There was once a young man who
wanted to go on a journey. His mother provided him
with sacks of dried meat and pairs of moccasins, but
his father said to him:
"Here,
my son, are four magic arrows. When you are in need,
shoot one of them!"
The young
man went forth alone, and hunted in the forest for
many days. Usually he was successful, but a day came
when he was hungry and could not find meat. Then he
sent forth one of the magic arrows, and at the end of
the day there lay a fat Bear with the arrow in his
side. The hunter cut out the tongue for his meal, and
of the body of the Bear he made a thank-offering to
the Great Mystery.
Again he was
in need, and again in the morning he shot a magic
arrow, and at nightfall beside his camp-fire he found
an Elk lying with the arrow in his heart. Once more
he ate the tongue and offered up the body as a
sacrifice. The third time he killed a Moose with his
arrow, and the fourth time a Buffalo.
After the
fourth arrow had been spent, the young man came one
day out of the forest, and before him there lay a
great circular village of skin lodges. At one side,
and some little way from the rest of the people, he
noticed a small and poor tent where an old couple
lived all alone. At the edge of the wood he took off
his clothes and hid them in a hollow tree. Then,
touching the top of his head with his staff, he
turned himself into a little ragged boy and went
toward the poor tent.
The old
woman saw him coming, and said to her old man:
"Old man, let us keep this little boy for our
own! He seems to be a fine, bright-eyed little
fellow, and we are all alone."
"What
are you thinking of, old woman?" grumbled the
old man. "We can hardly keep ourselves, and yet
you talk of taking in a ragged little scamp from
nobody knows where!"
In the
meantime the boy had come quite near, and the old
wife beckoned to him to enter the lodge.
"Sit
down, my grandson, sit down!" she said, kindly;
and, in spite of the old man's black looks, she
handed him a small dish of parched corn, which was
all the food they had.
The boy ate
and stayed on. By and by he said to the old woman:
"Grandmother, I should like to have grandfather
make me some arrows!"
"You
hear, my old man?" said she. "It will be
very well for you to make some little arrows for the
boy."
"And
why should I make arrows for a strange little ragged
boy?" grumbled the old man.
However, he
made two or three, and the boy went hunting. In a
short time he returned with several small birds. The
old woman took them and pulled off the feathers,
thanking him and praising him as she did so. She
quickly made the little birds into soup, of which the
old man ate gladly, and with the soft feathers she
stuffed a small pillow.
"You
have done well, my grandson!" he said; for they
were really very poor.
Not long
after, the boy said to his adopted grandmother:
"Grandmother, when you see me at the edge of the
wood yonder, you must call out: 'A Bear! There goes a
Bear!' "'
This she
did, and the boy again sent forth one of the magic
arrows, which he had taken from the body of his game
and kept by him. No sooner had he shot, than he saw
the same Bear that he had offered up, lying before
him with the arrow in his side!
Now there
was great rejoicing in the lodge of the poor old
couple. While they were out skinning the Bear and
cutting the meat in thin strips to dry, the boy sat
alone in the lodge. In the pot on the fire was the
Bear's tongue, which he wanted for himself.
All at once
a young girl stood in the doorway. She drew her robe
modestly before her face as she said in a low voice:
"I come
to borrow the mortar of your grandmother!"
The boy gave
her the mortar, and also a piece of the tongue which
he had cooked, and she went away.
When all of
the Bear meat was gone, the boy sent forth a second
arrow and killed an Elk, and with the third and
fourth he shot the Moose and the Buffalo as before,
each time recovering his arrow.
Soon after,
he heard that the people of the large village were in
trouble. A great Red Eagle, it was said, flew over
the village every day at dawn, and the people
believed that it was a bird of evil omen, for they no
longer had any success in hunting. None of their
braves had been able to shoot the Eagle, and the
chief had offered his only daughter in marriage to
the man who should kill it.
When the boy
heard this, he went out early the next morning and
lay in wait for the Red Eagle. At the touch of his
magic arrow, it fell at his feet, and the boy pulled
out his arrow and went home without speaking to any
one.
But the
thankful people followed him to the poor little
lodge, and when they had found him, they brought the
chief's beautiful daughter to be his wife. Lo, she
was the girl who had come to borow his grandmother's
mortar!
Then he went
back to the hollow tree where his clothes were
hidden, and came back a handsome young man, richly
dressed for his wedding.
