Part 13

And the boys said: "That is what they say."

And Cloud said: "I want you to do something to prove it."

Then the oldest boy thundered loud and lightened, and the other lightened a little, and Cloud said, "It is true, you are my children!"

And before night Cloud fed them, and then went into his kee and shut it up and left them outside all night. And it rained and snowed all night, but they staid outside.

And in the morning Cloud came out, and said: "It is really so, that you are my children."

And the next night he took them to a pond, where there was ice, and left them there all night. And the next day, when he came there and found they had staid in the water all night he said: "It is really so--you are my children."

So Cloud acknowledged them for his children and took them into his kee. And after awhile the boys wanted to go back to their mother, and Cloud said: "You may go, but you must not speak to anybody on the way. And I will be with you on the journey."

So the boys started, and cloud was over them, in the sky, shadowing them.

And after a while they saw a man coming, and the younger boy said: "We must ask him how our mother is."

But the older brother said: "Don't you remember that our father told us not to speak to anyone?"

The younger said: "Yes, I remember, but it would not be right not ask how our mother is."

So when the man came the boy asked: "How is everybody at home, and how is the old woman, our mother?"

And then the cloud above them lightened and thundered, and they were both turned into century plants.

NOTES ON THE STORY OF CLOUD

In Emory's report, before alluded to, also in Captain Johnston's, we find variants of The Story of the Children of Cloud. Thristy Hawk, the Maricopa, told Emory "that in bygone days a woman of surpassing beauty resided in a green spot in the mountains, near where we were encamped. All the men admired and paid court to her. She received the tributes of their devotion, grain, skins, etc., but gave no love or other favor in return. Her virtue and her determination to remain unmarried were equally firm. There came a drought which threatened the world with famine. In their distress, people applied to her, and she gave corn from her stock, and the supply seemed endless.... One day as she was lying asleep with her body exposed, a drop of rain fell on her stomach, which produced conception. A son was the issue, who was the founder of a new race which built all these houses" (ruins, vahahkkees).

Johnston has it: "The general asked a Pima who made the house I had seen. 'It is the Caza de Montezuma,' said he, 'it was built by the son of the most beautiful woman, who once dwelt in yon mountain; she was fair, and all the handsome men came to court her, but in vain; when they came, they paid tribute, and out of this small store she fed all the people in time of distress, and it did not diminish; at last, as she lay asleep, a drop of rain fell upon her navel, and she became pregnant, and brought forth a boy, who was the builder of all these houses."

The seeneeyawkum gives her twins but knew nothing of any story of their children or of these buildings, the vahahkkees.

THE STORY OF TCHEUNASSAT SEEVEN

Stcheuadack Seeven wanted to gamble with Tcheunassat Seeven, who lived at Kawtkee Oyyeeduck, and sent a man with an invitation to come and play against him, and bring all his wives.

And Tcheunassat Seeven said: "I will go, for my wives are used to travelling, and we will take food, and will camp on the road, and day after tomorrow, about evening, we will be there."

So the messenger went back with this word, and in the morning Tcheunassat Seeven got his lunch ready, and he and his wives started; and the first night camped at Odchee, and the next day came to the little mountain, near Blackwater, called Sahn-a-mik, and they crossed Ak-kee-mull, The River, the Gila, there, and Tcheunassat Seeven told his wives to wash their hair and clean themselves there, and then he told them to go ahead to Stcheuadack Seeven while he took his bath. And while he bathed they went on and came to Stcheuadack Seeven's house, where he was singing and his wives dancing.

Then the wives of Tcheunassat Seeven did not ask for invitation, but went right in and joined the dance, and went to Stcheuadack Seeven and took hold of his hand in the dance, pushing each other away to get it.

And Stcheuadack Seeven thought from this that he would get all of Tcheunassat Seeven's wives away from him.

