Oct., 1903. Arapaho Traditions — Dorsey and Kroeber. 393 



father. May my father take me home now?" "No. my grandson, 

 there is one more thing for your father to do," said his grandfather. 

 "There will be four days of myth telling. Your father is to keep awake. 

 You will sit by him on the right, and your mother on the left, and your 

 grandmother behind him, to support him." Then all the buffalo sat 

 there, and the old man telling the myths stood facing Blue-bird. "The 

 first night we will tell your father about water and food which we drink 

 and eat to make our body. These two things we will tell about the first 

 night ; they will occupy one whole night. The second night we will tell 

 your father about day and about plants and how we can live on plants. 

 The third night we will tell your father where we shall go in the coun- 

 try and what we shall see. The fourth night we will tell your father 

 what we will do at night, how we will sleep, and when awake do as we 

 think best, and in the morning get up." Then the old man told about 

 these things. The fourth night at dawn, his mother-in-law shook Blue- 

 bird and said to him: "Are you awake?" "Yes," he said. Then the 

 calf aslced him: "My father, are you asleep?" "No," he said. Then 

 the sun was just about to rise : now the man slept soundly. His son 

 and his mother-in-law shook him. but he did not wake. Then the old 

 man said four times : "Wake him !" but they could not do it ; and the 

 sun came up as he said it the fourth time. Then the old man directed 

 that he was to be laid on his side, as if in bed, with his head toward 

 the sunset. Then the bufifalo came and went about, trampling on him 

 until nothing was left of him, not even bones, except a blue plume, 

 which flew up and far away. 



When Blue-bird had started out he had called his brother Mag- 

 pie and said to him: "Brother, if I should be killed there will be 

 something reaching from the earth to the sky." So when Magpie saw 

 the dust rising from the trampling of the buflfalo up to the sky, he knew 

 what had happened. He told the people to make a sweat-house, put sage 

 inside, and make a little mound of earth in front of the sweat-house. He 

 painted himself with lime on his shoulders and sides, went out of the 

 tent, sat down, and became a magpie. He hopped, screamed like a 

 magpie, lit on the tent poles, and then on the ground. Then he flew 

 straight up to the sky. Then he flew to where he had seen the thing. 

 Coming below it, he flew in a circle from left to right, and lit on the 

 ground, which was bare and covered with buffalo tracks. He hopped 

 about, and bent down as if to listen. Some one groaned. He hopped 

 further; then again it cried. Indeed there was a blue plume on the 

 ground. He picked it up, rose, and flew towards his camp. He sailed 

 four times around the camp, then went to the sweat-house in the center 



