Djáudjau Flying Squirrel
Gäk Crow
Gapni Louse
Juljulcus Cricket
Kāhkaas Stork
Kai Rabbit
Káwhas Blackbird
Kékina Lizard
Kískina Beetle
Leméis Thunder
Lóluk Fire
Tcoóks Crane
Tusasás Joker (Skunk)
Wálwilégas Butterfly
Wámanik Bull Snake
Weketas Frog (small, green)
Wekwek Magpie
Wískäk Cedar-bird
Wisnik Garter Snake
Wûlkûtska Marten (black)
Wus Fox
Wámanik lived at Wiwĕnsi, in a hollow between two mountains. There was
a creek near the place, with lots of fish in it. Wámanik caught fish
and ate them. That was the way he lived.
East of Wiwĕnsi lived a great hunter who had four children, three
daughters and a son. This man and his son each had a song that they
sang while they were hunting.
Wámanik was a good hunter, too. One day, he went, with two other men,
to hunt deer. When he was on the south side of a mountain looking for
tracks, he heard a man singing. He thought: “It must be a beautiful man
who has that nice song. This is the first time I have heard any one
sing on this mountain. I would like to see that man, but maybe I’d
scare him.” He went up a little higher; he looked around everywhere,
then waited. At last he saw a young man coming along the trail with a
deer on his back. He passed near where Wámanik was hidden in the grass,
but Wámanik didn’t see his face. He ran ahead to get where he could
turn and look back at the man, but even then he couldn’t see his face.
The young man thought: “I feel scared, as if somebody were looking at
me. I never felt this way before.”
When Wámanik got back to his party, each man had killed a deer; and
they were roasting meat. They asked: “Didn’t you find a deer?”
“No,” said Wámanik, “I didn’t see a track.”
Just then the men saw Tusasás coming along with a fawn. They said:
“There is the young man who always talks smart.”
Tusasás came up and threw the fawn on the ground. “Here is meat,” said
he. “Cook it for yourselves.” He felt proud.
Wámanik said: “Go home and get something cooked for us.” (Wámanik was
chief).
When they started for home, Wámanik asked Wisnik, one of his kin, to go
with him by another trail; then he asked: “Have you ever seen, on the
mountain, a young man who sings all the time he is hunting?”
“I have seen him a good many times,” said Wisnik. “It is strange you
have never seen him; you often travel around near where he lives. His
father is old man Djáudjau. He belongs to this mountain; he has lots of
power. The young man has three sisters, nice-looking girls.”
“I have never seen him,” said Wámanik, “but his song is nice; I like
it. You must go and get those girls for me.”
“They wouldn’t like such a big man as you are,” said Wisnik.
“I can turn to a small man, if I want to.”
“Maybe they have men,” said Wisnik.
“We will go and find out,” said Wámanik. “I must have those girls.”
“You stay at home,” said Wisnik, “and I will go. Maybe you would
frighten them.”
Wisnik always sang as he traveled. On the road to the old man’s house
he sang all the time, sang loud.
When the second sister went to the spring for water, she heard some one
singing, far off; when she got back to the house, she said: “Some one
on the mountain is singing. I like the song: it sounds nice.” The
eldest sister said: “Maybe the chief of the mountain is out hunting.
Wámanik always sings when he is tracking deer.”
They looked toward the mountain and listened. Soon they saw Wisnik
coming. He had a bow and arrows. He was playing on the bowstring and
singing.
The youngest sister always worked, dug roots and helped her mother. The
two older sisters were lazy; they sat around, they wouldn’t work. Their
hair touched the ground; they wore bead-covered dresses, and white caps
made of deer fat.
When old Djáudjau saw Wisnik, he asked: “Where did you come from?”
“From home,” said Wisnik.
Djáudjau could always talk with people’s thoughts without their knowing
it, and right away he knew why Wisnik had come. Old woman Djáudjau got
the young man something to eat.
The eldest sister said: “I am hungry. I am going to get something to
eat.”
The second sister said: “I am hungry, too,” and they started off.
Their food was the inside bark of pine trees. Their mother had told
them to always begin at the bottom of the tree and work up, for if they
began at the top the bark would fall, and kill them.
While the girls were gone, old woman Djáudjau said to Wisnik: “You have
never been here before, and I have never seen you traveling around.”
“I am on the mountains all the time,” said Wisnik. “I often see you. I
came here because my chief sent me. He wants to know what you think
about your daughters; he wants to marry them.”
Old man Djáudjau said: “My son has gone somewhere; he takes care of
those girls.” In his heart he was afraid of Wisnik. “My son wants to
get good men for his sisters. He doesn’t want them to be abused. You
must stay till he comes; then he will tell you what he thinks.”
