86 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



seled them to remain quiet yet a little longer, saying they were 

 still surrounded by a foe which was gathering, and if discovered, 

 they should be destroyed. Then he talked to them in a monotonous 

 voice which stupefied them to dull, heavy sleep, and upon waking 

 the next morning, they discovered that one of their number was 

 ' missing ! 



Alarmed at the strange disappearance, one of the warriors, 

 determining to remain awake when again the Ton-da-yent should 

 come, filled his ears with moss to deaden his sorcering voice, and in 

 the night when his companions were sleeping, saw, to his horror, 

 the blood-thirsting chief scalp one of the number and carry the 

 body away ! 



Night after night came the Ton-da-yent to repeat his murderous 

 killings until but he, the relator, alone remained, and believing that 

 he too must die, was in despair. 



But an unlooked for relief came to him. During the day a young 

 bear, seeking refuge from the storm which raged outside, crept into 

 the place through an unknown opening, and the warrior starving 

 for food, killed it and, removing its skin, concealed himself within 

 it. In pretence of sleep he awaited the return of the chief who, 

 in the darkness not observing the warrior's disguise, scalped the 

 head of the bear in mistake, and in his hasty flight having neglected 

 to close the passage, the warrior escaped. Here ended his story. 



The warrior's story spread consternation among the people and 

 the chiefs deliberated. They decided that ''something was dis- 

 turbing the spirit of the dead Ton-da-yent," and that " as by their 

 ancient law his body must be lifted and questioned," thereupon 

 the grave of the chief was opened. 



There, indeed, was the body, but to their horror, they found 

 twelve scalps, one of them the scalp of a bear and covered with 

 blood! 



"It is he, the blood-thirsting Ton-da-yent!" exclaimed the 

 young warrior, and the society for the dead recited their chants for 

 " pacifying the unrest of a detained spirit " and " talked to " the 

 body. 



The medicine men knew that the murderer of the young warriors 

 was not the immortal Ton-da-yent, whose spirit of good had de- 

 parted forever, but the ghoul of his evil which remained and had 

 assumed his form, and unable to release itself from the earth, 

 had " become restless," therefore it " must be punished." 



So they built a lodge of light logs and boughs, smearing it over 

 with the pitch of the pine, and placing therein a high bier, which 



