ll^^l^i] TRADITIONS 441 



' I, too, am on the warpath,' to which they will respond : ' Well, we 

 must fight.' Then your man must leave them and come back to your 

 camp." 



The Seneca soon afterward saw men come and make a camp a 

 short distance away. Thereupon one of the three hunters, drawing 

 near them, said : " Hallo, I have discovered your fire. Where are you 

 going?" "We are on the warpath," they replied. "So am I," he 

 answered. Looking around, he saw stone clothing lying against one 

 of the trees, while the owner of the clothes was resting on the ground. 

 The people were all Stone Coats. The next morning the Stone Coat 

 army went up the ravine toward the Seneca camp. They made a 

 terrible noise, for all the army sang. " We are going to eat the Seneca 

 tribe.'" When the Stone Coat force had gone about halfway up the 

 ravine, filling the entire space between them and the Seneca, with 

 a great whoop they rushed forward. But at that moment great rocks 

 rolled down on them and great trees fell on them, killing them, and 

 the Seneca saw a .strange, wonderful man running along on the 

 top of the rocks and trees. Whenever he saw a Stone Coat head in 

 sight, he would hit it, killing its owner. Only one Stone Coat was 

 left alive, and he, having escaped, was never seen again. The man 

 who was throwing down the rocks sang all the time that the Seneca 

 tribe could stand against anything — against the world. When the 

 contest was over, the strange man came to the three men, saying: 

 " I am the one whom you call Hawenniyo. It is I who saved you. I 

 did not make those Stone Coats. Something else made them." And 

 Hawenniyo said further: "I want you, the Seneca people, to be the 

 most active of all tribes in every kind of game or conte.st and in 

 hunting." 



89. Gen ox sow A 



AA'hen the Seneca lived at Canandaigua one of their medicine-men 

 notified them that something terrible was about to happen, something 

 which would cause many to lose their lives. At this they were greatly 

 frightened : they quarreled with one another and became suspicious 

 even of their own children. 



One night a great uproar was heard in the village, and jumping up 

 from their couches, men, women, and children, running out of their 

 lodges, fled as fast as they could in every direction. The weather 

 was very cold. Among the people of the village was a woman who 

 two days before had given birth to a child. She ran for her life, 

 holding the infant in her arms; it was wrapped up and she carried it 

 as a bundle. On the way she determined to throw the bundle down 

 so as to be able to run faster, and on coming to a tree having a hole 

 in one side, not far from the ground, she dropped the bundle into it. 



