly over the water. His neighbor, who thought no less of the little boy than his own parents, made him a small spear like the one his father used for seal. Thereafter the little boy hunted ducks and geese on the lakes and river, and was very proud when he brought his game home and added it to the family larder.
Some winters later, when the little boy had grown to be a young man, he had in his heart a longing to see the world beyond and there to seek adventures. One day, while hunting seal in the river, he decided to see what kind of country lay beyond the limits of his hunting ground. Following the river toward its source, he came to a place where a tall clump of willows grew along the river bank. He drew to the shore and pulled his kayak up on the beach just far enough that it would not drift away, but would still be at hand in case of sudden need. Near the willows he found a well-beaten trail. Curious to know where it would lead him, he followed it until he came around a sharp bend. There in the dense growth of willows he suddenly disappeared and was never to see his people again.
The Eskimo hunter’s dilemma in dealing with the mysterious preternatural at the greenwood is, as it is for his counterparts everywhere, how to be a predator without becoming prey. To accomplish this he must excel as manipulator of hewn artifacts—in this Eskimo tale, the wooden-framed kayak and wooden-hafted hunting spear. Two other sons are born to the bereaved couple and go to their weird fates the same way as the first, making a total of three victims before the hero comes into the world who will have the requisite skill. Ohyahock seemingly did not even bother to name the three sons who perished, but the fourth and fifth sons merited naming. The fourth did not go to the greenwood at all, but remained as provider of manipulable hewn wood to the fifth son. Having both the advantage of his strong, stay-at-home elder brother’s material support (cultural superiority) and an innately greater skill and strength of his own (natural superiority), the fifth brother is destined to be the ogre-slayer. A proper cosmotact, he metes out to the ogres of his story the same injury they have inflicted previously on his people:
...
The fourth son, who had been given the name of Oakpone, (“blood in a poke”), was an unusually large and strong boy. When he was only eight winters old, he begged his father to make him a kayak so that he might hunt ducks and geese on the lakes and river. His father, mindful of the loss of his first three sons, did not want to make his fourth son a kayak in which he might meet the same fate. But Oakpone would give his father no rest. He begged so persistently that his father finally agreed to build the much-desired kayak.The fifth son to be born to these parents was called Ahzuak, (“black berries”). He was only two winters younger than the fourth son. When he became old enough to hunt, his brother, the fourth son, wanted him to have a kayak so they could go hunting together. His skill with the kayak and the spear was much greater than the skill of his brothers before him. His father had refused to build a kayak for him because he did not want to lose his two remaining sons at the same time. Ahzuak secretly practiced with his brother’s kayak and weapons so that he might soon go in search of his three lost brothers.
Early one morning, Ahzuak took the kayak belonging to his brother Oakpone and paddled swiftly up the river. As his strong arms paddled him farther and farther from home, he wondered why his three older brothers had never returned. So much did he think upon this problem that he finally decided to follow the river and search for them. Far up the river, he came upon some strange and terrible animals. He tried to evade them but they attacked and tried to kill him. But Ahzuak’s great skill with the spear saved his life. After battling with the monsters all day long he finally succeeded in killing them. Then he thought that these terrible animals must have killed his three brothers so he continued to hunt them and killed all he could find.
After several more sleeps, he came to the trail through the willows. When he had followed this trail for some distance, he came upon three kayaks hidden in the brush. They looked just like his own kayak, so he knew that his father had made them and that they belonged to his three lost brothers. Seeing that his brothers must have taken this trail he cautiously followed it through the overhanging willows. At length he came to a large and strange looking innie. Suspecting that his brothers had met foul play here, he stealthily entered the place. Resting on the floor of the innie and leaning against the wall, he saw the heads of his brothers. But they did not speak to him because their heads had been severed from their bodies. Strangely there seemed to be life in their eyes. They tried to warn him to leave the innie as quickly as possible. They seemed to tell him, that danger lurked within the walls of this place. Ahzuak had but one purpose in his mind. That was to find his lost brothers, so he gave no heed to the warning. As he came farther into the innie, he saw an old woman, who was unusually large, sitting in a corner. To the woman Ahzuak said, “you are the evil one who has killed all my brothers.”
