|AS a punishment for having once upon a time used that foot against
a venerable medicine man, Aggo Dah Gauda had one leg looped up to
his thigh, so that he was obliged to get along by hopping. By dint of
practise he had become very skilful in this exercise, and he could make
leaps which seemed almost incredible.
Aggo had a beautiful daughter, and his chief care was to secure her from
being carried off by the king of the buffalos, who was the ruler of all
the herds of that kind, and had them entirely at his command to make
them do as he willed.
Dah Gauda, too, was quite an important person in his own way, for he
lived in great state, having a log house of his own and a court-yard
which extended from the sill of his front-door as many hundred miles
westward as he chose to measure it.
Although he might claim this extensive privilege of ground, he advised
his daughter to keep within doors, and by no means to go far in the
neighborhood. Otherwise she would be sure to be stolen away, as he was
satisfied that the buffalo-king spent night and day lurking about, lying
in wait to seize her.
One sunshiny morning, when there were just two or three promising clouds
rolling moistly about the sky, Aggo prepared to go out a-fishing; but
before he left the lodge he reminded her of her strange and industrious
lover, whom she had never seen.
"My daughter," said he, "I am going out to fish, and as the day will be
a pleasant one, you must recollect that we have an enemy near, who is
constantly going about with two eyes that never close. Do not expose
yourself out of the lodge."
With this excellent advice, Aggo hopped off in high spirits. But he had
scarcely reached the fishing-ground, when he heard a voice singing at a
distance:=
```Man with the leg tied up,
```Man with the leg tied up,
````Broken hip--hip--
`````Hipped.
```Man with the leg tied up,
```Man with the leg tied up,
````Broken leg--leg--
`````Legged.=
There was no one in sight, but Aggo heard the words quite plainly, and
as he suspected the ditty to be the work of his enemies, the buffalos,
he hopped home as fast as his one leg could carry him.
Meantime, the daughter had no sooner been left alone in the lodge than
she thought to herself:
"It is hard to be thus forever kept in doors. But my father says it
would be dangerous to venture abroad. I know what I will do. I will get
on the top of the house, and there I can comb and dress my hair, and no
one can harm me."
She accordingly ascended the roof and busied herself in untying and
combing her beautiful hair; for it was truly beautiful, not only of a
fine, glossy quality, but so very long that it hung over the eaves of
the house and reached down to the ground, as she sat dressing it.
She was wholly occupied in this employment, without a thought of danger,
when all of a sudden the king of the buffalos came dashing up with his
herd of followers. Making sure of her by means of her drooping tresses,
he placed her upon the back of one of his favorite buffalos, and away he
cantered over the plains. Plunging into a river that bounded his land,
he bore her safely to his lodge on the other side.
And now the buffalo-king, having secured the beautiful person of Aggo
Dah Gauda's daughter, set to work to make her heart his own--a little
ceremony which it would have been, perhaps, wiser for his majesty, the
king of the buffalos, to have attended to before he carried her off, for
he now worked to little purpose. Although he labored with great zeal to
gain her affections, she sat pensive and disconsolate in the lodge among
the other women. She scarcely ever spoke, nor did she take the least
interest in the affairs of the king's household.
To the king himself she paid no heed, and although he breathed forth
to her every soft and gentle word he could think of, she sat still and
motionless, for all the world like one of the lowly bushes by the door
of her father's lodge when the summer wind had died away.
The king enjoined it upon the others in the lodge as a special edict,
on pain of instant death, to give to Aggo's daughter everything that she
wanted, and to be careful not to displease her. They set before her the
choicest food. They gave her the seat of honor in the lodge. The king
himself went out hunting to obtain the most dainty meats, both of
animals and wild fowl, to pleasure her palate; and he treated her every
morning to a ride upon one of the royal buffalos, who was so gentle in
his motions as not even to disturb a single one of the tresses of the
beautiful hair of Aggo's daughter as she paced along.
And not content with these proofs of his attachment, the king would
sometimes fast from all food, and having thus purified his spirit and
cleared his voice, he would take his Indian flute, sit before the lodge,
and give vent to his feelings in pensive echoes, something after this
fashion:=
````My sweetheart,
````My sweetheart,
`````Ah me!
````When I think of you,
````When I think of you,
`````Ah me!
