Origin of the Winds

In a village on the lower Yukon lived a man and his wife who had no children. One day the woman said to her husband, "Far out on the tundra there grows a solitary tree. Go to that and bring back a piece of the trunk, and make a doll from it. Then it will seem that we have a child."

ユーコン川下流のある村に、子どものいない男とその妻が住んでいた。ある日、女が夫に言った。「ツンドラのずっと向こうに、一本だけ木が生えています。そこへ行って幹をひと切れ持ち帰り、それで人形をこしらえてくださいな。そうすれば子どもがいるような気持ちになるでしょう」

The man went out of the house and saw a long track of bright light like that made by the moon shining on snow, leading off across the tundra in the direction he had been told to take. It was the Milky Way. Along this path he traveled far away until he saw before him a beautiful object shining in the bright light. Going up to it, he found it was the tree of which he came in search. The tree was small, so he took his hunting-knife, cut off a part of the trunk, and carried the fragment home.

男が家を出ると、雪に照る月の光のような明るい光の長い道が、言われた方角へツンドラを越えて延びているのが見えた。それは天の川だった。この道をたどってずっと遠くまで旅すると、明るい光のなかに輝く美しいものが前方に見えた。近寄ってみると、それが探しに来た木だった。木は小さかったので、男は狩りの小刀を取って幹の一部を切り取り、そのかけらを家へ持ち帰った。

He sat down in the house and carved out from the wood an image of a small boy, and his wife made two suits of clothing for it and dressed it in one of them, "saving the other to put on when he had soiled the first," she said.

男は家のなかに座って、その木から小さな男の子の像を彫り出した。妻はそのために着物を二組こしらえ、一組を着せた。「もう一組は、最初のを汚したときに着せるために取っておくの」と妻は言った。

"Now, Father, make your little boy a set of toy dishes," she said.

「さあ、お父さん、坊やにおもちゃの食器をひとそろいこしらえてやって」と妻は言った。

"I see no use in all this trouble. We will be no better off than we were in the first place," said the man.

「こんな手間をかけても何の役にも立たん。はじめのときと少しも変わらんだろう」と男は言った。

"Why, yes, we are already better off," said the wife. "Before we had the doll we had nothing to talk about except ourselves. Now we have the doll to talk about and to amuse us."

「あら、もうずっとよくなっているわ」と妻は言った。「人形がいないときは、自分たちのことしか話すことがなかったでしょう。今は話の種になって、わたしたちを楽しませてくれる人形がいるのよ」

To please her the husband made the toy dishes, and she placed the doll in the seat of honor on the bench opposite the door, with the dishes full of food and water before it.

妻を喜ばせるために夫はおもちゃの食器をこしらえ、妻は戸口の向かいの腰掛けの上の上座に人形を置き、食べ物と水をいっぱいに入れた食器をその前に並べた。

When the couple had gone to bed that night the room was very dark and they heard several low, whistling sounds.

その夜夫婦が寝床に入ると、部屋は真っ暗で、低い口笛のような音がいくつか聞こえた。

"Do you hear that? It is the doll," said the woman, shaking her husband till he awakened.

「聞こえる? あの人形よ」と女は言い、夫を揺り起こした。

They got up at once and, making a light, saw that the Doll had eaten the food and drunk the water, and that its eyes were moving. The woman caught it up with delight and fondled and played with it for a long time. When she became tired she put it back on the bench and they went to bed again.

二人はすぐに起き上がり、明かりをつけてみると、人形が食べ物を食べ、水を飲んでいて、その目が動いていた。女は喜んで人形を抱き上げ、長いあいだかわいがって遊んだ。疲れると人形を腰掛けに戻し、二人はまた寝床に入った。

In the morning when they got up the Doll was gone. They looked for it all around the house, but could not find it. Then they went outside, and there were its tracks leading away from the door. They followed the tracks to the creek and along the bank to a place outside the village, where they ended; for from this place the Doll had gone up the Milky Way on the path of light upon which the man had gone to find the tree.

朝起きてみると、人形はいなくなっていた。家のまわりをくまなく探したが見つからなかった。それから外へ出てみると、戸口から離れていく人形の足跡があった。足跡をたどって小川まで行き、岸に沿って村の外のある場所まで行くと、そこで足跡は途切れていた。その場所から人形は、男が木を探しに行ったあの光の道の上を、天の川へ登っていったのである。

Doll traveled along the bright path till he came to the edge of day, where the sky comes down to the earth and walls in the light. Close beside him, in the east, he saw a skin cover fastened over a hole in the sky wall. The skin was bulging inward as if some strong force on the other side were pushing it.

人形は明るい道をたどって、空が大地まで降りてきて光を囲い込んでいる、昼の縁まで来た。すぐそばの東の方角に、空の壁の穴に張られた皮の覆いが見えた。その皮は、向こう側から何か強い力に押されているかのように、内側へふくらんでいた。

"It is very quiet here. I think a little wind would make it livelier," said the Doll, drawing his knife and cutting the cover loose on one side of the hole. At once a strong wind blew through, every now and then bringing with it a live reindeer. Looking through the hole, Doll saw beyond the wall another world like the earth. He drew the cover over the hole again.

