THE CHIEF’S DAUGHTERS: AN OTOE TALE.
In the evening, in summer, upon a hot night two young girls, chief’s daughters, lay on the ground outside their tents gazing at the sky. As the stars came out one of them said:—
“I wish I were away up there. Do you see where that dim star is? There is where I wish I might be.” And she fixed her eyes upon the twinkling star that seemed to be vanishing behind the clouds.
The other girl said: “It is too dim. I wish I were up by that bright one, that large brilliant star,” and she pointed to where a steady light glowed red.
Soon they were asleep and the brilliant lights in the blue above kept watch. In the night when they awoke each young girl found herself where she had wished to be. The one in the dim star was in the home of a brave young chief, and she became his bride and was happy. The beautiful star had appeared dim to her while she was yet upon the earth because it was so far, far away that she could not see its glorious light.
The girl in the bright star found herself in a servant’s home, and was obliged to do all manner of work and to become the servant’s wife. This star had been nearer the earth, and so it had seemed to be the larger and brighter star. When this girl found that her friend had gone to a beautiful star and become the wife of a chief, with plenty of servants to wait upon her, and that she was never permitted to do any work, she cried and cried because the change in her own condition seemed more cruel, and she was even obliged to live with a servant.
The girls were still friends and often met in the clouds and went out to gather wild turnips, but the chief’s wife could never dig, her friend was always obliged to serve her. Whenever they started out an old man would say to them:—
“When you dig a turnip, you must strike with the hoe once, then pull up the turnip. Never, by any means, strike twice.” After going to gather turnips many times and receiving always this same instruction the chief’s wife grew curious, and one day she said to her friend:
“Why is it, they tell us to strike but once? To-day when you dig that turnip I wish you to strike twice. Let us see why they allow us to strike but once.”
The servant struck once with the hoe and took up the turnip, then, as commanded, she struck with her hoe again in the same place. Behold a hole! She leaned forward and looked down. She saw her home. She cried to her friend. “Look! I can see through the clouds. See! there is our home.”
The chief’s wife looked also, and she saw the village and her home. The girls sat looking through the hole, and they longed to go home, and they sat weeping. An old man chanced to pass by, and he saw them and stopped and asked:—
“What is the matter? What are you crying about?”
And they answered, “Because we can see our home. We are so far away, we wish to be there, but we can never get there.”
The old man passed on. He went to the chief and he told him that the girls sat weeping because they could see their home, and they wanted to go back to the earth.
The chief then called all his people together, and he sent them away to find all the lariats[[5]] that they could.
In the village, on the earth, every one had mourned for the chief’s daughters, who had so strangely disappeared, and could not be found. It was a long time since they were lost; but the people still thought of them.
To-day in the village a great many people had come to see the boys and young men play. They used a ring[[6]] and a long stick, round at one end. One person would throw the ring in the air and at the same time another would try to send his arrow through it; the men would run swiftly and throw their sticks when they were near the ring, for the one who got most arrows through while the ring was still in the air was the winner. All the people were excited over the game and urging on the young men, when one of them happened to look up toward the sky.
“Why, look up,” he called out, “something is coming down. Look! They are very large. Look at them!”
All who heard stopped and looked up, and others seeing them look, turned to see what it was. Many ran to the spot where these things were falling. Then the people found they were the lost girls.
The good chief in the dim star had ordered all the lariats knotted together and then he had wound them around the bodies of the two girls and dropped them gently through the hole in the sky to the earth, keeping tight the end of the rope until the girls reached the ground.
Joyfully the Indians ran before the girls to carry the news of their return to their sorrowful parents. One of the girls looked sad and pitiful, the other looked happy as though she had been in some beautiful place.