Some Seneca warriors were hunting in the woods, and one morning, on
starting out for the day, they left two boys behind to take care of
the camp. Soon after they had gone, a war party of Cherokee came up,
and finding the boys alone took them both and started back to the
south, traveling at such a rate that when the hunters returned in
the evening they decided that it was of no use to follow them. When
the Cherokee reached their own country they gave the boys to an old
man, whose sons had been killed by the Seneca. He took the boys and
adopted them for his own, and they grew up with him until they were
large and strong enough to go hunting for themselves.
But all the time they remembered their own home, and one day the older
one said to his brother, "Let's kill the old man and run away." "No,"
said the other, "we might get lost if we ran away, we are so far from
home." "I remember the way," said his brother, so they made a plan
to escape. A few days later the old man took the boys with him and
the three set out together for a hunt in the mountains. When they
were well away from the settlement the boys killed the old man,
took all the meat and parched corn meal they could easily carry,
and started to make their way back to the north, keeping away from
the main trail and following the ridge of the mountains. After many
days they came to the end of the mountains and found a trail which
the older brother knew as the one along which they had been taken
when they were first captured. They went on bravely now until they
came to a wide clearing with houses at the farther end, and the older
brother said, "I believe there is where we used to live." It was so
long ago that they were not quite sure, and besides they were dressed
now like Cherokee, so they thought it safer to wait until dark. They
saw a river ahead and went down to it and sat behind a large tree
to wait. Soon several women came down for water and passed close to
the tree without noticing the boys. Said the older brother, "I know
those women. One of them is our mother." They waited until the women
had filled their buckets and started to the village, when both ran
out to meet them with the Seneca hailing-shout, "Gowe'! Gowe'!" At
first the women were frightened and thought it a party of Cherokee,
but when they heard their own language they came nearer. Then the
mother recognized her two sons, and said, "Let us go back and dance
for the dead come to life," and they were all very glad and went into
the village together.--Arranged from Curtin, Seneca manuscript.