674 SENECA FICTION, LEGENDS, AND MYTHS [etii. ANN. 32 



we would return here." Thereupon the screech owl kept saying: 

 " It is another one, it is another one, it is another one," while the 

 horned owl said: "//«', hi, hi, hi; he has taken his younger sister to 

 wife; hi, hi, hi, hi." Finally, the old woman exclaimed: "I am be- 

 ginning to give attention to what is being said, for they have never 

 before during the time you have had them as pets acted in this man- 

 ner." In reply the young man said : " Pshaw ! you are all the time 

 paying attention to what they are saying; instead you must give them 

 meat, and then they will stop as usual. This is all you have to do to 

 quiet them." Then he started for his own lodge, saying: "After two 

 days' time you must again go there." 



The only thing he did when he arrived at his lodge was to make 

 preparations for leaving, and when everything was ready he departed. 

 Ho followed his sister, keeping on the track made by the dog as it 

 ran along homeward. He had fled some distance when his body be- 

 came very weak. 



At the end of two days the old woman went to the lodge of the 

 young people, where she found no one. Turning to the fire pit in her 

 great anxiety she was surprised by hearing the fire again say, thrice 

 in succession: "My friend has killed me." Thus it spoke. There- 

 upon the old woman said : " Oh ! my son lies there where I have been 

 thinking he lay all the time. It is exceedingly dismal to think of." 

 Then she began to dig up the fireplace ; and she found him lying there 

 with his face upturned and an arrow sticking through the middle of 

 his breast. At this discovery she began to weep and lament, saying : 

 " Oh, my dear child ! you have indeed become wretched. When I 

 have killed them I will return to pay the last rites to you." So say- 

 ing, she went out of the lodge and started for her home. 



Having arrived at her lodge, she took from a bark receptacle in 

 which it was kept hickory-nut meat and ate it, making the sounds, 

 '■^GaotV, gaoiV, gaoft''," and saying, too, " I shall fortify my body with 

 this meat." When she had finished eating her meal she went out of 

 the lodge, and going to a neighboring tree, by her great strength she 

 tore off a great part of it with her paws. Exclaiming, " I do not 

 think that this will suffice," she reentered the lodge and ate more of 

 the hickory-nut meat. Then she exclaimed, " Now I wonder whether 

 this will do." Going again to the tree she tore it into shreds, and 

 then exclaimed, " This is now sufficient ; I have strength eno\igh." 



Then she started away, running swiftly. She had become a bear 

 of enormous size and power. Going to the place where the tracks of 

 the fugitives showed the direction they had taken, and placing her 

 paws on the jiath along which they had fled, she exclaimed : " It is 

 impossible for you to escape even though you should have gone to 

 the end of the earth." With these words she started in pursuit of 

 the fugitives. As she ran along she often placed her paws on the 



