Then he stretched his mother’s house. He set up two planks in the rear of the house. Between them he hung the blanket.
Next day he went out and brought home woodpeckers.[12] Then she treated those in the same way in order to make a blanket. After she had finished he went to it and shook it. Upon that, too, the birds flew about in a flock. Then he went to bed. He ate nothing all that time. All that time he fasted.
Then he again set out. After he had stayed away longer than before he brought in a bunch of tanagers.[13] Those, too, his mother made [into a blanket]. When it was finished, he also went to that. He shook it. Those also flew about upon it. He laid that, too, on top of [the planks] in the rear of the house.
Next day he started off again and brought home a bunch of sixᴀsʟdᴀ′lgaña.[14] Those his mother also sewed into a blanket. And, when it was finished, he shook it. They flew about upon it. He laid that upon [the planks] also.
The next day he went out again. [He got] blue jays,[15] and his mother sewed those together.
After that he again started off. After he had been absent for some time he returned with the daughter of He-who-travels-behind-us,[16] whom he had married.
After he had lived with her a while, one morning he continued to lie abed. While he was still in bed, something went along under his pillow talking. “He-who-was-born-from-his-mother’s-side, are you [[229]]awake? Do you not feel that the supernatural beings, whom people are afraid even to think of, are gathering together against you?”
Then he ran out. He saw nothing. And he went out again. He pulled along an old man and made him sit at the end of the town. That was Heron,[17] they say.
One day he was again lying in bed. Then something passed under his pillow saying the same words as before. Then he seized his bow and went out. After he had looked about on the surface of the salt water he glanced upward. A thunderbird flew about above the town. It carried [his grandfather’s] town in its claws.
Then he went to the old man and said to him: “Grandfather, they are coming after me.” “What is the bow of the canoe like?” “A thunderbird is flying about above the town. He carries a town in his talons.” And the old man said to him: “Now, brave man, shoot it with arrows.”