````What can I do, do, do?=
````How I love you,
````How I love you,
`````Ah me!
````Do not hate me,
````Do not hate me,
`````Ah me!
````Speak--e'en berate me.
````When I think of you,
`````Ah me!
````What can I do, do, do?=
In the meantime, Aggo Dali Gauda reached home, and finding that his
daughter had been stolen, was so thoroughly aroused that he would have
forthwith torn every hair from his head in indignation, had he not been
entirely bald. This relief being out of the question, Aggo hopped
off half a mile in every direction as an easy and natural vent to his
feelings. First he hopped east, then he hopped west, next he hopped
north, and again he hopped south, all in search of his daughter; till
the one leg was fairly tired out. Then he sat down in his lodge, and
resting himself a little, reflected. After that he vowed that his
single leg should never know rest again until he had found his beautiful
daughter and brought her home. For this purpose he immediately set out.
Now that he proceeded more coolly, he could easily track the
buffalo-king until he came to the banks of the river, where he saw that
he had plunged in and swum over. There having been a frosty night or
two since, the water was so covered with thin ice that Aggo could not
venture upon it, even with one leg. So he encamped hard by till it
became more solid, and then crossed over and pursued the trail.
As he went along he saw branches broken off and strewed behind, which
guided him in his course; for these had been purposely cast along by the
daughter. And the manner in which she had accomplished it was this. Her
hair was all untied when she was caught up, and being very long it took
hold of the branches as they darted along, and it was these twigs that
she broke off as signs to her father.
When Aggo came to the king's lodge it was evening. Carefully
approaching, he peeped through the sides, and saw his daughter sitting
disconsolate. She immediately caught his eye, and knowing that it was
her father come for her, she all at once appeared to relent in her
heart. Asking for the royal dipper, she said to the king:
"I will go and get you a drink of water."
This token of submission delighted his majesty, and, high in hope, he
waited with impatience for her return.
Some time passed and at last he went out; but nothing could be seen or
heard of the captive daughter. Then calling together his followers, he
sallied forth with them upon the plains. They had not gone far when they
espied by the light of the moon, which was shining roundly just over the
edge of the prairie, Aggo Dali Gauda, his daughter in his arms, making
all speed with his one leg toward the west.
The buffalo, set on by their king, raised a great shout and scampered
off in pursuit. They thought to overtake Aggo in less than no time; but
although he had a single leg only, it was in such fine condition to go,
that to every pace of theirs he hopped the length of a cedar-tree.
But the buffalo-king was well assured that he would be able to overtake
Aggo, hop as briskly as he might. It would be a mortal shame, thought
the king, to be outstripped by a man with one leg tied up; so, shouting
and cheering and issuing orders on all sides, he set the swiftest of his
herd upon the track, with strict commands to take Aggo dead or alive.
And a curious sight it was to see.
At one time a buffalo would gain handsomely upon Aggo, and be just
at the point of laying hold of him, when off Aggo would hop, a good
furlong, in an oblique line, wide out of his reach; which bringing him
nearly in contact with another of the herd, away he would go again, just
as far off in another direction.
And in this way Aggo kept the whole company of the buffalos zigzagging
across the plain, with the poor king at their head, running to and fro,
shouting among them and hurrying them about in the wildest way. It was
an extraordinary road that Aggo was taking toward home; and after a time
it so puzzled and bewildered the buffalos that they were driven half out
of their wits, and they roared and brandished their tails and foamed, as
if they would put out of countenance and frighten out of sight the old
man in the moon, who was looking on all the time, just above the edge of
the prairie.
As for the king himself, he lost all patience at last at the absurd
idea of chasing a man with one leg all night long, so calling his herd
together, he fled in disgust toward the west, and never more appeared in
all that part of the country.
Aggo, relieved of his pursuers, hopped off a hundred steps in one, till
he reached the stream, crossed it in a twinkling of the eye, and bore
his daughter in triumph to his lodge.
In the course of time Aggo's beautiful daughter married a very worthy
young warrior, who was neither a buffalo-king nor so much as the owner
of any more of the buffalos than a splendid skin robe which he wore,
with great effect, thrown over his shoulders, on his wedding-day. On
which occasion, Aggo Dah Gauda hopped about on his one leg livelier than
ever.