But the boy was not yet ready to do this. The girl was very pretty, and he liked her, but he felt that before he married there were still some things that he must do. He called his brother and said to him, “Go, kill the fattest of the buffalo; bring it to me, and I will take a long journey with you.”
His brother went hunting and killed a buffalo, and brought the meat home, and they dried it and made a bundle of it. Medicine Bear told his brother to carry this bundle and a rawhide rope and a little hatchet, and they started on a journey towards the Missouri River. One day towards evening they reached the river, and they found themselves on top of a steep-cut bluff. The river ran at its foot. The poor [[105]]boy cut a cottonwood pole and drove it into the ground, and tied the rope to it, and then tied the other end of the rope about his brother’s body. Then he sharpened a stick and gave it to his brother and said: “Now take the bundle of meat, and I will let you down over the bank. You must put the meat on a ledge of the cliff, and when the birds come you must feed them. Give a piece to the first one that comes, and then take your sharp stick and get another piece, and so feed all the birds. They are the ones that have power, and they can take pity on you.” So he let the chief’s son down.
The first bird that came was a buzzard, then an eagle, then hawks and owls, all kinds of birds that kill their prey. He fed them all. While he was doing this, the poor boy was above lying on top of the bank. Late in the afternoon, just as the sun was going down, he saw, far up the river, what looked like a flock of geese coming. They came nearer and nearer, and at last passed out of sight under the bank. Afterwards, when he looked down on the river, he could see in the water red light as if it were all on fire, and as he lay on the bank he could [[106]]hear down below him the sound of drumming and singing just as plain as could be, and all the time the chief’s son was hanging there in front of the bank, and the poor boy would call down to him to cry and ask the animals to take pity on him. When Medicine Bear had done this, he started back and went home, leaving the chief’s son hanging there.
THE CONFERENCE IN THE LODGE
The chief’s son stayed there all the night and all the next day, and for three days and nights, and on the night of the fourth day he fell asleep. When he awoke he was in a lodge. It was under the Missouri River. When he looked about him he saw that those in the lodge were all animals. There was the beaver, there was the otter, two buffalo, the antelope, hawks, owls, ermines, bears, frogs, woodpeckers, catfish—all kinds of animals. On each side of the lodge was a little pool, and in each pool sat a goose, and every time they sang, the geese would shake their wings on the water, and it sounded just like drumming. The chief of the animals spoke to him, saying: “My son, at this time we can do nothing for you. We must first send our messenger up to the Bear’s lodge to ask him what we may do for you.” While [[107]]he was saying this the Bear’s servant entered the lodge and said: “My father, it is all right. Our father the Bear told me to say to you that his son has sent this young man to you, and you must exert all your power for him.”
Now the animals began to make ready to use their power to help the chief’s son. First the Beaver talked to the young man, to tell him of his powers and his ways, so that he might perform wonderful acts. How he should take the branch of a tree and strike a man with its point and it would go through him, and then how to draw it out and to make the man well again. He gave him the power to do this. He taught him how to take a stick two feet long and swallow it, and then take it out again from his throat, and gave him this power.
The Otter gave him the power, if his enemies ever attacked him, to break their arrows with his teeth and shoot back the shaft without a spike, and if he hit an enemy with the shaft, it would kill him. “The poison from your mouth will kill him,” he said.
The Ground-dog said: “My son, here is my little one. I give him to you. Take him, and if you have an enemy among the doctors in [[108]]your tribe, take this little one down to the water early in the morning and dip his nose in the water, and when you take it out it will have a piece of liver in its mouth. The man who has tried to kill you will be found dead.”
The Owl said: “My son, I give you power to see in the night. When you go on the war-path and want to take horses, the night will be like daytime for you.”