10. The Six Brothers

10. THE SIX BROTHERS (11)

Six Indian brothers lived at a certain place. One of them started off and disappeared. After some time had passed and he did not come back another started off. He went on and did not return. The same happened to five of them. The last started off and came to a bent tree under which was a smooth piece of ground. After standing there for a while he climbed the tree. While he was standing upon it an old woman carrying a basket came beneath. "Young men standing in the tree and I used to wrestle with each other," she said. She came and looked up and saw him standing there. "Get down. Let us wrestle," she said to him. He approached and jumped upon her and began to wrestle. As they went round she threw him down and he stood up again. This happened repeatedly. Presently she threw him down near her basket, whereupon he seized a club which was in her basket, struck her on the head, and almost killed her. He kept striking her on the head until he had killed her. Then he cut off her head and threw it away, but she said, "Come together," and it came back again. This went on for some time and he did not know how to destroy her. Finally he took her heart and threw it with force against a tree, where it stuck, turning into tree fungus (båkto). So that woman died.

Afterwards the man went and brought his sister who had remained at home. When she came she put the war club into the basket and took it along. Her brother cut the antelope's (old woman's) nose off, made a pipe out of it and carried it with him. Then they started off in the direction from which the antelope had come. They went on until they heard at intervals the noise of one pounding corn and laughing. They went on, and, when they came to the place, they found a young girl, who said, when she saw the basket, "That looks like

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my grandmother's basket." "No, she made it herself," he answered. And she said of the club, "This is like my grandmother's club." "No, it is to tickle you with," he said. "When you eat people, where do you put their bones?" he said. "We put them on the other side of that dead tree," she replied. Then he got an arrow for each and went to the other side of the tree. Shooting upward over one pile of bones he said, "Look out! It will stick into you." Upon this the dead man awoke and sat up. He treated each of them in the same way, took them, and went on.

"Don't look behind you," he said to them. But, as they went on, one of them looked back, turned into a wildcat, went off howling, and disappeared among the thick bushes. They went on again and another looked back, turned into a panther, and went off howling. When they went on once more, another looked behind, turned into an owl, and flew hooting out of sight. They started on again and had gone for a little while when one turned round and looked back, changed into a crow, and disappeared, cawing.

After that he and his sister traveled along alone. When they reached a hill he wanted to go up. "When I sit upon the notch of the arrow, and jump, hold on by one of my feet," he said to her. But when he sat on the notch of the arrow (not using a bow) and jumped, she laid hold of his testiculi and he came down again. When he jumped again, she again seized him by the testiculi, and he came down again. That happened repeatedly until he stopped trying to go up. He said to his sister, "They shall call you 'partridge' and you shall stay here always." He threw her up and she made the noise that is made by a bird flying at night, and disappeared. Then that man himself sat on the arrow notch, jumped up, started upward, and was gone. ¹

Footnotes

170:1 Similar stories relate that the man became the thunder. See Bull. 47, Bur. Amer. Ethn., pp. 85-407.