HOW THE TWINS OF WAR AND CHANCE, ÁHAIYÚTA AND MÁTSAILÉMA, FARED WITH THE UNBORN-MADE MEN OF THE UNDERWORLD
TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION
Heretofore I have withheld from publication such single examples of Zuñi folk-lore as the following, in order that the completer series might be brought forth in the form of an unbroken collection, with ample introductory as well as supplementary chapters, essential to the proper understanding by ourselves of the many distinctively Zuñi meanings and conceptions involved in the various allusions with which any one of them teems. Yet, to avoid encumbering the present example with any but the briefest of notes, I must ask leave to refer the reader to the more general yet detailed chapters I have already written in the, main, and with which, I have reason to hope, I will ere long be able to present the tales in question. Meanwhile, I would refer likewise to the essay I have recently prepared for the Thirteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, on Zuñi Creation Myths in their relation to primitive dance and other dramaturgic ceremonies.

Ever one of my chief story-tellers was Waíhusiwa,--of the priestly kin of Zuñi. He had already told me somewhat more than fifty of the folk tales, long and short, of his people, when one night I asked him for "only one more story of the grandfathers." Wishing to evade me, he replied with more show than sincerity:

[1. Reprinted from the Journal of American Folk-Lore, vol. V., No. 16, pp. 49-56.]

{p. 399}

There is a North, and of it I have told you té-la-p'-na-we.[1] There is a West; of it also I have told you té-la-p'-na-we. There are the South and East; of them likewise have I told you té-la-p'-na-we. Even of the Above have I not but lately told you of the youth who made love to his eagle and dwelt apace in the Sky-world? And of the great World-embracing Waters? You have been told of the hunter who married the Serpent-maiden and journeyed to the Mountain of Sunset. Now, therefore, my word-pouch is as empty as the food-pack of a lost hunter, and--"

"Feel in the bottom of it, then," interposed old Pálowahtiwa, who was sitting near, "and tell him of the Underworld."

"Hi-ta! [Listen!] brother younger," said Waíhusiwa, nonplussed but ever ready. "Did you ever hear tell of the people who could not digest, having, forsooth, no proper insides wherewithal to do so? Did you ever hear of them, brother younger?"

"Nay, never; not even from my own grandfathers," said I. "Sons éso to your story; short be it or long."[1]

"Sons éso tse-ná!" ("Cool your 'sons éso!' and wait till I begin.")--F. H. C.

ZUÑI INTRODUCTION
It seems--so the words of the grandfathers say--that in the Underworld were many strange things and beings, even villages of men, long ago.

[1. From té-na-la-a, "time or times of," and pé-na-we, words or speeches (tales): "tales of time."

2. The invariable formula for beginning a folk tale is, by the raconteur: "Són ah-tchi!" ("Let us take up")--té-la-p'-ne, or "a folk tale," being understood. To this the auditors or listeners respond: "É-so!" (" Yea, verily.") Again, by the raconteur: "Sons i-nó-o-to-na! Tem," etc. ("Let us (tell of) the times of creation! When," etc.) Again, by the listeners: "Sons éso! Te-ä-tú!" ("Yea, let us, verily! Be it so.")]

{p. 400}

But the people of those villages were unborn-made,--more like the ghosts of the dead than ourselves, yet more like ourselves than are the ghosts of the dead, for as the dead are more finished of being than we are, they were less so, as smoke, being hazy, is less fine than mist, which is filmy; or as green corn, though raw, is soft like cooked corn which is done (like the dead), and as both are softer than ripe corn which, though raw, is hardened by age (as we are of meat).

And also, these people were, you see, dead in a way, in that they had not yet begun to live, that is, as we live, in the daylight fashion.

And so, it would seem, partly like ourselves, they had bodies, and partly like the dead they had no bodies, for being unfinished they were unfixed. And whereas the dead are like the wind, and take form from within of their own wills (yän'te-tseman), these people were really like the smoke,[1] taking form from without of the outward touching of things, even as growing and unripe grains and fruits do.

[1. The Zuñi classification of states of growth or being is as elaborate as that of relative space in their mythology--both extremely detailed and systematic, yet, when understood, purely primitive and simple. The universe is supposed to have been generated from haze (shí-wai-a) produced by light (of the All-container, Sun-father) out of darkness. The observed analogy of this in nature is the appearance of haze (both heat and steam) preceding growth in springtime; the appearance of the world, of growing and living things, through mist seemingly rising out of the darkness each morning. In harmony with this conception of the universe is the correlative one that every being (as to soul, at least) passes through many successive states of becoming, always beginning as a shí-u-na hâ-i (haze being), and passing through the raw or soft (k'ya-pi-na), the formative (k'yaí-yu-na), variable (thlím-ni-na), fixed or done {footnote p. 401} (ak-na), and finished or dead (ä-shï-k'ya) states; whilst the condition of the surpassing beings (gods) maybe any of these at will (i-thlim-na, or thlim-nah-na, etc.). There are many analogies of this observed by the Zuñi, likening, as he does, the generation of being to that of fire with the fire-drill and stick. The most obvious of these is the appearance, in volumes, of "smoke-steam" or haze just previously to ignition, and its immediate disappearance with ignition. Further, the succession of beings in the becoming of a complete being may be regarded as an orderly personification of growth phenomena as observed in plants and seeds; for example, in corn, which is characterized by no fewer than thirteen mystic names, according to its stages of growth. This whole subject is much more fully and conclusively set forth in the writings to which I have already referred.]

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Well, in consequence, it was passing strange what a state they were in! Bethink ye! Their persons were much the reverse of our own, for wherein we are hard, they were soft--pliable. Wherein we are most completed, they were most unfinished; for not having even the organs of digestion, whereby we fare lustily, food in its solidity was to them destructive, whereas to us it is sustaining. When, therefore, they would eat, they dreaded most the food itself, taking thought not to touch it, and merely absorbing the mist thereof. As fishes fare chiefly on water, and birds on air, so these people ate by gulping down the steam and savor of their cooked things whilst cooking or still hot; then they threw the real food away, forsooth!

THE TALE
NOW, the Twain Little-ones, Áhaiyúta and Mátsailéma,[1] were ever seeking scenes of

[1. For the mythic origin of these two chief gods under the Sun, as his right- and left-hand being, their relation to chance, war, games, etc., I again refer the reader to the Zuñi Creation Myths.]

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contention; for what was deathly and dreadful to others was lively and delightful to them; so that cries of distress were ever their calls of invitation, as to a feast or dance is the call of a priest to us.

On a day when the world was quiet, they were sitting by the side of a deep pool. They heard curious sounds coming up through the waters, as though the bubbles were made by moans of the waters affrighted.

"Uh!" cried the elder. "What is that?"

The younger brother turned his ear to the ground and listened.

"There is trouble down there, dire trouble, for the people of the Underworld are shrieking war-cries like daft warriors and wailing like murder-mourners. What can be the matter? Let us descend and see!"

"Just so!" said Áhaiyúta.

Then they covered their heads with their cord-shields[1]--turned upside down--and shut their eyes and stepped into the deep pool.

"Now we are in the dark," said they, "like the dark down there. Well, then, by means of the dark let us go down"--for they had wondrous power, had those Twain; the magic of in-knowing-how thought had they.

[1. Pi-a-la-we (cord or cotton shields), evidently an ancient style of shield still surviving in the form of sacrificial net-shields of the Priesthood of the Bow. But the shields of these two gods were supposed to have been spun from the clouds which, supporting the sky-ocean, that in turn supported the sky-world (as this world is believed to. be supported by under-waters and clouds), were hence possessed of the power of floating upward when turned up, downward when reversed.]

{p. 403}

Down, like light through dark places, they went; dry through the waters; straight toward that village in the Underworld.

"Whew! the poor wretches are already dead," cried they, "and rotting"--for their noses were sooner accustomed to the dark than their eyes, which they now opened.

"We might as well have spared ourselves the coming, and stayed above," said Áhaiyúta.

"Nay, not so," said Mátsailéma. "Let us go on and see how they lived, even if they are dead."

"Very well," said the elder; and as they fared toward the village they could see quite plainly now, for they had made it dark (to themselves) by shutting their eyes in the daylight above, so now they made it light (to themselves) by opening their eyes in the darkness below and simply looking,--it was their way, you know.

"Well, well!" said Mátsailéma, as they came nearer and the stench doubled. "Look at the village; it is full of people; the more they smell of carrion the more they seem alive!"

"Yes, by the chut of an arrow!" exclaimed Áhaiyúta. "But look here! It is food we smell--cooked food, all thrown away, as we throw away bones and corn-cobs because they are too hard to eat and profitless withal. What, now, can be the meaning of this?"

"What, indeed! Who can know save by knowing," replied the younger brother. "Come, let us lie low and watch."

{p. 404}

So they went very quietly close to the village, crouched down, and peered in. Some people inside were about to eat. They took fine food steaming hot from the cooking-pots and placed it low down in wide trenchers; then they gathered around and sipped in the steam and savor with every appearance of satisfaction; but they were as chary of touching the food or of letting the food touch them as though it were the vilest of refuse.

"Did you see that?" queried the younger brother. "By the delight of death,[1] but--"

"Hist!" cried the elder. "If they are people of that sort, feeding upon the savor of food, then they will hear the suggestions of sounds better than the sounds themselves, and the very demon fathers would not know how to fare with such people, or to fight them, either!"

"Hah! But already the people had heard! They set up a clamor of War, swarming out to seek the enemy, as well they might, for who would think favorably of a sneaking stranger under the shade of a house-wall watching the food of another? Why, dogs growl even at their own offspring for the like of that!

"Where? Who? What is it?" cried the people, rushing hither and thither like ants in a shower. "Hah! There they are! There! Quick!" cried they, pointing to the Twain, who were cutting away to the nearest hillock. And immediately they fell to singing their war-cry.

[1. Hé-lu-ha-pa; from hé-lu, or élu, "hurrah," or "how delightful and há-pa, a corpse-demon, death.]

{p. 405}

"Ha-a! Sús-ki!
Ó-ma-ta
Há-wi-mo-o!
Ó-ma-ta,
Ó-ma-ta Há-wi-mo!"

sang they as they ran headlong toward the Two, and then they began shouting:

"Tread them both into the ground! Smite them both! Fan them out! Ho-o! Ha-a! Há-wi-mo-o ó-ma-ta."

But the Twain laughed and quickly drew their arrows and loosed them amongst the crowd. P'it! tsok! sang the arrows through and through the people, but never a one fell.

"Why, how now is this?" cried the elder brother.

"We'll club them, then!" said Mátsailéma, and he whiffed out his war-club and sprang to meet the foremost whom he pummelled well and sorely over the head and shoulders. Yet the man was only confused (he was too soft and unstable to be hurt); but another, rushing in at one side, was hit by one of the shield-feathers and fell to the ground like smoke driven down under a hawk's wing.

"Hold, brother, I have it! Hold cried Áhaiyúta. Then he snatched up a bunch of dry plume-grass and leaped forward. Swish! Two ways he swept the faces and breasts of the pursuers.

[1. This, like so many of the folk-tale songs, can only be translated etymologically or by extended paraphrasing. Such songs are always jargonistic, either archaic, imitative, or adapted from other languages of tribes who possibly supplied incidents to the myths themselves; but they are, like the latter, strictly harmonized with the native forms of expression and phases of belief.]

{p. 406}

Lo! right and left they fell like bees in a rainstorm, and quickly sued for mercy, screeching and running at the mere sight of the grass-straws.

"You fools!" cried the brothers. "Why, then, did ye set upon us? We came for to help you and were merely looking ahead as becomes strangers in strange places, when, lo! you come running out like a mess of mad flies with your 'Ha-a sús-ki ó-ma-la!' Call us coyote-sneaks, do you? But there! Rest fearless! We hunger; give us to eat."

So they led the Twain into the court within the town and quickly brought steaming food for them.

They sat down and began to blow the food to cool it, whereupon the people cried out in dismay: "Hold! Hold, ye heedless strangers; do not waste precious food like that! For shame!"

"Waste food? Ha! This is the way we eat! said they, and clutching up huge morsels they crammed their mouths full and bolted them almost whole.

The people were so horrified and sickened at sight of this, that some of them sweated furiously,--which was their way of spewing--whilst others, stouter of thought, cried: "Hold! hold! Ye will die; ye will surely sicken and die if the stuff do but touch ye!"

"Ho! ho!" cried the Twain, eating more lustily than ever. "Eat thus and harden yourselves, you poor, soft things, you!"

Just then there was a great commotion. Everyone rushed to the shelter of the walls and houses, shouting to them to leave off and follow quickly.

{p. 407}

"What is it?" asked they, looking up and all around.

"Woe, woe! The gods are angry with us this day, and blowing arrows at us. They will kill you both! Hurry!" A big puff of wind was blowing over, scattering slivers and straws before it; that was all!

"Brother," said the elder, "this will not do. These people must be hardened and be taught to eat. But let us take a little sleep first, then we will look to this."

They propped themselves up against a wall, set their shields in front of them, and fell asleep. Not long after they awakened suddenly. Those strange people were trying to drag them out to bury them, but were afraid to touch them now, for they thought them dead stuff, more dead than alive.

The younger brother punched the elder with his elbow, and both pretended to gasp, then kept very still. The people succeeded at last in rolling them out of the court like spoiling bodies, and were about to mingle them with the refuse when they suddenly let go and set up a great wail, shouting "War! Murder!"

"How now?" cried the Twain, jumping up. Whereupon the people stared and chattered in greater fright than ever at seeing the dead seemingly come to life!

"What's the matter, you fool people?"

"Akaa kaa," cried a flock of jays.

"Hear that!" said the villagers. "Hear that, and ask what's the matter! The jays are coming;

{p. 408}

whoever they light on dies-run you two! Aii! Murder!" And they left off their standing as though chased by demons. On one or two of the hindmost some jays alighted. They fell dead as though struck by lightning!

"Why, see that!" cried the elder brother--"these people die if only birds alight on them!"

"Hold on, there!" said the younger brother. "Look here, you fearsome things!" So they pulled hairs from some scalp-locks they had, and made snares of them, and whenever the jays flew at them they caught them with the nooses until they had caught every one. Then they pinched them dead and took them into the town and roasted them. "This is the way," said they, as they ate the jays by morsels.

And the people crowded around and shouted: "Look! look! why, they eat the very enemy say nothing of refuse!" And although they dreaded the couple, they became very conciliatory and gave them a fit place to bide in.

The very next day there was another alarm. The Two ran out to learn what was the matter. For a long time they could see nothing, but at last they met some people fleeing into the town. Chasing after them was a cooking-pot with earrings of onions.[1] It was boiling furiously and

[1. The onion here referred to is the dried, southwestern leek-clove, which is so strong and indigestible that, when eaten raw and in quantity, gives rise to great distress, or actually proves fatal to any but mature and vigorous persons. This, of course, explains why it was chosen for its value as a symbol of the vigor (or "daylight perfection" and invincibility) of the Twin gods.]

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belching forth hot wind and steam and spluttering mush in every direction. If ever so little of the mush hit the people they fell over and died.

"He!" cried the Twain;

"Té-k'ya-thla-k'ya
Í-ta-wa-k'ya
Äsh'-she-shu-kwa!

--As if food-stuff were made to make people afraid!" Whereupon they twitched the ear-rings off the pot and ate them up with all the mush that was in the pot, which they forthwith kicked to pieces vigorously.

Then the people crowded still closer around them, wondering to one another that they could vanquish all enemies by eating them with such impunity, and they begged the Twain to teach them how to do it. So they gathered a great council of the villagers, and when they found that these poor people were only half finished, . . . they cut vents in them (such as were not afraid to let them). . . . and made them eat solid food, by means of which they were hardened and became men of meat then and there, instead of having to get killed after the manner of the fearful, and others of their kind beforetime, in order to ascend to the daylight and take their places in men born of men.

And for this reason, behold! a new-born child may eat only of wind-stuff until his cord of viewless sustenance has been severed, and then only by sucking milk or soft food first and with much distress.

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Behold! And we may now see why, like newborn children are the very aged; childish withal--á-ya-vwi[1];--not only toothless, too, but also sure to die of diarrhœa if they eat ever so little save the soft parts and broths of cooked food. For are not the babes new-come from the Shi-u-na[2] world; and are not the aged about to enter the Shi-po-lo-a[3] world, where cooked food unconsumed is never heeded by the fully dead?

Thus shortens my story.

[1. Dangerously susceptible, tender, delicate.

2. Hazy, steam-growing.

Thats much better!

This is totally off topic (well except as it relates to Native Americans). I was looking up a tribe on the internet just now and I noticed that Indians were the first to create popcorn. They made and ate it as a snack constantly. Of course they weren't slobbering it in the petrol that we now refer to as "butter" and no salt either. But they passed it on to the whites. Too cool.

That's correct my lady, i think it was the iriquois or one of the other 5 nationd tribes, i'll have to look to make sure, but they did introduce it to the pigrims and also showed them how to use fish to fertilize the ground to grow corn by planting a fish with every corn seed planted[the phosphorous] helps quite a bit. of course we did not continue using the fish fertilizer method but others as we found what minerals were in the fish so they could be added but when iloived in a commune in michigan we did try it just to see how well it worked and it was good.

