I had this story of the Lost Boy from the Rev. Albert Cusick, a native
Onondaga, and the first part is very nearly as he wrote it out. The
latter part he told me, and I took it down.
A long time ago, among the Onondaga Indians, were several families who
went off to camp near the wildwood streams, where fish, deer, bear,
otter, beaver, and other like game could be caught for winter use. These
Onondagas, or People of the Hill, journeyed several days, and finally
came to the hunting-grounds. The hunting-ground where they stopped was a
very beautiful place, with its little hills and the river with high
banks. Not far from their camp was a beautiful lake, with high rocky
banks, and with little islands full of cedar-trees. When they came there
it was in the moon or month of _Chut-ho-wa-ah_, or October. Some of
these Indians made their camps near the river, and some near the lake.
As it was quite early in the season for hunting, some of the Indians
amused themselves by making birch-bark canoes. With these they could go
up and down the river and on the lakes, fishing and trapping, or making
deadfalls for smaller game.
In the party were five little boys, who had their own bows and arrows,
and would go hunting, imitating their fathers and uncles. Among them was
one much smaller than the rest, who was greatly teased by the older
boys. Sometimes they would run away from him and hide themselves in the
woods, leaving him crying; then they would come back and show
themselves, and have a great laugh over the little boy’s distress.
Sometimes they would run for the camp, and would tell him that a bear or
a wolf was chasing them, leaving the little boy far behind, crying with
all his might. Many a time he sought his father’s camp alone, when the
other boys would leave him and hide themselves in the woods.
One day these little Indians found a great hollow log lying on the
ground. One of them said, “Maybe there is a _Ta-hone-tah-na-ken_
[rabbit] or a _Hi-sen_ [red squirrel] in this hollow log. Let us shoot
into it, and see if there is any _Ta-hone-tah-na-ken_ in it.” All agreed
to this, and they began to take the little boy’s arrows from him and
shoot them into the hole; then the larger boys said to him, “Now go into
the hollow log, and get your arrows.” The little boy said, “No; I am
afraid something might catch me.” Then he began to cry, and was not at
all willing to go into the log. The others coaxed him to do so, and one
said he would get his uncle to make him a new bow and arrows if he would
go into the hollow log, and get the arrows they had shot there. At last
this tempted the little boy. He stopped crying, got down on his hands
and knees, and crawled into the log. When he had gone in a little way,
he found one of his arrows, and handed it out. This gave him courage to
go in a little farther. When he had advanced some distance in the log,
one of the larger boys said, “Let’s stop up the log, and trap that boy
in it, so that he can’t get out.” This was soon agreed to, and the boys
began to fetch old rotten wood and old limbs, stopping up the hollow,
and trapping the little boy in it. When this mischief was done, the four
boys ran to their camp, not saying a word about the little boy who was
trapped in the log.
It was two days before the mother[2] and father began to notice the
absence of their boy, for they thought he must have stayed over night
with one of the others, as very often he had done; but the second day a
search was begun, and the other four boys were asked whereabouts they
had left him. They all said that they did not know, and that the last
time they were out the little boy did not go with them. Then the entire
camp turned out to join in the search, as now they knew that the boy
must be lost. After they had hunted a long time he could not be found,
and they ceased to look for him; they thought he must have been killed
and eaten by a wolf or a bear.