“Yes, yes,” replied the old woman. “One has been waiting a long time for the meat of a young hunter. One will kill you and place your head beside the heads of your brothers,” said the evil old woman as she began to crawl toward Ahzuak.
Ahzuak was ready and waiting for this move. With a powerful thrust of his spear, he drove it through the evil one’s body, killing her. Then out of fear that some strange magic might overcome him, he quietly withdrew from the evil place and stealthily followed the trail through the willows. He found his kayak lying on the beach where he had left it. But before placing his kayak in the water, he brought the kayaks of his three brothers from the brush and tied them fast behind his own. Soon he was gliding swiftly toward home towing the kayaks of his three lost brothers behind him.
With the river current in his favor, he reached the village of his people in the middle of the following night. Straight to the cosegy he went. There he sounded the alarm on the big ceremonial drum calling all the people together. At length all the people were assembled and then Ahzuak, with much pride, recounted his experiences and adventure. Thereafter the people could hunt far up the river without fear of the man-eating monsters and the evil old witch-woman who had killed and eaten all young hunters passing her way.
For a last example of the Two Trees, we turn once again to Mesopotamia, where heavy destruction of arboreal life by man and the flooding rivers was already a fact before the beginning of history—and of all places on this planet history is there most ancient. The following tale is from Arab tradition in Baghdad in the third decade of the twentieth century.183 The stick Al Madhūna with its power to enforce civilized reciprocity (robbing the cannibal robbers) and the reversals of fortune between mutually dissimulating human guest (cosmotact) and preternatural hosts at the coppice of green trees are typologically so pure and obvious that they need after the previous discussions in this Appendix no comment beyond the bare evidence of the tale itself.
There was once an industrious woman who earned a living for herself and her family by carding cotton. Her husband earned nothing, for he was a lazy lout who did nothing but sleep in the courtyard of the house, and never went without. All that he did was to clamour for food, and if his wife did not bring it to him, he would beat her with his thick stick, which he kept greased with fat stolen from her kitchen. This stick he called Al Madhūna, ‘the Greased One,’ and if she dared to reproach him for his laziness, he would reply ‘Bring me the Greased One,’ and as he was powerful and strong she quickly stopped her scolding and ran off lest she should be beaten.
One day when she was in the market, she told a friend of her troubles, and complained that her husband had become an intolerable burden.
The friend was a wise woman, and said to her, ‘Endure his laziness no longer! When be has left the house, lock the door and refuse to let him enter until he comes with money in his hand!’
The cotton-carder said, ‘How shall that be, seeing that he never leaves the house. He never leaves our courtyard, faith, the whole day he sleeps!’ Said the old woman, ‘Has he a favorite dish, my sister?’
Said the cotton-carder, ‘He is very fond of pācha.’
Said the old woman, ‘He is a dog, the son of a dog, and like the dogs must be led by the nose. Cook some pācha and throw it outside the door and entice him into the street, and then close the door upon him.’
The cotton-carder followed the advice of her wise friend and bought some pācha, which she cooked very succulently. When it was ready, she scattered a little in the courtyard near the corner where her husband slept, and the rest outside the door of the house.
Then she shook him, and while he was yawning, and still half asleep, she cried, ‘Ya Kasilun [Lazy-Bones]! See! In the night it has rained pācha!’
He rubbed his eyes and took up the pācha and began to eat.
‘Leave this here,’ cried his wife, ‘Go outside, there is abundance there, and if we don’t get it, the neighbours will eat it!’
So he ran to the door, and while the stupid fellow was still gathering up the pācha and cramming it into his mouth, his wife closed the door upon him and bolted it.
‘Hey wife,’ cried Kasilun, ‘I have picked up pācha enough—come and get the rest. Open the door, I want to go to sleep again.’
