Indians of North America -- Folklore; Modoc Indians -- Folklore; Modoc Indians -- Religion; Modoc mythology
That night, while the boy was asleep, the old woman made a quiver out
of her own hair. The quiver was blue and bright. Then she made a spear
that would last always and never get old or break. At daylight she said
to him: “Now, my grandson, it is time to get ready. Wash and eat, then
I will tell you what to do.”
He washed in the brook and ate pounded seeds. Then she gave him the
spear, and said: “Go to the rock out there and try this spear. Stand on
the right side of the rock and strike it five times.” He struck four
times, and each time great pieces of rock fell; the fifth time the rock
split in the center. Every time he struck, the spear looked like a
flash of lightning.
His grandmother said: “Look at your spear and see if it is hurt.”
“No,” said the boy, “it is as good as ever.”
“Well, put it in its quiver; then stand up straight.”
He stood up straight. She made him tall and covered his body with five
kinds of rock. The outside cover was of granite.
Then the boy asked: “How many places are there where people kill
folks?”
“The Yaukûl place is the worst of all,” said his grandmother, “but
between that place and the end of the world in the north there are
three bad places.”
“Don’t get frightened if I am gone a long time,” said the boy. “I am
going to all those bad places.” And he started.
Old woman Yaukûl, from the top of her house, saw him coming. Her sons
were lying on their backs and looking at her through the smoke hole;
they thought she saw some one, and the chief called out: “Whom do you
see?”
“I see a man who is just big enough to bring water. He has a
rabbit-skin blanket, and he has something on his back, something that
is nice and bright.”
“Go and get him,” said the chief, “and the thing he is carrying. I
wonder who it is that has never heard of me!”
When the old woman got to Góshgoise, she said: “Give me your blanket
and quiver.”
The boy walked along; he didn’t say a word.
She went back to her sons, and said: “He looks like a bad man; he won’t
say a word, and he won’t give me what he has on his back.” She called
him names; she was mad.
Her son said: “Go again!”
When she came to Góshgoise the second time, she said: “Give those
things to me, quick; my son is mad.”
Góshgoise was lying on the ground with his head on his hands. He didn’t
say a word, didn’t notice her. She talked and talked, but couldn’t get
the things. She went and told her sons that the man wouldn’t give her
his blanket and quiver, and wouldn’t speak to her.
The youngest son said: “Who can that man be? Has he never heard of me?
I thought every one knew about me. Go again, and this time be sure to
get the things.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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