292 MYTHS OF THE CHKROKEK [f.th.ann.19 



I'eturnt'd at last with only ;i li;m(lful of scraps that lie liad t'ouiid wlicre 

 soiiio huiitoi's had out up a deer. 



By this time the old woman was suspicious. So next morning when 

 he started off again, as he said, to fish, she told her daughter to follow 

 him secretly and see how he set to work. The girl followed through 

 the woods and kept him in sight until he came down to the river, where 

 she saw her husband change to a hooting owl {uguku') and fly over to 

 a pile of driftwood in the water and cry, "• U-gu-hi! Im! Imf u! n!" 

 She was surprised and very angry and said to herself, "I thought 

 I had married a man, but my husband is only an owl." She watched 

 and saw the owl look into the water for a long time and at last 

 swoop down and bring up in his claws a, handful of sand, from 

 which he picked out a crawfish. Then he flew across to the bank, took 

 the form of a man again, and started home witli the crawfish. His 

 wife hurried on ahead through the woods and got there before him. 

 When he came in with the crawfish in his hand, she asked him where 

 were all the fish he had caught. He said he had none, because an owl 

 had frightened them all away. "I think you are the owl,'" said his 

 wife, and drove him out of the house. The owl went into the woods 

 and there he pined away with grief and love until there was no flesh 

 left on any part of his body except his head. 



45. THE HUHU GETS MARRIED 



A widow who had an only daughter, })ut no son. found it very hard 

 to make a living and was constantly urging upon the young woman 

 that they ought to ha\-e a man in the family, who would be a good 

 hunter and able to help in the field. One evening a stranger lover 

 came courting to the house, and when the girl told him that she could 

 marry only one who was a good worker, he declared that he was 

 exactly that sort of man; so the girl talked to her mother, and on her 

 advice they were married. 



The next morning the widow gave her new son-in-law a hoe and sent 

 him out to the cornfield. When breakfast was ready she went to call 

 him. following a sound as of some one hoeing on stony soil, but when 

 sh(> came to the spot she found only a small circle of hoed ground and 

 no sign of her son-in-law. Away over in the thicket she heard a huhu 

 calling. 



He did not come in for dinner, either, and when he returned home 

 in the evening the old woman asked him where he had been all day. 

 •'Hard at work," said he. "But I didn't see you when 1 came to call 

 you to breakfast." " I was down in the thicket cutting sticks to mark 

 ofl' the field," said he. "But why didn't you come in to dimiei-r' 

 "I was too l)usy working," said he. So the old woman was satisfied, 

 and they had their supper together. 



