Now, this girl was keeping the deer and antelope and other animals so long closed up in the corral that the people in all the villages round about were ready to die of hunger for meat. Still, for her own gratification she would keep these animals shut up.
The young man came back at evening, and she asked him if he had found a deer for her.
“No,” said he, “I could not even find the trail of one.”
“Well,” she said, “I am sorry, for your bundles are heavy.”
He took them up and went home with them.
Finally, this matter became so much talked about that the two small gods on the top of Thunder Mountain, who lived with their grandmother where our sacrificial altar now stands, said: “There is something wrong here; we will go and court this maiden.” Now, these gods were extremely ugly in appearance when they chose to be—mere pigmies who never grew to man’s stature. They were always boys in appearance, and their grandmother was always crusty with them; but they concluded one night that they would go the next day to woo this maiden.
Said one to the other: “Suppose we go and try our luck with her.” Said he: “When I look at you, you are very handsome.”
Said the other to him: “When I look at you, you are extremely handsome.”
They were the ugliest beings in human form, but in reality were among the most magnificent of men, having power to take any form they chose.
Said the elder one: “Grandmother, you know how much talk there is about this maiden in the Village of the Yellow Rocks. We have decided to go and court her.”