‘No, not I!’ replied the cotton-carder from within the door. ‘I will not open to you until you return, as a man should, with money in your pocket!’
‘Bring me the Greased One!’ shouted Kasilun in a great rage, and when she threw him the stick from a window, he rattled at the door and made such a noise that the neighbours gathered to laugh at him. At last, mad with anger, he set off, all bareheaded as he was, and walked far into the desert.
At nightfall, when he was far from Baghdad, he saw a fire, and as he was cold and hungry, he went towards it. Round the fire were sitting seven ‘afarit [demons], and upon the fire a pot was boiling. Now ‘afarit are addicted to human flesh, and when they saw Kasilun approaching, they said, ‘Here is good fortune! This man will make us a meal tomorrow!’
As for Kasilun, when he saw the pot and smelt the hot meat, he was very pleased, for he had eaten nothing since the pācha that morning; so, approaching them, he wished them peace. They gave him the salutation, and invited him to join them.
Said he, ‘I will cat with pleasure, for since it rained pācha this morning, I have not eaten a crumb!’ and so saying, he dipped his frozen fingers in the pot and drawing out the lamb that seethed therein, he tore it in half, and devoured it.
After he had eaten he fell asleep, and the ‘afarit, seeing how fat and big he was, decided to kill him next day so that they would have fresh meat to last them for some time.
The next morning they roused him and said, ‘We are going to kill meat soon; go, take this water-skin and fill it with water and return to us so that we can fill the pot ready for the boiling.’
‘This will never do,’ thought Kasilun when he saw the big skin that they gave him to fill. ‘They will make a water-carrier of me!’ So when he reached the river, he bent as if he were filling it, but in reality he put his lips to it and blew until it was swollen with air and appeared full to the brim. Then, tying it, he began to return with the skin on his shoulders. The ‘afarit expected to see him bowed under the weight of the water, but lo! he walked as if the skin were but a feather. When he was near their tents, however, he sat down, and putting his mouth to the skin, he made as though he were emptying it, and did so until the skin was deflated.
‘What sort of man is this?’ said the ‘afarit. ‘He drinks more at a draught than an ordinary man in a week!’
They went up to him, and when he saw them, he said that he had drunk the water and was still thirsty, and would go down and refill the skin.
‘We will send one of our number,’ said the ‘afarit. ‘But as you are a strong fellow, we will send you to get the wood to make fire for the pot.’
‘Where shall I find the wood?’ asked Kasilun.
‘There is a coppice of trees at a little distance from here. One of us will show you where it is.’
‘This is very bad,’ thought Kasilun, ‘they are making a beast of burden of me!’ and he asked for a very long rope. When they had reached the coppice, he said to the ‘afrit who had accompanied him, ‘Take this end of the rope and walk around the coppice and come back with it here.’
‘Why must I do that?’ asked the ‘afrit, but Kasilun insisted, and as the ‘afrit was afraid of the strength of a man who could drink a water-skin at a draught, he did what was required of him. Then Kasilun tied the two ends of the rope and bent his back.
‘Now we have tied the wood together,’ said he, ‘hoist it on my back!’
‘How can I hoist living trees!’ cried the ‘afrit.
‘That is nothing,’ said Kasilun. ‘I shall do the real work when I carry it back! Hoist the wood on my back and be quick about it!’
‘But,’ said the afrit, ‘we only want a few faggots!’
Then Kasilun pretended to be very angry. ‘What is this?’ he said. ‘You refuse to hoist a few light trees on to my back? Am I to do all the work? Then I refuse to carry them at all!’
He went back to the camp and told his story as if he were in the utmost indignation.
The ‘afarit became more than ever afraid of him when they heard he had wanted to carry the coppice on his back, and made up their minds to kill him in the night when he was asleep, lest he should prove too much for them.
So that night they took him to their house, and pretending to welcome him, they put him into the best room.
