How Niscaminou Made Glooscap

Long ago, on the great bold cliffs of Cape North (Kte’dnuk), on the eastern side of the Cape, Niscaminou, the Very Great, made Glooscap of the good red earth of Cape Breton, and breathed on him until he lived. Then, when He had made him and he breathed, Niscaminou willed that Glooscap should wait on the lonely cliffs seventy times seven days until He came again.

“Until I come, wait on the mountain,” Niscaminou told Glooscap; and Glooscap waited, lying on the cliffs as Niscaminou had made him, with his head toward the rising sun, his feet toward the setting sun; his arms flat on the earth and stretched toward the north and the south.

He waited through long dark nights when the lone gull cried; he waited through the long brittle-dry days of summer, and in the snow of winter. The wind came and the rain; still he waited. The hills turned from the palest blue to indigo and were black and bare before the snow covered them with white. Still Niscaminou did not come; and Glooscap waited. The land turned soft with spring; the sea birds laid their eggs. Still Glooscap waited. Then, at noonday, when the red cliffs were blue with hare bells, Niscaminou came again to Cape North, and from the dew that clings to the rocks, He made an old woman to care for Glooscap’s wigwam, “Noogumich, Grandmother,” Glooscap called her.

Still Niscaminou willed that Glooscap should wait on the great bold bluff of Cape North until the noon of another day, when He came again to the mountain, and from the sea foam where it was white and thick at the foot of the cliffs, He made a little man to wait on Glooscap. “Nataoa-nsem, my sister’s son, Little Martin,” Glooscap called him.

Still Niscaminou willed that Glooscap should wait on Cape North, and with the next noonday, when the sun was high in the sky, came the Mother of the Micmacs out of the great beautiful earth of Cape Breton.

When Niscaminou had made old Grandmother and Nataoa-nsem, my sister’s son, Little Martin and the Mother of the Micmacs, Glooscap left Cape North and went over the mountains until he came to the Fairy Holes on the lovely bay of St. Ann. There he pitched his wigwam and lived for many long winters.

Medium: Air brush with acrylics
Size: 38 ½” x 27” (framed)