Tcheunassat Seeven, after his bath, cut a piece of oapot wood and sharpened it, and split the other end into four pieces, and bent them over and tied the ends of crow's feathers to them, and stuck it in his hair, and dipped his finger in white paint and made one little spot over each eye, which was all the paint he used, and then he went and watched his wives dancing and taking Stcheuadack Seeven's hand.

And Stcheuadack Seeven asked them if that was their husband, and they said: "Yes, he is our husband. He is not very good-looking, but we care so much for him."

Tcheunassat Seeven watched the dancing awhile and then stepped back a little and took out his rattle and began to sing. And at once everybody crowded around him, and all his wives came back to him, and finally all Stcheuadack Seeven's wives came and contended for his hand, as his wives had been doing with Stcheuadack Seeven.

And this went on into the night, all dancing and having a good time, except Stcheuadack Seeven, who walked around looking at his wives dancing.

And finally he sent a message to the most beautiful of his wives (who had a beautiful daughter) and told him to tell her: "I am sleepy, and I want you home now, and I want all my wives to go into the house."

And she said: "I will come. I will tell my daughter, who is over there, and then we will come home."

But she did not tell her daughter, and did not come home, and Stcheuadack Seeven waited awhile, and then found his messenger and asked him: "Did you tell her?"

And the messenger said: "I did."

And he said: "Tell her again that I am waiting outside here, and I want her to come to me and we will go home."

Then the messenger told the woman again, but she did not come, and Stcheuadack Seeven wandered around outside till morning.

And near morning Tcheunassat Seeven sang a beautiful song, and began to move toward his own home, dancing all the way, and all the women going before him.

And he did this till morning, and then stopped, and went home, taking all his own wives and all of Stcheuadack Seeven's wives with him.

And Stcheuadack Seeven went home, when he saw this, and took his beautiful cloak all covered with live butterflies and humming-birds, and lay down, covering himself with it.

But four days after, Stcheuadack Seeven told the messenger to take this beautiful cloak to Tcheunassat Seeven, and ask him to send back that beautiful wife and her daughter, and to keep the rest of the wives; and to keep the cloak and use that to marry more wives.

But Tcheunassat Seeven said to the messenger: "Tell him I do not want his cloak. I have one just like it, and I have all I want, and I will not send back any of his wives. It was his wish that we should gamble, and if he had been the better singer and had won my wives I would not have asked for any of them back."

And now Tcheunassat Seeven appeared as a beautiful person, with long hair and turquoise ear-rings, and he said: "He need not think I always look as I did when I came to his dance. That was only to fool him."

The beautiful daughter of the beautiful wife grew up, and Tcheunassat Seeven married her, too, and she had a baby.

And when Stcheuadack Seeven heard of it, he said: "I am going to punish him." And he made a black spider and sent it thru the air.

And in the evening when the mother wanted to air her baby's cradle, she took it out, and then the black spider got in the baby's cradle and hid himself, and when the baby was put back the spider bit it, and it began to cry.

And its father and mother tried to pacify it, but could not, and when they took it out of the cradle, there they found the black spider.

And Tcheunassat Seeven sent word to Stcheuadack Seeven to come and see his grand-child, which was about to die, but Stcheuadack Seeven said to the messenger: "What is the matter with Tcheunassat Seeven? He is a powerful doctor. Tell him to cure the child. I will not come. The bite of a black spider is poisonous, but it never kills anybody. Tell him to get some weeds on Maricopa Mountain and cure the child." And he sent the messenger back again.

And Tcheunassat Seeven said: "How can I get those weeds when I do not know which ones are right and there are so many! I cannot go."

And he did not go, and the child died.

A SONG OF TCHEUNASSAT SEEVEN

There stands a dead vahahkkee On top of it there runs back and forth the Seeven And he has a robe with yellow hand prints on it.

THE LARK'S SONG ABOUT HIS LOST WIFE [9]

My poor wife! In the West she seems to be bound by the song of the Bamboo.