When he was first shut up in the log the little boy tried to get out,
but could not do it, as the chunks of rotten wood were too large for him
to move. He could not kick or push them out. Then he cried for help, but
no one came. There he was for three days and three nights, crying loudly
for help, and now and then falling asleep. But on the fourth night,
while he was in the hollow log, he thought he heard some one coming. He
listened, and was sure he heard the crying of a very old woman and the
noise of the tramping of human feet. The crying and the tramping came
nearer and nearer to the log where he was. At last the crying came very
close to him, and then he heard a noise, as though some one sat down on
the log. Now he heard the old woman cry in earnest, and now and then she
would say: “Oh, how tired I am! how tired I am! and yet I may have come
too late, for I do not hear my grandchild cry. He may be dead! he may be
dead!” Then the old woman would cry in earnest again. At last he heard a
rap on the log and his own name called: “Ha-yah-noo! Ha-yah-noo! are you
still alive?” Ha-yah-noo, or Footprints under the Water (for this was
the name of the little lost boy), answered the old woman, and said that
he still lived. The old woman said, “Oh, how glad I am to find my
grandchild still alive!” Then she asked Ha-yah-noo if he could not get
out; but he said he could not, for he had already tried. Then said the
old woman, “I will try to get you out of this log.” He heard her pull at
the chunks of old wood; but at last she said she could not get him out,
as she was too old and tired. She had heard him crying three days
before, and had journeyed three days and nights to come and help her
grandchild out of his trouble. Now this old woman was an O-ne-ha-tah, or
Porcupine. She lived in an old hemlock tree near the spot where the boy
was shut up in the log.[3]
When Grandmother O-ne-ha-tah had said that she had to journey three days
and nights, and now she could not help Ha-yah-noo out of the log, she
was very sorry, and began to cry again. Finally she said that she had
three children, who were very strong, and that she would get them to
help her; so she went after them. It was almost daylight when they came,
and then Ha-yah-noo heard them pull out the chunks which stopped up the
log. At last Grandmother O-ne-ha-tah said to Ha-yah-noo: “Come out now.
My children have got the chunks out of the log. You can come out.”
When Ha-yah-noo came out, he saw four wild animals around him. There was
Grandmother O-ne-ha-tah and her three children, as she called them. They
were Oo-kwa-e, the Bear; Sken-no-doh, the Deer; and Tah-you-ne, the
Wolf. “Now,” said O-ne-ha-tah, “I want one of you to take care of this
boy, and love him as your own child. You all know that I have got to be
very, very old. If I were younger I would take care of him myself.”
Tah-you-ne, the Wolf, was the first one to speak. She said she could
take care of the boy, as she lived on the same meat on which he fed.
“No,” said Grandmother O-ne-ha-tah, “you are too greedy. You would eat
up the boy as soon as he is left with you alone.” The Wolf was very
angry. She showed her teeth, and snapped them at the boy, who was very
much afraid, and wanted no such mother.
The next that spoke was Sken-no-doh, the Deer. She said that she and her
husband would take care of the boy, as they lived on corn and other
things which they knew the boy liked. Her husband would carry him on his
back wherever they went. But Grandmother O-ne-ha-tah said: “No; you
can’t take care of the boy, for you are always travelling, and never
stay in one place. The boy cannot do the travelling that you do, for you
run very fast and make very long journeys. The boy cannot stand it, and
you have no home for him for the winter. Boys like this have homes.”
Then the Deer ran away, very happy, as though she were glad to be rid of
the boy.
Then Oo-kwa-e, the Bear, said that she knew she could take care of the
boy, as she lived in a large stone house and had plenty to eat. She
lived on meats and fishes, and all kinds of nuts and berries, and even
wild honey, all of which the boy would like. She had a good warm bed for
him to sleep on through the winter, and she was a loving mother to her
children. She would rather die than see them abused. Then O-ne-ha-tah,
or Porcupine (meaning “Full of quills”), said: “You are just the right
one to take care of this boy. Take him and carry him home.” So the Bear,
like a loving mother, took the boy and brought him to her home. When
they got there, Oo-kwa-e said to her two children, the Oo-tutch-ha, or
Young Bears, “Don’t play with him roughly, and he will be your kind
little brother.” Then she gave him some berries to eat, and they were
all happy together.
The stone house was a cave in the rocks, but to the little boy it seemed
to have rooms like any other house, and the little bears seemed to him
like human children. They did not tease him, but lived in the most
friendly way, and the old Oo-kwa-e was a very kind mother to the boy. It
was now quite late in the fall, and the days became short and dark. Then
Mother Oo-kwa-e said: “It is late and dark now. We had better go to
bed.” The nights were cold, but the bed was warm, and they slept until
the spring.