I feel one of our biggest sins as a society in this land here.
Is the fact that we as a nation who knows well that this place was first founded by Indians.
After taking it from them and all the blood shed.
We have never given the American Indians, their own day set aside on a calendar, to honor that fact. THATS just wrong!
The Indians were the first to live and breath on this plain, we now call the USA.

thnx for the input my friend, i agree but i also extend it to the whole world, we have raped and pillaged all of the earth. to me it's the changing of a mind set that's important, withoiut that things will continue to worsen. as the first poeple stated "when all the trees are gone, and all the land spoiled, and all the animals are no more, then they [us] will finally understand you can't eat money."

THE **** AND THE MOUSE
NOTE.--While on their pilgrimage to the "Ocean of Sunrise" in the summer of 1886, three Zuñis--Pálowahtiwa, Waíhusiwa, and Héluta-with Mr. Cushing, were entertaining their assembled friends at Manchester-by-the-Sea with folk tales, those related by the Indians being interpreted by Mr. Cushing as they were uttered. When Mr. Cushing's turn came for a story he responded by relating the Italian tale of "The **** and the Mouse" which appears in Thomas Frederick Crane's Italian Popular Tales. About a year later, at Zuñi, but under somewhat similar circumstances, Waíhusiwa's time came to entertain the gathering, and great was Mr. Cushing's surprise when he presented a Zuñi version of the Italian tale. Mr. Cushing translated the story as literally as possible, and it is here reproduced, together with Mr. Crane's translation from the Italian, in order that the reader may not only see what transformation the original underwent in such a brief period, and how well it has been adapted to Zuñi environment and mode of thought, but also to give a glimpse of the Indian method of folktale making.--Editor.

ITALIAN VERSION
Once upon a time there were a **** and a mouse. One day the mouse said to the ****: "Friend ****, shall we go and eat some nuts on yonder tree?" "As you like." So they both went under the tree and the mouse climbed up at once and began to eat. The poor **** began to fly, and flew and flew, but could not come where the mouse was. When it saw that there was no hope of getting there, it said: "Friend Mouse, do you know what I want you to do? Throw me a nut." The mouse went and threw one and hit the **** on the head. The poor ****, with its head all broken and covered with blood, went away to an old woman. "Old aunt, give me some rags to cure

{p. 412}

my head." "If you will give me two hairs I will give you the rags." The **** went away to a dog. "Dog, give me two hairs; the hairs I will give the old woman; the old woman will give me rags to cure my head." "If you will give me a little bread," said the dog, "I will give you the hairs." The **** went away to a baker. "Baker, give me bread; I will give bread to the dog; the dog will give hairs; the hairs I will carry to the old woman; the old woman will give me rags to cure my head." The baker answered: "I will not give you bread unless you give me some wood." The **** went away to the forest. "Forest, give me some wood; the wood I will carry to the baker; the baker will give me some bread; the bread I will give to the dog; the dog will give me hairs; the hairs I will carry to the old woman; the old woman will give me rags to cure my head." The forest answered: "If you will bring me a little water, I will give you some wood." The **** went away to a fountain. "Fountain, give me water; water I will carry to the forest; forest will give wood; wood I will carry to the baker; baker will give bread; bread I will give dog; dog will give hairs; hairs I will give old woman; old woman will give rags to cure my head." The fountain gave him water; the water he carried to the forest; the forest gave him wood; the wood he carried to the baker; the baker gave him bread; the bread he gave to the dog; the dog gave him the hairs; the hairs he carried to the old woman; the old woman gave him the rags; and the **** cured his head.

{p. 413}

ZUÑI VERSION
Thus it was in the Town of the Floods Abounding,[1] long ago. There lived there an old woman, so they say, of the Italia-kwe,[2] who, in the land of their nativity, are the parental brothers of the Mexicans, it is said. Now, after the manner of that people, this old woman had a Tâkâkâ **** which she kept alone so that he would not fight the others. He was very large, like a turkey, with a fine sleek head and a bristle-brush on his breast like a turkey-****'s too, for the Tâkâkâ-kind were at first the younger brothers of the Turkeys, so it would seem.

Well, the old woman kept her **** in a little corral of tall close-set stakes, sharp at the top and wattled together with rawhide thongs, like an eagle-cage against a wall, only it had a little wicket also fastened with thongs. Now, try as he would, the old Tâkâkâ **** could not fly out, for he had no chance to run and make a start as turkeys do in the wilds, yet he was ever trying and trying, because he was meat-hungry--always anxious for worms;--for, although the people of that village had abundant food, this old woman was poor and lived mainly on grain-foods, wherefore, perforce, she fed the old Tâkâkâ **** with the refuse of her own eatings. In the morning the old woman would come and throw this refuse food into the corral cage.

Under the wall nearby there lived a Mouse. He had no old grandmother to feed him, and he was particularly fond of grain food. When, having eaten

[1. Venice.

2. "Italy-people."]

{p. 414}

his fill, the old **** would settle down, stiff of neck and not looking this side nor that, but sitting in the sun kâ-tâ-kâ-tok-ing to himself, the little Mouse would dodge out, steal a bit of tortilla or a crumb, and whisk into his hole again. Being sleepy, the Tâkâkâ **** never saw him, and so, day after day the Mouse fared sumptuously and grew over-bold. But one day, when corn was ripe and the **** had been well fed and was settling down to his sitting nap, the Mouse came out and stole a particularly large piece of bread, so that in trying to push it into his hole he made some noise and, moreover, had to stop and tunnel his doorway larger.

The **** turned his head and looked just as the Mouse was working his way slowly in, and espied the long, naked tall lying there on the ground and wriggling as the Mouse moved to and fro at his digging.

"Hah! By the Grandmother of Substance, it is a worm!" cackled the ****, and he made one peck at the Mouse's tail and bit it so hard that he cut it entirely off and swallowed it at one gulp.

The Mouse, squeaking "Murder!" scurried down into his sleeping-place, and fell to licking his tail until his chops were all pink and his mouth was drawn down like a crying woman's; for he loved his long tail as a young dancer loves the glory of his long hair, and he cried continually: "Weh tsu tsu, weh tsu tse, yam hok ti-i-i" and thought: "Oh, that shameless great beast! By the Demon of Slave-creatures, I'll have my payment of him! For he is. worse than an owl

{p. 415}

or a night-hawk. They eat us all up, but he has taken away the very mark of my mousehood and left me to mourn it. I'll take vengeance on him, will I!"

So, from that time the Mouse thought how he might compass it, and this plan seemed best: He would creep out some day, all maimed of tail as he was, and implore pity, and thus, perchance, make friends for a while with the Tâkâkâ ****. So he took seed-down, and made a plaster of it with nut-resin, and applied it to the stump of his tail. Then, on a morning, holding his tail up as a dog does his foot when maimed by a cactus, he crawled to the edge of his hole and cried in a weak voice to the Tâkâkâ:

"Ani, yoa yoa! Itâ-ak'ya Mosa,
Motcho wak'ya,
Oshe wak'ya,
Ethl hâ asha ni ha. Ha na, yoa, ha na!"

Look you, pity, pity! Master of Food Substance,
Of my maiming,
Of my hunger,
I am all but dying. Ah me, pity, ah me!

Whereupon he held up his tail, which was a safe thing to do, you see, for it no longer looked like a worm or any other eatable.

Now, the Tâkâkâ was flattered to be called a master of plenty, so he said, quite haughtily (for he had eaten and could not bend his neck, and felt proud, withal), "Come in, you poor little thing, and eat all you want. As if I cared for what the

{p. 416}

like of you could eat!" So the Mouse went in and ate very little, as became a polite stranger, and thanking the ****, bade him good-day and went back to his hole.

By-and-by he came again, and this time he brought part of a nutshell containing fine white meat. When he had shouted warning of his coming and entered the corral cage, he said: "Comrade father, let us eat together. Of this food I have plenty, gathered from yonder high nut-tree which I climb every autumn when the corn is ripe and cut the nuts therefrom. But of all food yours I most relish, since I cannot store such in my cellar. Now, it may be you will equally relish mine; so let us eat, then, together."

"It is well, comrade child," replied the ****; so they began to eat.

But the **** had no sooner tasted the nut than he fairly chuckled for joy, and having speedily

But the **** had no sooner tasted the nut than he fairly chuckled for joy, and having speedily made an end of the kernel, fell to lamenting his hard lot. "Alas, ah me!" he said. "My grandmother brings me, on rare days, something like to this, but picked all too clean. There is nought eatable so nice. Comrade little one, do you have plenty of this kind, did you say?"

"Oh, yes," replied the Mouse; "but, you see, the season is near to an end now, and when I want more nuts I must go and gather them from the tree. Look, now! Why do you not go there also? That is the tree, close by."

"Ah me, I cannot escape, woe to me! Look at my wings," said the ****, "they are worn to

{p. 417}

bristles--and as to the beard on my breast, my chief ornament, alas! it is all crumpled and uneven, so much have I tried to fly out and so hard have I pushed against the bars. As for the door, my grandmother claps that shut and fastens it tightly with thongs, be you sure, as soon as ever she finishes the feeding of me!"

"Ha! ha!" exclaimed the Mouse. "If that's all, there's nothing easier than to open that. Look at my teeth; I even crack the hard nuts with these scrapers of mine! Wait!" He ran nimbly up the wicket and soon gnawed through the holding-string. "There! comrade father; push open the door, you are bigger than I, and we will go nutting."

"Thanks this day," cried the ****, and shoving the wicket open, he ran forth cackling and crowing for gladness.

Then the Mouse led the way to the tree. Up the trunk he ran, and climbed and climbed until he came to the topmost boughs. "Ha! the nuts are fine and ripe up here," he shouted.

But the Tâkâkâ fluttered and flew all in vain; his wings were so worn he could not win even to the lowermost branches. "Oh! have pity on me, comrade child! Cut off some of the nuts and throw them down to me, do! My wings are so worn I cannot fly any better than the grandmother's old dog, who is my neighbor over there."

"Be patient, be patient, father!" exclaimed the Mouse. "I am cracking a big one for you as fast as I can. There, catch it!" and he threw a fat

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nut close to the ****, who gleefully devoured the kernel and, without so much as thanks, called for more.

"Wait, father," said the Mouse. There! Stand right under me, so. Now, catch it; this is a big one!" Saying which the Mouse crawled out until he was straight over the ****. "Now, then," said he, "watch in front!" and he let fall the nut. It hit the **** on the head so hard that it bruised the skin off and stunned the old Tâkâkâ so that he fell over and died for a short time, utterly forgetting.

"Té mi thlo kô thlo kwa!" shouted the Mouse, as he hurried down the tree. "A little waiting, and lo! What my foe would do to me, I to him do, indeed!" Whereupon he ran across, before ever the **** had opened an eye, and gnawed his bristles off so short that they never could grow again. "There, now!" said the Mouse. "Lo! thus healed is my heart, and my enemy is even as he made me, bereft of distinction Then he ran back to his cellar, satisfied.

Finally the **** opened his eyes. "Ah me, my head!" he exclaimed. Then, moaning, he staggered to his feet, and in doing so he espied the nut. It was smooth and round, like a brown egg. When the **** saw it he fell to lamenting more loudly than ever: "Oh, my head! Tâ-kâ-kâ-kâ-â-â!" But the top of his head kept bleeding and swelling until it was all covered over with welts of gore, and it grew so heavy, withal, that the Tâkâkâ thought he would surely die. So off

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to his grandmother he went, lamenting all the way. Hearing him, the grandmother opened the door, and cried: "What now?"

"Oh, my grandmother, ah me! I am murdered!" he answered. "A great, round, hard seed was dropped on my head by a little creature with a short, one-feathered tail, who came and told me that it was good to eat and--oh! my head is all bleeding and swollen! By the light of your favor, bind my wound for me lest, alas, I die

"Served you right! Why did you leave your place, knowing better?" cried the old woman. "I will not bind your head unless you give me your very bristles of manhood, that you may remember your lesson!"

"Oh! take them, grandmother!" cried the ****; but when he looked down, alas! the beard of his breast, the glory of his kind, was all gone. "Ah me! ah me! What shall I do?" he again cried. But the old woman told him that unless he brought her at least four bristles she would not cure him, and forthwith she shut the door.

So the poor **** slowly staggered back toward his corral, hoping to find some of the hairs that had been gnawed off. As he passed the little lodge of his neighbor, the Dog, he caught sight of old Wahtsita's fine muzzle-beard. "Ha!" thought he. Then he told the Dog his tale, and begged of him four hairs--"only four!"

"You great, pampered noise-maker, give me some bread, then, fine bread, and I will give you

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the hairs." Whereupon the **** thought, and went to the house of a Trader of Foodstuffs; and he told him also the tale.

"Well, then, bring me some wood with which I may heat the oven to bake the bread," said the Trader of Foodstuffs.

The **** went to some Woods near by. "Oh, ye Beloved of the Trees, drop me dry branches!" And with this he told the Trees his tale; but the Trees shook their leaves and said: "No rain has fallen, and all our branches will soon be dry. Beseech the Waters that they give us drink, then we will gladly give you wood."

Then the **** went to a Spring near by,--and when he saw in it how his head was swollen and he found that it was growing harder, he again began to lament.

"What matters?" murmured the Beloved of the Waters.

Then he told them the tale also.

"Listen!" said the Beings of Water. "Long have men neglected their duties, and the Beloved of the Clouds need payment of due no less than ourselves, the Trees, the Food-maker, the Dog, and the Old Woman. Behold! no plumes are set about our border! Now, therefore, pay to them of thy feathers--four floating plumes from under thy wings--and set them close over us, that, seen in our depths from the sky, they will lure the Beloved of the Clouds with their rain-laden breaths. Thus will our stream-way be replenished and the Trees watered, and their Winds in the Trees will drop

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thee dead branches wherewith thou mayest make payment and all will be well."

Forthwith the Tâkâkâ plucked four of his best plumes and set them, one on the northern, one on the western, one on the southern, and one on the eastern border of the Pool. Then the Winds of the Four Quarters began to breathe upon the four plumes, and with those Breaths of the Beloved came Clouds, and from the Clouds fell Rain, and the Trees threw down dry branches, and the Wind placed among them Red-top Grass, which is light and therefore lightens the load it is among. And when the **** returned and gathered a little bundle of fagots, lo! the Red-top made it so light that he easily carried it to the Food-maker, who gave him bread, for which the Dog gave him four bristles, and these he took to the old Grandmother.

"Ha!" exclaimed she. "Now, child, I will cure thee, but thou hast been so long that thy head will always be welted and covered with proud-flesh, even though healed. Still, it must ever be so. Doing right keeps right; doing wrong makes wrong, which, to make right, one must even pay as the sick pay those who cure them. Go now, and bide whither I bid thee."

When, after a time, the **** became well, lo! there were great, flabby, blood-red welts on his head and blue marks on his temples where they were bruised so sore. Now, listen:

It is for this reason that ever since that time the medicine masters of that people never give cure

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without pay; never, for there is no virtue in medicine of no value. Ever since then cocks have had no bristles on their breasts-only little humps where they ought to be;-and they always have blood-red crests of meat on their heads. And even when a hen lays an egg and a tâkâkâ **** sees it, he begins to tâ-kâ-kâ-â as the ancient of them all did when he saw the brown nut. And sometimes they even pick at and eat these seeds of their own children, especially when they are cracked.

As for mice, we know how they went into the meal-bags in olden times and came out something else, and, getting smoked, became tsothliko-ahâi, with long, bare tails. But that was before the **** cut the tail of the tsothliko Mouse off. Ever since he cried in agony: "Weh tsu yii weh tsu!" like a child with a burnt finger, his children have been called Wehtsutsukwe, and wander wild in the fields; hence field-mice to this day have short tails, brown-stained and hairy; and their chops are all pink, and when you look them in the face they seem always to be crying.

Thus shortens my story.

THE GIANT CLOUD-SWALLOWER
A TALE OF CAÑON DE CHELLY
TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION
Deep down in cañons of the Southwest, especially where they are joined by other cañons, the traveller may see standing forth from or hugging the angles of the cliffs, great towering needles of stone--weird, rugged, fantastic, oftentimes single, as often--like gigantic wind-stripped trees with lesser trees standing beside them--double or treble. Seen suddenly at a turn in the cañon these giant stones startle the gazer with their monstrous and human proportions, like giants, indeed, at bay against the sheer rock walls, protecting their young, who appear anon to crouch at the knees of their fathers or cling to their sides.

Few white men behold these statuesque stones in the moonlight, or in the gray light and white mists of the morning. At midday they seem dead or asleep while standing; but when the moon is shining above them and the wanderer below looks up to them, lo! the moon stands still and these mighty crags start forth, advancing noiselessly. His back is frozen, and even in the yielding sand his feet are held fast by terror--a delicious, ghostly terror, withal! Still he gazes fascinated, and as the shadow of the moonlight falls toward him over the topmost crest, lo, again! its crown is illumined and circled as if by a halo of snow-light, and back and forth from this luminous fillet over that high stony brow, black hair seems to tumble and gather.

