“Oh, you miserable boy, you are always doing something foolish; where is your wife?” asked the grandmother.
“Oh, I shot her!” was the response.
“Why did you do that?”
“I didn’t want my father, the Sun, to take them away with my wife. I knew you would not care anything about my wife, but I knew you would be very fond of the grandchildren. Here they are.”
But she wouldn’t look at all. So the younger brother drew his face down, and taking the poor little children in his arms said: “You unnatural grandmother, you! Here are two nice little grandchildren for you!”
She said: “How shall I feed them? or what shall I do with them?”
He replied: “Oh, take care of them, take care of them!”
She took a good look at them, and became a true grandmother. She ran and clasped the little ones, crying out: “Let me take you away from these miserable children of mine!” She made some beds of sand for them, as Zuñi mothers do today, got some soft skins for them to lie on, and fed them with a kind of milk made of corn toasted and ground and mixed with water; so that they gradually enlarged and grew up to be nice children.
Thus it was in the days of the ancients, and has been told to us in these days, that even the most cruel and heartless of the gods do these things. Even they took these helpless children to their grandmother, and she succored them and brought them up to the time of reason. Therefore it is the duty of those who find helpless babies or children, inasmuch as they are not so cruel and terrible as were the Gods of War,—not nearly,—surely it is their duty to take those children and succor and bring them up to the time of reason, when they can care for themselves. That is why our people, when children have been abandoned, provide and care for them as if they were their own.
Thus long is my story.