60. The Flight to the Tree

60. THE FLIGHT TO THE TREE (76)

A woman had an only daughter. One day the girl started out to get water and a bison seized her and carried her off. Her mother did not know where she was. She went about asking for her, but none of the people knew where she had gone, although they lived in the same village.

The last person she met said that he knew what had happened to the girl, but some of the people did not believe him. However, he started off to hunt for her, carrying two red arrows and two white ones. By and by he saw her. She was standing in the middle of a herd of bison. By singing continually he caused the bison to sleep. All lay down and slept except a big bison who remained awake, although he kept on singing to him. But after a time he too lay down and slept.

Then the youth ran to the girl, seized her, and carried her off. Though she wanted to stay, he seized her and started off with her. But when he got fifty paces away the big bison awoke and pursued him. The man climbed into a tree. Then all of the bison came to the place. They pushed against the tree with their horns and trampled the earth with their feet. They butted with their horns. Now the man had a bucket filled with hen's eggs which he threw down. When the bison had almost butted the tree over, he threw an egg upon the ground and it stood up again.

After this had happened several times, the youth drew his four arrows. He shot a red arrow. He killed a bison, but it was not the big one. After his arrow had passed through a bison it returned to him, so he kept on shooting until he had used the four arrows and killed them all. The big bison was the woman's husband, and when he shot him she jumped down from the tree and fell upon him. She wept; she did not want to go home. For that the youth killed her, took her clothes and earrings and carried them home, and when he got to where her mother lived she gave him a trunk full of things by way of payment.