At midday the young man came with a large deer on his back. He was
frightened when he saw Wisnik. Wisnik looked at him hard; he thought he
was nice.
Old Djáudjau said to his son’s mind: “What do you think about it? That
chief over in Wiwĕnsi wants your sisters.” The young man was so
frightened that he didn’t know what to do. The old woman went outside
and cried. Everybody knew that Wámanik was a bad man when he got mad,
and that he got mad easily. The young man thought: “I sha’n’t live long
if Wámanik marries my sisters.”
Old man Djáudjau said: “I don’t know how Wámanik found out about us. I
am sorry he wants my daughters. It is easy for him to get mad. He kills
a great many people. I don’t care for myself, but I am afraid something
will happen to my son.”
When Djáudjau’s daughters came home and saw their mother crying, they
asked: “What are you crying about?”
She told them, and said: “My daughters, you must say something. Your
brother never harms anybody. All he knows is how to be happy. If you
don’t marry Wámanik, trouble will come to us.”
“Why doesn’t Wámanik marry a woman of his own people, one that lives in
the ground?” asked the eldest sister. “We are not of his people; we
wouldn’t be happy in his house.” Then she began to make fun of Wisnik.
When Wisnik got home, he said: “Those girls won’t marry you. They say
they can’t live with our people. They told me to ask you why you didn’t
marry a woman of your own kind. They are afraid of you; you get mad so
easily.”
“Those girls needn’t be so proud,” said Wámanik. “I was only trying
them; I don’t want to marry them.”
The next day Wámanik and Wisnik went to hunt for deer. They killed one
and stopped at the foot of the mountain to roast some of the meat.
Wisnik wanted to go home, but Wámanik said: “We will camp and stay here
all night.”
The next morning young man Djáudjau went to hunt. He didn’t kill
anything; he couldn’t even find a track. Wámanik and Wisnik stayed in
their camp for five days. Wisnik was singing all the time, but Djáudjau
didn’t hear him. After five days Wámanik sent Wisnik home; he said:
“You needn’t come again; I am going to stay here for ten days and hunt
deer.”
“Why do you do that?” asked Wisnik. “Old Djáudjau said you had no home;
that you made it anywhere. You had better come back with me.” Wámanik
wouldn’t go and he wouldn’t listen to anything Wisnik said.
The young man hunted deer for five days, but couldn’t find even a
track. Then he said to his father: “I can’t call deer; they don’t come
when I sing. What can I do to get them?”
The old man heated rocks and had his son steam himself; then he gave
him some of the sweet-smelling stuff that comes out of the corners of a
deer’s eyes, and said: “Swallow this; if you are going to kill a deer
the smell of this stuff will come out of your mouth.” No smell came
from the young man’s mouth, but he went to hunt. He tried to sing, but
Wámanik drew his song from him; he couldn’t sing any longer. He went
home and lay down.
His mother asked: “What is the matter?”
“I feel as if I couldn’t walk any longer. I feel as if I had to fly.”
They steamed him again, and gave him sweet roots to eat. His mother
said: “If deer are to come to you, the roots will smell out of your
nose.” She held her nose to his, but there was no odor. Then she said:
“My son, I don’t know how you are to be cured.”
“I will try once more,” said the young man. He went out to hunt, but
didn’t see any game. That night he dreamed that he was lying against
something hard, that something heavy lay across his body and crushed
him down on stones. When he told his dream, his mother cried. To hide
his dream she got an old panther-skin, burned it in the fire, and
rubbed his face with the ashes.
Old Djáudjau’s nephew, a little bit of a man, came from the East to
visit his uncle. The girls were glad to see him; their brother was off
trying to find a deer. The little man asked: “How far is it to
Wûlkûtska’s house?”
“It is very far,” said his uncle; “you must stay here to-night.”
When the young man came, he was glad to see his cousin; they talked a
long time. When he went to sleep, he dreamed that the little man choked
him to death, and then went far off on the mountain. He thought he saw
his mother and sisters crying.
The next morning, after the little man had gone, the young man asked
his father to go and show him where he used to hunt when he was young.
They went, but when they got to the place, they didn’t find any deer.
The young man said: “I feel as if I were dead.” The next morning he
said to his father: “I am going away. I want you to stay at home and
not to feel lonesome in the world. I shall die to-day. I feel as if
somebody had tied me up and was going to kill me.”
He went to Wámanik’s mountain. Wámanik was singing to draw him there;
he couldn’t help going. When the young man got to the mountain, Wámanik
began to stretch. He stretched out far from the foot of the mountain.
Then he stretched around the mountain and began to crush it. The young
man heard a terrible roar. Trees were breaking, and stones and rocks
were cracking. A great storm of wind and stones came. The young man lay
down and tried to hold to the earth. But Wámanik pressed the mountain
still harder. His body looked like the sun. He kept stretching till his
head was right there by the young man; then he asked: “Are you afraid?”