Again, beheld in the dawn-light, when the mists are rising slowly and are waving to and fro around the giddy

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columns, hiding the cliffs behind them, these vast pinnacles seem to nod and to waver or to sway themselves backward and forward, all as silently as before. Soon, when the sun is risen and the mists from below fade away, the wind blows more mist from the mesa; you see clouds of it pour from the cliff edge, just behind and above these great towers, and shimmer against the bright sky; but as soon as these clouds pass the crag-nests they are lost in the sunlight around them-lost so fast, as yet others come on, that the stone giants seem to drink them.

Of such rocks, according to their variety and local surroundings, the Zuñis relate many tales which are so ingenious and befitting that if we believed, as the Zuñis do, that in the time of creation when all things were young and soft and were therefore easily fashioned by whatever chanced to befall them--into this thing or that thing, into this plant or that plant, this animal or that, and so on endlessly through a dramatic story longer than Shakespeare or the Bible--we would fain believe also as he does in the quaint incidents of these stories of the time when all things were new and the world was becoming as we see it now.

One of these tales, a variant of others pertaining to particular standing rocks in the west, south, or east, is told of that wonder to all beholders, "El Capitan," of the Canon de Chelly in the north. No one who has seen this stupendous rock column can fail to be interested in the following legend, or will fail to realize how, as this introduction endeavors to make plainer, the Zuñi poet and philosopher of olden times built up a story which he verily believed quite sufficient to account for the great shaft of sandstone and its many details and surroundings.--F. H. C.

Häki Suto, or Foretop Knot, he whose hair was done up over his forehead like a quail's crest, lived among the great cliffs of the north long ago, when the world was new. He was a giant, so tall that

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men called him Lo Ikwithltchunona, or the Cloud-swallower. A devourer of men was he,--men were his meat--yea, and a drinker of their very substance was he, for the cloud-breaths of the beloved gods, and souls of the dead, whence descend rains, even these were his drink. Wherefore the People of the Cliffs sought to slay him, and hero after hero perished thuswise. Wherefore, too, snow ceased in the north and the west; rain ceased in the south and the east; the mists of the mountains above were drunk up; the waters of the valleys below were dried up; corn withered in the fields; men hungered and died in the cliffs.

Then came the Twin Gods of War, Áhaiyúta and Mátsailéma, who in play staked the lives of foes and fierce creatures. "Lo! it is not well with our children, men," said they. "Let us destroy this Häki Suto, the swallower of clouds," said they.

They were walking along the trail which leads southward to the Smooth-rocks-descending.

"O, grandchildren, where be ye wending?" said a little, little quavering voice. They looked,--the younger, then the elder. There on the tip of a grass-stalk, waving her banner of down-stuff, stood their grandmother, Spinner of Meshes.

"The Spider! Our Grandmother Spider!" cried one of the gods to the other. "Ho! grandmother, was that you calling?" shouted they to her.

"Yea, children; where wend ye this noon-day?

"A-warring we are going," said they. "Look now!"

"No beads for to broider your awning
Have fallen this many a morning."

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"Aha, wait ye! Whom ye seek, verily I know him well," said the Spider-woman.

"Like a tree fallen down from the mountain
He lies by the side of the cliff-trail
And feigns to sleep there, yet is wary.
I will sew up his eyes with my down-cords.
Then come ye and smite him, grandchildren."

She ran ahead. There lay Häki Suto, his legs over the trail where men journeyed. Great, like the trunks and branches of pine trees cast down by a wind-storm, were his legs arching over the pathway, and when some one chanced to come by, the giant would call out: "Good morning!" and bid him "pass right along under." "I am old and rheumatic," he would continue, oh, so politely! "Do not mind my rudeness, therefore; run right along under; never fear, run right along under!" But when the hunter tried to pass, kúutsu! Häki Suto would snatch him up and cast him over the cliff to be eaten by the young Forehead-cresters.

The Spider stepped never so lightly, and climbed up behind his great ear, and then busily wove at her web, to and fro, up and down, and in and out of his eyelashes she busily plied at her web.

"Pesk the birds and buzz creatures!" growled the giant, twitching this way and that his eyebrows. which tickled; but he would not stir,--for he heard the War-gods coming, and thought them fat hunters and needs must feign sleepy.

"And these? Ha! ha! They begin to sing, as was their fearless wont sometimes. Häki Suto

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never looked, but yawned and drawled as they came near, and nearer. "Never mind, my children, pass right along under, pass right along under; I am lame and tired this morning," said he.

Áhaiyúta ran to the left. Mátsailéma ran to the right. Häki Suto sprang up to catch them, but his eyes were so blinded with cobwebs that he missed them and feigned to fall, crying: "Ouch! my poor back! my poor back! Pass right along under, my children, it was only a crick in my back. Ouch! Oh, my poor back!" But they whacked him over the head and stomach till he stiffened and died. Then shouting "So ho!" they shoved him over the Cliff.

The Navahos say that the grandmother tied him there by the hair--by his topknot--where you see the white streaks on the pillar, so they say; but it 's the birds that streak the pillar, and this is the way. When Häki Suto fell, his feet drave far into the sands, and the Storm-gods rushed in to the aid of their children, the War-gods, and drifted his blood-bedrenched carcass all over with sand, whence he dried and hardened to stone. When the young ones saw him falling, they forthwith flocked up to devour him, making loud clamor. But the Twain, seeing this, made after them too and twisted the necks of all save only the tallest (who was caught in the sands with his father) and flung them aloft to the winds, whereby one became instantly the Owl, who twists her head wholly around whensoever she pleases, and stares as though frightened and strangled; and another the Falcon became, who

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perches and nests to this day on the crest of his sand-covered father, the Giant Cloud-drinker. And the Falcons cry ever and ever "'Tis father; O father!" ("Tí-tätchu ya-tätchu.")

But, fearing that never again would the waters refreshen their cañons, our ancients who dwelt in the cliffs fled away to the southward and eastward--all save those who had perished aforetime; they are dead in their homes in the cliff-towns, dried, like their cornstalks that died when the rain stopped long, long ago, when all things were new.

Thus shortens my story.

THE MAIDEN THE SUN MADE LOVE TO, AND HER BOYS
OR, THE ORIGIN OF ANGER
Let it be about a person who lived in the Home of the Eagles (K'iákime), under the Mountain of Thunder, that I tell you today. So let it be. It was in the ancient, long-forgotten times. It was in the very ancient times beyond one's guessing. There lived then, in this town, the daughter of a great priest-chief, but she had never, never, never since she was a little child, come forth from the doorway of the house in which she dwelt. No one there in that town had ever seen her; even her own townspeople had never seen her.

Now, day after day at noon-time, when the Sun stood in the mid-heavens, he would look down from the sky through a little window in the roof of her house. And he it was who instant was her lover, and who, descending upon the luminously yellow trail his own rays created, would talk to her. And he was her only companion, for she knew not her own townspeople, neither had she seen them since she was a child. None save only her parents ever saw her.

"Wonder what the cacique's child looks like," the people would say to one another. "She never comes out; no one has seen her since she was a

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little child." And so at last they schemed to get a look at her. One said: "I have it! Let us have a dance for her. Then it may be she will deign to come forth."

The young man who spoke was chief of the dances, and why should he not suggest such a thing? So, his friends and followers agreeing, they began to make plumes of macaw feathers--beautiful plumes they were--for the Plume dance. They set a day, and on that day, in the morning, they danced, with music and song, in the plaza before the house of the great priest-chief where the girl lived. They looked along the top of the house in vain; the girl was not there; only her old parents sat on the roof.

"Oh! I'm so thirsty!" cried the chief of the dance, for he it was who wanted to see the girl.

"Run right in and get a drink," said the girl's old ones. So the young man climbed the ladder and went into the first room. There was no water there; then he went into the second room, but there was no water there; then into the third room, but still he found no water. He looked all around, but saw nothing of the priest-chief's daughter. All the same, she was back in the fourth room, sitting there just as if no dance were going on in the plaza, weaving away at her beautiful trays of colored splints.

Well, the young man went back; they finished their dance, but no one saw anything of the priest-chief's daughter; and when the dancers all returned to their ceremonial chamber they said to

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one another: "Alas! although we danced for her, she came not out to see us!"

Now, in reality, the Sun, who was her lover, and came down each day on a ray of his own light to visit her, loved her so much he would not that she should come forth from her house and be seen of men. Therefore he set an Eagle upon the housetop in a great cage to watch her. He was a very wise old Eagle. He could understand every word that the people said. And he it was that she fed and watered from day to day. Now, the dancers in the ceremonial chamber asked: "What shall we do?"

"Why, let us dance again," said the chief of the dances, "and if we do not succeed, yet again." They did as he said, but with no better success than before; so at last the two Warrior Priests of the Bow grew angry, and although they were the girl's father's own warriors, they ordered the Warrior festival, or Óinahe dance. "Surely," said they, "she will come forth, and if not, let her perish, for how can she refuse the delight of the great Óinahe, where each young man dances and masks himself according to his fancy?"

So, one night the two warriors went out and called to the people to make ready and be happy, for in four days they should dance the Óinahe. When they had done calling, they descended, and the people said to one another: "Surely she will come out when we dance the Óinahe, for she will be delighted with it, and we shall yet see her. She was very beautiful when she was a little girl."

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Then both of the warriors climbed to the top of Thunder Mountain, where Áhaiyúta and his brother, Mátsailéma, the Gods of War, and their grandmother lived in the middle of the summit. As they approached the presence of the two gods, they exclaimed: "She-e!"

"Hai!" the gods replied.

"Our fathers, how is it that ye are, these many days?" they asked, and the Twain replied: "We are happy. Come in; sit down "; and they placed a couple of stools for the warriors. "What is it that ye would of us?" they continued; "for it would be strange if ye came up to our house for nothing."

"True it is," replied the warriors. "It is in our hearts as your two chosen children--as the war-priests of our nation--that our people should be made happy as the days of the year go by; and we therefore think over all the beautiful dances, and now and then command that the most fitting of them shall appear. Now, our children, the people of the Home of the Eagles, are anxious to see our child, the daughter of the priest-chief, who has not come forth from her house, and whom we have never seen since she was a little girl. We have thought to order your dance of the Óinahe, and we would that without fail our daughter should be made to come forth or else die; therefore, our fathers, we have come to consult ye and to ask your advice."

"Aha!" cried the Twain. "Then ye are anxious that this should be, are ye?"

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"Yes," they replied.

"Well, it shall come to pass as ye wish it, and the girl must die if she come not forth at the bidding of the Óinahe!"

"Aha!" ejaculated they both. "Thanks!"

"Yea, it shall be as ye wish. Make our days for us-name the times for preparation, and we shall be with ye to lead the Óinahe. The first time our dance will come forth, and the second time our dance will come forth, and the third time our dance will come forth, but the fourth time our dance comes forth, it will happen as ye wish it. It will certainly be finished as ye wish it.

"Well! Thanks; we go!" (good-by).

"Go ye," said the gods to their children; and they went.

The Eagle was very unhappy with all this. He knew it all, for he understood everything that was said. Next morning he hung his head at the window with great sadness; so the girl, after she had eaten her morning meal, took some dainty bits to the window and said: "Why are you so unhappy? See, I have brought you some food. Eat!"

"I will not eat; I cannot eat," replied the Eagle.

"Why not?" asked she. "I will not harm you; I am happy; I love you just as much as ever."

"Alas, alas! my mother," said the Eagle. "It is not with thoughts of myself that I am unhappy, but your father's two war-priests are anxious that their children shall be made happy, and their

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children, the people of our town under the mountain, are longing to see you. They have said to one another that you never come forth; they have never seen you. Therefore they have ordered the Óinahe, that you may be tempted out. They went up to the home of Áhaiyúta and his younger brother, where they live with their grandmother, on the top of Thunder Mountain, and the two gods have said to them: "It shall come to pass as ye wish it." Therefore they will dance, and on the fourth day of their dancing it shall come to pass as they wish it. Indeed, it shall happen, my poor mother, that you shall be no more. Alas! I can do nothing you can do nothing; why should I tarry longer with you? You must loosen my bonds and let me free."

"As you like," said the girl. "I suppose it must be as you say." Then she loosened the Eagle's bonds, and, straight as the pathway of an arrow, away he flew upward into the sky--even toward the zenith where the Sun rested at noon-time, and whither he soon arrived himself.

"Thou comest," said the Sun.

"I do, my father. How art thou these many days?" said the Eagle to the Sun.

"Happy. Here, sit down." There was a blanket already placed for him, and thereupon he sat; but he never looked to the riff ht nor to the left, nor yet about the Sun-father's splendid home. He said not a word. He only drooped his head, so sad was he.

"What is it, my child?" asked the Sun. "I

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suppose thou hast some errand, else why shouldst thou come? Surely it is not for nothing that thou wouldst come so far to see me."

"Quite true," answered the Eagle. "Alas! my child; alas, my mother! Day after day down in the home under the mountain the people dance that they may tempt her forth; yet she has never appeared. So her father's war-priests are angry and have at last been to see the Twain in their home on Thunder Mountain, and the Twain have commanded that soon it shall come to pass as the people wish or that our beautiful maiden shall perish. Even tomorrow it shall be; so have the Twain said; and when the fourth dance comes out it shall come to pass, and our beautiful maiden shall be no more; thus have the Twain said. I cannot enrich my mother, the daughter of the priest-chief, thy beautiful child, with words of advice, with aid of mine own will; hence come I unto thee. What shall I do?"

"What shalt thou do?" repeated the Sun. "I know it is all as thou hast said. Know I not all these things? The Twain, whose powers are surpassed only by mine own, have they not commanded that it shall be? What shalt thou do but descend at once? Tell her to bathe herself and put on her finest garments tomorrow morning. Then, when the time comes, mount her upon thy shoulders and bear her up to me. Only possibly thou wilt have the great good fortune to reach my house with her. Possibly in thy journey hither it shall come to be, alas! as the Twain have said; for

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have not they said it should be, and are they not above all things else powerful?"

"Well, we'll try to come."

"But I will watch thee when thou art about to reach the mid-heavens."

"Well, I go," said the Eagle, rising.

"Very well," responded the Sun; "happily mayest thou journey." And the Eagle began to descend.

Meanwhile the daughter of the priest-chief opened the skyhole and placed a sacred medicine-bowl half full of water on the floor where the sunlight would shine into it, and where it would reflect the sky, and there she sat looking intently down into the water. By-and-by the Eagle came in sight, and she saw his shadow in the water.

Just then the Sun drew his shield from his face. Oh! how hot it was down there on the earth. The sky was ablaze with light, and no one dared to look at it; and the sands grew so hot that they burned the moccasins of those who walked upon them. Everybody ran into the houses, and the Eagle spread his wings and gently descended, for he too was hot. And when he came near to the house, the girl let him in and welcomed him.

"Thou comest, father," said she.

He only drooped his head and flapped his wings, unable even to speak, so hot was he.

She saw that he was near to fainting. Therefore she fanned him-made cool wind for him with the basket tray and her mantle-and sprinkled cold water upon his head.

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"Thou hast been to the home of our father?" she asked, when he had recovered.

"Yes," replied the Eagle.

"What has he advised that we should do?" asked she.

"This," said the Eagle; "tomorrow morning at the dawn of day thou wilt arise and bathe thyself. Then at sunrise thou shalt put on thy finest garments. The dance will come forth; and then it will come forth the second time, and the third time, and again it will come the fourth time. Then I will mount thee upon my shoulders and bear thee away toward the Sun, who will be waiting for us. It may be that we shall have the good fortune to reach his home; and it may be that we shall get only a little way when everything shall come to pass unhappily and thou wilt be no more." That is what he said to her.

It grew night. The girl collected all the basket-trays that she had made for her father's sacred plumes; these by the fire-light she spread out, and then began to divide them into different heaps.

Now, her parents, who were sitting in the next room, heard her until it was late at night, and they said to each other: "Wonder what it is that keeps our daughter up?" So the old priest-chief arose and entered her room.

"My child, art thou not at rest yet?" asked he.

"No," replied she. "I am dividing the trays I have made for thee. "These," said she, pointing to a heap of yellow ones, "shall pertain to the north-land; these, the blue, to the west-land; the

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red to the land of the south, the white to the east, the variegated to the upper regions, and the black to the regions below. For tomorrow, beloved father, thou shalt see me no more."

"It is well," said the father, for he was a great priest and knew the will of the gods, and to this he always said: "It is well. What, therefore, should I say?" So the old man left her.

Then as morning approached she bathed herself. And the Eagle, looking down, said: "My child, my mother, lie down and rest thyself, for we are about to undertake a long journey. Never fear; I will wake thee at the right time." So she lay down and slept. The Eagle perched himself above her and watched for the dawn.

By-and-by the great star arose. Then he knew that the Sun would soon follow it, and he said: "Mother, arise! dress thyself, for the time is near at hand."

Outside on the house-tops called the two war-priests to their children:

Hasten, hasten! Prepare for the dance!
Hasten, hasten! Eat for the dance!
Hasten, hasten, our children all!"

