The mother now gave a heart-broken cry and called, “Oh my first born son, give your mother one look,—one last look or I die!” This weakened the heart of the oldest son and he looked down toward the figure of his mother with outstretched arms, weeping for him.
As he looked he lost his power to master the air, and began to fall. With great rapidity he fell until he struck the earth and penetrated it, leaving only a scar where the soil came together again.
The mother rushed to the spot and swept aside the rubbish, but no trace of her son could she find. Finally looking up she saw her other boys dancing far up in the sky. They had become the “dancing stars.”
In deep sorrow the mother with covered head sat beside the spot where her first born had fallen. For a whole year she wept as she watched.
Winter came and her dancing boys appeared over the council house and each night were observed overhead, but no sign of her eldest could be seen.
Came springtime and the time of budding plants. From the spot where the eldest had disappeared a tiny green shoot appeared. This the mother watched with great solicitude. It grew into a tall tree and became the first pine. This tree was guarded by the melancholy old woman and she would allow no man to touch it; she knew that it was her son and would sometime speak to her.
The winds blew and the tree swayed, it began to speak, and the mother heard. Only she could interpret the sounds that came from the waving branches, only she could see the face of the young warrior with his plumes.
A careless hunter slashed at the tree and blood flowed, but the mother bound up the wound and drove other intruders away. In time the tree bore small short feathers (cones), and more trees grew. These the hunters slashed in order to get pitch for canoes and ropes.
Every winter the pine tree talked to its dancing brothers in the sky and the mother knew that her eldest son should be her comfort while she rested on this earth.
GENERAL NOTES. This legend I had from Edward Cornplanter but being so familiar with it I made only a few rough notes which I have transcribed. This myth is similar to the Huron and Wyandot forms recounting the origin of “the cluster.”