“No,” said the young man, “I am not afraid of you. I have never done
you any harm. I feel like a little child.”
“I feel badly for you,” said Wámanik, “but I want to punish your
sisters. I want to show them what I can do when I am mad. I caught you
in this way, so I could talk to you.”
That night Wisnik dreamed that he saw the young man’s head and
Wámanik’s head. He was scared. The next morning he started early and
walked till he got to where Wámanik was pressing the mountain, then he
said: “Now I know why you wanted to stay here. You wanted to kill this
man. He is not to blame for what his sisters did.” He felt sorry for
the young man.
“Go home,” said Wámanik. “I don’t want you around here.”
“One of those girls said that if you married them you would kill all of
their family. You are making those words true!” said Wisnik. He was mad
at Wámanik. He pretended to go home, but he went to old man Djáudjau’s
house. The youngest sister was crying. “When did your brother go away?”
asked Wisnik.
“More than two days ago.”
“Wámanik has caught him,” said Wisnik. “He has him on the mountain and
is crushing him. You must make up with that man, or he will kill you
all. He has lots of power.”
“We won’t talk to him or see him,” said the eldest sister.
“Then your brother will die soon. Wámanik has pressed him to the
mountain for two days. He feeds him. He wishes food and drink to be in
his mouth, and right away it is there. He keeps him alive to torment
him as long as he can.”
When the little sister heard this, she ran off to the mountain to find
her brother; she was crying. When she came where he was, she said: “I
want you to tell Wámanik that I will be his wife as soon as I am old
enough.”
“No,” said her brother, “I don’t want you to pay for me; I shall die
soon.”
Wámanik heard what they said and he didn’t like it. “I won’t have her,”
said he; “she is too young. I want your other sisters.”
Wisnik listened to what Wámanik said; then he told old Djáudjau: “Your
son is alive yet, but his heart is almost dead; it feels flat. Wámanik
wants your daughters.”
“We won’t go,” said the girls. “He has our brother; let him keep him.
We won’t change our minds.” They laughed at their mother because she
cried all the time.
Wisnik went back to Wámanik, and said: “No matter what you do, those
girls won’t have you; they hate you worse than ever.”
“Go home and stay there,” said Wámanik. “I know what I will do.”
“You will kill that man for nothing,” thought Wisnik, but he didn’t say
anything, he went home.
Wámanik said to the young man, “I won’t take your little sister. I
don’t want her; I want your two older sisters, but I will let you get
up and go home.”
Wámanik drew himself in, loosened the young man, and let him go home;
then he went home himself. The girls laughed and were glad. They
thought that Wámanik hadn’t much power. They didn’t feel afraid of him;
they talked about him and made fun of him.
Wámanik stayed at home and laughed and sang. He didn’t talk about the
girls, but he had made up his mind that when seed time came he would
get them.
When seeds were ripe, the sisters went, each day, off toward the lake,
to gather them. Then Wámanik sent Wisnik to tell Wus he wanted to see
him. When the old man came, Wámanik said: “I want you to go to
Djáudjau’s house and get his two oldest girls for me. I don’t want the
little one. Tell the old man I shan’t ask for those girls again.”
In the evening Wus got to Djáudjau’s house. The old man asked: “What do
you want? Why do you come here?”
“The chief sent me to say that he must have your two daughters. If you
don’t send them to him, he will get mad and kill all of your children.”
“I like Wámanik,” said the old man. “He let my son live. I am glad, for
he is all the boy I have.” Then he shook the girls, and woke them up.
“Come and talk to this man,” said he. “Wámanik is mad. He let your
brother live, but if you don’t go to him he will kill us all. You must
say right away what you will do. This man won’t wait long; he wants to
go back. You were not made to live single, you didn’t come up from the
earth.”
The eldest sister pushed her father away, and said: “Go off and leave
us alone; we want to sleep.”
The brother said: “Don’t talk to them. Don’t try to make them go to
Wámanik, if they hate him. He is just as good as any man. He has a
clean skin, and it is bright and beautiful; I like him.” Then he said
to Wus: “Tell Wámanik that I have done what I could for him. If he
wants to kill me, he can. I am not afraid to die, but I can’t make
these girls go to him. If he wants them, he must come and talk to them
himself.”
Wus said to the girls: “You must do as I tell you; I love everybody in
this world. I love you, but no one can save you from that man if you
make him mad.” Wus talked all night, talked nice, but the girls didn’t
listen to him. At daylight he went back to Wámanik.
While Wus was gone, Wámanik made two flutes with many holes in them.
When he saw Wus coming, he went to meet him. He asked: “What did they
say? Are they coming?”
