October, 1903. Traditions of the Crows — Simms. 283 



thought of what Old Man Coyote had told him and it made him feel 

 badly, so that he wanted to see the summer land and run after the 

 buffalo calves and the birds. Old Man Coyote said to him: "I can 

 help you to get there, for I am going after the Summer ; for Summer 

 and Winter are owned by 'a Woman with a strong heart living in a 

 large tipi, and to get the summer I have to have four animals.'' So 

 he got the male Deer, male Coyote, male Jack Rabbit, and the male 

 Wolf. Old Man Coyote asked each of these four animals how far 

 could they run, and each told his greatest distance. He said to these 

 four animals : 



"I am going to turn myself into an Elk. You, Coyote, are noted 

 for being sly, and are given a medicine paint to rub on the face of 

 the Woman (the keeper of the summer) if she were found in the 

 tipi. I'll go along the woods, so when the inhabitants of the sum- 

 mer land come to kill me I'll draw them out from their tipis. You go 

 down and watch your chance, and when she comes out to see if her 

 children are going to kill me you slip into the tipi, where there are 

 two bags, one containing Winter and one containing Summer, — the 

 Summer is in a dark bag, and the Winter is in a white bag, — but under 

 no circumstances take the white bag." So Elk (Old Man Coyote) went 

 -down there and exposed himself to the Summer people and they came 

 out to kill him. The Woman, owner of Summer and Winter, came, 

 on hearing the shouts, to see if they would kill the Elk and sly Coyote 

 slipped into her tipi. She always kept close watch of the two bags, 

 and as she thought that the door of the tipi had been moved, she hur- 

 ried back to the tipi and on entering met Coyote at the door coming 

 out. As Coyote met her, he rubbed the medicine paint on her face and . 

 she lost her voice and so could not call her children to her assistance, 

 though she did everything to attract their attention. 



Coyote made off with the bag to the woods where the Elk was, who 

 directed the carrying of the bag containing the Summer. Coyote ran 

 until tired out and then turned the bag over to the male Jack Rabbit, 

 who took it a long way, with the inhabitants of the Summer Land in 

 close pursuit, and when he was tired, he met the male Deer, to whom 

 he gave the bag with instructions to carry it as fast and as far as pos- 

 sible, as the children were getting nearer. The male Deer carried it 

 until tired, and he gave it to the male Wolf, and when the male Wolt 

 got to his destination where the youth was awaiting them, the pur- 

 suers were closer on to the carriers of the bag. The male Wolf, 

 obeying instructions, tore open the bag containing the Summer, and 

 an agreement was made between the youth and the children of the 



