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SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS 



VOL. 



123 



At night the Chinese opened up her grave 

 and took her clothing. 



What is most aggravating is that the Chi- 

 nese took a long bamboo stick and stuck it 

 from her vagina up out of her mouth. But 

 her soul did not consent to this, and that night 

 she cried out loudly, "The Chinese has robbed 

 me, the Chinese has robbed me." Next morn- 

 ing her sons carried breakfast to her, and 

 when they reached her grave they saw that 

 the dirt and the cofSn lid had been pushed 

 aside, and the blood from her body was run- 

 ning out, a sight truly hard for one's eyes 

 to look upon. 



Then her descendants left this song to com- 

 memorate her. 



One Who Ate Dog Manure (476) 



Formerly there was a Chinese. He had no 

 respect for the Miao people. He looked upon 

 the Miao as very barbarous. 



One day a Miao man went to the home of 

 this Chinese. Then the Chinese ridiculed him. 

 At that moment the big black dog came and 

 left his manure at the door of the Chinese 

 man's house. Then he said to the Miao, "I see 

 that you are this sort of a man. You pick up 

 this dog's manure and eat it, and I will give 

 you a piece of land. The Miao said, "Is that 

 true?" The Chinese replied, "In the mouths 

 of us big people, there are no lies. Can this 

 not be true.?" Then the Miao picked up the 

 dog's manure with his hands and ate it. 

 When he had eaten it, he told the Chinese 

 to give him the field. But the Chinese would 

 not do it. The Miao then said, "If you do 

 not give me the land today, I will invite you 

 to eat the poison on the point of my arrow. 

 When you have eaten it, I will not want your 

 place." 



The Chinese saw that he was truly very 

 angry, and so did not dare to talk to him any 

 more, but told people to be middlemen and 

 gave him a piece of land. Then the Miao 

 composed this song to commemorate it. 



Cutting a Mountain Tendon (near a Grave 

 to MaJ{e It Unlucliy) (557) 



In ancient times this Miao family truly 

 prospered. The Chinese, when they saw that 

 they prospered like this, came and cut the 

 Miao family's mountain sinew.^^ Then the 

 Chinese made a report to the emperor. The 

 emperor sent word back, "You must dig the 



^^ Cutting the mountain sinev^f is regarded as a 

 way of spoiling a grave by ruining its jengshui, 

 thus causing the descendants of the person buried 

 in the grave to be less prosperous. 



mountain sinew in two even more thor- 

 oughly." Then the children of the Miao wept 

 several days. Afterward the Miao people 

 could not hold their own. Then they left the 

 big plains near the ocean and scattered among 

 the forests on the mountains to live. 



A Lazy Woman Abandoned Her Child Be- 

 cause She Did Not Want to Be Dis- 

 turbed. Ntzi' Sent a Girl to Save the 

 Child. A Bad Chinese Planned to Come 

 and Take the Girl by Force. The Girl 

 Killed the Chinese (80) 



There was a poor Miao who hired out by 

 the year to a rich man. He worked for the 

 rich man many years, and so received a great 

 deal of wages. When the wife came they had 

 no house to live in, so he secured a small out- 

 side house from the master. After he had 

 lived there over a year, the wife gave birth to 

 a son. When it was three days old, the hus- 

 band killed a fat hen to give to his wife to 

 eat in order to name the child. That boy 

 was named after the door of the house Ts'ao 

 Men Shin (house door star). 



Daily the child grew larger. Then they 

 moved to another house where things did not 

 go well with them. The husband went forth 

 every day and worked for others in order to 

 find a living. But the wife would not do a 

 bit of work. Later her husband came home 

 and asked her, "Why don't you do any 

 work?" The woman said, "Because this son is 

 tied to me I am unable to do anything. Please 

 take him away quickly and discard him so he 

 will not take hold of me." Her husband said, 

 "According to your words I will take him 

 away tomorrow and desert him." 



Next morning they all arose, cooked and ate 

 breakfast, and the woman prepared dinner 

 for them. The father and the son each car- 

 ried a bag of food. The father said, "My son, 

 today I will lead you out to catch wild ani- 

 mals." The son said, "All right, let's go." The 

 father then led the boy and proceeded for- 

 ward and asked his son, "Have you been here 

 before?" The boy said, "My mother carried 

 me over this place." They again walked 

 awhile and again the father asked, "Have you 

 been here before?" The child replied, "My 

 mother has come here to gather grass for the 

 pigs." They again went forward and passed 

 over a hilltop and entered a deep forest. He 

 then asked the boy, "Have you ever been 

 here?" He said, "This is where my mother 

 brought me when she gathered firewood." 

 The two then walked until in the afternoon. 

 The father asked his son, "Have you ever 