‘There is something in this,’ thought Kasilun, who had become suspicious of their intentions, and, when night came, instead of sleeping beneath the fur mantle which they gave him to cast over himself, he went and hid in the oven, from which hiding-place he contrived to overhear his hosts discussing their plot of killing him.
As soon as he understood plainly their intention, he went back to the room, arranged the fur mantle over some carpets so that it had the appearance of a sleeping man, and hid himself in another part of the house. At midnight, the ‘afarit came with daggers and sticks and attacked the heap all at once, and went out making sure that their guest was dead.
In the morning, Kasilun greeted them as if nothing had happened, and told them that he had been a little disturbed by mosquito-bites during the night, but that towards morning he had slept soundly.
The ‘afarit then resolved on a fresh attempt to kill him. They had in their house a cupboard lined with scimitars, which closed upon the victim when a button was touched without. But Kasilun overheard their plan from his hiding-place in the oven, and made up his mind that they should die in their own trap. The next day they led him to the door of the cupboard and told him that if he went in, he would find gold and treasure, which would be his from henceforth.
‘I am a big man,’ said Kasilun, ‘and I could not get into the cupboard.’
The ‘afarit assured him that he could. ‘Why,’ said they, ‘it would hold six of us!’
‘I will believe that when I see it,’ said Kasilun.
So in they went, and when they were safety inside, he pressed the button and the knives closed and killed them.
There was only one ‘afrit left, and Kasilun began to think that as he had disposed of the others so easily, he need not fear him. Indeed the case was entirely otherwise, as the ‘afrit came to him and implored him to save his life, saying that if he did so he would show him where his brothers had kept their treasure, for it had been their practice to rob caravans in the desert and take possession of the goods of their victims after they had killed and eaten them.
Kasilun filled a large sack with the stolen gold, and told the ‘afrit to carry it, for he was going back to his home. Thus they set off together; Kasilun clad in the rich robes which he had found amongst the stolen goods, and the ‘afrit walking behind him like his servant with the sack of gold on his shoulders.
‘Life in the desert does not suit me,’ said Kasilun to the ‘afrit. ‘There is too much hard work there! One is better off in a town.’
At nightfall he came to his house in the city, knocked at the door, and bade his wife open, telling her that he had returned bringing her some money.
Though she could scarcely believe him, the cotton-carder opened the door.
‘Here is a guest, wife,’ said Kasilun; ‘and here is a sack of gold. Make us a good meal, for I have hardly had a bite since I went away.’
The cotton-carder prepared a sumptuous meal and they spent three days in feasting and music.
At the end of the three days the ‘afrit said to Kasilun, ‘I want to have a furwa [a skin cloak or coat with the hair inside] made, for it is cold.’
Said Kasilun, ‘Go to Hasan the tailor, he will make you a furwa.’
The ‘afrit went and gave the order to the tailor, but each time the ‘afrit went to see if the furwa was ready, the tailor answered ‘Tomorrow!’ At last the ‘afrit went to Kasilun and said, ‘The tailor will not make the furwa that I need for my journey.’
Kasilun said to the ‘afrit, ‘Tell him you are the guest of Kasilun, and that he must hurry with the work.’
The ‘afrit went to the tailor and said, ‘I am the guest of Kasilun, and you must hurry to finish the furwa!’
The tailor knew Kasilun as a good-for-nothing and lazy man, and when the ‘afrit said this, he began to laugh in the ‘afrit’s face, saying, ‘I am not afraid of Kasilun! He is always asleep! Come, we will go together, and will talk to him in his own house!’
So the tailor and the ‘afrit went together to Kasilun’s house, and the tailor knocked at the door and calling to Kasilun bade him open the door as he was not afraid of him. When Kasilun heard, he roared out to his wife, ‘Wife, bring me the Greased One!’ And the tailor had his hand on the door to open it, the ‘afrit being beside him. When the ‘afrit heard Kasilun call for his stick, however, he pulled the tailor back in fear, and Kasilun coming out and seizing the tailor by the other hand, the tailor was torn in two pieces, and the ‘afrit took one half and ran away in mortal fear and never came back!