The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories

by George Bird Grinnell

For the rest of the day the bear stood at the foot of the tree, looking upward and whining and moaning for his friend, but he saw nothing of him. About sundown all the boy’s clothing came tumbling down together, but nothing was seen of the boy. The bear would not leave the tree. He waited there, hoping to see what had become of the boy, but that was the last of him. He saw him no more.

After the boy and the bear had left the camp, the older brother kept thinking of what had taken place. When they did not come back he felt lonesome and sad, and began to fear that something would happen to his young brother, and at last he made up his mind that he would start out and learn what had become of him. He left his lodge and set out in the direction the two had taken. He found their [[172]]trail and followed it, and after two days came to the tree and there saw the bear, standing on his hind feet and resting his paws against the tree. The man asked the bear what had become of the boy, but the bear would not reply to him. He asked him the same question again, and a third and a fourth time, and then the bear answered and said: “All this trouble has come upon us through your fault, because you listened to the lies your woman told you. Your brother has climbed this tree and has gone out of sight, and now for three days I have stood here, waiting for him to come down. His clothing has fallen down from up above, but he does not return.” They waited by the tree longer, but the boy did not come down, and at length the man said to the bear: “My brother is gone. He will never come back. We had better go back to the camp where we can live.” The bear went back with him.

On their way the bear told the man how it really had been, and that it was not the boy who had hurt the woman, but that she had done it herself, and in this way had caused his brother to lose his life. Then the man was angry, and when they came near to the lodge [[173]]he took an arrow from his quiver and shot his wife, and her shadow went to the sand-hills.

That night the man said to the bear, “Well, we are only two now, and for myself, I have decided to stay here and starve to death, and as for you, you had better leave me and go your way and make your living as all bears do.” So the bear went away and did not return.

One night while the man was lying asleep, he dreamed of the bear; and the bear spoke to him and said: “My brother, listen to the words that I speak to you, and do now what I tell you to. Go back to the old camp of your people, to the cliff where they drive the buffalo, the piś kun, and wait there. A camp of your people is moving towards that place. They are very poor and have but little to eat. It may be that you can help them. Be sure to do exactly as I tell you from this time on, and in the days to come you will be unhappy no longer, but will have plenty of everything and will have full life. Now I wish you to-morrow, when you awake, to eat up your lodge and everything that is in it. This seems to you like a hard thing, something that cannot be done, [[174]]but, by the power that I give you, you will be able to do it.”

When the man awoke, in the morning, he thought for a long time over what the bear had said to him in his sleep, and how it had said that in the time to come he would be poor no longer, but would have full life, and how it had said that it would give him that power, and he made up his mind to do as the bear had told him. He tore down his lodge and began to eat it, and found that this was not a hard thing to do. He ate the lodge and the lining, his clothing, his wife’s things—everything that he could find in the lodge, and then took his bow and arrows and started to go to the cliff as the bear had told him to.

Now since the bear had left, the man had had no food to eat, and on his journey he found himself getting weak and growing smaller. When he reached the cliff there was no camp there, so he waited, and all the time he kept getting weaker, and smaller and smaller, until he was no bigger than a year-old child. He thought now that he would surely die, and hid himself under a bunch of rye grass.

The next day the people moved in and camped [[175]]at this place. An old woman went out to get some grass for her bed, and while she was gathering it, she heard a sound as if a little child were crying. She went in the direction of the sound, and under a bunch of rye grass she found a little child. She carried him into the camp and took good care of him. When the chief of the camp heard of how she had found the child, he said to the old woman, “Take good care of that child; he was put there for some good purpose.”

As time passed the child grew fatter and stronger, and the old woman grew fond and proud of him. They called him Kiś tap i pokau (Nothing Child.)

Near this camp stood a tree, and every day an eagle came and alighted in the tree. The chief had tried many times to kill this eagle, and so had other men, but no one could kill it. When they found that no one could kill it, they wanted it all the more. The chief had two very pretty daughters, and at length he said that he would give his daughters to any one who would kill this eagle. When this was called out through the camp by the old crier, all the young men came out to try to kill the eagle, [[176]]but no one could do it. At last Nothing Child said to the old woman, “Grandmother, make me some arrows so that I can kill the eagle.” The old woman laughed when he asked her this, but she was very fond of him, so she tied a string to a deer’s rib for a bow and made him some little arrows, and he set out to kill the eagle. When the young men who had been shooting at the eagle saw the child coming with the tiny bow, they laughed and made fun of him, but Nothing Child fitted a little arrow on the string of his bow, and shot and killed the eagle. Then all who were standing by were astonished, but they said, “It must have been a chance shot.” The eagle was taken to the chief’s lodge, and they told him it had been killed by the Nothing Child. So he told his daughters to go and marry the found boy.