One evening it thundered; for the bears do not wake up until the thunder
is heard. It made such a noise that they thought the walls were coming
down. Then the old Oo-kwa-e said: “Why, it’s getting light. We had
better get up.” So they lived happily together for a very long time. She
went out in the woods, going to and fro for food, and the children
amused themselves at home.
Every now and then, through the summer, the Bear people would come in
and say, “In such a place are plenty of berries.” These would be
strawberries, raspberries, or others, according to the season. Later
they told of chestnuts and other kinds of nuts, of which they were fond.
Then they would say, “Let us go and gather them.” So the Mother Bear and
the little Bears went, taking the little boy along with them; for they
always expected a good time. The other bears knew nothing about the
little boy. When they came near the spot, and he was seen, these would
be frightened, and say: “There is a human being! Let us run! let us
run!” So they would scamper off as fast as bears can, leaving their
heaps of nuts or berries behind them. Then the old Oo-kwa-e would gather
these up, she and her children, and take them home, which was a very
easy way of getting plenty of food. Thus the boy became very useful to
Mother Bear.
The boy lived with them thus for about three years, and the same things
happened every year. In the third year Mother Bear said, “Some one is
coming to kill us.” Then all looked out, and saw a man coming through
the woods, with his bow and arrows in his hand, and his dog running all
around looking for game. Then Mother Bear said, “I must see what I can
do.” So she took a forked stick, and pointed the open fork towards the
man. It seemed to come near him, and appeared to him like a line of
thick brush that he did not wish to break through. So he turned aside,
and went another way, and they were safe that time.
Another day she again said, “Some one is coming towards us again, and we
shall be killed.” She put forth the forked stick again; but the man did
not mind it, and came straight towards her stone house. The stick itself
split, and there was nothing in the way. Then she took a bag of feathers
and threw these outside. They flew up and down, and around and around,
and seemed like a flock of partridges. The dog ran after them, through
the bushes and trees, supposing them to be birds, and so the second man
went away.
The days went by, and the third time Mother Bear saw a man coming. This
time she said, “Now we certainly are all going to die.” Then she said to
the boy: “Your father is coming now, and he is too good a hunter to be
fooled. There is his dog, with his four eyes, and he, too, is one of the
best of hunters.” Now when a dog has light spots over each eye, the
Indians say that he has four eyes. So the man came nearer, and she tried
the forked stick, but it split; and still the man and dog came on. Then
she scattered the feathers, and they flew around as before; but the
hunter and dog paid no attention to them, and still they both came on.
At last the dog reached the door and barked, and the man drew his bow to
shoot at anything that came out.
When the Mother Oo-kwa-e saw the man standing there, she said, “Now,
children, we must all take our bundles and go.” So each of the Bears
took a small bundle and laid it on its back, but there was no bundle at
all for the boy. When all were ready, Mother Oo-kwa-e said, “I will go
first, whatever may happen.” So she opened the door, and as she went out
the man shot, and she was killed. Then the oldest of the Oo-tutch-ha
said, “I will go next;” and as he went he also was killed.
The last little Bear was afraid, and said to the boy, “You go first.”
But the little boy was afraid, too, and said: “No; you go first. I have
no bundle.” For all the Bears tried to get their bundles between them
and the man. So the little Bear and the boy at last went out together;
but though the Bear tried to keep behind, the man shot at him first, and
he was killed. As the hunter was about to shoot again, the boy called
out: “Don’t shoot me! don’t shoot me! I am not a bear!” His father
dropped his arrow, for he knew his voice at once, and said: “Why did you
not call out before? Then I would not have killed the Oo-kwa-e and
Oo-tutch-ha. I am very sorry for what I have done, for the Bears have
been good to you.” But the boy said: “You did not kill the Bears, though
you thought so. You only shot the bundles. I saw them thrown down, and
the spirits of the Bears run off from behind them.” Still, the man was
sorry he had shot at the Bears, for he wished to be kind to them, as
they had been to his boy.