Then the girl went into another room and brought forth her finest dresses, and these, garment after garment, she put on--not one dress, but many. Upon her shoulders she placed four mantles of snow-white embroidered cotton. Then she said to the Eagle: "Wait a moment; I have yet to think of our children in the Home of the

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Eagles." Therefore she brought forth her basket-bowls of fine meal with which she had been accustomed to powder her face. There was meal of the yellow corn, the blue corn-meal, the red corn-meal, the white corn-meal, the speckled corn-meal, and the black corn-meal. "See," said she, as she regarded the various vessels of meal "my children, by means of these shall ye beautify flesh; by means of these be precious against evil; by means of these shall ye finish preciously your roads of life. I am to be no more. Far off and to an unknown region go I. Possibly I may reach it, and live; probably not reach it, and die. These do I leave as your inheritance. My children, good-by."[1]

Then the Eagle descended. The drum began to sound outside; the dance was coming--for the first time, mind you, not the fourth. Then said the Eagle, as he lowered himself: "Place thyself upon my back; grasp me by the shoulders." And the girl did as she was bidden. She reclined herself lengthwise on the back of the Eagle, and grasped with her left hand his shoulders. "Now, place one foot on one of thighs and the other on the other." She placed one foot on one of his thighs and the other on the other; and the Eagle spread his tail and raised it that she might not fall off. "All ready?" asked he, as the drum of the coming dance sounded outside.

"Yes," said the girl; and they arose.

"Open the wicket!" and shoa! the Eagle

[1. The maiden here addresses mankind generally.]

{p. 440}

spread his wings and away off up into the sky he sprang with the maiden. Round and round, round and round, they circled in the sky, but those below saw nothing as they danced in the shadows of the great houses. The dancers retired. Then they came forth again. Again they retired and came forth. Then the girl said: "Father, slower. Let me sing a farewell song to my people, my children of Earth, that they may know I am going."

The Eagle spread his wings and sailed gently through the air as the maiden sang. Then the people in the plaza below heard the song, and said: "Alas, alas! ye Twain!" said they to the two gods who led the dance. "Our mother, our child, away off through the skies goes she! Ye are fools that ye have let her escape and deceive us!"

Some listened to the song and learned it. Others did not. For the third time the dancers came forth. "Once more have we to dance," said the two gods. "Where are they now?"

"In the mid-heavens," said the people.

"Take it easily, my child," said the Eagle.

Once more are they to come forth. Possibly we will yet have the great good fortune to reach the home of our father." And they sped along through the air, nearer and nearer to the home of the Sun-father, while the dancers below danced harder and harder--many so joyful that. they listened not to the complainings of the people around, but danced only more vigorously.

{p. 441}

Then the dancers retired and came out for the fourth and last time. In the van danced the two gods, their faces blackened with the paint of war, their hands bearing bows and arrows with which to destroy the daughter of the priest-chief.

Yes, they were almost there. Now, the Eagle's heart was high with hope. When the two gods below reached the center of the plaza they turned to the people and asked: "Where are they? Where have they gone?"

"There they are in the skies--almost there," replied the people.

"Humph!" responded the gods. "Suppose they are almost there; they shall never reach the home of our father!"

"Now, then, hurry, brother younger!" exclaimed the elder; "with which hand wilt thou draw the arrow?

"With thy hand, my right," said the younger.

"Very well; with thy hand, my left," said the elder.[1]

So they drew their medicine-pointed arrows to the heads. Tsi-ni-i-i! sang the arrows as they shot through the air. Soon they reached the home of the Sun, crossed one another over his face, and shot downward more swiftly than ever toward the coming Eagle and the maiden. "Alas! my mother, my child," said the Sun as the arrows flew past him and

[1. The twin children of the Sun were, in the days of creation, the benignant guardians of men; but when

the world became filled with envy and war, they were changed by the eight gods of the storms into warriors more powerful than all monsters, gods, or men. The elder one was right-handed, the younger, left-handed; hence the form of expression here used.]

{p. 442}

from him, "thou art no more." And the arrows shot downward on their course.

Tsook! sang the arrow of the elder god as it pierced the back of the girl and entered her heart. Tso-ko! sang the arrow of the younger as it struck in the middle of her back.

"Alas! my mother, my mother," cried the Eagle, "it is over, alas, alas!" said he, as she released her hold, and, fainting, he left her to fall through the air. Over and over, this way and that, fell the beautiful maiden; and as the people strained their eyes, nearer and nearer to the town neath the mountain she fell. Soon, over and over, this way and that, she came falling even with the top of the mountain.

Then the people rushed past one another out of the plaza toward the place where they thought she would strike. And just over there below the Home of the Eagles, where the Waters of the Coyote gush forth from the cliff-base, fell the beautiful maiden.

Then there were born twin children--two wee infants who rolled off into the rubbish and were concealed under sticks and stones.

Down rushed the people, and an Acoma spectator seized her body. "Mine!" cried he, triumphantly, as he raised the body above him.

"Thine!" cried the people, for they had lost the beautiful maiden.

"Ours!" cried the Acomas, one to another, who had come to witness the dances. "Great good fortune this day has smiled on us." And they bore her body away to their pueblo in the east.

{p. 443}

Now, under the other end of Thunder Mountain was the home of the Badgers, and an old Badger who lived there was out hunting. After the people had again gathered in the city, he passed near the Waters of the Coyote and heard, the voices of the infants crying among the rubbish.

"Ah!" said he, "I hear the cry of children. My little boys, my little girls," cried he, "whichever ye may be"; and he hastily searched and found them where they were rolling about and crying among the refuse. "Twins!" cried he. "Boys! Somebody has left them here. Soon he will come back to reclaim them. Let me walk away for a few moments."

So he walked all around, but found no traces of the parents, only the tracks of many men who had gathered near.

"Mine!" said he, as he trotted back; and with soft grass he rubbed them till they were free from the mud and refuse. "Thanks, thanks! Splendid! Children have I, and boys at that, and when I am older grown they will take from me the cares of the chase. Goodness! Thanks! Nothing but boys shall be my children!" So he rubbed them dry and clean with more soft grass, and they stopped crying. Then he took some dry grass and made a bundle and put them in it, and started off for his home in the Red Hills.

The old Badger-woman was up on top of their house looking around, running back and forth and jumping in and out of her doorway. "Hai!" said she; "thou comest?"

{p. 444}

"Yes, hurry!" said the old Badger. Come down and meet me."

"What have you?" asked the Badger-woman, as she ran down to meet him.

"What have I," said the old Badger, "but a couple of wee little children! Here, take them and carry them up to the house."

So the old woman took the bundle of grass and opened it and began to fondle the children. "O my poor little children; poor little babes!" said she.

"Ah! stop playing with them and hurry along!" commanded the old Badger.

So the old woman hurried up to their doorway as fast as possible and ran in. The old Badger followed, and she said to him: "Where in the world did you get these little children?"

"Why," replied he, "I had the greatest luck in the world. I was out hunting, you know, and found these two little fellows down in Coyote Cañon, just this side of those men's houses. They're boys, both of them. When they grow up, old wife, perhaps they can hunt for us, and then I shall rest myself from the labors of the hunt, with plenty of meat for you and me every day of the year. What are you standing there for?" said he. "Why don't you go and get them something to eat and make them a bed?"

"Oh, Yes!" responded the old woman. "My poor little children!" So she made a little nest at the bottom of the hole and laid them on it. Then she ran and fetched some green-corn ears and, picking the kernels off, made some gruel of them, and fed

{p. 445}

the little fellows. So the boy babies ate till they kicked their heels with satisfaction, and that night the old Badger-mother took one in her arms and slept with it, and the old Badger-father slept with the other.

Now, every day they grew as much as the children of men do in a year, so that. in eight days they were as large and knew as much as children usually do in eight years. There was no little animal that they could not kill unfailingly, for they were the children of the Sun, you know. But, alas! they grew weary of killing birds around their doorway, and their old father kept telling them every morning never to go out of sight of their house; and the old woman kept watching them always for fear that they would run off and get lost, or somebody would find and claim them. Yes, they grew impatient of this. They wanted to kill prairie-dogs and cottontails, but they could not get near enough to them. So one night when the old Badger came home they said to him: "Father, come now; do make us some bows and arrows so that we can hunt rabbits, and you and mother can have all that you want to eat."

"All right," replied the old man. And the next day he went off to the Cañon of the Woods, and somehow he managed to cut down a small oak and get a lot of branches for arrows. He brought these home, and that night with a piece of flint, little by little he managed to make each of the boys a bow and some arrows. But when he tried to put feathers on the arrows he was very awkward (for you know badgers don't have fingers like men), so he

{p. 446}

had to take a single feather for each arrow and split it and twist it around the butt of the shaft. That very night, do you know, it snowed; yes, a great deal of snow fell, and the little fellows looked out and said to each other and to the old Badgers:

"Now then, tomorrow we will go rabbit-hunting."

"O mother, make a lunch for us!" they exclaimed.

"Where are you going?" asked the old woman.

"We are going out among the hills and down on the plains where the trees grow, to hunt rabbits."

"O my poor little boys! What will you do?--you will freeze to death, for you have no clothes and no wool grows on your backs."

"Well, mother, we're tough. We will get up tomorrow and wait until the sun shines warm--then we can go hunting."

"How in the world will you carry your food? You have no blanket to wrap it in."

"Oh, you just make some corn-cakes, "answered the boys, "and string them on a little stick, and we can take hold of the middle of the stick and carry them just as well as not."

"Hi-ta!" cried the old woman. "Listen, father." So she made the corn-cakes and strung them on little sticks, and the two boys went to bed. But they couldn't sleep very well, being so impatient to go hunting rabbits, and they kept waking each other and peeping out to see how long it would be before daylight.

In the morning the old Badger got up early and collected a lot of bark which he rubbed until it

{p. 447}

was soft, and then he wove the boys each a curious pair of moccasins that would come half-way up to the knees. So the elder brother put on his moccasins and ran out into the snow. "U-kwatchi!" exclaimed he. "First rate!" So the other little boy put on his bark moccasins, and they took their strings of corn-cakes and bows and arrows, and started off as fast as they could. Well, they went off among the hills at the foot of Thunder Mountain. It was only a little while ere they struck a rabbit trail, and the first arrow they shot killed the rabbit. So they kept on hunting until they had a large number of rabbits and began to get tired. Although there was snow on the ground, the sun was very warm, so they soon forgot all about it until they began to grow hungry, and then they looked up and saw that it was noon-time, because the sun was resting in the mid-heavens. So they went up on top of a high hill, and carried their rabbits there one by one, to find a place where the snow was shallow. Here they brushed a space clear of the snow, and, depositing the rabbits, sat down to eat their corn-cakes, which they laid on a bundle of grass. While they sat there eating, the Sun looked down and pitied his two poor little children. "Wait a bit," said he to himself, "I'll go down and talk to the little fellows, and help them." So by his will alone he descended, and lo! he stood there on the earth just a little way from the two boys,-grand, beautiful, sublime. Upon his body were garments of embroidered cotton; fringed leggings covered his knees, and he

{p. 448}

was girt with many-colored girdles; buckskins of bright leather protected his feet; bracelets and strings of wampum ornamented his neck and arms; turquoise earrings hung from his ears; beautiful plumes waved over his head; his long, glossy hair was held with cords of many colors., into which great plumes of macaw feathers were stuck. Fearful, wonderful, beautiful, he stood. Suddenly one of the boys looked up and saw the Sun-father standing there.

"Blood!" cried he to the other. "Ati! Somebody's coming!"

"Where?" asked the other. "Where?"

"Right over there!"

"Ati!" he exclaimed.

Then the Sun, with stately step, approached them, dazzling their eyes with his beauty and his magnificent dress. So the poor little fellows huddled together and crouched their knees close to their bodies (for they had no clothes on), and watched him, trembling, until he came near. Then one of them said faintly: "Comest thou?" as though he just remembered it.

"Yea, I do, my children," said the Sun. "How are ye these many days?"

"Happy," responded they; but they were almost frightened out of their wits, and kept looking first at the Sun-father and then at each other.

"My children," said the Sun-father tenderly,

"Ye are my own children; I gave ye both life." But they only gazed at him, not believing what he said.

{p. 449}

"Ye are both mine own children," he repeated.

"Is that so?" replied they.

"Yea, that is true; and I saw ye here, and pitied ye; so I came to speak with ye and to help ye."

"Hai!" exclaimed they. But they still looked at each other and at the Sun-father, and did not believe him.

"Yea, ye are verily my children,"' continued the Sun. "I am your own father. Around Thunder Mountain there is a city of men. It is called the Home of the Eagles, and there once lived a beautiful maiden who never left her home, but was always shut in her room. Day after day at midday, just at this time, I came down and visited her in my own sunlight. And a great Eagle always stood and watched her. Now, the townspeople grew anxious to see her, so they danced day after day their most beautiful dances, hoping to entice her to come forth; but she never looked out. So her father's warriors went to the home of Áhaiyúta and his younger brother, Mátsailéma, where they lived with their grandmother, on the middle of Thunder Mountain, and the Twain said that they would go with them and compel her to come forth. Therefore, one day they went and led the dance of the Óinahe. Yet, although they danced four times, she would not come forth, but tried to escape to my home in the heavens on the back of her Eagle; so the two gods shot her, and she fell down the cañon. Then it was that ye two, my children, were born and rolled among the bushes. Now, the people ran down from the village to

{p. 450}

strive for your mother's body, and an Acoma got her and carried her away to the home of his people. An old Badger found ye and brought ye ho, me to his wife, and that is the way ye came to live in the home of the Badgers."

Still the little ones did not believe him.

"Look!" said the Sun-father. "See what I have brought ye!" Then he continued: "Wait; in eight days, in the Home of the Eagles, where your aunts live in the house of your mother's father, there will be a great dance. Go ye thither. Ye will climb up a crooked path and enter the .town through a road under the houses. Do not go out at once into the plaza, but wait until the dancers come out. Then step forth, and over to the left of the plaza ye will see your grandfather's house. It is the greatest house in the city, and the longest ladder leads up to it, and fringes of hair ornament its poles. On the roof ye will see, if the day be warm, two noisy macaws, and there ye will see your mother's sisters--your own aunts. When ye go into the plaza the people will rush up to ye and say: 'Whither do ye come, friends? Will ye not join in the dance?' And ye must say ye will, and then your aunts will come down and dance for the first time, because they are the most beautiful maidens in the pueblo, and very proud. But they will take hold of your hands and dance with ye, and when they have done will ask ye to come into their house; and ye must go.

"Now, the one who sits over in the northern corner is the first sister of your mother, therefore

{p. 451}

your mother; and the one who sits next to her is, your next mother, and so on. There will be eight of them, and the youngest will be like a sister unto ye. They will place stools for ye, and ye must sit down and call them aunts. They will say: 'Certainly, we are the aunts of all good boys in the cities of men who are not our enemies.' And then ye must tell them that they are your real aunts, that this is your house, that your mother used to live there--was the maiden who never went out, but always sat making beautiful basket-trays of many-colored splints. Then ye must lead them into the next room, and the next, and then into the next one, and point to the beautiful basket-trays on the walls. There on the northern wall will hang a yellow tray, on the west wall will hang a blue one, and on the south wall, a red tray, then on the east wall will hang a white tray, and fastened to the ceiling will be a tray of many colors, while a black one will stand under the floor. And then ye must point to the trays and say: 'These our mother made.' Then they will believe and embrace ye and will not want to let ye go; but after ye have sat and eaten with them, ye must come back to the home of the Badgers. And the next day ye must go to Acoma to get your mother. just before ye arrive at the town of Acoma ye will meet an old, wrinkled hag carrying a big bundle of wood on her back. Ye must call her 'grandmother' and greet her pleasantly. She will tell ye she is the dance-priestess of Acoma. Then ye must ask her why she, a woman,

{p. 452}

comes out to gather wood, and she will reply that she gets the wood to make a light. Then ask her why she wishes a light, and she will say to ye that day after day she lights a fire in her ceremonial chamber and that when she reaches home with her wood the young men of her chamber come together and give her food, and that at night she takes the wood to the ceremonial chamber and then sits on a stone seat by the side of the fireplace and builds a fire; that the young men gather in the chamber and prepare for a dance. And when they are ready she takes the bones of your mother from a niche in the west end of the chamber and distributes them among the young men, who carry them in the dance. She gives the skull to the first one, the breast-bone to the next, the ribs to another, and so on until they all have bones to carry in the dance. When the dance is over, she goes around and takes all the bones back again and replaces them in the niche. Then the young men depart for their homes, but some of them sleep there in the chamber, and then she lies down to sleep and to keep guard over the bones.

"Now, when she has told ye these things, ye must ask her if that is all. If she says 'Yes,' kill her; then skin her, and the younger brother must wave his hands over her skin and put it on, and he will look just like the old woman. And he must climb up to the town of the Acomas and enter and do just as the old woman said that she did.

"Now, after the dance is over and he has taken

{p. 453}

back all of the bones and replaced them in the niche, he must lie down and pretend to sleep, and some of the young men will go, home; others will sleep there. When they all begin to snore, he must gather all the bones, and the two dried eyes, and the heart of his mother, and bring them away as fast as ever he can to where his brother waits. And when he gets there,--lo! she will come to life again and be just as she was before she was killed by the Twain. Now, mind, ye must not leave a single bone nor any part, for if ye do, your mother will lack that when she comes to life again."

