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rated by the two Potawatomi Indians, Jonas and Tom King, although 
the myth seems to contain other elements derived from Christianity: 
“ Once an Indian decided to walk east to the place of sunrise in order that he 
might obtain the blessing of long life. He selected five lads to accompany him, and 
bade them ask their mothers to make them many moccasins, both large and small, 
since they would travel for a very long time. A sixth lad asked permission to join 
the party, and after long hesitation the leader consented. Each lad was exactly five 
years of age. 
As soon as their moccasins were finished the party set out to the eastward. 
Always, when they stopped to rest for the night, they found a camp already built 
and food awaiting them; and whenever they came to a lake or a river the manidos 
had supplied a canoe and paddles to facilitate their crossing. Finally they reached 
the great water. There also was a canoe, in which they embarked and paddled east- 
ward. They paddled steadily for ten days, or ten years according to human reckoning, 
for they were journeying like manidos, and a year is but a day in manido- land. Now 
they came to a mountain. The lads could see nothing on it, but after their leader 
had walked around it four times a door opened into its interior, and an old woman, 
Nokomis, the moon, invited them to enter. She knew why they had come, for she 
could read their thoughts. Each thought how many years he would like to live, and 
Nokomis understood. But the sixth boy, he who had urged the leader to allow him 
to go, desired everlasting life; so Nokomis walked over to where he sat and planted 
a stone beside him. You can see him today in the moon — a boy sitting beside a stone. 
When they had stayed in Nokomis ’ home for ten days, that is to say ten years, 
the sun said to them, ‘Today you shall walk with me across the sky; but first I 
shall take you to the home of Madji Manido , the Bad Spirit/ The leader told the 
boys to walk exactly in his footsteps, and they all followed the sun to the home of 
the Bad Spirit. The house had the shape of a large wigwam (waginogan) , and inside, 
on either side, were sorcerer’s ( mede ) medicine-bags and drums. The Bad Spirit him- 
self seemed to be of fire, transparent. He said to them, ‘ Nokomis has approved of 
your desires for long lives, and I give my consent/ 
Next they travelled to the home of Kitchi Manido, the Good Spirit, which was 
fronted with a pathway and trees of silver. The Good Spirit said to them likewise, 
‘ Nokomis has approved of your desires. I also assent/ 
The party continued to follow the sun, and at noon came to a hole in the sky 
where the sun rests at mid-day. Four old men sat around the hole, one in the east, 
one in the south, one in the west, and one in the north. They were the manidos 
of the four cardinal points. The hole was exactly over the centre of the earth, and 
the sun bade the Indians descend through it to their home. They descended by a 
pathway invisible to mortal eyes, the five youths still treading in their leader's 
footsteps. 
Now Nokomis had warned them not to return straightway to their parents’ 
homes, but to camp apart for ten days, i.e., ten years, and to summon their fathers 
to visit them. When they landed on the earth some boys ran out to greet them. 
The leader of the party said to them, * Go and tell our fathers to come to us/ The 
fathers came, and at the bidding of their sons, engaged an old man who had lived 
purely all his life to build them a wigwam in a spot where no woman had set her 
foot. They hired a pure woman, too, who had never married, to cook for them. 
There the party lived for ten years.” 
The father of Jonas King, one of the narrators of this story, saw the 
manidos of the four quarters in a vision. They told him that he would 
live until his hair was grey; and in fact he was a very old man when 
he died. 
Yet not all the Indians subscribe to this doctrine of “ deputy ” 
manidos at the four cardinal points, coequal, and all drawing their power 
directly from the Great Spirit. Some hold that there are innumerable 
manidos independent of one another, though endowed by the Great Spirit 
with varying powers. When confronted with a myth like that just given 
