Creation Myths of Primitive America: In relation to the Religious History and Mental Development of MankindCurtin, Jeremiah
Religion
Creation Myths of Primitive America: In relation to the Religious History and Mental Development of Mankind
Curtin, Jeremiah
Creation -- Mythology; Indian mythology -- North America; Indians of North America -- Folklore
Tulchuherris heard him. When Sas was outside the door, he stood a
while and talked on,--
"You were dug out of the ground, Tulchuherris," said he. "You are
nobody. I have beaten you. You'll never trouble me again."
He started to go into the house, looked around, and saw Tulchuherris
sitting with his two daughters.
"Father-in-law, were you talking of me? What were you saying?" asked
Tulchuherris, when Sas had come in and sat down.
"Oh, my son-in-law, I cannot tell what I said, but I was thinking,
'Oh, I am so old, I know nothing. I am weak, I am blind. Sometimes I
do not know what I am doing. I think that I have done wrong to my
son-in-law, my poor son-in-law.'"
Soon after Sas went out, and at one side near the door he dug a grave
for the old woman, his wife. When he had dug it, he buried her and
with her all the bears and snakes, and said, "These are my children."
He put them in the same grave, and cried, singing as he cried,--
"Koki, koki, koki nom,
Koki, koki, koki nom."
(Creeping, creeping, creeping west,
Creeping, creeping, creeping west.)
While he was burying his wife and the bears and the snakes, he had
beaver teeth hanging on strings at the back of his head and on each
side of his face. After he had cried awhile he danced and sang, and
these teeth rattled as his head swayed from side to side. Then he went
into the house, sat down, looked at Tulchuherris, and said,--
"Tulchuherris, you are my son-in-law; your wives, those two women, are
my daughters. There are some things which they have wanted to play
with this long time, and they have begged me to go for them, but I am
old and blind; if I were to go I could not get what they ask for. My
daughters want pets. My son-in-law, on a small tree, not far from
this house, is a nest, and young woodpeckers chirp every day in it.
Your wives want these red-headed woodpeckers, but I am blind and old;
I cannot climb the tree, but you can get the woodpeckers. I will show
the nest."
"Go ahead," said Tulchuherris, "show me the nest."
The tree was a mile away. Sas went to it and stopped. Tulchuherris
stood near. Both looked up, and Sas asked, "Do you see the nest?"
The tree was very straight, and so high that they could hardly see the
top of it; the trunk was as smooth as ice.
"My father-in-law," said Tulchuherris. "I do not think that I can go
up there; I do not believe that I can climb the tree."
"You can climb it if I help you," said Sas, who took out a rope made
of single hairs tied end to end, a great many of them tied together,
hairs from the heads of his daughters. He threw the rope very high
over a limb near the nest, and said: "Now, my son-in-law, I will hold
the rope; you climb."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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