NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



lost in the woods, and had wept until nearly blinded. For many 

 days and nights the rain had flooded the forest, and Jo-wiis could 

 not find his home path. In the black sky there was no sun or 

 moon to guide him, and hungering and faint, he had fallen on the 

 river bank to die, when Don-yon-do, who chanced to be flying across 

 the earth, discovered him, and lifting him on his wings, flew in 

 search of an Indian village. Looking down in the far below, he 

 discovered smoke ascending from some lodges, and alighting left 

 Jo-wiis lying near them and slowly winged away. The rain con- 

 tinued to fall, and no one had come for the fast dying boy when 

 Sa-go-da-oh, winging past in search of night prey, espied him and 

 closing in his wings, dropped to the wet earth where the boy was 

 lying. Though Sa-go-da-oh's talons were long and strong, his 

 heart was tender, and gently lifting Jo-wiis, bore him to the village, 

 but failing to find his home, took him to Ga-do-jih in the sky, who 

 nourished him and grew to love him. 



Ga-do-jih took Jo-wiis to the sky council house when the birds 

 were celebrating the New Year, and taught him their dances ; also 

 to all the feasts throughout the year, teaching him the bird songs 

 and all the laws of the birds, especially the sacred law protecting 

 their nests in the spring and sheltering them in the winter. And 

 he was shown the corn and the grains, which Ga-do-jih told him 

 must be shared with the feathered folk below. All these laws he 

 was enjoined to impart to his people when he should return to the 

 earth. 



Now, the Seven Star Brothers (the Pleiades) were dancing the 

 New Year dance over the council house when Ga-do-jih directed 

 Sa-go-da-oh to return Jo-wiis to the earth, and he nestled close 

 under the wing of the great bird during the journey. 



Earth was sleeping beneath her snow blanket when Jo-wiis 

 returned. Her streams were frozen, and her forests silent save 

 for the keen voice of the wind which wandered through their leaf- 

 less loneliness. Seeing a light in the well remembered council 

 house where the people were holding a feast Jo-wiis entered and 

 related to his astonished listeners his experiences in the sky. As 

 one of the chiefs remembered the lost boy, his strange tale was be- 

 lieved, and it was decided that he should teach the people the bird 

 dances he had learned in the sky, as also the songs the sky birds 

 sing in their councils. 



At the end of the feast it was declared, that, in memory of the 

 wonderful event, the name Sa-go-da-oh, the Vulture, should be 

 added to their clan chiefs' names, and be conferred upon Jo-wiis, 

 to whom the Vulture had been the good friend. 



