394 MYTHS OF THE CHEROKEE [eth.axn.W 



uuissol shell. With his medicine lie changed tiii.s to a canoe, in which 

 he ci'ossod over to his grandmother's house, and found her sitting- 

 there, waiting for the enemy to come and kill her. Again he made 

 medicine and put her into a small gourd which he fastened to his belt. 

 Then climbing a tree he changed himself to a swamp woodcock, and 

 M'ith one cry he spread his M'ings and flew across to the other side of 

 the river, where both toolv their natural shape again and made their 

 way through the woods to another settlement. 



There was another gi'eat Cherokee warrior, named Dasi giya'gi, or 

 Shoe-boots, as the whites called him, who lived on Higlitower creek, 

 in Georgia. He was so strong that it was said he could throw a corn 

 mortar over a house, and with his magic power could clear a river at 

 one jump. His war medicine was an uktena scale and a verj^ large 

 turtle shell which he got from the Shawano. In the Creek war he put 

 this scale into water and l)athed his l)ody with the water, and also 

 burned a piece of the turtle shell and drew a black line ai'ound his men 

 with the coal, and he was never wounded and never had a man killed. 



Some great warriors had a medicine l)}'the aid of which th(\v could 

 dive under the ground as under water, come up among tlie enemy to 

 kill and scalp one, then dive under the ground again and come up 

 among their friends. 



Some war captains knew how to put their lives up in the tree tops 

 during a fight, so that even if they were struck by the enemy they 

 could not be killed. Once, in a battle with the Shawano, the Chero 

 kee leader stood directly in front of the enemy and let the whole party 

 shoot at him, but was not hurt until the Shawano captain, who knew 

 this war medicine himself, ordered his men to shoot into the l>ranches 

 above the head of the other. They did this and the Cherokee leader 

 fell dead. 



no. INCIDENTS OF PERSONAL HEROISM 



fn the Cherokee war of 1760 when small bodies of the enemy, 

 iucording to Haywood, were pusliing their inroads eastward almost to 

 Salisbury, a party of six or eiglit warriors was discovered, watched, 

 and followed until they were seen to enter a deserted cal)in to pass 

 the night. The alarm was given, and shortly before dayliglit the 

 whites surrounded the house, posting themselves behind the fodder 

 stack and some outbuildings so as to command both the door and the 

 Avide chimney top. They then })egan to throw fire upon the roof to 

 drive out the Indians, when, as the blaze caught the dry shingles, and 

 death either l)y fire or bullet seemed certain, one of the besieged 

 warriors called to his companions that it was better that on(> should he 

 a sacrifice than that all should die, and that if they would follow his 

 directions lie would save them, but die himself. He proposed to sally 

 out alone to draw the fire of the besiegers, while his friends stood 



