Heluta Plants the Deer

HELUTA PLANTS THE DEER ^14a

They were living in Cochiti. They challenged each other to a display of their crops, and they asked Heluta to come to compete. They fasted for four days, and on the fourth day they sent to Heluta and said, "It is time to come to our village." All the people of Cochiti gathered together but Heluta did not come. They sent a messenger again to hurry him. All the people had brought their harvests but Heluta. did not bring any corn or muskmelons or gourds. They made fun of him and said, "What has he got to show off? He has not brought anything." He came into the house where all the men were eating. The east room was filled with white corn, and the north room was filled with yellow corn; the west room was filled with blue corn, and the south room was filled with red corn, and the middle room was filled with spotted corn and with watermelons and muskmelons and all kinds of gourds. When they had looked at everything Heluta, said, "Is this all?" "Yes." "Now it is my turn to show you how I live." He opened his little fawn-skin bag and took out a piece of cob with two or

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three kernels sticking to it. "This is what I live by." They laughed at him. "What kind of a living is that? No melons and only a few little corn kernels." Heluta said, "Wait. You will see which one makes the best living; you by all your work, or the man who has the power himself." He went back to Shipap and he said, "In four days (years) you will find out." The people tried to make him turn back, but they could not.

Next spring the people began to plant. Their corn and melons grew well, but there was no rain. By the middle of the summer everything was dried up and dead. The next year it was the same. For four years they planted, but every year the rain failed them and their crops were burned up by the sun.

In four years they were starving. They chose the fly as messenger and sent him to Shipap to Heluta. He came into the center of the first room. In that room the sk'akuts katcinas ¹⁵ were roasting corn. Whenever one of the kernel's popped they all jumped. The fly flew past them into the second room and the third room and came to the fourth room. Heluta said to him, "What is it you have come to ask?" "They sent me to talk to you." "You are foolish. You mustn't come to find me whenever those people tell you to come to me. Come close." The fly flew close to him. "Stick out your tongue." He stuck out his tongue and Heluta pulled it out by the root. "Now go back and tell your people that you found me. I am not coming back to the village. I have told them already it is their own fault."

Fly went back to the village. He tried to tell them what Heluta had said. He could not because be had lost his tongue. After that he could only say "buzz." Heluta had said, "You will never talk any more, you have no tongue." The people said, "How can he tell us? He has no tongue. What shall we do?" "We will send Hummingbird to find Heluta." They called Hummingbird and said, "Go and find Heluta and bring him back to the village." Hummingbird went to Shipap. He flew into the first room where the sk'akuts katcinas were roasting corn. He flew into the second room and the third room. He came to Heluta. Heluta said to him, "What is it you have come to ask?" "I have come to bring you back to the village. The people need you. They want you to forgive what they have done to you. The children are dying of hunger and thirst. Now they have learned that it is by your power that they live." Heluta said to Hummingbird, "Yes, my son, I will go back to the village. I am sorry for them. First they must hunt and bring me a deer from the north side of the mountains where the sun has never shone upon him. When they have taken this deer, send for me."

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The people went hunting and caught a deer from the north side of the mountain upon whom the sun had never shone. They sent for Heluta and brought him to the village. They laid the deer before him. Heluta took it to Shipap. The clouds began to come up with thunder and lightning, and it rained. Since then there has always been rain in this country.

Heluta told them, ^15a "My seed is dewclaws. Whenever you kill a deer, do not throw these away, because these are my seed. Watch me, and you will see my field." He took a great bunch of dewclaws and dug in the ground. He put each one in a hole in the earth. When he, had finished, the first he had planted were already coming up above the ground. The people saw the small antlers of the deer. They watched them grow until they were full size and ran off to the mountains. Heluta, called them all together and took them to Shipap and shut them up there. When they were full grown he opened the door and let them out over the mountains. So he is the father of all the deer.

Footnotes

9:14a Informant 2. Notes, p. 207. For text translation see p. 251.

10:15 They are spotted with downy feathers.

11:15a See pp. ¹¹, 251.