"Very well," replied the boys, "we will do as you have told us; certainly we will."

"Now, I have given ye with your birth the power to slay all game; but mind that not a single rabbit, nor deer, nor antelope, nor mountain sheep, nor elk--though he be the finest ye have ever seen--shall ye slay, for in that case ye shall perish with your mother."

So the two boys promised they would not. "Of course we will not," said the younger brother. "When one's father commands him, can he disobey?"

"Come hither," said the Sun-father to the younger brother. "Stand here." So the little boy did as he was bidden.

"Lift up thy foot." Then the Sun-father drew off the moccasin of bark and put beautiful fringed leggings upon it, and replaced the bark moccasins with buskins like his own, and tied up the leggings

{p. 454}

with many-colored garters, and dressed him as he was dressed, and placed a beautiful quiver upon his back. But the poor little boys were dark-colored, and their hair was tangled and matted over their heads. Then the Sun-father turned himself about as if to summon some unseen messenger, and created a great warm cloud of mist, with which he cleansed the boys, and lo! their skins became smooth and clear, and their hair fell down their backs in wavy masses. Then the Sun-father arranged the younger brother's hair and placed a plume therein like his own, and beautiful plumes on his head.

"There," said he to the elder; "look at thy younger brother." But the poor little fellow was covered with shame, and dared only steal glances at his brother and the Sun-father. Then the Sun-father dressed the other like the first.

"Ti!" exclaimed they, as they looked at each other and at the Sun-father.

"You are just like Him," they said to each other. But still they did not call him father. Then they fell to conversing.

"Why; he must be our father!" said they to each other. "Mother's face has a black streak right down the middle of it, and father's face is just like it, except that his chin is grizzly." Then they knew that the Sun was their father, and they thanked him for his goodness.

Then said the Sun-father to them: "Mind what I have told ye, my children. I must go to my home in the heavens. Happy may ye always be.

{p. 455}

Ye are my children; I love ye, and therefore I came, to help ye. Run home, now, for your father and mother who reared ye--the Badgers--are awaiting your coming. They will not know ye, so ye must roll up your bark moccasins and take along your strings of corn-cakes together with the rabbits ye have slain."

"How can we carry them?" asked they; "for they are heavy."

Then the Sun-father turned about and passed his hands gently over the heap of dead rabbits. "Lift them now," said he to the children; and when they tried to lift them, lo! they were as light as dry grass-stalks. So they bade their father farewell and started home. When they had gone a little way they stopped to look around, but their father was nowhere to be seen.

Sure enough, when they neared home there were the two old Badgers running around their hole, and the old Badger-father was just getting ready to go out and search, for fear that they had perished from cold. He had just gone down to get some rabbit-skins and other things with which to wrap them, when the old woman, who was up above, shouted down: "Hurry, come out! Somebody is coining!"

"Look!" said one of the children to the other.

"There's our poor mother waiting for us. Hurry up! Let's run, or else our father will come out searching for us."

As they approached they called out: "Poor mother, here you are in the cold waiting for us."

{p. 456}

But she did not recognize them, and only hid her face in her paws from shame, for they were too beautiful to look upon--just like the Sun-father.

"Don't you know us, mother?" asked the Two to the old woman just as the old Badger came out.

"No!" answered she.

"Why, we are your children!

"Ah! my children did not look like you!"

"We are they! Look here!" said they, and they showed the bark moccasins and the strings of corncakes.

"Our poor children!"

"Yes, our father is no other than the Sun-father, and he came down to speak to us today, and he dressed us as you see, just like himself, and he said that our mother used to live over in the Home of the Eagles, that our aunts still live there, and our grandfather, and that our mother used to live there, but the Twain killed her as she was trying to escape on the back of an Eagle. And when she fell into the Cañon of the Coyote we were born, and father here found us and you both reared us."

"Yes, that is very true," said the old Badger. "I know it all; and I know, too, that there will be a dance at the Home of the Eagles in eight days. Tomorrow there will be only seven left, and when the eighth day comes you will both go there to see it. Come up and come down," said they.

So the two entered, but they were ill at ease in their clothes, which they were not used to. And when the old mother had placed soft rabbit-skins on the floor, they doffed their clothing and carefully

{p. 457}

laid it away. Then the whole family ate their evening meal.

"Keep count for us, father, and when the time comes, let us know," said the boys.

So the days passed by until the day before the dance, and that morning the old Badger said to the Two: "Tomorrow the dance will come."

"Very well," replied they; "let us go out and hunt today, that you and mother may have something to eat." So they went forth, and in the evening came back with great numbers of rabbits; and the old mother skinned the rabbits and put some of them to cook over night, so that her children might eat before starting for the town under Thunder Mountain.

At sunrise next morning both dressed themselves carefully, put on their plumes, and started on the pathway that leads around the mountain. They passed the village of K'yátik'ia on their way, and the people marvelled greatly at their beauty and their magnificent dress. And so they followed the road through the Cañon of the Coyotes, thence by the crooked pathway and the covered road under the house into the court of K'iákime. Just as the Sun-father had told them, they found everything there. There was the great house with the tall ladder and the two macaws, and there were the young maidens, their aunts, sitting on the housetop.

And as the dancers came into the court they stepped forward, and then it was that the people first saw and hailed them. The chief of the dance

{p. 458}

came forward and asked them whither they came and if they would not join in the dance. So they assented and came forward to the center of the plaza, and as they began to dance, the young girls arose and the dance chiefs went and escorted them to the dance plaza.

Although they told them, "Dance here," they did not obey. They ran right over to where the two young men were dancing, and took hold of their hands just as the Sun-father had told them it would come to pass. And, in fact, everything happened just as he had said. Yes, they all ran down and grasped the two boys' hands, and when the dance was over and they let go, they said to the two handsome young strangers: "Come up; come in."

"It is well," said the two young men. So they all went up into the house and sat down. Now, all these girls were young, and they were very much pleased with the young men. In fact the two youngest were in love with them already; so they smiled and made themselves very pleasant. Then the first brother arose and went over to the eldest one, and said: "Mother-aunt."

"What is it?" she replied, "for of course throughout the cities of men we, as the daughters of a great priest, are the mothers of children,"--and so on until they came to the last and youngest one, whom they called "little mother-aunt," and she also replied that, however young they might be, still they might be counted the mothers of the children of men.

{p. 459}

No, verily, ye are our parents," replied the Twain. "Beyond this room is another, and beyond that another, and beyond that yet another where lived our mother, who never went forth from her house, but sat day after day making sacred trays. And there even now, according to the colors of the parts of the world hang her trays on the wall."

And so, as the Sun had told them, they finished their story. Then the people were convinced, and sent for the grandfather, the great priest-chief, and when he came they all embraced their new children, admiring greatly their straight, smooth limbs and abundant hair. Then the grandfather dressed them in some of the beautiful ornaments their mother used to wear, and when evening approached they feasted them. And after the meal was over, as the Sun was setting, the two boys arose and said, "We must go."

"Stay with us, stay with us," the young girls and the grandfather said. "Why should you go away from your home? This is your own home."

"No; we said to our mother and father, the Badgers, that we would return to them; therefore we must go," urged the boys. So at last they consented and wished them a happy journey.

"Fear not," said the Two as they started, "for we shall yet go and get our mother. Even tomorrow we shall go to Acoma where the people dance day after day in her memory." Then they departed and returned to the place of the Badgers.

When they arrived at home, sure enough, there

{p. 460}

were their Badger-mother and Badger-father awaiting them outside their holes.

"Oh, here you are!" they cried.

"Yes; how did you come unto the evening?"

"Happily!" replied the old ones. "Come in, come in!" So they entered.

When they had finished eating, the elder brother said: "Mother, father, look ye! Tomorrow we must go after our mother to Acoma. Make us a luncheon, and we will start early in the morning. We are swift runners and shall get there in one day; and the next day we will start back; and the next day, quite early, we will come home again with our mother."

"Very well," replied the Badger-father; "it is well." But the Badger-mother said, "Oh! my poor children, my poor boys!"

So, early next morning, the Badger-mother rolled up some sweet corn-cakes in a blanket, for she did not have to string them now, and together the Twain started up the eastern trail. Their father, the Sun, thought to help them; therefore he lengthened the day and took two steps only at a time, until the two boys had arrived at the Springs of the Elks, almost on the borders of the Acoma country. Then, with his usual speed journeyed the Sun-father toward the Land of Night; and the two boys continued until they arrived within sight of the town of the Acomas-away out there on top of a mountain. Sure enough, there was an old hag struggling along under a load of wood, and as the two brothers came up to her

{p. 461}

they said: "Ha, grandmother, how are you these many days?"

"Happy," replied the old woman.

"Why is it that you, a woman, and an old woman, have to carry wood?"

"Why, I am the priestess of the dance!" answered the old woman.

"Priestess of the dance?

"Yes."

"What dance?"

"Why, there once lived a maiden in the Town of the Eagles, and the two Gods of War shot her one day from the back of an Eagle who was trying to run away with her, and she fell; and one of my young men was the first to grasp her, therefore we dance with her bones every night."

"Well, why do you get this wood?" they asked.

"I light the ceremonial chamber with it."

"What do you do when you get home?"

"Why, the maidens of my clan come and baptize me and feast me; then when the evening comes I go and light a fire with this wood in the chamber and wait until the young men gather; and when everything is ready I go to a niche in the wall and get the maiden's bones and distribute them; and when they have finished the dance I tell them to stop, and they replace the bones."

"What do they do then?" asked the two boys.

"Why, some of them go home, and some sleep right there, and I lie down and sleep there, too."

"Is that all?" inquired the two boys.

"Why, yes, what more should there be?"

{p. 462}

"Nothing more, except that I think we had better kill you now." Thereupon they struck her to the earth and killed her. Then they skinned her like a bag, and the elder brother dressed the younger in the skin, as the Sun-father had directed, and he shouldered the bundle of wood.

"How do I look?" asked he.

"Just like her, for all the world!" responded the other.

"All right," said he; "wait for me here."

"Go ahead," said the elder brother, and away the younger went. He ran with all his might till he came near to the town, and then he began to limp along and labor up the pathway just as the old woman was wont to do, so that everybody thought that he was the old woman, indeed. And sure enough it all happened just as the Sun-father had said it would. When the dance was over, some of the young men went away and others slept right there. There were so many of them, though, that they almost covered the floor. When they all began to snore, the young man arose, threw off his disguise, and stepped carefully between the sleepers till he reached the niche in the wall. Then he put his mother's bones, one by one, into his blanket, felt all around to see that he left nothing, and started for the ladder. He reached it all right and took one, two, three steps; but when his foot touched the fourth rung it creaked, and the sleeping dancers awoke and started.

"Now, when she has told ye these things, ye must ask her if that is all. If she says 'Yes,' kill her; then skin her, and the younger brother must wave his hands over her skin and put it on, and he will look just like the old woman. And he must climb up to the town of the Acomas and enter and do just as the old woman said that she did.

"Now, after the dance is over and he has taken

{p. 453}

back all of the bones and replaced them in the niche, he must lie down and pretend to sleep, and some of the young men will go, home; others will sleep there. When they all begin to snore, he must gather all the bones, and the two dried eyes, and the heart of his mother, and bring them away as fast as ever he can to where his brother waits. And when he gets there,--lo! she will come to life again and be just as she was before she was killed by the Twain. Now, mind, ye must not leave a single bone nor any part, for if ye do, your mother will lack that when she comes to life again."

"Very well," replied the boys, "we will do as you have told us; certainly we will."

"Now, I have given ye with your birth the power to slay all game; but mind that not a single rabbit, nor deer, nor antelope, nor mountain sheep, nor elk--though he be the finest ye have ever seen--shall ye slay, for in that case ye shall perish with your mother."

So the two boys promised they would not. "Of course we will not," said the younger brother. "When one's father commands him, can he disobey?"

"Come hither," said the Sun-father to the younger brother. "Stand here." So the little boy did as he was bidden.

"Lift up thy foot." Then the Sun-father drew off the moccasin of bark and put beautiful fringed leggings upon it, and replaced the bark moccasins with buskins like his own, and tied up the leggings

{p. 454}

with many-colored garters, and dressed him as he was dressed, and placed a beautiful quiver upon his back. But the poor little boys were dark-colored, and their hair was tangled and matted over their heads. Then the Sun-father turned himself about as if to summon some unseen messenger, and created a great warm cloud of mist, with which he cleansed the boys, and lo! their skins became smooth and clear, and their hair fell down their backs in wavy masses. Then the Sun-father arranged the younger brother's hair and placed a plume therein like his own, and beautiful plumes on his head.

"There," said he to the elder; "look at thy younger brother." But the poor little fellow was covered with shame, and dared only steal glances at his brother and the Sun-father. Then the Sun-father dressed the other like the first.

"Ti!" exclaimed they, as they looked at each other and at the Sun-father.

"You are just like Him," they said to each other. But still they did not call him father. Then they fell to conversing.

"Why; he must be our father!" said they to each other. "Mother's face has a black streak right down the middle of it, and father's face is just like it, except that his chin is grizzly." Then they knew that the Sun was their father, and they thanked him for his goodness.

Then said the Sun-father to them: "Mind what I have told ye, my children. I must go to my home in the heavens. Happy may ye always be.

{p. 455}

Ye are my children; I love ye, and therefore I came, to help ye. Run home, now, for your father and mother who reared ye--the Badgers--are awaiting your coming. They will not know ye, so ye must roll up your bark moccasins and take along your strings of corn-cakes together with the rabbits ye have slain."

"How can we carry them?" asked they; "for they are heavy."

Then the Sun-father turned about and passed his hands gently over the heap of dead rabbits. "Lift them now," said he to the children; and when they tried to lift them, lo! they were as light as dry grass-stalks. So they bade their father farewell and started home. When they had gone a little way they stopped to look around, but their father was nowhere to be seen.

Sure enough, when they neared home there were the two old Badgers running around their hole, and the old Badger-father was just getting ready to go out and search, for fear that they had perished from cold. He had just gone down to get some rabbit-skins and other things with which to wrap them, when the old woman, who was up above, shouted down: "Hurry, come out! Somebody is coining!"

"Look!" said one of the children to the other.

"There's our poor mother waiting for us. Hurry up! Let's run, or else our father will come out searching for us."

As they approached they called out: "Poor mother, here you are in the cold waiting for us."

{p. 456}

But she did not recognize them, and only hid her face in her paws from shame, for they were too beautiful to look upon--just like the Sun-father.

"Don't you know us, mother?" asked the Two to the old woman just as the old Badger came out.

"No!" answered she.

"Why, we are your children!

"Ah! my children did not look like you!"

"We are they! Look here!" said they, and they showed the bark moccasins and the strings of corncakes.

"Our poor children!"

"Yes, our father is no other than the Sun-father, and he came down to speak to us today, and he dressed us as you see, just like himself, and he said that our mother used to live over in the Home of the Eagles, that our aunts still live there, and our grandfather, and that our mother used to live there, but the Twain killed her as she was trying to escape on the back of an Eagle. And when she fell into the Cañon of the Coyote we were born, and father here found us and you both reared us."

"Yes, that is very true," said the old Badger. "I know it all; and I know, too, that there will be a dance at the Home of the Eagles in eight days. Tomorrow there will be only seven left, and when the eighth day comes you will both go there to see it. Come up and come down," said they.

So the two entered, but they were ill at ease in their clothes, which they were not used to. And when the old mother had placed soft rabbit-skins on the floor, they doffed their clothing and carefully

{p. 457}

laid it away. Then the whole family ate their evening meal.

"Keep count for us, father, and when the time comes, let us know," said the boys.

So the days passed by until the day before the dance, and that morning the old Badger said to the Two: "Tomorrow the dance will come."

"Very well," replied they; "let us go out and hunt today, that you and mother may have something to eat." So they went forth, and in the evening came back with great numbers of rabbits; and the old mother skinned the rabbits and put some of them to cook over night, so that her children might eat before starting for the town under Thunder Mountain.

At sunrise next morning both dressed themselves carefully, put on their plumes, and started on the pathway that leads around the mountain. They passed the village of K'yátik'ia on their way, and the people marvelled greatly at their beauty and their magnificent dress. And so they followed the road through the Cañon of the Coyotes, thence by the crooked pathway and the covered road under the house into the court of K'iákime. Just as the Sun-father had told them, they found everything there. There was the great house with the tall ladder and the two macaws, and there were the young maidens, their aunts, sitting on the housetop.

And as the dancers came into the court they stepped forward, and then it was that the people first saw and hailed them. The chief of the dance

{p. 458}

came forward and asked them whither they came and if they would not join in the dance. So they assented and came forward to the center of the plaza, and as they began to dance, the young girls arose and the dance chiefs went and escorted them to the dance plaza.

Although they told them, "Dance here," they did not obey. They ran right over to where the two young men were dancing, and took hold of their hands just as the Sun-father had told them it would come to pass. And, in fact, everything happened just as he had said. Yes, they all ran down and grasped the two boys' hands, and when the dance was over and they let go, they said to the two handsome young strangers: "Come up; come in."

"It is well," said the two young men. So they all went up into the house and sat down. Now, all these girls were young, and they were very much pleased with the young men. In fact the two youngest were in love with them already; so they smiled and made themselves very pleasant. Then the first brother arose and went over to the eldest one, and said: "Mother-aunt."

