stick Indians?

[Mike Cleven]

peter webster wrote:
>
> Around here they are like "little people" who live out in the bush. They
> can be helpful or harmful, depending. Some people I know always leave them
> matches, a little food, maybe some tobacco, which they seem to appreciate.
> I leave some, too, just in case...Craig Lesley mentions them in a couple of
> his novels.

Interesting; I note that this legend comes from the interior side of the
Cascades, also; I hadn't heard mention of any "little people" in the
Northwest (hmmm - or have I?  Something comes to mind from Seton but I
can't remember exactly what....).  That is, unless we consider northern
California to be "the Pacific Northwest" (some northern Californians
do).  Because amidst all the mumbojumbo surrounding the Shasta district
of California there's supposed to be semi-invisible "little people" who
infest a plain to the west of the mountain covered in mounds of
mysterious origin; evil-sounding whisperings heard at night, panicking
animals, people getting mysterious scratches etc. etc.; FWIH they're not
supposed to be benevolent, unlike the godlike/angelic beings who
supposedly inhabit the secret palaces inside the mountain ;-) and the
aliens who flit about the summit from time to time.  Aaahhh - California
at its finest.......not even BC gets quite _that_ weird......there are
tales from Skara Brae and other isles in the Hebrides and the Orkneys of
similarly malign "little people", there known as "Drows" and held to be
connected with "elf arrows", tiny arrowhead-shaped flints found in the
locations the beings are seen and associated with mysterious
scratch-wounds gotten by people roaming the moors in question......

OK, OK, this is way off-topic for CHINOOK-L, but it just seemed a propos
considering the local reading of "stick Indian" that Peter's
provided......

MC