Then the father began to look at his boy more closely, to see how he had
grown and how he had changed. Then he saw that long hairs were growing
between his fingers, for, living so long with them, he had already begun
to turn into a Bear. He was very glad when he took the boy back to his
home, and his friends and relatives, and the whole town, rejoiced with
him. All day they had a great feast, and all night they danced, and they
were still dancing when I came away.
Bear stories of this kind seem to have been favorites among the
Iroquois, and Mrs. Erminnie A. Smith relates three of them in her
collection. Of such tales in general, she remarks that, “In nearly all
of these, wherever the bear is introduced he serves as a pattern of
benevolence, while many other animals, such as the porcupine, are always
presented as noxious.” Yet in the one most resembling the one just
given, “The Hare and his Step-son,” the man shuts the child in a
porcupine’s hole, and the porcupine rescues him, calling on the animals
to feed him. The fox and the wolf, however, do not bear a good
character, and snakes are invariably agents of evil.
The old story of “Valentine and Orson” has so delighted white children
that it is no matter of surprise that Indians have enjoyed their own
stories of lost boys nursed by bears. Perhaps the tendency of these
animals to assume an erect position may have suggested to them a near
kinship to the human race. To complete the present paper, a sketch may
be given of the three tales related by Mrs. Smith. It may be premised
that several incidents of the present story are found in all three of
these, but not in each other.
The first she had from the Senecas of the Cattaraugus reservation. In
this a young boy is missed from the hunting-camp, and all search proves
vain. His friends think him dead, and go home. A bear takes pity on him,
but changes herself into the appearance of a woman, and takes him home
to live with her cubs, in her hollow tree. When the time for the return
of the hunters arrives, she tells him of her device, and he is restored
to his friends. He never kills a bear.
The next is quite different. A hunter is angry with his wife for
secreting food, and makes her eat until she dies from its effects. Her
new-born child he throws into a hollow tree, but takes good care of his
older boy. For him he makes a bow and arrows, and after a long time saw
little footprints around his lodge. He made a second small bow and
arrows, and soon found they were being used. He now saw a little child
come from the hollow tree to play with his boy, and knew it was the
infant he had thrown away. He had been cared for by a bear, whom the
hunter treated kindly. The two boys afterwards went far westward to slay
the great and hurtful beasts.
The third was told in Canada, and is a variant of the one I have
related. A man hated his step-son, and persuaded him to enter a
porcupine’s hole. This he stopped up, leaving the boy a prisoner. He
cried himself asleep, and when he woke up he was in a room with an old
woman, who was the porcupine. He could not eat her food, and so she
called the animals to a council to tell how he might be fed. “The fox
said: ‘I live on geese and fowls. I’ll take him, but still he can’t eat
raw food.’ The council decided that it was useless for him to assume the
charge.” All offered in turn, without effect. At last the bear spoke,
and the child was left with her, all agreeing to help her gather nuts.
After living several years in a hollow tree, they saw a man and dog
coming. The tree was cut down, and the bear and her two cubs were
killed. The hunter looked for another cub, but found the boy instead. He
made noises just like the cubs. The hunter took him home, tamed and
taught him, and gave him his daughter for a wife. Her mother, however,
was angry because the boy brought home no bear’s meat. At last he killed
a bear, but it brought him no good luck. On his way home he fell on a
sharp stick, which killed him at once.
In this tale the words of the fox are much like those of the wolf in the
other. Some of the incidents differ much, and yet the common origin of
the two is readily seen.
In New York the Iroquois stories are becoming increasingly difficult to
obtain. They maintain their hold among the older people, but the younger
ones find those which are quite as good among the literature of the
whites. It is easy to see how our stories are adopted, and told in an
Indian way; and Mrs. Smith has given some good examples. The Onondagas
are not behind in following the spirit of the times.