"What is it?" she replied, "for of course throughout the cities of men we, as the daughters of a great priest, are the mothers of children,"--and so on until they came to the last and youngest one, whom they called "little mother-aunt," and she also replied that, however young they might be, still they might be counted the mothers of the children of men.

{p. 459}

No, verily, ye are our parents," replied the Twain. "Beyond this room is another, and beyond that another, and beyond that yet another where lived our mother, who never went forth from her house, but sat day after day making sacred trays. And there even now, according to the colors of the parts of the world hang her trays on the wall."

And so, as the Sun had told them, they finished their story. Then the people were convinced, and sent for the grandfather, the great priest-chief, and when he came they all embraced their new children, admiring greatly their straight, smooth limbs and abundant hair. Then the grandfather dressed them in some of the beautiful ornaments their mother used to wear, and when evening approached they feasted them. And after the meal was over, as the Sun was setting, the two boys arose and said, "We must go."

"Stay with us, stay with us," the young girls and the grandfather said. "Why should you go away from your home? This is your own home."

"No; we said to our mother and father, the Badgers, that we would return to them; therefore we must go," urged the boys. So at last they consented and wished them a happy journey.

"Fear not," said the Two as they started, "for we shall yet go and get our mother. Even tomorrow we shall go to Acoma where the people dance day after day in her memory." Then they departed and returned to the place of the Badgers.

When they arrived at home, sure enough, there

{p. 460}

were their Badger-mother and Badger-father awaiting them outside their holes.

"Oh, here you are!" they cried.

"Yes; how did you come unto the evening?"

"Happily!" replied the old ones. "Come in, come in!" So they entered.

When they had finished eating, the elder brother said: "Mother, father, look ye! Tomorrow we must go after our mother to Acoma. Make us a luncheon, and we will start early in the morning. We are swift runners and shall get there in one day; and the next day we will start back; and the next day, quite early, we will come home again with our mother."

"Very well," replied the Badger-father; "it is well." But the Badger-mother said, "Oh! my poor children, my poor boys!"

So, early next morning, the Badger-mother rolled up some sweet corn-cakes in a blanket, for she did not have to string them now, and together the Twain started up the eastern trail. Their father, the Sun, thought to help them; therefore he lengthened the day and took two steps only at a time, until the two boys had arrived at the Springs of the Elks, almost on the borders of the Acoma country. Then, with his usual speed journeyed the Sun-father toward the Land of Night; and the two boys continued until they arrived within sight of the town of the Acomas-away out there on top of a mountain. Sure enough, there was an old hag struggling along under a load of wood, and as the two brothers came up to her

{p. 461}

they said: "Ha, grandmother, how are you these many days?"

"Happy," replied the old woman.

"Why is it that you, a woman, and an old woman, have to carry wood?"

"Why, I am the priestess of the dance!" answered the old woman.

"Priestess of the dance?

"Yes."

"What dance?"

"Why, there once lived a maiden in the Town of the Eagles, and the two Gods of War shot her one day from the back of an Eagle who was trying to run away with her, and she fell; and one of my young men was the first to grasp her, therefore we dance with her bones every night."

"Well, why do you get this wood?" they asked.

"I light the ceremonial chamber with it."

"What do you do when you get home?"

"Why, the maidens of my clan come and baptize me and feast me; then when the evening comes I go and light a fire with this wood in the chamber and wait until the young men gather; and when everything is ready I go to a niche in the wall and get the maiden's bones and distribute them; and when they have finished the dance I tell them to stop, and they replace the bones."

"What do they do then?" asked the two boys.

"Why, some of them go home, and some sleep right there, and I lie down and sleep there, too."

"Is that all?" inquired the two boys.

"Why, yes, what more should there be?"

{p. 462}

"Nothing more, except that I think we had better kill you now." Thereupon they struck her to the earth and killed her. Then they skinned her like a bag, and the elder brother dressed the younger in the skin, as the Sun-father had directed, and he shouldered the bundle of wood.

"How do I look?" asked he.

"Just like her, for all the world!" responded the other.

"All right," said he; "wait for me here."

"Go ahead," said the elder brother, and away the younger went. He ran with all his might till he came near to the town, and then he began to limp along and labor up the pathway just as the old woman was wont to do, so that everybody thought that he was the old woman, indeed. And sure enough it all happened just as the Sun-father had said it would. When the dance was over, some of the young men went away and others slept right there. There were so many of them, though, that they almost covered the floor. When they all began to snore, the young man arose, threw off his disguise, and stepped carefully between the sleepers till he reached the niche in the wall. Then he put his mother's bones, one by one, into his blanket, felt all around to see that he left nothing, and started for the ladder. He reached it all right and took one, two, three steps; but when his foot touched the fourth rung it creaked, and the sleeping dancers awoke and started.

"Now, when she has told ye these things, ye must ask her if that is all. If she says 'Yes,' kill her; then skin her, and the younger brother must wave his hands over her skin and put it on, and he will look just like the old woman. And he must climb up to the town of the Acomas and enter and do just as the old woman said that she did.

"Now, after the dance is over and he has taken

{p. 453}

back all of the bones and replaced them in the niche, he must lie down and pretend to sleep, and some of the young men will go, home; others will sleep there. When they all begin to snore, he must gather all the bones, and the two dried eyes, and the heart of his mother, and bring them away as fast as ever he can to where his brother waits. And when he gets there,--lo! she will come to life again and be just as she was before she was killed by the Twain. Now, mind, ye must not leave a single bone nor any part, for if ye do, your mother will lack that when she comes to life again."

"Very well," replied the boys, "we will do as you have told us; certainly we will."

"Now, I have given ye with your birth the power to slay all game; but mind that not a single rabbit, nor deer, nor antelope, nor mountain sheep, nor elk--though he be the finest ye have ever seen--shall ye slay, for in that case ye shall perish with your mother."

So the two boys promised they would not. "Of course we will not," said the younger brother. "When one's father commands him, can he disobey?"

"Come hither," said the Sun-father to the younger brother. "Stand here." So the little boy did as he was bidden.

"Lift up thy foot." Then the Sun-father drew off the moccasin of bark and put beautiful fringed leggings upon it, and replaced the bark moccasins with buskins like his own, and tied up the leggings

{p. 454}

with many-colored garters, and dressed him as he was dressed, and placed a beautiful quiver upon his back. But the poor little boys were dark-colored, and their hair was tangled and matted over their heads. Then the Sun-father turned himself about as if to summon some unseen messenger, and created a great warm cloud of mist, with which he cleansed the boys, and lo! their skins became smooth and clear, and their hair fell down their backs in wavy masses. Then the Sun-father arranged the younger brother's hair and placed a plume therein like his own, and beautiful plumes on his head.

"There," said he to the elder; "look at thy younger brother." But the poor little fellow was covered with shame, and dared only steal glances at his brother and the Sun-father. Then the Sun-father dressed the other like the first.

"Ti!" exclaimed they, as they looked at each other and at the Sun-father.

"You are just like Him," they said to each other. But still they did not call him father. Then they fell to conversing.

"Why; he must be our father!" said they to each other. "Mother's face has a black streak right down the middle of it, and father's face is just like it, except that his chin is grizzly." Then they knew that the Sun was their father, and they thanked him for his goodness.

Then said the Sun-father to them: "Mind what I have told ye, my children. I must go to my home in the heavens. Happy may ye always be.

{p. 455}

Ye are my children; I love ye, and therefore I came, to help ye. Run home, now, for your father and mother who reared ye--the Badgers--are awaiting your coming. They will not know ye, so ye must roll up your bark moccasins and take along your strings of corn-cakes together with the rabbits ye have slain."

"How can we carry them?" asked they; "for they are heavy."

Then the Sun-father turned about and passed his hands gently over the heap of dead rabbits. "Lift them now," said he to the children; and when they tried to lift them, lo! they were as light as dry grass-stalks. So they bade their father farewell and started home. When they had gone a little way they stopped to look around, but their father was nowhere to be seen.

Sure enough, when they neared home there were the two old Badgers running around their hole, and the old Badger-father was just getting ready to go out and search, for fear that they had perished from cold. He had just gone down to get some rabbit-skins and other things with which to wrap them, when the old woman, who was up above, shouted down: "Hurry, come out! Somebody is coining!"

"Look!" said one of the children to the other.

"There's our poor mother waiting for us. Hurry up! Let's run, or else our father will come out searching for us."

As they approached they called out: "Poor mother, here you are in the cold waiting for us."

{p. 456}

But she did not recognize them, and only hid her face in her paws from shame, for they were too beautiful to look upon--just like the Sun-father.

"Don't you know us, mother?" asked the Two to the old woman just as the old Badger came out.

"No!" answered she.

"Why, we are your children!

"Ah! my children did not look like you!"

"We are they! Look here!" said they, and they showed the bark moccasins and the strings of corncakes.

"Our poor children!"

"Yes, our father is no other than the Sun-father, and he came down to speak to us today, and he dressed us as you see, just like himself, and he said that our mother used to live over in the Home of the Eagles, that our aunts still live there, and our grandfather, and that our mother used to live there, but the Twain killed her as she was trying to escape on the back of an Eagle. And when she fell into the Cañon of the Coyote we were born, and father here found us and you both reared us."

"Yes, that is very true," said the old Badger. "I know it all; and I know, too, that there will be a dance at the Home of the Eagles in eight days. Tomorrow there will be only seven left, and when the eighth day comes you will both go there to see it. Come up and come down," said they.

So the two entered, but they were ill at ease in their clothes, which they were not used to. And when the old mother had placed soft rabbit-skins on the floor, they doffed their clothing and carefully

{p. 457}

laid it away. Then the whole family ate their evening meal.

"Keep count for us, father, and when the time comes, let us know," said the boys.

So the days passed by until the day before the dance, and that morning the old Badger said to the Two: "Tomorrow the dance will come."

"Very well," replied they; "let us go out and hunt today, that you and mother may have something to eat." So they went forth, and in the evening came back with great numbers of rabbits; and the old mother skinned the rabbits and put some of them to cook over night, so that her children might eat before starting for the town under Thunder Mountain.

At sunrise next morning both dressed themselves carefully, put on their plumes, and started on the pathway that leads around the mountain. They passed the village of K'yátik'ia on their way, and the people marvelled greatly at their beauty and their magnificent dress. And so they followed the road through the Cañon of the Coyotes, thence by the crooked pathway and the covered road under the house into the court of K'iákime. Just as the Sun-father had told them, they found everything there. There was the great house with the tall ladder and the two macaws, and there were the young maidens, their aunts, sitting on the housetop.

And as the dancers came into the court they stepped forward, and then it was that the people first saw and hailed them. The chief of the dance

{p. 458}

came forward and asked them whither they came and if they would not join in the dance. So they assented and came forward to the center of the plaza, and as they began to dance, the young girls arose and the dance chiefs went and escorted them to the dance plaza.

Although they told them, "Dance here," they did not obey. They ran right over to where the two young men were dancing, and took hold of their hands just as the Sun-father had told them it would come to pass. And, in fact, everything happened just as he had said. Yes, they all ran down and grasped the two boys' hands, and when the dance was over and they let go, they said to the two handsome young strangers: "Come up; come in."

"It is well," said the two young men. So they all went up into the house and sat down. Now, all these girls were young, and they were very much pleased with the young men. In fact the two youngest were in love with them already; so they smiled and made themselves very pleasant. Then the first brother arose and went over to the eldest one, and said: "Mother-aunt."

"What is it?" she replied, "for of course throughout the cities of men we, as the daughters of a great priest, are the mothers of children,"--and so on until they came to the last and youngest one, whom they called "little mother-aunt," and she also replied that, however young they might be, still they might be counted the mothers of the children of men.

{p. 459}

No, verily, ye are our parents," replied the Twain. "Beyond this room is another, and beyond that another, and beyond that yet another where lived our mother, who never went forth from her house, but sat day after day making sacred trays. And there even now, according to the colors of the parts of the world hang her trays on the wall."

And so, as the Sun had told them, they finished their story. Then the people were convinced, and sent for the grandfather, the great priest-chief, and when he came they all embraced their new children, admiring greatly their straight, smooth limbs and abundant hair. Then the grandfather dressed them in some of the beautiful ornaments their mother used to wear, and when evening approached they feasted them. And after the meal was over, as the Sun was setting, the two boys arose and said, "We must go."

"Stay with us, stay with us," the young girls and the grandfather said. "Why should you go away from your home? This is your own home."

"No; we said to our mother and father, the Badgers, that we would return to them; therefore we must go," urged the boys. So at last they consented and wished them a happy journey.

"Fear not," said the Two as they started, "for we shall yet go and get our mother. Even tomorrow we shall go to Acoma where the people dance day after day in her memory." Then they departed and returned to the place of the Badgers.

When they arrived at home, sure enough, there

{p. 460}

were their Badger-mother and Badger-father awaiting them outside their holes.

"Oh, here you are!" they cried.

"Yes; how did you come unto the evening?"

"Happily!" replied the old ones. "Come in, come in!" So they entered.

When they had finished eating, the elder brother said: "Mother, father, look ye! Tomorrow we must go after our mother to Acoma. Make us a luncheon, and we will start early in the morning. We are swift runners and shall get there in one day; and the next day we will start back; and the next day, quite early, we will come home again with our mother."

"Very well," replied the Badger-father; "it is well." But the Badger-mother said, "Oh! my poor children, my poor boys!"

So, early next morning, the Badger-mother rolled up some sweet corn-cakes in a blanket, for she did not have to string them now, and together the Twain started up the eastern trail. Their father, the Sun, thought to help them; therefore he lengthened the day and took two steps only at a time, until the two boys had arrived at the Springs of the Elks, almost on the borders of the Acoma country. Then, with his usual speed journeyed the Sun-father toward the Land of Night; and the two boys continued until they arrived within sight of the town of the Acomas-away out there on top of a mountain. Sure enough, there was an old hag struggling along under a load of wood, and as the two brothers came up to her

{p. 461}

they said: "Ha, grandmother, how are you these many days?"

"Happy," replied the old woman.

"Why is it that you, a woman, and an old woman, have to carry wood?"

"Why, I am the priestess of the dance!" answered the old woman.

"Priestess of the dance?

"Yes."

"What dance?"

"Why, there once lived a maiden in the Town of the Eagles, and the two Gods of War shot her one day from the back of an Eagle who was trying to run away with her, and she fell; and one of my young men was the first to grasp her, therefore we dance with her bones every night."

"Well, why do you get this wood?" they asked.

"I light the ceremonial chamber with it."

"What do you do when you get home?"

"Why, the maidens of my clan come and baptize me and feast me; then when the evening comes I go and light a fire with this wood in the chamber and wait until the young men gather; and when everything is ready I go to a niche in the wall and get the maiden's bones and distribute them; and when they have finished the dance I tell them to stop, and they replace the bones."

"What do they do then?" asked the two boys.

"Why, some of them go home, and some sleep right there, and I lie down and sleep there, too."

"Is that all?" inquired the two boys.

"Why, yes, what more should there be?"

{p. 462}

"Nothing more, except that I think we had better kill you now." Thereupon they struck her to the earth and killed her. Then they skinned her like a bag, and the elder brother dressed the younger in the skin, as the Sun-father had directed, and he shouldered the bundle of wood.

"How do I look?" asked he.

"Just like her, for all the world!" responded the other.

"All right," said he; "wait for me here."

"Go ahead," said the elder brother, and away the younger went. He ran with all his might till he came near to the town, and then he began to limp along and labor up the pathway just as the old woman was wont to do, so that everybody thought that he was the old woman, indeed. And sure enough it all happened just as the Sun-father had said it would. When the dance was over, some of the young men went away and others slept right there. There were so many of them, though, that they almost covered the floor. When they all began to snore, the young man arose, threw off his disguise, and stepped carefully between the sleepers till he reached the niche in the wall. Then he put his mother's bones, one by one, into his blanket, felt all around to see that he left nothing, and started for the ladder. He reached it all right and took one, two, three steps; but when his foot touched the fourth rung it creaked, and the sleeping dancers awoke and started.

"Somebody is going up the ladder!" they exclaimed to one another. Then the young man ran

{p. 463}

up as fast as ever he could, but alas! he dropped one of his mother's eyes out of the blanket. He kept on running until he reached the foot of the hill upon which the town stood; and when he came to the spring down on the plains he stopped to drink, and lo! his mother had come to life!

"Ahwa!" uttered the mother, "I'm tired and I don't know what is the matter with my eyes, for things don't look straight."

Then the young man looked at his mother. She was more beautiful than all the other girls had been, but one of her eyes was shrunken in. "Alas! my mother," said he, "I have dropped one of your eyes; but never mind, you can comb your hair down over it and no one will ever know the difference.

As soon as they were rested they started again, and soon came to where the elder brother stood awaiting them. When he looked at his mother, he saw that one of her eyes had been left.

"Didn't I tell you beforehand to be careful? said he. "Poor mother; you have lost one of her eyes!

"Well, it can't be helped; never mind, she can comb her hair down over the eye that is dry and no one will ever know the difference."

"That's so; it can't be helped. Now let's go," said the elder brother, and they all started.

