Creation Myths of Primitive America Part 28

"I will go and bring him," said Tsaroki.

"Go, my grandson. I will show you a trail, but do not go near the east side of my sweat-house. It is not far. Kanhlalas lives northeast from here."

Tsaroki found Kanhlalas's sweat-house on the trail. He heard music inside, beautiful music. He stood awhile listening, then went in and saw an old man lying on his back playing. The old man stopped playing, but did not speak. Tsaroki touched him on the shoulder and said,--

"My grandfather, I have come for you. Waida Dikit, my grandfather, sent me to ask you to visit him."

"I will go," was all that the old man said. No questions were asked or answered. "I have come for you," "I will go;" no more. Those people of long ago talked in that way; they didn't talk much.

Tsaroki went home. Kanhlalas made ready to go, and went under the ground. Waida Dikit was lying in his house when on a sudden Kanhlalas rose at his feet. Waida Dikit sat up when he saw him, took a pipe, and told him to smoke. Kanhlalas smoked, and the two old men talked a good while. The young men played, first one, then the other. It was dark in the sweat-house, but after Kanhlalas came he shone and gave light like a torch in a dark house. You could see some, but not very much.

Kanhlalas was a grandfather of Waida Werris.

"I sent for you," said Waida Dikit, "for I thought you might teach my grandsons to play better. They like to make music. They think of nothing else."

"I am old," said Kanhlalas. "I am not as I used to be. I cannot play much now. When I was a boy, when I was young, I could play. But I will play a little."

About dark he said a second time, "I will play a little." So he lay on his back, took his own flute, which he had brought with him, and began. The two brothers lay and listened. Kanhlalas never took the flute out of his mouth from the dark of evening until daylight. Next day he played, and all night again. When morning came there was a light stripe down his breast, and when the sun rose his breast was white, for the breath was nearly out of his body. That morning old Waida Dikit said,--

"Now we will invite all people in the world who can play, to come here."

"If you invite all people in the world who can play," said Tsaroki, "this house will be too small for them."

"No," said the old man, "it will not be too small. You will find it large enough when they come."

Tsaroki was sent to the northwest to invite people. He went very fast.

In a little while he was at a place just this side of where the sky touches the earth. He went to Nop Hlut. When near the sweat-house he heard stamping in a dance. He went in and saw a very big house full of people sitting around at the wall. Only one woman and a young girl were dancing in the middle of the house, Nop Pokte and Nop Loimis. The girl was very small, and had fawn's feet tied behind her head. These rattled so sharply that you could hear them when far away. As Tsaroki was coming in through the door on the south, he saw an old man lying on the north side. This was Nop Kiemila, the master of the house.

Tsaroki went straight to him, put his hand on his shoulder, and said,--

"I have come for you."

"What kind of call do you make?" asked Nop.

"My grandfather is going to have a playing on flutes."

"I will go," said Nop.

"My grandfather is inviting people from all parts of the world. All will be invited who can play on the flute."

Waida Dikit himself went south to invite people living in the water, and sent Tsaroki to invite all the land people. They went far and near to invite all. After a time both grew wearied, and wanted to get some one to take invitations. They thought who would be best in heat and cold, light and darkness, and thought that Kinus would be; so they called him, and hired him to go.

Kinus went as far as he could go, went around the whole world to a distance a little this side of where the sky comes down. After a time he returned and said,--

"This world is wide and big. I called all the people as far as I went, but I was not able to go everywhere,--this world goes farther than I went. Whole days I could get no water, no food; but I invited all the people that I saw."

Now, while Kinus was speaking the invited people were listening; and there were many of them then at Waida Dikit's. Lutchi sat at one side and listened.

"There is," said Waida Dikit, "a man that we should like to see here.

Waida Werris and also a man who lives far in the East, Patkilis; he lives behind the sky, beyond the place where the sky touches the earth, and Sedit lives with him. We want these three. Now Kinus cannot go to them,--n.o.body that we know is able to go to them. What shall we do?"

