Once the animals challenged the birds to a great ballplay, and the
birds accepted. The leaders made the arrangements and fixed the day,
and when the time came both parties met at the place for the ball
dance, the animals on a smooth grassy bottom near the river and the
birds in the treetops over by the ridge. The captain of the animals
was the Bear, who was so strong and heavy that he could pull down
anyone who got in his way. All along the road to the ball ground he
was tossing up great logs to show his strength and boasting of what
he would do to the birds when the game began. The Terrapin, too--not
the little one we have now, but the great original Terrapin--was with
the animals. His shell was so hard that the heaviest blows could not
hurt him, and he kept rising up on his hind legs and dropping heavily
again to the ground, bragging that this was the way he would crush any
bird that tried to take the ball from him. Then there was the Deer,
who could outrun every other animal. Altogether it was a fine company.
The birds had the Eagle for their captain, with the Hawk and the great
Tla'nuwa, all swift and strong of flight, but still they were a little
afraid of the animals. The dance was over and they were all pruning
their feathers up in the trees and waiting for the captain to give
the word when here came two little things hardly larger than field
mice climbing up the tree in which sat perched the bird captain. At
last they reached the top, and creeping along the limb to where the
Eagle captain sat they asked to be allowed to join in the game. The
captain looked at them, and seeing that they were four-footed, he
asked why they did not go to the animals, where they belonged. The
little things said that they had, but the animals had made fun of
them and driven them off because they were so small. Then the bird
captain pitied them and wanted to take them.
But how could they join the birds when they had no wings? The Eagle,
the Hawk, and the others consulted, and at last it was decided to make
some wings for the little fellows. They tried for a long time to think
of something that might do, until someone happened to remember the
drum they had used in the dance. The head was of ground-hog skin and
maybe they could cut off a corner and make wings of it. So they took
two pieces of leather from the drumhead and cut them into shape for
wings, and stretched them with cane splints and fastened them on to the
forelegs of one of the small animals, and in this way came Tla'meha,
the Bat. They threw the ball to him and told him to catch it, and by
the way he dodged and circled about, keeping the ball always in the
air and never letting it fall to the ground, the birds soon saw that
he would be one of their best men.
Now they wanted to fix the other little animal, but they had used up
all their leather to make wings for the Bat, and there was no time to
send for more. Somebody said that they might do it by stretching his
skin, so two large birds took hold from opposite sides with their
strong bills, and by pulling at his fur for several minutes they
managed to stretch the skin on each side between the fore and hind
feet, until they had Tewa, the Flying Squirrel. To try him the bird
captain threw up the ball, when the Flying Squirrel sprang off the
limb after it, caught it in his teeth and carried it through the air
to another tree nearly across the bottom.
When they were all ready the signal was given and the game began,
but almost at the first toss the Flying Squirrel caught the ball and
carried it up a tree, from which he threw it to the birds, who kept
it in the air for some time until it dropped. The Bear rushed to get
it, but the Martin darted after it and threw it to the Bat, who was
flying near the ground, and by his dodging and doubling kept it out
of the way of even the Deer, until he finally threw it in between
the posts and won the game for the birds.
The Bear and the Terrapin, who had boasted so of what they would do,
never got a chance even to touch the ball. For saving the ball when
it dropped, the birds afterwards gave the Martin a gourd in which to
build his nest, and he still has it.