3IO Field Columbian Museum — Anthropology, Vol. V. 



132. — Blood-Clot-Girl." 



An old man and his wife, who had a daughter and a son-in-law, 

 were away alone, hunting buffalo. Their son-in-law had a hard heart 

 and was very greedy. Whenever he killed a buffalo, he told his wife : 

 "Tell the old man to go to that place and let him take the jaws and the 

 feet for himself." He himself took all the good meat. But the old 

 people did what he told them. Once the old woman cut up the meat 

 for her daughter. Then her son-in-law watched anxiously, and scolded 

 his wife that some of the meat which the old woman had cut up was 

 missing. His wife said: "All the meat is there. It has not yet all 

 been sliced. My mother received only her own proper portion. That 

 she has already eaten." Then the son-in-law again went hunting and 

 killed a buffalo and brought back the meat, and told his father-in-law 

 to skin the head and get the meat of the jaws for himself. Of all the 

 meat that he brought back, he gave the old man only the feet. As the 

 young man became easily angry, his father-in-law, who was now old, 

 did not say anything to him, but did as he had been told, and lived, 

 together with his wife, on the scanty remnants left for them on the 

 prairie- by their son-in-law. The third time that the son-in-law killed 

 a buffalo, the same hapi>ened. The fourth time, he told his wife : "Tell 

 the old man that I have killed a buffalo bull, and wounded a cow. Let 

 him go out and skin the head of the bull and use the meat of the jaws. 

 Tell him that if he finds the cow he can have it all." Then the old 

 man went out, but instead of skinning the bull's head, followed the 

 T)loody trail of the cow. It was nearly sunset and he had gone a long 

 way when he found a piece of clotted blood on the cow's trail. He 

 took this home. ''I became very tired. This is all we shall have to 

 eat," he said to his wife. Then she put the clotted blood into a kettle 

 to make soup. As she boiled it, it rattled and made a noise. "My 

 daughter must be doing something," said the old man. Then the kettle 

 began to move and the water began to splash out from it. They poured 

 it out and found a little girl, very beautiful but very small. They 

 called her Clot-woman (notiniisei). Then their daughter came in and 

 saw the girl, and going back, told her husband. The man would not 

 believe her story and sent his wife to ask the old people to allow her 

 to bring the child to his tent, so that he might look at it. But the 

 old man and woman refused. Then their son-in-law promised them 

 sliced buffalo meat if he could have the child, but they refused again. 

 Then he sent them the meat, but they refused to accept it. They said 



> Informants J. 



