moved his wings, and they saw that he looked nice. | Then Diver said: "That youth said, 'You shall | go to the shore there. He will make you look the same way as I am.'" || Then all the ducks went ashore. Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m | took off the feathers of all of them. He said to them: "Now | swim out again and play. It will be this way: | in the fall your feathers will be long again; in the spring they will I come off, and others will grow." Then he said || to the ducks: "You may fly to a nice place there back from the shore. There are | lakes all over that place, and you shall visit all of them. | Then in the fall come back here to this your country; | but there far away it is very cold." Then the ducks swam away. | They were glad. Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m made them look nice. || Then they looked at one another, and all the ear ornaments had become pretty feathers. | Then Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m took the feathers | and went back. Then Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m did this. There are | ducks all over the country in the summer time. Long ago | the ducks did not come ashore out on the big sea. || Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m went back to his tent. |
(d) Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m Obtains the Arrow Straightener
There he staid. He said: "I wish I had an arrow straightener!" Frog said: | "There is none, but people die where there are | arrow straighteners. Mountain-sheep Ram has them. He kills those | who go to get them." Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m started. He thought: || "Let me start, even if my uncle should kill me." The Ram was | the brother of Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m's mother. He arrived there, and there was a tent. | He entered. An old man with long hair was seated there. Now, this | old man with long hair was called Bighorn. | Bighorn said: "What do you want? Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m said:||"I want an arrow straightener." Bighorn said: "There is none here | in my tent. It is hanging on the other side of the river. I'll take you across in my canoe." | Then he took him across. When Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m was about to come, | his grandmother had told him what the old man | would do to him. When he had taken him across, Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m was told: || "Now go on, climb up the mountain! Farther along it hangs. You | shall bring it." Then Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m knew that (Bighorn) intended to kill him. | He went up and went on some distance. Then he went up again. He looked at the | old man, who was going back in his canoe. When he was in the middle of the water, he took | something, put it into the water, and shook it in the water, and sang, || saying: |
"I always take them across in my canoe, he he ha, he he ha!"[1] |
Then he put it back into the canoe and went back. Now, Ya.ukᵘe′ika·m | knew very well what the old man had done. He had been
- ↑ My interpreter could not translate the words of this song, but explained it in the way given here.