When they arrived at the Waters of the Elks, the younger brother said: "Let's camp here."

"No, let's run home," returned the elder brother.

"No, let's camp. Our poor mother will get

{p. 464}

tired, and, besides, she can see nothing of the country we are going through."

And although the elder brother urged that they should go on, the younger insisted that they should stay; therefore they camped. The next day they continued their journey until they came near to the City of the Heights, not far from their own home; and as they journeyed, the deer, the antelope, the elks, and the mountain sheep were everywhere.

"Just look at that buck!" exclaimed the younger brother, clutching his bow. Let's shoot him."

"No, no!" said the other; Do you not remember that our father forbade us?" So they went on until they came to some trees, and as it was noonday they sat down to eat. Now, the fine game animals circled all around and even came up near enough to smell them, and stood gazing or cropping the grass within a few steps of them.

"Just look at that splendid antelope!" cried the younger brother, and he nocked an arrow quicker than thought.

"No, no, no!" cried the elder, "you must not shoot it."

"Why not? Here our poor mother has nothing but corn-cakes to eat, with all this meat around us." And before his brother could speak another word, he drew his arrow to the head, and tsi! it pierced the heart of the great antelope and it fell dead.

Now, all the great animals round about grew angry when they saw this, and tene! they came thundering after the little party. So the two fools, forgetting all about their poor mother, jumped up

{p. 465}

and ran away as fast as they could and climbed a big tree to the very top. When they straddled a big branch and looked down, the great deer had trampled their poor mother to death. Then they gathered around the foot of the tree to batter its trunk with their sharp horns, but they could not stir it. Presently some big-horn bucks came running along. Thle-ee-la-a-a! they banged their horns against the butt of the tree until it began to split and tremble, and presently bang! went the tree, and the boys fell to the ground. Then the mountain sheep and the great bucks trampled and tore and speared them with their sharp horns, and tossed them from one to another and lacerated them with their hoofs until they were like worn-out clothing--all torn to pieces except the head of the elder brother which none of them would touch. And there the head lay all through the winter; and the next spring there was nothing but a skull left of the two brothers.

Now, off in the valley that led to Thunder Mountain, just where it turns to go south, stood the village of K'yátik'ia, and down in the bottom of the valley the great priest-chief of K'yátik'ia had his fields of corn and melons and squashes. Summer came, and the squashes were all in bloom, when the rain poured down all over the country; and thus, little by little, the skull was washed until it fell into a stream and went bumping along on the waters even till it came to the fields of corn and pumpkins and melons in the planting of the priest-chief of K'yátik'ia.

{p. 466}

Now, when the pumpkin and squash vines were in bloom, the priest-chief's daughter, who was as beautiful as you could look upon, went down every morning just at daylight to gather squash-flowers with which to sweeten the feast bread. The morning after the rain had passed over, very early, she said to her younger sister: "Stay here and grind meal while I run down to the squash patch to pick a lot of flowers." So she took her mantle with her and started for the fields. She had not been picking flowers long when a voice rose from the middle of the vines

"Ä-te-ya-ye,
Ä-te-ya-ye.
E-lu-ya."

Here are more flowers,
Here are more flowers.
Beautiful ones.

"Ah!" said the girl, "I wonder what that is!"

So she put her blanket of flowers down as soon as possible and started to hunt. As she approached the vine where the skull had been wont to lie, lo! there was a handsome young man!

"What are you doing?" asked the young man.

"Gathering flowers," said she.

"If you will promise to take me home with you, I will help you," said the young man.

"Very well," replied the girl.

"Will you surely do it?" inquired the young man.

"Yes," said she, and lo! the young man reached out his hand and there was a great heap of flowers

{p. 467}

already plucked before him! And while they were yet talking, the Sun rose; and as its first rays touched him he began to sink, until there before the girl was nothing but a hideous old skull.

"Oh, dear!" cried she; "but I promised to take it, and I suppose I must." So she took the skull up with the tips of her fingers and put it into the blanket among the flowers, and started for home. Then she entered an inner room of the house, and taking the skull carefully out of the blanket, placed some cotton in a large new water-jar, and laid the skull upon it. Then she covered the jar with a flat stone and went to work grinding meal.

When the Sun was setting, a voice came from the jar.

"Take me down, quick!" And the girl took the skull down and placed it on the floor, and as it grew dark there stood the same handsome young man as before, magnificently clothed, with precious stones and shells all about him, just as the Sun-father had dressed him. And the girl was very happy, and told him she would marry him.

Next morning, just as the Sun rose, the young man vanished, and nothing but the old white skull lay on the floor. So the girl placed it in the jar again, and taking up another water-jar went out toward the spring. Now, her younger sister went into the room and espied the jar. "I wonder what sister has covered this jar up so carefully for," said she to herself; and she stepped up to the jar and took the lid off.

"Ati!" cried she. "O dear! O dear!" she

{p. 468}

screamed. For when she looked down into the jar there was a great rattlesnake coiled up over the smooth white skull.

So she ran and called her father and told him in great fright what she had seen.

"Ah!" said the father, for he was a very wise priest-chief, "thou shouldst not meddle with things. Thou shouldst keep quiet," said he. He then arose and went into the room. Then he approached the jar, and, looking down into it, said: "Have mercy upon us, my child, my father. Become as thou art. Disguise not thyself in hideous forms, but as thou hast been, be thou." And the skull rattled against the sides of the jar in assent.

"It is well that thou shouldst marry my daughter. And we will close this room that thou shalt never come forth"; and again the skull clattered and nodded in glad assent.

So when the young girl returned, the voice came forth from the jar again, and said: "Close all the windows and doors, and bring me raw cotton if thy father have it, for he has consented that I marry you and throw off my disguise."

Then the girl gladly assented, and ran to get the cotton, and brought a great quantity in the room. Then when the night came the voice called once more: "Take me down!" The girl did as she was bidden, and the young man again stood before her, more handsome than ever. So he married the girl and both were very happy.

And the next morning when the Sun rose the young man did not again change his form, but remained

{p. 469}

as he was, and began to spin cotton marvellously fine and to weave blankets and mantles of the most beautiful texture, for in nothing could he fail, being a child of the Sun-father and a god himself.

So the days and weeks passed by, and the Sun-father looked down through the windows in sorrow and said: "Alas! my son; I have delivered thee and yet thou comest not to speak with thy father. But thou shalt yet come; yea, verily, thou shalt yet come."

So in time the beautiful daughter of the priest-chief gave birth to two boys, like the children of the deer. As day succeeded day, they grew larger and wiser and their limbs strengthened until they could run about, and thus it happened that one day in their play they climbed up and played upon the house-top and on the ground below. Thus it was that the people of K'yátik'ia saw for the first time the two little children; and when they saw them they wondered greatly. Of course they wondered greatly. Our grandfathers were fools.

"Who in the world has married the priest-chief's daughter?" everybody asked of one another. Nobody knew; so they called a council and made all the young men go to it, and they asked each one if he had secretly married the priest-chief's daughter; and every one of them said "No," and looked at every other one in great wonder.

"Who in the world can it be? It maybe that some stranger has come and married her, and it may be that he stays there." So the council decided that it would be well for him and the girl and

{p. 470}

their two little ones to die, because they had deceived their people. Forthwith two war-priests mounted the house-tops and commanded the people to make haste and to prepare their weapons. "Straighten your arrows, strengthen the backs of your bows, put new points on your lances, harden your shields, and get ready for battle, for in four days the daughter and grandchildren of the priest-chief and the unknown husband must die!"

And when the priest-chief's daughter heard the voices of the heralds, she asked her younger sister, who had been listening, what they said. And the younger sister exclaimed: "Alas! you must all die!" and then she told her what she had heard.

Now, the young man called the old priest and told him that he knew what would happen, and the old priest said: "It is well; let the will of the gods be done. My people know not the way of good fortune, but are fools and must have their way."

Therefore for two days the people labored at their weapons, and on the morning of the third day they began to prepare for a feast of victory. Then said the young man to his wife: "My little mother, dearly beloved, on the morrow I must go forth to meet my father"; for he suddenly remembered that he had neglected his father.

When the Sun had nearly reached the mid-heavens, the young man said to his wife: "Go up and open the skyhole. Farewell!" said he, and he suddenly became a cloud of mist which whirled round and round and shot up like a whirlwind in the rays of sunlight.

{p. 471}

When he neared the Sun, the Sun-father said nothing, and the young man waited outside in shame. Then said the Sun-father in pretended anger: "Come hither and sit down. Thou hast been a fool. Did I not command thee and thy brother?" And the young man only bent his head and said: "It is too true."

Then the Sun-father smiled gently, and said: "Think not, neither be sad, my child. I know wherefore thou comest, and I remember how thou didst try to prevail upon thy younger brother to obey my commandments; and that it might be well I caused thee to forget me, and to come unto the past that thou hast come unto. Thou shalt be a god, and shalt sit at my left hand. Forever and ever shalt thou be a living good unto men, who will see thee and worship thee in the evening. And through thy will shall rain fall upon their lands. True, I had designed, had my children been wiser, that thou shouldst remain with them and enrich them with thy precious shells and stones, with thy great knowledge and good fortune. But those are men very unwise and ungrateful, therefore shalt thou and thy children, and even thy wife, be won from thy earth-life and sit by my left hand. Descend. Make four sacred hoops and entwine them with cotton. Make four sacred wands, such as are used in the races. Hast thou an unembroidered cotton mantle?"

"I have," replied the young man.

"It is well. This evening spread it out and place at each of its four corners one of the sacred hoops

{p. 472}

and wands. Place all thereon that thou valuest. Leave not a precious stone nor yet a shell to serve as parentage for others, but place all thereon. The people will gather around thy father's house and storm it, and then retire and storm it again. Now, when the people approach the house, sit ye down, one at each of the four corners; grasp them and lift them upward, and gradually ye will be raised. Then when the people approach nearer, lift them upward once more, and ye will be raised yet farther. And when they begin to mount the ladders, lift ye again, and yet again, and ye shall come unto my country."

So the young man descended. No change was visible in the old priest-chief's countenance. He had caused gay preparations to go forward for the festival, for a priest knows that all things are well, and he makes no change in his mind or actions. And when he asked the young man what the Sun-father had said to him, the only reply was: "It shall be well. Tomorrow we go to dwell forever at the home of the Sun-father."

Early in the morning the two Priests of War mounted to the house-tops and called out: "Hasten, hasten! For the time has come and the people must gather, each carrying his weapons, for today the children of our priest-chief must die!"

So, after the morning meal, all gathered at the council chambers of the warriors, and a great company they were. The Sun had risen high. Brightly painted shields glittered in his light. Long lances stood black with paint like the charred trunks of a burned forest; and the people raised their war-clubs

{p. 473}

and struck them against one another until the din was like thunder.

"Ho-o-o!" sounded the clash of weapons and the war-cries of the people, and in the home of the priest-chief they knew they were coming. All night long they had been preparing; the young man had placed all their belongings upon the blanket, and now one by one they sat down. The wife and the husband grasped two corners, the children grasping the two others. They lifted them and slowly arose toward the ceiling. Once more, as the people came nearer, they lifted the corners and neared the skyhole. When again they lifted the corners, they passed above the roof, and the people saw their shadows cast upon the ground.

"Quick, quick!" shouted the young men. "See the shadow; they are escaping!"

Already the arrows began to whistle past them, but the Sun cast his shield beneath them, and the arrows only glanced away or flew past. Once more they drew the corners of the mantle upward, and as they rose higher and higher, the people, old and young, began to quarrel and fell to beating one another, and to fighting among themselves. The old ones called the young ones fools for attempting the life of a god, and the young ones in turn called the old ones fools for counselling them to attempt the life of a god.

"Thus shall ye ever be," cried the young man, "for ye are fools! Your father, the Sun, had intended all things for your good, but ye were fools; therefore with me and mine will pass away your peace and your treasures."

{p. 474}

My children, at sunset have you not seen the little blue twinkling stars that sit at the left hand of the Sun as he sinks into night? Thus did it come to pass in the days of the ancients, and thus it is that only in the east and the west where the Sun rises and sets, even on the borders of the great oceans, may we find the jewels whereby we decorate our persons. And ever since then, my children, the world has been filled with anger, and even brothers agree, then disagree, strike one another, and spill their own blood in foolish anger.

Perhaps had men been more grateful and wiser, the Sun-father had smiled and dropped everywhere the treasures we long for, and not hidden them deep in the earth and buried them in the shores of the sea. And perhaps, Moreover, all men would have smiled upon one another and never enlarged their voices nor strengthened their arms in anger toward one another.

Thus short is my story; and may the corn-stalks grow as long as my stretches, and may the will of the Holder of the Roads of Life shelter me from dangers as he sheltered his children in the days of the ancients with the shield of his sunlight.

It is all finished. (Tenk'ia.)

And that is why compassion for all living things NOW.
Is so important to me to try and show others before everyone just blindly follows their pursuits to vanity and riches.
We all have little time to see before we our no longer here to make any difference to this living world.

VERY TRUE -

I'm going off topic somewhat with these next post, but i find them so enlightning that i would like to share these glimpses into another cultures dealing supposedly with the american indians and others in the pacific islands area especially the western coast indians as far north as canada and possiblt even farther. it will explain itself so i will star:

CHAPTER II.
IDENTITY OF THE TARTARS AND NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS; OR, THE ROAD TO AMERICA, AND THE PEOPLE IN IT.
THE Tunguse, Mongolians, and a great part of the Turkish race, formed originally, according to all external organic tokens, as well as the elements of their languages, but one people, closely allied with the Esquimaux, the Skräling, or dwarf of the Norsemen, and the races of the New World. This is the irrefutable result to which all the more recent inquiries in anatomy and physiology, as well as comparative philology and history, have conduced. All the aboriginal Americans have those distinctive tokens which forcibly recall their neighbours dwelling on the other side of Behring's Straits. They have the four-cornered head, high cheek-bones, heavy jaws, large angular eye-cavities, and 'a retreating forehead. The skulls of the oldest Peruvian graves exhibit the same tokens as the heads of the nomadic tribes of Oregon and California. The different American languages, as has been already proved by Albert Gallatin in his minute researches, have such an identity, that we can, however varied the vocabulary, at once reduce them to

p. 8

one original source. 1 In fact, all researches as to the manner in which America was first populated lead to one inevitable conclusion. Since the earth has been inhabited, these rude tribes dwelt in their separate divisions of Asia and America. This rough mass has, however, during the course of centuries, been separated by different corporeal and mental formative influences into different nations, each with peculiar bodily distinctions, the natural consequence of higher mental influences; and various languages have been developed; yet all of these distinctions, whether of body or of language, of manner or custom, present internal evidence of an original unity. This unity manifests itself in their genealogies, the oldest historical system of all nations by which the identity of the Turks, Mongolians, and Tunguse is clearly proved. Among these Tartaric hordes we find absolutely the same relation as that which existed among the German nations. The Ostrogoths and Visigoths, the Westphalians, the northern and southern nations, belonged originally, notwithstanding their different destinies and culture, to the internal being of one and the same German race.

TUNGUSE EASTERN BARBARIANS.
All the numerous Tartaric hordes dwelling about the north-east of the Central Empire were termed by


p. 9

the civilised natives of the South "Tonghu," "Eastern Red Men," or savages, from which appellation we derive our word Tunguse, 1 which has been subsequently applied to an extremely limited portion of the entire race. Among these Mongolian nations, many centuries before Zenghis Khan (Tschinggs Chakan), the Mongolians proper were distinguished by the differently-written name of Wog or Mog, and divided into seven hordes, dwelling in different places, extending from the Corean Peninsula to the distant north, over the river Amo to the eastern sea; that is to say, to the Gulf of Anadir or Behring's Straits. The nomadic tribes dwelling more directly to the north they termed Peti, or Northern Savages, and many tribes were reckoned by them as belonging either to the Tunguse or Peti. During the course of many centuries the Chinese acquired a surprisingly accurate knowledge of the north-east coast of Asia, extending, as their records in astronomy and natural history prove, to the sixty-fifth degree of latitude, and even to the Arctic Ocean. 2 Among other accounts, they tell us of a land very far from the Central Kingdom, whose inhabitants, termed Kolihan or Chorran, sent during the latter part of the seventh century ambassadors to the Court at Singan. This land lay on the North Sea; and still further to the north, on the other side of that sea, the days were so



p. 10

long, and the nights in proportion so short, that the sun set and rose again "before one could roast a leg of mutton." 1

The Chinese were well acquainted with the customs of these tribes, and describe them to us as resembling the Tsohuktschi or Koljuschens 2 of the present day, and other tribes of North-eastern Asia and North-western America. They had neither oxen, sheep, nor other domestic animals, but there were tribes among them which employed deer, which were there very numerous. These deer of which they speak were undoubtedly reindeer. They knew nothing of agriculture, but lived by hunting and fishing, as well as on the root of a certain plant which grew there in abundance. Their dwellings were constructed of twigs and wood, their clothes were made of furs and feathers. They laid their dead in coffins, which they placed in trees in the mountains. 3 They were ignorant of any subdivisions of the year. The Chinese were also as well acquainted with those dwelling more directly to the east, as with these inhabitants of the north.