All talked about this. Lutchi sat back in silence, and listened to what they were saying.

"This sweat-house is too small," said Kanhlalas.

"You will see," answered Waida Dikit.

The sweat-house was spreading out, growing gradually, growing all the time as the people came. A great many came that afternoon. The house extended now as far as the eye could see. Whenever new people came, Waida Dikit would blow and say, "I wish this house to be larger!" And the house stretched, became wider and longer and higher. In the evening great crowds were there already.

Kinus and the rest talked all night and the next day. "n.o.body can go to Waida Werris, Patkilis, and Sedit. That was what they said."

They asked all present, and each answered, "I cannot go to them." They talked and talked. At last one man said to another, "Let's ask that Lutchi Herit over there; maybe he can go." A third said, "Yes, let's ask him." And the three said to Waida Dikit, "Ask that little man; perhaps he can go." "He is small," said Waida Dikit, "but I will ask him." He went up to Lutchi, touched him on the shoulder, and asked,--

"My grandson, can you do something for me? You are small, but I am asking you."

Lutchi said nothing; just raised his brows, which meant "Yes." As soon as he did this, Waida Dikit put his hand under his arm and took out a kunluli (a delicate blue flower that grows near the water), and gave it to Lutchi. Lutchi took it in his open palm, looked at it, rubbed it between his two hands, spat on it, and made a paste which was a beautiful blue paint. Then he rubbed his face, arms, breast--he became blue all over (to this day Lutchi is blue, he was white before). He went out among the people then, and said,--

"People, look at me! What do I look like? Haven't I a nice color now?"

"You are beautiful," said the people. "You look well."

It was at the point of daybreak. They could see just a bit of light.

When he was ready to start, Lutchi said,--

"I don't know how far it is, but if I go to those places I shall be back here at sunrise. If they are very far away, I shall be here when the sun is as high as the tree-tops."

"Do you think you will be back by sunrise?" asked Kinus. "Those places are very far away."

"I know they are far away," said Lutchi.

"I have been all over the world," added Kinus. "I was gone a long time, but those places are farther away than any spot where I have been."

"Ho! Now I am going!" said Lutchi; and he darted straight up into the sky, next down, and up and down again. Then he called out,--

"How do you like that? Do you think I can go to those people? This is the way I travel."

He shot away east and returned. Then he went west and came back in a twinkle. Next he turned north and was gone. He had never travelled through the air before. Till that morning he had always walked on the ground, just as we do now. He went straight to Waida Werris's house and went in. It was dazzling there, and seemed to him just as bright as daylight seems to a man coming out of a dark place.

Lutchi saw some one inside, who was young and beautiful. He could not look at his face, it was so bright. There were two brothers in the house. The younger was Waiti, the elder Waida Werris. Waiti never left the house; never went abroad or wandered, stayed at home all the time.

"I have come," said Lutchi, "to invite you to meet people from all the world at a flute-playing in Waida Dikit's sweat-house."

"I will go," said Waida Werris. He knew all that was going on. He had seen it while travelling early, before daylight.

"I am going now," said Lutchi to Waida Werris. And as soon as he was outside he rushed off toward the west, came back, rose in the air, came down, and then shot away, like a lightning flash, eastward to find Patkilis and Sedit. Soon he was in the east, where the sky comes to the earth. He took a sky stick, which he had brought with him, pried up the sky, raised it a little, and then he went under to the other side. When the sky came down again behind him and struck the earth, it made an awful noise which was heard over the world. The whole world shook. All the people at Waida Dikit's heard the noise and wondered.

"What can that be?" asked they. "What awful noise is that?" Waida Dikit knew what the noise was, but he never told any one.

Lutchi went straight east from the other side of the sky, and never stopped till he found Patkilis and Sedit. They were in another world, another sky came down to their world, and they lived almost at the edge of that second sky. Lutchi went into their sweat-house. They were sitting just inside the door, one at one side, the other at the other; the door was on the east side. When Lutchi had sat a little while, Sedit rose and said,--

"My grandson, which way have you come?"