Myths and Legends of the Sioux
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Marie L. McLaughlin >> Myths and Legends of the Sioux
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Myths and Legends of the Sioux
MYTHS AND LEGENDS
OF THE SIOUX
MRS. MARIE L. MCLAUGHLIN
In loving memory of my mother,
MARY GRAHAM BUISSON,
at whose knee most of the stories
contained in this little volume
were told to me, this book is affec-
tionately dedicated
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication
Foreword
The Forgotten Ear of Corn
The Little Mice
The Pet Rabbit
The Pet Donkey
The Rabbit and the Elk
The Rabbit and the Grouse Girls
The Faithful Lovers
The Artichoke and the Muskrat
The Rabbit, and the Bear with the Flint Body
Story of the Lost Wife
The Raccoon and the Crawfish
Legend of Standing Rock
Story of the Peace Pipe
A Bashful Courtship
The Simpleton's Wisdom
Little Brave and the Medicine Woman
The Bound Children
The Signs of Corn
Story of the Rabbits
How the Rabbit Lost His Tail
Unktomi and the Arrowheads
The Bear and the Rabbit Hunt Buffalo
The Brave Who Went on the Warpath Alone and
Won the Name of the Lone Warrior
The Sioux Who Married the Crow Chief's
Daughter
The Boy and the Turtles
The Hermit, or the Gift of Corn
The Mysterious Butte
The Wonderful Turtle
The Man and the Oak
Story of the Two Young Friends
The Story of the Pet Crow
The "Wasna" (Pemmican Man) and the Unktomi (Spider)
The Resuscitation of the Only Daughter
The Story of the Pet Crane
White Plume
Story of Pretty Feathered Forehead
The Four Brothers or Inyanhoksila (Stone Boy)
The Unktomi (Spider), Two Widows and the Red Plums
FOREWORD
In publishing these "Myths of the Sioux," I deem it proper to state
that I am of one-fourth Sioux blood. My maternal grandfather,
Captain Duncan Graham, a Scotchman by birth, who had seen service
in the British Army, was one of a party of Scotch Highlanders who
in 1811 arrived in the British Northwest by way of York Factory,
Hudson Bay, to found what was known as the Selkirk Colony, near
Lake Winnipeg, now within the province of Manitoba, Canada. Soon
after his arrival at Lake Winnipeg he proceeded up the Red River of
the North and the western fork thereof to its source, and thence
down the Minnesota River to Mendota, the confluence of the
Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers, where he located. My
grandmother, Ha-za-ho-ta-win, was a full-blood of the Medawakanton
Band of the Sioux Tribe of Indians. My father, Joseph Buisson,
born near Montreal, Canada, was connected with the American Fur
Company, with headquarters at Mendota, Minnesota, which point was
for many years the chief distributing depot of the American Fur
Company, from which the Indian trade conducted by that company on
the upper Mississippi was directed.
I was born December 8, 1842, at Wabasha, Minnesota, then Indian
country, and resided thereat until fourteen years of age, when I
was sent to school at Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin.
I was married to Major James McLaughlin at Mendota, Minnesota,
January 28, 1864, and resided in Minnesota until July 1, 1871, when
I accompanied my husband to Devils Lake Agency, North Dakota, then
Dakota Territory, where I remained ten years in most friendly
relations with the Indians of that agency. My husband was Indian
agent at Devils Lake Agency, and in 1881 was transferred to
Standing Rock, on the Missouri River, then a very important agency,
to take charge of the Sioux who had then but recently surrendered
to the military authorities, and been brought by steamboat from
various points on the upper Missouri, to be permanently located on
the Standing Rock reservation.
Having been born and reared in an Indian community, I at an early
age acquired a thorough knowledge of the Sioux language, and having
lived on Indian reservations for the past forty years in a position
which brought me very near to the Indians, whose confidence I
possessed, I have, therefore, had exceptional opportunities of
learning the legends and folk-lore of the Sioux.
The stories contained in this little volume were told me by the
older men and women of the Sioux, of which I made careful notes as
related, knowing that, if not recorded, these fairy tales would be
lost to posterity by the passing of the primitive Indian.
The notes of a song or a strain of music coming to us through the
night not only give us pleasure by the melody they bring, but also
give us knowledge of the character of the singer or of the
instrument from which they proceed. There is something in the
music which unerringly tells us of its source. I believe musicians
call it the "timbre" of the sound. It is independent of, and
different from, both pitch and rhythm; it is the texture of the
music itself.
The "timbre" of a people's stories tells of the qualities of that
people's heart. It is the texture of the thought, independent of
its form or fashioning, which tells the quality of the mind from
which it springs.
In the "timbre" of these stories of the Sioux, told in the lodges
and at the camp fires of the past, and by the firesides of the
Dakotas of today, we recognize the very texture of the thought of
a simple, grave, and sincere people, living in intimate contact and
friendship with the big out-of-doors that we call Nature; a race
not yet understanding all things, not proud and boastful, but
honest and childlike and fair; a simple, sincere, and gravely
thoughtful people, willing to believe that there may be in even the
everyday things of life something not yet fully understood; a race
that can, without any loss of native dignity, gravely consider the
simplest things, seeking to fathom their meaning and to learn their
lesson--equally without vain-glorious boasting and trifling
cynicism; an earnest, thoughtful, dignified, but simple and
primitive people.