THE LEGEND OF BLACKWATER

A little off from the road between Sacaton, and Casa Grande Ruins there is, or was in the old days, a mysterious pool of dark water, which the Indians regarded with superstitious awe.

They said it was of fathomless depth, that it communicated with the ocean, and that strange, monstrous animals at times appeared in it. There are Indians still living who declare they have seen them with their own eyes.

I visited this famous place once with my interpreter, Mr Wood. After galloping a while thru a mezquite forest we suddenly emerged upon its legendary shores. Alas, for the prosaic quality of fact! It was but a common-place water-hole, or spring-pond, a few rods across, with bogs and bulrushes in its center.

The unkindness of irrigation ditches, withdrawing its waters, revealed that like most bottomless pools of story it was very shallow indeed.

It was nearly dry.

Its name of Blackwater has been given to the nearby surrounding district.

This was the only trace of the common Indian superstition of water monsters I found among the Pimas.

Koo-a Kutch

The End

ERRATA

In this book of Pima legends, various errors with regard to Indian words have occurred which will be corrected in a second edition. These are principally as follows:

The rule was made that all Indian words should be printed the first time in italics, with hyphens to facilitate pronunciation; afterwards in roman type, without hyphens. This rule has many times been violated.

There is a lack of uniformity in the spelling, etc., of many of the Indian terms. Thus the name of the old seeneeyawkum has been spelled in different ways, but should always be Comalk Hawkkih. The name of the Creator should always be Juwerta Mahkai. The name of his subordinate should be Eeheetoy. Gee-ee-sop should be Geeheesop. Cheof should be Cheoff. Vah-kee-woldt-kee, as on page 8, should be Vahf-kee-woldt-kih as on page 112. Sah-kote-kee, on page 183, should be Sah-kote-kih, and Chirt-kee should be Chirt-kih. On page 224, vahs-shroms should be vahs-hroms. Tcheuassat Seeven (page 237) should be Tcheunassat Seeven. Stchenadack Seeven (page 238) should be Stcheuadack Seeven. Scheunassat Seeven, on page 239, should be Tcheunassat Seeven. In the story of the Turquoises and the Red Bird (page 99) the name of the chief who lived in the Casa Grande ruins should have been spelled with a u, instead of a w, to secure uniformity; also the Indian name of the turquoises. The name of the Salt River Mountain, wherever it occurs, should always be Moehahdheck.

NOTES

[1] Many doubt that the Indians of North America knew anything about the diamond, but my interpreter insisted that the Doctor-stone was the diamond, therefore I have taken his word for it. Perhaps it was crystal.

[2] What the Pimas call the haht-sahn-kahm is the wickedest cactus in Arizona. The tops of the branches fall off, and lie on the ground, and if stepped on the thorns will go thru ordinary shoe leather and seem to hold with the tenacity of fish-hooks, so that it is almost impossible to draw them out.

[3] "To swallow charcoal" implies the swallowing of meat so greedily it is not properly cleansed of the ashes of its roasting.

[4] The reference to the "gun" shows clearly that this song was made after the advent of the white man.

[5] This word was not translated--probably archaic and the meaning forgotten.

[6] This song is evidently imperfect, for in the context it is said that before this fight they sang about the beads, sah-vaht-kih, but there is no mention of them here.

[7] The reason why the older people went inside the circle was to protect the younger ones from the impurity of anything Apache, and they went inside as more hardened to this.

[8] Read before the Anthropological Society of Philadelphia, May 11, 1904.

[9] This is a Pima flute-song, a record of which I obtained for my phonograph while in Arizona. It has no direct connection with the legends; but illustrates the Story of Tcheunassat Seeven a little, as it is about a woman, the wife of an Indian named the Lark, who is led away by the seductive singing of another Indian named the Bamboo; the Indians having an idea that women were most easily seduced by music. The Pimas, when they speak English, calling the wild cane bamboo.

End of Project Gutenberg's Aw-Aw-Tam Indian Nights, by J. William Lloyd