HOW THE PAWNEE GOT THE EAGLE DANCE. 399 
have been with your people for some time you must get an Eagle-wing fan. 
That wing will have our power and our breath, so that in waving that 
wing over a sick person we will breathe over them. The sickness will go 
from them and they will become well. After you have been with your 
people for some time you must kill a young fawn and from the fawn skin 
you must make a rattle. The rattle you will use when you sing for sick 
people. In shaking this rattle over them it will arouse the animal spirit 
in them. The sick will try to imitate our kind and they will be made 
well.”” The old Eagle then selected other Eagles to fly with the boy to 
his home. At daylight ten Eagles flew out of the den with the boy. 
They flew toward the south where the village was located upon the 
Republican River. When they came near the village the Eagles flew 
down to the earth. They alighted upon a high mound. They told the 
boy to go to his people; that they would watch over him and take care 
of him. The Eagles flew around the boy Eagle and he turned into a 
young man. Then the Eagles flew away. 
The boy went toward the village. When he entered the village he 
looked into the different lodges, and at last he came to one lodge where 
he saw his father and mother sitting by the fireplace. They were all 
scarred and had their hair cut short. All these years they had mourned 
over their lost child. The boy entered the lodge and said, ‘‘ Father, I am 
here.”” The man looked and saw a young man with a buffalo robe with 
many Eagle feathers upon it. He thought this was the same man who 
had been carried away by the Eagles. The boy said, ‘‘Father, I have 
come back to remain with you.”’ The father saw that the boy was now 
quite a young man. He jumped up, caught his son in his arms, and said, 
‘*Woman, come, our son is here.’”? The woman came and cried, but the 
young man said: ‘‘Do not cry, for I am here now. Take this bundle 
and place it at the altar in the west.” 
It was then told through the village that the boy who had been lost 
had returned. The people began to come in. The men sat in a circle 
around the fireplace. The boy told how his uncle had found a wonderful 
place away from the village; that the wonderful place was a mound cov- 
ered with Eagle feathers; at the top was the entrance, but it was covered 
with soft downy feathers so that the hole could not be seen; that his 
uncle had gone there and gathered the feathers; that he had placed these 
feathers upon his robe; several times he had gone to this place; that the 
people looked upon him as a wonderful man when in reality he had no 
power atall. He told that his uncle was in a hurry to learn of the powers 
of the Eagles and had thought that by giving something to the wonder- 
ful place he might receive powers. He decided, therefore, to steal the 
