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Experiments on Reproduction of Folk-Stories.

whole story. With this inserted, all the rest is satisfactory. But I have already shown how all mention of the ghosts dropped out of my reproductions. This leaves the two awkward and disconnected incidents of the painless wound and the strange death. It is interesting to pursue the adventures of these two incidents throughout the stories. I take one chain of reproductions only. In the original the painless wound incident is related thus:

"Presently the young man heard one of the warriors say: 'Quick, that young Indian has been hit.' Now he thought, 'Oh, they are ghosts.' He did not feel sick, but they said he had been shot.

"So the canoes went back to Egulac, and the young man went ashore to his house, and made a fire."


The first reproduction runs:

Then one of the warriors called to the young Indian and said: "Go back to the canoe, for you are wounded by an arrow." But the Indian wondered, for he felt not sick.

And when many had fallen on either side, they went back to the canoes, and down the river again, and so the young Indian came back to Egulac.

Next comes:

Then one of the warriors called out to the young Indian: "Go back home now, for you are wounded."

"No that is not so, for I feel no pain."

But the warrior sent him back to the canoe, for he had been wounded by an arrow, though he could not be convinced of it, for he felt not sick.

Then:

At last the warrior said to the young Indian: "Go home, for you are wounded." But the Indian replied: "Nay, that cannot be, for I feel no pain." Still the warrior urged him, and he returned to Egulac.