The Bear Legend

"A Cherokee Tale"

In the long ago time, there was a Cherokee Clan
call the Ani-Tsa-gu-hi (Ahnee-Jah-goo-hee),
and in one family of this clan was a boy
who used to leave home and be gone all day
in the mountains.
After a while he went oftener
and stayed longer, until at last he
would not eat in the house at all,
but started off at daybreak
and did not come back until night.
His parents scolded,
but that did no good,
and the boy still went every day
until they noticed that long brown hair
was beginning to grow out all over his body.
Then they wondered and asked him why
it was that he wanted to be so much
in the woods that he would not even eat at home.

Said the boy, "I find plenty to eat there,
and it is better than the corn
and beans we have in the settlements,
and pretty soon I am going into the
woods to say all the time."
His parents were worried and begged him not
leave them, but he said,
"It is better there than here,
and you see I am beginning to be different already,
so that I can not live here any longer.
If you will come with me,
there is plenty for all of us
and you will never have to work for it;
but if you want to come,
you must first fast seven days."
The father and mother talked it over
and then told the headmen of the clan.
They held a council about the matter
and after everything had been said they decided:
"Here we must work hard and have not always enough.
There he says is always plenty without work.
We will go with him."
So they fasted seven days,
and on the seventh morning al the
Ani-Tsa-gu-hi left the settlement
and started for the mountains
as the boy led the way.
When the people of the other towns heard
of it they were very sorry
and sent their headmen to persuade the
Ani Tsaguhi to stay at home
and not go into the woods to live.
The messengers found them already on the way,
and were surprised to notice that their bodies
were beginning to be covered with hair like
that of animals, because for seven days they
had not taken human food and their nature was changing.
The Ani Tsaguhi would not come back,
but said, "We are going where there is always plenty to eat.
Hereafter we shall be called Yonv(a) (bears),
and when you yourselves are hungry come
into the woods and call us and we shall
shall come to give you our own flesh.
You need not be afraid to kill us,
for we shall live always."
Then they taught the messengers the songs
with which to call them
and bear hunters have these songs still.

When they had finished the songs,
the Ani Tsaguhi started on again
and the messengers turned back to the settlements,
but after going a little way they looked back
and saw a drove of bears going into the woods.