Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk-Tales / With notes on the origin, customs and character of the Pawnee people

by George Bird Grinnell

LONE CHIEF—SKIDI.

THE BOY WHO WAS SACRIFICED.

THERE was a time, far back, when some people thought that it was good to sacrifice to Ti-ra´-wa whatever they had that was most precious to them. The sacrifice of the animal, the burnt offering, has always been made by all the Pawnees; that is one of the things handed down from the ruler. It is very old. The Skidi have always performed the sacrifice of the captive. Each one of these is sacred and solemn, but it is not like giving up something that belongs to you, and that you love. It is a sacrifice, but it does not cost much.

Many years ago, in the Skidi village on the Loup, there lived a man, who believed that if he sacrificed his son to Ti-ra´-wa, it would be a blessing to him. He thought that if he did this thing, perhaps Ti-ra´-wa would speak to him face to face, and that he could talk to him just as two people would talk to one another, and that in this way he would learn many things that other people did not understand. His child was a nice boy about ten years old, strong, growing up well, and the man loved him. It made him feel badly to think of killing him. He meditated long about this, but the more he thought about it, the more he believed that this sacrifice would please Ti-ra´-wa. There were many things that he wanted to understand, and to do; and he thought if he gave up his son, these good things would come to him. So he resolved to make the sacrifice.

One morning he started out from the village, and took the boy with him. They went over to the Platte. When they got to the river, as they were walking along, the man took his knife from its sheath, and caught the boy by the shoulder, and stabbed him quickly, and cut him open. When the boy was dead, he threw the body into the river, and then went back to the village. When he got there, he went into his lodge and sat down. After a time he said to his wife, “Where is the boy?” The woman said, “He went out with you, when you went over to see the horses.” The man answered, “No; I went out to where the horses are feeding, and looked at them, but he did not go with me.”

The man went out, and looked for the boy all through the village, but he could not find him. At night when the boy did not come home, they began to get frightened, and for two days they hunted for the boy, and at last they got the old crier to call out for him from the top of the lodge, and ask if any one had seen him, but none of the people knew what had become of the boy. Now the mother was mourning, and the father pretended to feel very badly. They could not find the boy; and soon after this the tribe started on the summer hunt, and the father and mother went with them. The village made a good hunt, killing plenty of buffalo, and made much dried meat.

After the boy had been thrown into the river, he floated down with the current, sometimes turning over and over in the swift water, and sometimes grounding for a little while on a sand bar, and then being floated off again, and being carried further down. At length he came near to the place where the whirlpool is, under the bluff at Pa-hŭk´, where is the lodge of the Nahu´rac. There were two buzzards sitting on the bluff, just above this place, and as they sat there, one of them stretched out his neck and looked up the river, and after he had looked, he said to the other, “I see a body.” Then both the buzzards flew down to where the boy was floating in the water, and got down under him, and raised him on their backs, and lifted him up out of the water, and flew up to the bluff, carrying the boy on their backs, and placed him on the ground on top of the bluff over the big cave, which is the home of the Nahu´rac. In this lodge were all kinds of animals, and all kinds of birds. There were bears, and mountain lions, and buffalo, and elk, and beaver, and otter, and deer; all kinds of animals, great and small, and all kinds of birds.

There is a little bird, smaller than a pigeon. Its back is blue, and its breast white, and its head is spotted. It flies swiftly over the water, and when it sees a fish, it dives down into the water to catch it. This bird is a servant or a messenger for the Nahu´rac. Such a bird came flying by just as the buzzards put the body on the ground, and he stopped and looked at it. When he saw how it was—for he knew all that had happened—he flew down into the lodge and told the Nahu´rac about the boy. The bird said, “There is a boy up here on the hill. He is dead, and he is poor, and I want to have him brought to life again.” Then he told the Nahu´rac all the things that had happened. When the messenger bird had done speaking, the Nahu´rac earnestly counselled together for a long time to decide what should be done, and each one made a speech, giving his opinion about the matter, but they could not make up their minds what ought to be done.

The little bird was coaxing the Nahu´rac, and saying, “Come, now, we want to save his life.” But the Nahu´rac could not decide. At last the chief of the Nahu´rac said, “No, messenger, we cannot decide this here. You will have to go to the other council lodges, and see what they say about it.” The bird said, “I am going,” and flew swiftly out of the lodge and up the river, till he came to the Nahu´rac lodge near the Lone Tree. When he got there, he told them all about the boy, and said that the council at Pa-hŭk´ could not decide what should be done. The Nahu´rac here talked, and at last they said, “We cannot decide. The council at Pa-hŭk´ must decide.” Then the bird went to the lodge on the Loup, and the Nahu´rac there said that they could not decide Then he went to Kitz-a-witz-ŭk, and to Pa-hūr´; and at each place the Nahu´rac considered and talked about it, and then said, “We cannot decide what shall be done. The council at Pa-hŭk´ must decide for themselves.”