The limits of the Chinese Empire extended, under the




p. 11

dynasty of Tschen, in the time of David and Solomon, to the Eastern Ocean. They knew and frequented the numerous groups of islands in the Pacific Ocean, for the sake of trade. The natives inhabiting these islands sent, on their part, messengers to the coast with presents, which are registered in the Chinese annals. It also frequently happened that China sent a portion of its discontented or superfluous population to these thinly-inhabited islands, as well as to Japan, Lieu-kuei, and Formosa, of which we have accurate historical proofs. The tribe of the Ainos, or Jebis, extending from Japan to Kamtschatka, over the Kurilean and Aleutian, or Fox Islands, to the distant north, where it touched upon the nearly-allied Esquimaux, must naturally have astonished the occasional colonists and merchants who found their way thither, by a singular distinctive bodily phenomenon, namely, an exceeding growth of hair on their bodies. Such was the case, and they were termed Mau-schin (or, according to the Japanese mode of pronouncing Chinese writing, Mosin)--i.e., Hairy People, and also, from the great number of sea-crabs found in their region, Hi-ai (in Japanese, Jeso), or Crab-Barbarians. 1 And as these barbarians, like the inhabitants of the southern islands, were in the habit of tattooing figures upon their skin, they were also termed by the Chinese Wen-schin, or Painted People. In the course of time other names were also added, but any one acquainted with the nature


p. 12

of that part of the world and its inhabitants, readily recognises, despite the varied appellations, the same race of men in the Ainos. We are indebted to the numerous embassies which in earlier times passed between China and Japan for the greater part of the information contained in their Year-Books, relating to the north and south-easterly islands and nations. These embassies brought back with them many traditionary accounts, which were strongly tinged with fable, and yet not entirely devoid of truth. For instance, when they speak of the land of Tschutschu, or dwarfs, very far to the south of Japan, whose inhabitants, black and ugly and naked, kill and devour all strangers, we readily recognise the natives of Papua or New Guinea.

The Ainos were first described, under the name of Hairy People, in "The Book of Mountains and Seas," a Chinese work, written in the second or third century, and richly adorned with wonderful legends. They dwelt, according to this book, in the Eastern Sea, and were completely overgrown with hair. 1 Some of these people came, A.D. 659, in company with a Japanese embassy, to China; they are termed in the Year-Book of Tang, "Crab-Barbarians," 2 after which this note fellows:--"They had long beards, and dwelt in the



p. 13

north-east of Japan; they laid bows, arrows, and deer-skins as presents before the throne. These were the inhabitants of Jeso, which island had, not long before, been subdued and rendered tributary by the Japanese." The report of the Japanese embassy, in their own domestic returns, is, however, much more copious and satisfactory. The queries of the Heaven's Son of Tang, and the replies of the Japanese ambassador, are there narrated as follows:--

The Ruler of Tang.--"Does the heavenly Autocrat find himself in constant tranquillity?"

The Ambassador.--"Heaven and earth unite their gifts, and constant tranquillity ensues."

The Ruler of Tang.--"Are the Government officers well appointed?"

The Ambassador.--"They have the grace of the Heavenly Ruler, and are well."

The Ruler of Tang.--"Is there internal peace?"

The Ambassador.--"The Government harmonises with heaven and earth--the people have no care."

The Ruler of Tang.--"Where lies the land--this Jeso?"

The Ambassador.--"To the north-east."

The Ruler of Tang.--"How many divisions has it?"

The Ambassador.--"Three; the most distant we call Tsgaru, the next Ara, and the nearest Niki. To the last belong these men here before us. They appear yearly with their tribute at the court of our king."

The Ruler of Tang.--"Does this land produce corn?"

The Ambassador.--"No; its inhabitants live on flesh."

The Ruler of Tang.--"Have they houses?"

The Ambassador.--"No; they live in the mountains, under trunks of trees."

p. 14

This extract is from the Nipponki, or Japanese Annals, from 661 until 696, which were collected in the year 720. They embrace thirty volumes octavo. The portions translated by Hoffman are to be found in vol. xxvi. p. 9; of Siebold's "Japanese Archives," viii. 130.

Since this time, in the seventh century, many wars have been undertaken against these northern border barbarians by their more civilised neighbours, and generally with success. But the inhabitants of Jeso always rose again after a short time, drove forth the Japanese invaders from the land, and gave themselves up again to their wild, original freedom, like their ancestors on the neighbouring island. Even at the present day the Japanese govern only a very small portion of Jeso, i.e., the gold district of this remarkably rich island. Jeso readily leads to an acquaintance with Kamtschatka, which country was also described about the same period, in the following manner: 1--

KAMTSCHATKA IN THE TIME OF TANG.
Lieu-kuei (Loo-choo), or Hing-goci, as the Kamtschadales of the present day term their fellow-countrymen dwelling on the Penschinisch Bay, is situated, according to the Chinese Year-Books, fifteen thousand Chinese miles distant from the capital, which, according to the measurement of the celebrated astronomer Ihan, in the time of Tang, gives about three hundred and thirty-eight to one of our grades--the Chinese grades being rather smaller than our geographical. Now, Sigan, the capital of China during the dynasty of Tang, lies in the district Schensi, 34° 15´ 34″ north latitude, and 106° 34´ east longitude from Paris. Peter and Paul's Haven, on the contrary, according to Preuss, lies 53° 0´ 59″ north latitude, and 153° 19´ 56″ east longitude from Paris. These are differences which the accounts of the Chinese Year-Books establish in an astonishing manner, and leave no doubt whatever as to the identity of Kamtschatka with Lieu-kuei; for it is certainly satisfactory if estimates of such great distances, drawn in all probability from the accounts of half-savage sailors or quite savage natives, should agree within two or three grades with accurate astronomic results.

"This land lies exactly north-east from the Black River, or Black Dragon River, and the Moko, and the voyage thither requires fifteen days, which is the time in which the Moko generally effect it."

p. 16

The Moko here alluded to are, beyond doubt, the Mongolians, who governed in earlier ages, and even in the time of Tang as far south as Corea, and in the north as far as the other side of the Amur. The western limits of this people are unknown. In the east they dwelt, as our chronicle expressly remarks, as far as the ocean, or the Pacific, from whence they could very easily pass to the islands and to the American Continent. That this was in reality effected, is evident from their external appearance, as well as the affinity between the Mongolian language and that of the American Indians. The distance from Ocho-tock to the opposite peninsula is about 150 German miles, and, in fact, the natives generally require from ten to fifteen days to make the voyage.

"Lieu-kuei lies to the north of the North Sea, 1 by which it is on three sides surrounded. To the north this peninsula touches upon the land of Jetschay, or Tschuktschi, but the exact limits are not easy to determine; it requires an entire month to make the journey from Kamtschatka to Jetschay. Beyond this the land is unexplored, and no mission has as yet come from thence to the Central Kingdom. Here are neither fortified


p. 17

places nor towns; the people dwell in scattered groups on the sea-islands and along the shore, or on the banks of rivers, where they live by catching and salting fish.

Steller also assures us that the dwellings of the Itölmen, or native Kamtschadales, are always situated on rivers, bays, or the mouths of the lesser streams, and especially in places which are surrounded by woods. Fish in incredible quantities, and in great variety, are found there, serving during the long winters as pro-vender for both men and cattle. These they prepare in many ways, but principally by salting. Those living still more to the north subsist almost entirely on the same food, from which they receive the name Eskimantik or Eskimo, i.e., "raw-fish-eating."

"They dwell in caves, generally dug tolerably deep in the earth, around which they lay thick, unhewn planks."

This is applicable only to their winter dwellings; their summer habitations are built high in the air, on posts like our dovecots. The Itölmen dig out the earth to the depth of three or four feet in the form of a brick, and to such an extent as the number of their family may require. The excavated earth they pile to the height of two or three feet around the pit thus formed, and then roof it with pieces of bark or willow sticks, five or six feet long, which they drive deep within the pit into the earth, so that the tops are all equally high. Between these sticks and the earth they

p. 18

generally lay dry straw, so that none of the earth may fall through, nor any of the articles in the dwelling become rusty or mouldy by direct contact with it; then they leave a shelf of earth around, about a foot broad, and lay great beams thereon in squares, which they support on the outside with planks and sticks stuck into the ground, so that they may not give way externally. Then they place over them four posts cut in the form of forks, as high as they wish to have the lodging in the middle.

Over this they lay again crosswise four beams, and fasten them with thongs to the posts, upon which they lay on every side the rafters. Between these rafters they put thin sticks, and across these small pieces of wood, quite close together; this entire wooden roof they cover to the depth of six inches with straw, shake over it the remnant of the excavated earth, and tread it down firm. In the middle of the house they make the hearth between four thin posts; of these posts, two form the entrance, which is at the same time the chimney. Opposite the fireplace they dig out an air-passage from eight to twelve feet long, according to the size of the house, which passes beyond the limits of the dwelling itself. This is kept closed, except when they are making a fire. To facilitate the admission of air they build the roof of the air-passage in such a manner that the wind continually strikes against it, and is drawn in. If any one would enter, he must naturally descend the door-chimney, which is done either by

p. 19

means of a ladder, or the notched trunk of a tree. The smoky atmosphere is very oppressive to a European, though the natives support it without inconvenience. The little children generally creep through the draft, which also serves as a repository for cooking utensils. In the interior, cubes of wood are placed, to indicate the divisions of the separate sleeping-places.

"The climate, owing to fogs and heavy snows, is very severe. The natives are all clothed in furs, which they obtain by hunting. They also prepare a sort of cloth from dog's-hair and different species of grass. In winter they wear the skins of swine and reindeer; in summer, those of fish. They have great numbers of dogs."

We know that the climate of Kamtschatka presents remarkable differences. Districts situated at no great distance from each other have at the same season a different temperature. The southern part of the peninsula is damper, darker, and more exposed to terrible storm-winds, on account of its vicinity to the sea; but the farther north we ascend on the Pensiuischen Bay, so much the milder are the winds in winter, and so much the less rain falls in summer. In no land are the fogs so frequent and so thick as in Kamtschatka, nor is any country known where deeper snows fall than between 51° and 54° of the peninsula. The natives, therefore, naturally require the heavy sea-dog (seal) and reindeer fur-clothing spoken of in the Chinese chronicle. The women prepare from dried nettles and other grasses a sort of linen which serves for all domestic purposes.

p. 20

[paragraph continues] Reindeer, black bears, wolves, foxes, and other animals are found here in abundance, and are caught by a variety of ingenious methods, which the Chinese have also described. Dogs, which they use instead of horses to draw their sledges, are their only tame animals. It is an error of the Chinese writer when he speaks of swine; they would indeed succeed in this country, but in the time of Steller they were as yet unknown. Even at the present day several of the north-easterly Mantchou tribes clothe themselves in fish-skins, for which reason they are termed by the Chinese Jupi, or Fish-skins.. These, like the Chadschen, belong to the Aleutes.

"The people have no regular constitution; they know nothing of officers and laws. If there is a robber in the land, all of the inhabitants assemble together to judge him. They know nothing of the divisions and courses of the four seasons. Their bows are about four feet long, and their arrows are like those of the Middle Kingdom. They prepare from bones and stones a sort of musical instrument; they love singing and dancing. They place their dead in the hollow trunks of trees, and mourn for them three years, without wearing any mourning-clothes. In the year 640, during the reign of the second Heaven's Son of Tang, came the first and last tribute-bringing embassy from the land of Lieu-kuei to the Middle Kingdom."

Before the conquest of their land by the Russians, the Kamtschadales lived in a sort of community, such

p. 21

as is generally found among all primitive tribes, as, for example, the early Germans. Every one revenged his own wrongs with the readiest weapons--such as bows, arrows, and bone-spears. In war they chose a leader whose authority ceased with it. In case of theft, where the offender was unknown, the elders called the people together, and advised them to give him up. When this proved unsuccessful, death and destruction were generally invoked upon his head by means of their Shamanic sorcery. They divide the entire solar year into summer and winter, but are ignorant of any division of time into days and weeks, and few are able to count above forty. They pass their time principally in dancing, singing, and relating tales and legends. Their songs and melodies, several of which are given in Steller, are remarkably soft and agreeable. "When I compare," says this excellent writer, "the songs of the great Orlando Lasso, with which the King of France was so much delighted after the Parisian Bloody Marriage, with these airs of the Itölmen, I am compelled, so far as. agreeableness is concerned, to give the latter the preference." The Chinese account of the three years of mourning is groundless; at least, when the Russians first discovered Kamtschatka, nothing of the kind existed. The sick were thrown, when beyond all hope of recovery, to the dogs, even while yet alive, and anything like mourning or lamenting from their surviving relatives was seldom even thought of. It is, however, possible, if not probable, that since the seventh century,

p. 22

the manners of the Kamtschadales have much changed, or deteriorated.

The situation of the Wen-schin, or Painted People, if we are to credit the account regarding their distance from Japan, must be sought for to the east of Kamtschatka, and within the Aleutian group of islands. "The land of Wen-schin," says the Year-Book of the Southern Dynasty, "is situated about 7000 Chinese miles (or twenty of our geographical degrees) to the north-east of Japan," 1 a direction and distance which places us in the midst of the Aleutian or Fox group of islands. It is not readily intelligible how Deguignes could seek and find these Painted People on the Island of Jeso. 2

"Their bodies are usually covered with a variety of figures of animals and the like. On the forehead they have three lines: the long and straight indicate the nobles, the small and crooked the common people." 3

The Aleutian or Fox Islanders, before their conversion to Christianity, not only cut, as is well known, a variety




p. 23

of figures upon the body, but also bored the cartilage of the nose, and through it stuck a pin, upon which they placed, on festive occasions, glass beads. The women, for a similar purpose, bored the ear. Moreover, they made cuts in the under lip, in which they wore needles of stone or bone, about two inches long.


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Footnotes
8:1 Vide Memoires de la Société des Antiquaires de l’Amerique du Nord, Partie linguistique rapport fait a l’Institut Historique, par M. Antonio Renzi, Paris, 1842, 8vo.

9:1 In the "Shajrat ul Atrak," or Genealogical Tree of the Turks and Tartars, translated by Colonel Miles, London, 1838, Tung or Tungus is rendered "son of a Tartar."

9:2 Gaubil: Observations Mathematiques, Paris, 1732, ii. 110.

10:1 Mantuanlin, bk. 348, p. 6.

10:2 Koljustchi, or Koljuki, signifies the peg or pin which those savages wear in the under lip, and from which the name is derived. They were subsequently termed by the Russians, who possess the land, Galloches, from the French word, merely in jest. In the course of time this name supplanted the earlier term Koljuken, so that all are now known as Kaloschen.

10:3 This is similar to the custom of many North American Indians of the West.--C. G. L.

11:1 Description of the Kurilean and Aleutian Islands (translated from the Russian), Ulm, 1792, p. 16.

12:1 Shan-hai-king, quoted in the "Histoire des Trois Royaumes, traduite par Titsingh." Klaproth has, according to his custom, passed off the translation, as his own. Paris, 1832, p. 218.

12:2 Tang-schu, or, "Year-Books of Tang," bk. 220, p. 18, v. Mantuanlin, bk. 326, p. 23, v., where the report as usual is given. Titsingh: Annales des Empereurs do Japon, Paris, 1834, p. 52. This is a remarkable coincidence in the Chinese and Japanese Year-Books.

14:1 Vide Steller's Description of Kamtschatka, Leipzig, 1734, p. 3. All that occurs here in quotation marks has been literally translated from the Year-Books of Tang (Tang-schu, bk. 220, p. 19, v.) The part not thus marked is drawn principally from Steller, and is added for explanation. The article of Mantuanlin (bk. 347, p. 6), may be compared with the Year-Books of Tang. The article is indeed evidently borrowed from the Tang-schu, but is much better arranged, and contains many original incidents, on which account I have freely availed myself of it. The compiler of the "Encyclopædia of Kang hi" (Juen-kien-hui-han) satisfied himself (bk. 241, p. 19), as he frequently did, with merely transcribing from Mantuanlin.

16:1 In Tang-schu an error of transcription occurs. Instead of Pe-hai, North Sea, we have Schao-hai, "little sea." The correct reading is to be found in the two encyclopædias already quoted. Jetschaykno, a kingdom, here "an excellent country;" the Jetschay is only to be found in the encyclopædias. The arrogant Chinese love to write the names of foreigners with names which indicate scorn and contempt. Lieu-kuei, for example, signifies "the devil who runs through," and Jetschay, "the devil's companion."

22:1 Nausse, i.e., History of the Southern Dynasties, bk. 79, p. 5. The same article is to be found in Leang-schu, i.e., in the Year-Book of Leang, bk. 54, p. 19, and by Mantuanlin, bk. 327, p. 2.

22:2 Mémoires de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres, xxxviii. 506. This is not the only error which this writer, so excellent in other respects, has made in this treatise.

22:3 While engaged on this re-edition of Professor Neumann's work (London, March 1874), I have frequently seen two very curious Chinese figures, carved from wood, representing Aleutian Islanders. The faces are smooth, but the garment, or external figure, ingeniously adapted from some wood covered with a long fibre, gives them a very wild, hairy appearance.--C. G. L.