340 Field Columbian Museum — Anthropology, Vol. V. 



138. — The Porcupine and the Woman who climbed to the Sky.' 



Some women who had gone out to get wood found a porcupine 

 and chased it. It ran up a cottonwood tree. They could not strike it. 

 One of them cHmbed after it while the others watched her. As she 

 climbed, the earth seemed near to her. The tree stretched until at last 

 it reached the sky, and the sky opened, and the porcupine, followed 

 by the woman, entered. It ran into the timber and she continued to 

 follow it. In the timber she found a handsome young man, the sun, 

 who took her for his wife. The moon was envious of the sun. He 

 said, "You have said that the women on earth are not beautiful enough 

 for you, for they are ugly when they look up at you ; but now after 

 having despised them, you have brought this woman up." Then the 

 woman had a child. The sun and the moon went hunting and pro- 

 vided for their sisters and this woman. Thus she obtained sinew of 

 which to make ropes. Whenever the sisters of the sun went out to 

 dig roots, she was forbidden to go with them, and told to stay at 

 home. But one day she went out secretly with her child in order to 

 dig. She found roots and began to dig with her digging stick. To her 

 surprise 'she found that the soil gave way and below her she saw the 

 earth, with its rivers and circles of tents and people walking about. 

 Then she covered up the hole and went back. Then she procured all 

 the sinew she could get and made more rope and tied it to what she 

 had, until she thought it long enough to reach the earth. Then, taking 

 this rope and her boy, she went out, made a hole, laid the digging 

 stick across it, and tied the rope to the stick. Then, holding her boy^ 

 she let herself down. She was unable, however, to reach the earth, and 

 remained hanging at the end of the rope. The people above began 



that she missed it. Then she went farther up. Finally she approached it again, but just as she 

 tried to seize it, it went on up and escaped from her. Thus it slipped from her and climbed farther, 

 until it had led her so far that she could not come back down. "I will catch it at last," she thought, 

 still ignorant of how she was being deceived. Thus the porcupine brought her to the sky. Whenr 

 she arrived there, suddenly the moon came to her, smiling, it is said. He married her. The 

 luminary (moon) had abundance of everything in the sky. He brought much game and stored it up. 

 " I will escape by means of sinew," thought the woman. So she secretly twisted much sinew. 

 When she had made enough [rope], she fastened it. When she had fastened [the end J. she let the 

 rope down. There was a large hole above, through which she was going to let herself down. Then 

 she slid down. When she had let herself down the full length of the rope, it did not reach the 

 earth. She hung there. Then her husband found her, it is said. He had looked for his wife, and at 

 this hole in the sky he saw her. hanging below. He became angry and dropped a large stone upoo 

 her. It fell directly upon her head and killed her. The woman had been with child. After she had 

 lain some time the boy was born. After he was born he began to run about in play. Then he 

 became lost in the -grass. So he remained and slept in the grass. An old woman who was going by 

 found him. " Alas ! my grandchild I" she said. She brought him home and cared for him. Then 

 they came to live in large tent. The boy was liked by every one. When he became a man he was 

 brave in charging the buffalo and In war. 

 ' Told by informants J. 