“I wouldn’t walk so slowly,” said Wus, “if they had said they would
come. The father and brother are willing, but those girls hate you.”
“I wonder why they hate me. I can be a man. See.”
He pulled off two blankets and became a nice-looking man.
“I am a man. I shall never stay old; each year I shall be young again.
They will grow old and die, but I shall always be young.” He stuck his
flutes up in the ground and hung on them the blankets he had taken off.
Wus said in his heart: “He is awful mad. It is too bad to kill such
nice-looking girls. I am sorry for them.”
The girls grew sleepy; they wanted to sleep all the time. Old Djáudjau
said to them: “You haven’t done as your brother asked you to. Now
trouble is coming to us. Go off and sleep in the bushes. Stay by
yourselves.”
When the girls were asleep, Wus made lots of Wámanik’s kin and hung
them on the bushes where the girls were sleeping. He had power and he
did this by wishing hard. The eldest sister dreamed of snakes; when she
woke up and saw them, she screamed.
Her brother called out: “Why don’t you keep still? What do you make
such a noise for? You don’t let us sleep. If dreams frighten you, go
off into the woods and jump around and scream. You have had your own
way; now when trouble comes you must show us what you can do.”
Every time the sisters fell asleep, they dreamed of snakes, and when
they woke up there were snakes all around them. They were terribly
scared.
The next morning the young man said to his father: “I want to go and
see my cousin, Wûlkûtska. I don’t want to stay where my sisters are. I
don’t like them any longer.”
“I will go, too,” said the old man. And they started.
The younger of the two sisters asked: “Where have my father and brother
gone?”
“They have gone far off,” said the mother. “They don’t like to be here.
You scream and keep them awake nights, and you won’t do as they say.
They know that trouble is coming.”
Now from the different villages, people were moving toward the lava bed
country. There was to be a great council. Word had gone out that a new
people was coming, that the present people were to be turned to other
things. The council was called to give the present people a chance to
decide what they would be, where they would live, and which would be
the nicest-looking.
Old Djáudjau and his son went to the council. Wámanik was there, and
Wisnik, and Wus, and Wálwilégas and Wekwek, and Weketas, and Wískäk and
Gapni, and Gäk, and Kískina and Káwhas, and Tcoóks, and Kāhkaas and
Kai, and Kékina, and Lóluk, and Leméis, and Juljulcus. All the people
in the world were at that council.
The two Djáudjau girls were there. Their brother wouldn’t let the
little sister be with them, so they wandered around alone.
The people talked about how every one would be, about who should be
chosen to be the nicest-looking, and if there was any one among them
powerful enough to turn to something that would never get old, that
would live after they were all dead. As they looked around, they said:
“Those Djáudjau sisters are nice-looking, but they are pale; they look
sick.”
Wûlkûtska’s daughter said: “It is that man over there, the man with
such a bright blanket, that makes them look that way. He is mad because
they won’t marry him.” The different people told what they wanted to
do. Lok said: “I will live in the mountains. I will raise children and
have many kin.”
Wískäk said: “I and my kin will be birds; we will stay a little while
in one place and then go to another. We will never harm anybody.”
Some said: “When we change, we will go east to where the sun comes up.”
Others said: “This is our country; we will stay around here.” When the
council was over all the people went home.
Djáudjau’s daughters were scared. They felt sick, felt that Wámanik was
killing them. They told their father to send word to the chief that
they would go to him. The old man sent Kékina to tell Wámanik.
Wámanik laughed, and said: “Didn’t I tell you that I wouldn’t let them
go a second time? I don’t want those girls. I am going to kill them;
they won’t be persons much longer.”
Midikdak’s daughter was sorry for the sisters. She cried and said to
them: “I am afraid Wámanik will kill you. He has killed people in this
way before. It’s his way.”
When Kékina came back, he said: “Wámanik doesn’t want your daughters.
He says that he is going to change them; that they will be people no
longer.”
The girls said: “We haven’t much longer to live, anyway. We don’t care
to stay in this world. Even Wámanik won’t live always. He won’t care so
much for his bright skin when he comes to die. He may change his skin
and look young, but he will have to die.” Then they said to their
father: “We are going away. We will live in the woods and have good
things to eat. Wámanik will no longer be a person; he will not have
good things to eat. People will abuse him, and he will live under rocks
and in little stony hills.”
The girls changed to flying squirrels and went toward the east. As they
flew, snakes dropped from their mouths and hearts,—the snakes that
Wámanik had put there. As the snakes fell out, they ran off in every
direction, and that is why there are so many snakes now.
When the little girl saw her sisters turn into common djáudjaus and
heard their call, she felt sorry for them. She cried, and said: “Let us
go with my sisters.”
The whole family turned to djáudjaus and flew away to the woods.