「ここはたいそう静かだ。少し風があればにぎやかになるだろう」と人形は言い、小刀を抜いて穴の片側の覆いを切り離した。すぐに強い風が吹き込んできて、ときどき生きたトナカイを一緒に運んできた。穴からのぞいてみると、壁の向こうに大地のような別の世界が見えた。人形はまた穴に覆いをかぶせた。

"Do not blow too hard," he said to the wind. "Sometimes blow hard, sometimes light, and sometimes do not blow at all."

「あまり強く吹くなよ」と人形は風に言った。「強く吹くときもあり、弱く吹くときもあり、まったく吹かないときもあるようにしろ」

Then he got upon the sky wall and walked along till he came to the southeast. Here another opening was covered like the first, and the covering was bulging inward. When he cut this covering loose a gale swept in bringing reindeer, trees, and bushes. He quickly covered the hole and said to the gale, "You are too strong. Sometimes blow hard, sometimes light, and sometimes do not blow at all. The people on earth will want variety."

それから人形は空の壁に上って、南東まで歩いていった。ここにも最初のと同じように覆われた穴があり、その覆いが内側へふくらんでいた。この覆いを切り離すと、大風が吹き込んできて、トナカイや木や茂みを運んできた。人形はすばやく穴を覆って大風に言った。「お前は強すぎる。強く吹くときもあり、弱く吹くときもあり、まったく吹かないときもあるようにしろ。地上の人々は変化を望むだろうから」

Again walking along the sky wall he came to a hole in the south, and when this covering was cut a hot wind came rushing in carrying rain and spray from the great sea lying beyond the sky-hole on that side. Doll closed this opening and talked to the wind as before.

また空の壁に沿って歩いていくと、南に穴があり、この覆いを切ると、その側の空の穴の向こうに広がる大海から雨としぶきを運んで、熱い風がどっと吹き込んできた。人形はこの穴を閉じ、前と同じように風に言い聞かせた。

Then he passed on to the west where there was another hole which admitted heavy rainstorms, with sleet and spray from the ocean. When he had closed this and given the wind its instructions he went on to the northwest. There, when he cut away the covering, a cold blast came rushing in, bringing snow and ice, so that he was chilled to the bone and half frozen, and he made haste to close the hole as he had the others.

それから西へ進むと、そこにも穴があって、海からのみぞれとしぶきを伴う激しい暴風雨を入れていた。これを閉じて風に指図すると、北西へ進んだ。そこで覆いを切り離すと、冷たい突風が雪と氷を運んでどっと吹き込み、人形は骨まで冷えて半ば凍えたので、ほかの穴と同じように急いでその穴を閉じた。

He started to go along the sky wall to the north, but the cold became more and more severe until at last he was obliged to leave the wall and make a circuit to the southward, going back to the north only when he came opposite the opening. There the cold was so intense that he waited some time before he could muster courage to cut the cover away. When he did so, a fearful blast rushed in, carrying great masses of snow and ice, strewing it over the entire plain of the earth. It was so bitter that he closed the hole very quickly, and told the wind from that direction to come only in the middle of the winter so that the people might not be taken unawares, and might be prepared for it.

人形は空の壁に沿って北へ行こうとしたが、寒さはますます厳しくなり、とうとう壁を離れて南へ回り道をし、穴の向かいに来てはじめて北へ戻らねばならなかった。そこの寒さはあまりに激しかったので、覆いを切り離す勇気を奮い起こすまでしばらく待った。切り離すと、恐ろしい突風が大量の雪と氷を運んでどっと吹き込み、それを大地の平原一面にまき散らした。あまりに身を切るようだったので、人形は大急ぎで穴を閉じ、その方角からの風には、人々が不意を突かれず備えができるように、真冬にだけ来るよう言いつけた。

From there he hastened down to warmer climes in the middle of the earth plain, where, looking up, he saw that the sky was supported by long, slender, arching poles, like those of a conical lodge, but made of some beautiful material unknown to him. Journeying on, he finally came to the village from which he started and went into his own home.

そこから人形は大地の平原の真ん中のもっと暖かい地方へ急いで下りていった。そこで見上げると、空が、円錐形の小屋の柱のような、長く細い弧を描く柱で支えられているのが見えた。けれどもその柱は、人形の知らない何か美しい材料でできていた。旅を続けて、とうとう出発した村に着き、自分の家に入った。

Doll lived in this village for a very long time; for when the foster parents who had made him died, he was taken by other people of the village and so lived on for many generations, until he finally died. Since his death parents have made dolls for their children in imitation of the Doll who first opened the wind-holes of the sky and regulated all the six winds of earth.

人形はこの村にたいそう長いあいだ住んだ。自分をこしらえた養い親が死ぬと、村のほかの人々に引き取られ、そうして何代にもわたって生き続け、とうとう死んだ。人形が死んでからというもの、親たちは、空の風の穴を初めて開けて地上の六つの風をすべて整えたあの人形にならって、子どもたちのために人形をこしらえるようになったのである。