Seneca myths and folk tales

by Arthur C. Parker

By and by he came to a path and saw one man’s tracks, by and by two, three, four, by and by, good many,—regular path. Pretty soon so many that the path, it was good deal dust in it, and he kept on. Then he noticed other tracks and paths coming on,—the big road it is, now, from every direction. Now way off in the distance he saw smoke rising. He kept looking. He thought something was going to happen. He was all alone on the big path in the dusty plain. Path gets wider the more he goes along. By and by he thinks he’d better look nice so he stripped off some bark and rolled it and spit on it to make a nice neck-string. My! it was a nice one and shined where he spit on it. By and by he went along and he saw a bush and a big thing on it—what hornets live in,—hanging down. It was a very big thing, so he went up slow and took some moss and clay in his fingers and made a plug and pasted up the door where hornets came out. Then he picked it off and he was a big witch, and rolled the big,—why, I guess it’s nest, you call it,—roll in his hands and got it small like a little bottle and he spit on it. My, it shined! Then he fastened the bottle to his neck on the bark. Oh it looked nice! Then he shook up the bottle hard. Oh! Then he went along and he saw a milk-weed stalk with pods popped open. So he pulled out the white threads and cut the stalk and got his hands sticky—and rubbed it on his long hair. Then he spit on it some more and stuck in the white stuff and worked a long time and it looked nice. You couldn’t see his black hair. It looked all white, like a dandelion. So he went along and he thought he would spit on his hands and rub it on his body and he did and it got all colors and they changed. Oh my! And he went on and he began to notice he was going down hill and he went on and the hill got steeper. He saw smoke all the time and now he saw it coming out of a big house and the road went right into the door. And the hill got steeper and by and by very steep and slippery. And he got there and said, “Yo hoh´! I am in for it now!” So he looked sharp and saw a woman in the door and he was all right. Then all of a sudden he looked around and oh my! his foot slipped and he fell right down the hill and didn’t stop until he landed right in the middle of the room. Now the old woman there said, “Yes, get the kettle ready. We’ve been waiting long enough for that animal.”

Now there were seven sisters there and the oldest was an old maid and all were except the youngest, and the oldest said, “Go get the knife and we will butcher him.” So they tied his body to a post and they were ready to kill him. Then the youngest said, “Oh look, he isn’t like the others. He has curious hair and his body shines! His skirt is nice, it is spotted and pretty and has deer’s hoofs rattling for a fringe. Let us look at him.” So she touched his hair and pulled it and said, “My, it is funny, it won’t pull out. Let’s not kill him yet.” So she looked at him some more. Pretty soon she says, “Oh what a funny bottle,” and she pulled out the cork and all of a sudden, out came something, bump, on the floor. Now he was a great witch and when the hornets struck the floor he used his great magic, and oh! it was strong magic! Now when the women looked, Ah-gey! the hornets were warriors! And they kept falling out until the house was full and the hornet captain took out his knife and cut the strings on the post and then he stopped up the bottle.

The old woman called her youngest daughter to her and said: “I am a big witch but he is a bigger one. If I get beaten you must burn down the house and all things in it. You must burn all the medicine because it will kill you all if you don’t. Then have all the ashes of me and everything buried.” Then the mother rushed and yelled, “Kill him!” and she tried it but a hornet-man warrior raised his tomahawk and he didn’t hit her but she fell down dead. So the oldest sister ran to stick a knife in him and a warrior raised his arm and she fell dead and he didn’t hit her. And they were all afraid and stood back and the youngest daughter kind o’ cried and said, “I’ll give up my way and eat what he eats and I’ll take him for my husband.” So right away the chief hornet married them.

So there was no more fighting and it was dark and he and the seventh daughter went to bed because they were married and the five sisters planned to kill him as he slept but it was so he had a friend, a guard who was a star. And the star came down and sat on his eye and the witch sisters thought him awake and by and by the star went away, but it was morning then and they couldn’t kill him.

So that day he ordered the big lodge to be burned and all the medicine in it and the body of the mother in it. It was a very big fire and hot and after awhile the mother’s head burst open and up in the smoke flew all kinds of evil birds that no one eats,—owls and screech-owls, and hawks and crows, and big crow buzzards, and black eagles and wild poison animals with feathers. Now the wife said he must not kill those animals but let them fly away. She told him before her mother died that must be the way. So that’s how it happened all kinds of mischief got scattered around.

Then the sisters told him that once in a fight all of their men were killed and everybody else only them and they didn’t have any men and wanted some now because they had made up their minds that they wouldn’t eat any more people. So some of his warriors married the sisters and others he sent out to find wives for some of the hornet men had no hornet wives. He wanted to make a big village there.

So then he went back and brought his grandparents to the new village and they were surprised and knew he was a big witch then. Now when all the warriors had returned with wives he said, “You are mine.” Then he uncorked his bottle and let out more warriors for his grandparents. So they went to another village and the warriors built houses and boats and cleared land and made a big town.

Now the youngest daughter told her husband where his brother’s bones were hidden. And she showed him the spot and he dug up the bones and was in a hurry to match them and smoked on them and they came to life again but he had been in too much of a hurry. He didn’t put the bones together the right way they ought to be and that was very bad because when the meat grew on again some had long legs, some long some short, some had broken arms, some too many fingers, some not enough, some had not enough ribs and so were soft and bent over. Oh they were in an awful fix! Their bones were not a match and some were missing because they had been chewed up. Oh! But the brothers had lots of hornets to work for them and it was easy. So now that’s why crooked and lame people come to be born. They are the grandchildren,—way down,—of the brothers, and it is awful!

Now that’s only how far my Grandfather told us because he said we wouldn’t go to sleep if we listened to more and he never finished it but next time began it all over again.

GENERAL NOTES.—This is a characteristic Seneca legend and its elements are not at all unusual. As a variation I have given it almost exactly in the same language as originally related to me by Mrs. Aurelia Jones Miller. My informant was a woman of unusual natural intelligence and spoke English fairly well, but she frequently omitted the articles, “the,” “an” and “a,” and in other ways her language was picturesquely provincial, but typical of the reservation brogue.