142 TALES OF READY-TO-GIVE. 
39. HANDSOME-BOY AND AFTER-BIRTH BOY.* 
A long time ago the Indians had their village upon the Wide River. 
There was one poor boy among the people, but somehow this poor boy 
was liked by the chief’s daughter. One day the girl was out with her 
ponies. On her way to the village she saw the poor boy going to the 
creek. She rode fast, caught up with him, and called to him. The boy | 
did not want to talk to the girl, for he knew that if he were caught with 
her he would be either whipped or killed by the relatives of the girl. 
But the girl spoke to the boy and said: “I want you to come to my 
lodge to-night and sit in the entrance. I will be there to meet you.” 
The boy said: ‘‘No; I will not go there. Your father might kill me if 
I were caught in his lodge.”’ They separated. 
That night the girl left her bed and went to the lodge where the poor 
boy stayed. The poor boy always had his bed upon the ground. The 
girl went to the boy’s bed and they lay together. The girl begged the 
boy to sit up, for she wanted to talk to him, but the boy would not do it. 
After a while the girl said: ‘‘I know you think that you can not marry 
me, but there is a way for us to be married. I can takemy meat bag and 
fill it with dried meat and fat. We can then go away to some far-away 
country and there we can live together.’’ The boy became interested 
in the girl’s talk. Then the boy said: ‘‘I have no bow and arrows with 
which to kill game.”’ The girl said: ‘‘I will get my brother’s quiver and 
bow and arrows.”’ The girl then told the boy that she would see him out 
on the prairie the next day; that she would go for her father’s ponies 
again, and there they would make arrangements to runaway. The girl 
then left the boy’s bed and went to her home. 
The next day the girl watched over the village for the poor boy, but 
she could not see him. But while the girl was looking for the boy he 
was sitting on top of the lodge watching for the girl to go for her ponies. 
Some time in the afternoon the boy saw the girl go out from the village. 
The boy saw the girl catch one pony and ride it with the others to the 
water. After she had taken the ponies back to where she got them, in- 
stead of leaving them there she drove them over several hills. Then the 
boy went down from his lodge and went over the hills. He met her and 
they agreed torun away that night. The girl promised to be at a certain 
place in the village and the boy was to meet her thers. They went home. 
1Told by Woman-Newly-Made-Chief, Skidi, daughter of Scabby-Bull, a famous 
medicine-man. This is an interesting variant of the widespread tale generally 
known as After-Birth-Boy, the after-birth in this case not being thrown into the 
river but placed at the foot of an elm tree. Cf. Nos. 40 and 41. 
