He then went to the hind-quarter. "No, that will not do, either; they
will say I ate him forward. I will begin here, say what they will."
He took a delicate piece from the small of the back and was just on the
point of putting it to his mouth, when a tree close by made a creaking
noise. He seemed vexed at the sound. He raised the morsel to his mouth
the second time, when the tree creaked again.
"Why," he exclaimed, "I cannot eat when I hear such a noise. Stop,
stop!" he said to the tree. He put the meat down, exclaiming--"I cannot
eat with such a noise"; and starting away he climbed the tree, and was
pulling at the limb which had offended him, when his fore-paw was caught
between the branches so that he could not free himself.
While thus held fast, he saw a pack of wolves advancing through the wood
in the direction of his meat. He suspected them to be the old wolf and
his cubs, but night was coming on and he could not make them out.
"Go the other way, go the other way!" he cried out; "what would you come
to get here?"
The wolves stopped for a while and talked among themselves, and said:
"Manabozho must have something there, or he would not tell us to go
another way."
"I begin to know him," said the old wolf, "and all his tricks. Let us go
forward and see."
They came on, and finding the moose, they soon made away with it.
Manabozho looked wistfully on to see them eat till they were fully
satisfied, when they scampered oft in high spirits.
A heavy blast of wind opened the branches and released Manabozho, who
found that the wolves had left nothing but the bare bones. He made for
home, where, when he related his mishap, the old wolf took him by the
fore-paw and condoled with him deeply on his ill-luck. A tear even
started to his eye as he said:
"My brother, this should teach us not to meddle with points of ceremony
when we have good meat to eat."
On a bright morning in the early spring, the winter having by this time
drawn fairly to a close, the old wolf addressed Manabozho:
"My brother, I am obliged to leave you; and although I have sometimes
been merry at your expense, I will show that I care for your comfort. I
shall leave one of the boys behind me to be your hunter and to keep you
company through the long summer afternoons."
The old wolf galloped off with his five young ones; and as they
disappeared from view, Manabozho was disenchanted in a moment and
returned to his mortal shape.
Although he had been sometimes vexed and imposed upon, he had,
altogether, passed a pleasant winter with the cunning old wolf, and now
that he was gone, Manabozho was downcast and low in spirit. But as
the days grew brighter he recovered by degrees his air of cheerful
confidence and was ready to try his hand upon any new adventure that
might occur to him. The old spirit of mischief was still alive within
him.
The young wolf who had been left with him was a good hunter and never
failed to keep the lodge well supplied with meat. One day Manabozho
addressed him as follows:
"My grandson, I had a dream last night, and it does not portend good. It
is of the large lake which lies in that direction. You must be careful
always to go across it, whether the ice seem strong or not. Never go
around it, for there are enemies on the further shore who lie in wait
for you. The ice is always safe."
Now Manabozho knew well that the ice was thinning every day under the
warm sun, but he could not stay himself from playing a trick upon the
young wolf.
In the evening when he came to the lake, after a long day's travel
in quest of game, the young wolf, confiding to his grandfather, said,
"Hwooh! the ice does look thin, but Nesho says it is sound"; and he
trotted upon the glassy plain.
He had not got half way across when the ice snapped, and with a
mournful cry, the young wolf fell in and was immediately seized by the
water-serpents. They knew that it was Manabozho's grandson and were
thirsting for revenge upon him for the death of their relations in the
war upon Pearl Feather.
Manabozho heard the young wolf's cry as he sat in his lodge; he knew
what had happened; and from that moment he was deprived of the greater
part of his magical power.
He returned scarcely more than an ordinary mortal to his former place
of dwelling, whence his grandmother had departed no one knew whither.
He married the arrow-maker's daughter, and became the father of several
children, and very poor. He was scarcely able to procure the means of
living. His lodge was pitched in a remote part of the country where he
could get no game. It was winter, and he had not the common comforts of
life.
He said to his wife one day:
"I will go out a-walking and see if I can not find some lodges."
After walking some time he saw a lodge at a distance. The children were
playing at the door. When they saw him approaching they ran in and told
their parents that Manabozho was coming.
It was the residence of the large red-headed woodpecker. He came to
the door and asked Manabozho to enter. This invitation was promptly
accepted.
After some time, the woodpecker, who was a magician, said to his wife:
"Have you nothing to give Manabozho? He must be hungry." She answered,
"No."
