276 MYTHS OF THE CHEROKKE [eth.ann ID 



the bushes where I ain to run." They thought tliut all right, so the 

 Rabbit wont into the thicket, but he was gone so long that at last the 

 animals suspected he must lie up to one of his ti'icks. They sent a 

 messenger to look for him, and away in the middle of the thicket he 

 found the Rabbit gnawing down the bushes and pulling them away 

 until he had a road cleared nearly to the other side. 



The messenger turned around (juietly and came back and told the 

 other animals. When the Rabbit came out at last they accused him of 

 cheating, but he denied it until they went into the thicket and found 

 the cleared road. They agreed that such a trickster had no right to 

 enter the race at all, so they gave the horns to the Deer, who was 

 admitted to he the best runner, and he has worn them ever since. 

 They told the Rabbit that as he was so fond of cutting down bushes he 

 might do that for a living hereafter, and so he does to this day. 



27. WHY THE DEERS TEETH ARE BLUNT 



The Rabbit felt sore because the Deer had won the horns (see the 

 last story), and resolved to get even. One day soon after the race he 

 stretched a large grapevine across the trail and gnawed it nearly in 

 two in the middle. Then he went back a piece, took a good run, and 

 jumped up at the vine. He kept on running and jumping up at the 

 vine until the Deer came along and asked him what he was doing ^ 



"Don't you seeT' saj's the Ra1)bit. "I'm so strong that I can bite 

 through that grapevine at one jump." 



The Deer could hardly l)elieve this, and wanted to see it done. So 

 the Rabbit I'an back, made a tremendous spring, and bit through the 

 vine where he had gnawed it before. The Deer, when he .saw that, 

 said. ""Well, I can do it if you can." 80 the Rabl)it stretched a larger 

 grapevine across the trail, )iut without gnawing it in the middle. The 

 Deer ran back as he had seen the Rabliit do, made a spring, and struck 

 the grapevine right in the center, but it only flew back and threw him 

 over on his head. He tried again and again, until he was all t)ruised 

 and bleeding. 



■"Let me see your teeth," at last said the Rabliit. So the Deer 

 showed him his teeth, which were long like a wolf's teeth, but not very 

 sharp. 



"No wonder you can't do it," says the Rabbit; "your teeth are too 

 blunt to bite anything. Let me sharpen them for you like mine. 3Iy 

 teeth are so sharp that I can cut through a stick just like a knife." 

 And he showed him a black locust twig, of which rabbits gnaw the 

 young shoots, which he had shaved oti as well as a knife could do it, 

 in regular rabbit fasliion. The Deer thought that just the thing. 

 So the Rabl)it got a hard stone with rough edges and hied and tiled 

 away at the Deer's teeth until the}- were worn down almost to the gums. 



