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 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 home 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 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,
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 clan 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 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 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.
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 coming!”
“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.” 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 corn-cakes.
“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 he.
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
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
house-top.
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
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.
“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 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 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?”
“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 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 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
noon-day 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 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-ta-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.
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.