"He ought not to go without his supper," said the woodpecker. "I will
see what I can do."
In the center of the lodge stood a large tamarack tree. Upon this the
woodpecker flew, and commenced going up, turning his head on each side
of the tree and every now and then driving in his bill. At last he
pulled something out of the tree and threw it down; when, behold! a fine
fat raccoon lay on the ground. He drew out six or seven more. He then
descended and told his wife to prepare them.
"Manabozho," he said, "this is the only thing we eat; what else can we
give you?"
"It is very good," replied Manabozho.
They smoked their pipes and conversed with each other.
After eating, Manabozho got ready to go home. Then the woodpecker
said to his wife, "Give him the other raccoons to take home for his
children."
In the act of leaving the lodge, Manabozho, on purpose, dropped one of
his mittens, which was soon after observed upon the ground.
"Run," said the woodpecker to his eldest son, "and give it to him; but
mind that you do not give it into his hand; throw it at him, for there
is no knowing him, he acts so curiously."
The boy did as he was directed.
"Grandfather," said he to Manabozho, as he came up to him, "you have
left one of your mittens. Here it is."
"Yes," he said, affecting to be ignorant of the circumstance, "it is so;
but don't throw it, you will soil it on the snow."
The lad, however, threw it, and was about to return, when Manabozho
cried out:
"Bakah! Bakah! stop--stop! Is that all you eat? Do you eat nothing else
with your raccoon? Tell me!"
"Yes, that is all," answered the young Woodpecker; "we have nothing
else."
"Tell your father," continued Manabozho, "to come and visit me, and
let him bring a sack. I will give him what he shall eat with his
raccoon-meat."
When the young one returned and reported this message to his father, the
old woodpecker turned up his nose at the invitation.
"I wonder," he said, "what he thinks he has got, poor fellow!"
He was bound, however, to answer the proffer of hospitality, so he went
accordingly to pay a visit to Manabozho, taking along a cedar-sack.
Manabozho received the old red-headed woodpecker with great ceremony.
He had stood at the door awaiting his arrival, and as soon as he came in
sight Manabozho commenced, while he was yet far off, bowing and opening
wide his arms in token of welcome; all of which the woodpecker returned
in due form by ducking his bill and hopping to right and left upon the
ground, extending his wings to their full length and fluttering them
back to his breast.
When the woodpecker at last reached the lodge, Manabozho made various
remarks upon the weather, the appearance of the country, and especially
on the scarcity of game.
"But we," he added, "we always have enough. Come in, and you shall not
go away hungry, my noble bird!"
Manabozho had always prided himself on being able to give as good as he
had received; and to be up with the woodpecker, he had shifted his lodge
so as to inclose a large dry tamarack tree.
"What can I give you?" said he to the woodpecker. "But as we eat so
shall you eat."
With this Manabozho hopped forward, and jumping on the tamarack tree,
attempted to climb it just as he had seen the woodpecker do in his own
lodge. He turned his head first on one side, then on the other, in the
manner of the bird, meanwhile striving to go up, and as often slipping
down. Ever and anon he would strike the tree with his nose, as if it had
been a bill, and draw back, but he pulled out no raccoons; and he dashed
his nose so often against the trunk that at last the blood began to
flow, and he tumbled down senseless upon the ground.
The woodpecker started up with his drum and rattle and by beating them
violently be succeeded in bringing him to.
As soon as he came to his senses, Manabozbo began to lay the blame of
his failure upon his wife, saying to his guest:
"Nemesho, it is this woman-relation of yours--she is the cause of my not
succeeding. She has made me a worthless fellow. Before I took her I also
could get raccoons."
The woodpecker said nothing, but flying on the tree, drew out several
fine raccoons.
"Here," said be, "this is the way we do!" and left in disdain, carrying
his bill high in the air and stepping over the door-sill as if it were
not worthy to be touched by his toes.
After this visit, Manabozbo was sitting in the lodge one day with his
head down. He heard the wind whistling around it, and thought that by
attentively listening he could hear the voice of some one speaking to
him. It seemed to say to him:
"Great chief, why are you sorrowful? Am not I your friend--your guardian
spirit?"
Manabozbo immediately took up his rattle, and without rising from the
ground where he was sitting, began to sing the chant which has at every
close the refrain of, "Wha lay le aw."
