350 SENECA FICTION, LEGENDS, AND MYTHS [eth. ann.m 



tlu\v found their lodge in ruins agciin. But the youth encouraged 

 his grantlniuther with comforting words and commanded the erec- 

 tion of another lodge as he had done in the first instance. 



The next morning after he had eaten his parched corn, he started 

 out again to hunt. Taking a southward course for a time, he soon 

 turned toward the north. As he went along he soliloquized, " I shall 

 not hunt, but I shall make it my business to catch my uncle." After 

 going some distance farther, he called a mole, to which he said, when 

 it came to him : " I want you to take me to that tree yonder. You 

 must go almost up to the man who sits on it. After I shall have 

 spoken to him, yon must bring me back to this place." The mole at 

 once agreed to aid him. By shaking himself the youth reduced his 

 size until he became as small as a flea ; then he got on the mole. The 

 mole went to the foot of the tree indicated, whereupon the youth 

 called out, " Oh, uncle ! I have caught you." The man looked all 

 around but saw nothing. Again the youth shouted, " What would 

 you do if a whirlwind should come?" The man pleaded, "Oh, 

 nephew ! do not be so hard on me as that." The youth replied, " Oh ! 

 1 did not beg that way when you asked me about spears and stones." 

 Then the mole ran back to the place whei-e he had found the youth, 

 and the latter, assuming his natural size, ran home. Grasping his 

 grandmother's arm, he rushed her to the spring. They both disap- 

 peared in its waters, going to their shelter under the rock. TJie 

 grandmother kept scolding her grandson, saying, " It is too bad : you 

 have been at the north again." There under the rock they sat until 

 the youth had calmed the whirlwind, when they came up out of the 

 water. They found the trees uprooted and their lodge in ruins. But 

 the youth soon had a lodge in the place of the other by merely com- 

 manding his fetishes and walking around the space of ground, as he 

 had previously done. 



The next morning, after his usual preparation.s, the youth started 

 out southward from his home. When out of sight of the lodge he 

 .suddenly turned toward the north, with the remark: "I must see 

 my uncle. I find the trees are all uprooted, and it must be that my 

 uncle is buried under these fallen trees. So I can go to hunt in 

 safety now." After keeping on his journey for some time he found 

 a large number of partridges, which he killed; then he started home. 

 His grandmother was pleased to see him return quietly with game. 

 After laying aside his weapons he remarked : " Well, grandmother, 

 I have destroyed my uncle. He is no longer on the tree." The 

 grandmother replied, warmly, "Well, you need not think that he 

 was alone in the world. He has a brother, who lives in a lodge 

 farther north." The youth made no reply, but resolved what he 

 would do in the matter. 



