“He went to sleep again and a lynx came around, but Old Man slept on. When he woke up at last and looked for the squirrels, they were all gone. The lynx had eaten them up. “Then Old Man followed that lynx and found him asleep after eating all the squirrels. Old Man seized him and shouted: ‘I have you now.’ He took him by the ears and banged his nose against a rock and made it flat. He stood him on his hind legs and stretched out his body and his legs to make them long. He broke off most of his tail and left only a stump. Then he took some hair and stuck it on his nose for whiskers, and said: “‘You bob-cats will always look like that. You will have flat faces, long bodies and long legs and a stump of a tail; and you will be so short-winded you cannot run far.’ “Old Man was so angry with his own hind-end for not waking him, that he struck it with a fire-stick. And when the burned place began to hurt, he held it towards the wind to cool it off and shouted: ‘Let the wind blow harder and harder.’ “Then the wind came so hard Old Man was blown away. He felt himself going and caught hold of anything within reach; he tore up trees and bushes by the roots. At last he held to some birch trees, and they did not break. “After the wind went down, Old Man got up and shouted: “‘Mean old birches! You spoiled all my fun. I was having a good time being blown by the wind, until you stopped me.’ “He grabbed the birches and slashed them with his knife; all up and down the trees he cut, until they were covered with slashes. ‘Now you will always look like that,’ he cried. ‘And forever, all the birches shall have these same cuts.’ They came from the slashes Old Man made long ago with his knife.” By this time it was late, and the old medicine man ended by saying: “Now the dogs are scratching the ground, having had their evening meal.” An Indian way of saying: “My story-telling is finished.” CHAPTER XXIV ONESTA AND HIS SACRED BEAR SPEAR Onesta was an older man than Little Creek. He was religious, fond of rituals, inactive and inclined to sit by the fire. But he had a good mind and liked to lead ceremonies. It gave him a prominent social position in the tribe. He was a good story-teller, but only talked when he felt in the mood, and that did not happen often. He was reserved and adroit in hiding under an air of candor what he did not want to discuss; then he had a sort of mask to cover his feelings. Although he lacked a sense of humor, he was fond of jokes when he felt in the mood; but he was inclined to be religious and serious rather than pleasure-loving.