When he had dwelt for a long time on this peculiar chant, which he had
been used to sing in all his times of trouble, he laid his rattle aside
and determined to fast. For this purpose he went to a cave which faced
the setting sun and built a very small fire, near which he lay down,
first telling his wife that neither she nor the children must come near
him till he had finished his i fast.
At the end of seven days he came back to the lodge, pale and thin,
looking like a spirit himself, and as if he had seen spirits. His wife
had in the meantime dug | through the snow and got a few of the roots
called truffles. These she boiled and set before him, and this was all
the food they had or seemed likely to obtain.
When he had finished his light repast, Manabozho took up his station in
the door to see what would happen. As he stood thus, holding in his hand
his large bow, with a quiver well filled with arrows, a deer glided past
along the far edge of the prairie; but it was miles away, and no shaft
that Manabozho could shoot would be able to touch it.
Presently a cry come down the air, and looking up he beheld a great
flight of birds; but they were so far up in the sky that he would have
lost his arrows in a vain attempt among the clouds.
Still he stood watchful and confident that some turn of luck was about
to occur, when there came near to the lodge two hunters, who bore
between them on poles, a bear; and it was so fine and fat a bear that it
was as much as the two hunters could do with all their strength to carry
it.
As they came to the lodge-door, one of the hunters asked if Manabozho
lived thereabout.
"He is here," answered Manabozho.
"I have often heard of you," said the first hunter, "and I was curions
to see you. But you have lost your magical power. Do you know whether
any of it is left?"
Manabozho answered that he was himself in the dark on the subject.
"Suppose you make a trial," said the hunter.
"What shall I do?" asked Manabozho.
"There is my friend," said the hunter, pointing to his companion, "who
with me owns this bear which we are carrying home. Suppose you see if
you can change him into a piece of rock."
"Very well," said Manabozho; and he had scarcely spoken before the other
hunter became a rock.
"Now change him hack again," said the first hunter.
"That I can't do," Manabozho answered; "there my power ends."
The hunter looked at the rock with a bewildered face.
"What shall I do?" he asked. "This bear I can never carry alone, and it
was agreed between my friend there and myself, that we should not divide
it till we reached home. Can't you change my friend hack, Manabozho?"
"I would like to oblige you," answered Manabozho, "but it is utterly out
of my power."
With this, looking again at the rock with a sad and bewildered face, and
then casting a sorrowful glance at the bear, which lay by the door of
the lodge, the hunter took his leave, bewailing bitterly at heart the
loss of his friend and his bear.
He was scarcely out of sight when Manabozho sent the children to get
red willow sticks. Of these he cut off as many pieces of equal length as
would serve to invite his friends among the beasts and birds to a feast.
A red stick was sent to each one, not forgetting the woodpecker and his
family.
"When they arrived they were astonished to see such an abundance of meat
prepared for them at such a time of scarcity. Manabozho understood their
glance and was proud of a chance to make such a display.
"Akewazi," he said to the oldest of the party, "the weather is very
cold, and the snow lasts a long time; we can kill nothing now but small
squirrels, and they are all black. I have sent for you to help me eat
some of them."
The woodpecker was the first to try a mouthful of the bear's meat, but
he had no sooner begun to taste it than it changed into a dry powder and
set him coughing. It appeared as bitter as ashes.
The moose was affected in the same way, and it brought on such a dry
cough as to shake every bone in his body.
One by one, each in turn joined the company of coughers, except
Manabozho and his family, to whom the bear's meat proved very savory.
But the visitors had too high a sense of what was due to decorum and
good manners to say anything. The meat looked very fine, and being
keenly set and strongly tempted by its promising look, they thought they
would try more of it. The more they ate the faster they coughed and the
louder became the uproar, until Mana-bozho, exerting the magical gift
which he found he retained, changed them all into squirrels; and to this
day the squirrel sutlers from the same dry cough which was brought on by
attempting to sup off of Manabozho's ashen bear's meat.
And even after this transformation, when Mana-bozho lacked provisions
for his family, he would hunt the squirrel, a supply of which never
failed him, so that he was always sure to have a number of his friends
present, in this shape, at the banquet.
The rock into which he changed the hunter, thus becoming possessed of
the bear, and laying the foundations of his good fortune, ever
after remained by his lodge-door, and it was called the Game-Bag of
Mana-bozho, the Mischief-Maker.
[Illustration: 0059]