To the children of any race these stories can not fail to give
pleasure by their vivid imaging of the simple things and creatures
of the great out-of-doors and the epics of their doings. They will
also give an intimate insight into the mentality of an interesting
race at a most interesting stage of development, which is now fast
receding into the mists of the past.
MARIE L. McLAUGHLIN (Mrs. James McLaughlin).
McLaughlin, S. D., May 1, 1913.
THE FORGOTTEN EAR OF CORN
An Arikara woman was once gathering corn from the field to store
away for winter use. She passed from stalk to stalk, tearing off
the ears and dropping them into her folded robe. When all was
gathered she started to go, when she heard a faint voice, like a
child's, weeping and calling:
"Oh, do not leave me! Do not go away without me."
The woman was astonished. "What child can that be?" she asked
herself. "What babe can be lost in the cornfield?"
She set down her robe in which she had tied up her corn, and went
back to search; but she found nothing.
As she started away she heard the voice again:
"Oh, do not leave me. Do not go away without me."
She searched for a long time. At last in one corner of the field,
hidden under the leaves of the stalks, she found one little ear of
corn. This it was that had been crying, and this is why all Indian
women have since garnered their corn crop very carefully, so that
the succulent food product should not even to the last small nubbin
be neglected or wasted, and thus displease the Great Mystery.
THE LITTLE MICE
Once upon a time a prairie mouse busied herself all fall storing
away a cache of beans. Every morning she was out early with her
empty cast-off snake skin, which she filled with ground beans and
dragged home with her teeth.
The little mouse had a cousin who was fond of dancing and talk, but
who did not like to work. She was not careful to get her cache of
beans and the season was already well gone before she thought to
bestir herself. When she came to realize her need,
she found she had no packing bag. So she went to her hardworking
cousin and said:
"Cousin, I have no beans stored for winter and the season is nearly
gone. But I have no snake skin to gather the beans in. Will you
lend me one?"
"But why have you no packing bag? Where were you in the moon when
the snakes cast off their skins?"
"I was here."
"What were you doing?"
"I was busy talking and dancing."
"And now you are punished," said the other. "It is always so with
lazy, careless people. But I will let you have the snake skin.
And now go, and by hard work and industry, try to recover your
wasted time."
THE PET RABBIT
A little girl owned a pet rabbit which she loved dearly. She
carried it on her back like a babe, made for it a little pair of
moccasins, and at night shared with it her own robe.
Now the little girl had a cousin who loved her very dearly and
wished to do her honor; so her cousin said to herself:
"I love my little cousin well and will ask her to let me carry her
pet rabbit around;" (for thus do Indian women when they wish to
honor a friend; they ask permission to carry about the friend's
babe).
She then went to the little girl and said:
"Cousin, let me carry your pet rabbit about on my back. Thus shall
I show you how I love you."
Her mother, too, said to her: "Oh no, do not let our little
grandchild go away from our tepee."
But the cousin answered: "Oh, do let me carry it. I do so want to
show my cousin honor." At last they let her go away with the pet
rabbit on her back.
When the little girl's cousin came home to her tepee, some rough
boys who were playing about began to make sport of her. To tease
the little girl they threw stones and sticks at the pet rabbit. At
last a stick struck the little rabbit upon the head and
killed it.
When her pet was brought home dead, the little rabbit's adopted
mother wept bitterly. She cut off her hair for mourning and all
her little girl friends wailed with her. Her mother, too, mourned
with them.
"Alas!" they cried, "alas, for the little rabbit. He was always
kind and gentle. Now your child is dead and you will be lonesome."
The little girl's mother called in her little friends and made a
great mourning feast for the little rabbit. As he lay in the tepee
his adopted mother's little friends brought many precious things
and covered his body. At the feast were given away robes and
kettles and blankets and knives and great wealth in honor of the
little rabbit. Him they wrapped in a robe with his little
moccasins on and buried him in a high place upon a scaffold.
THE PET DONKEY
There was a chief's daughter once who had a great many relations so
that everybody knew she belonged to a great family.
When she grew up she married and there were born to her twin sons.
This caused great rejoicing in her father's camp, and all the
village women came to see the babes. She was very happy.
As the babes grew older, their grandmother made for them two saddle
bags and brought out a donkey.
"My two grandchildren," said the old lady, "shall ride as is
becoming to children having so many relations. Here is this
donkey. He is patient and surefooted. He shall carry the babes in
the saddle bags, one on either side of his back."
It happened one day that the chief's daughter and her husband were
making ready to go on a camping journey. The father, who was quite
proud of his children, brought out his finest pony, and put the
saddle bags on the pony's back.
"There," he said, "my sons shall ride on the pony, not on a donkey;
let the donkey carry the pots and kettles."
So his wife loaded the donkey with the household things. She tied
the tepee poles into two great bundles, one on either side of the
donkey's back; across them she put the travois net and threw into
it the pots and kettles and laid the skin tent across the donkey's
back.
But no sooner done than the donkey began to rear and bray and kick.
He broke the tent poles and kicked the pots and kettles into bits
and tore the skin tent. The more he was beaten the more he kicked.
At last they told the grandmother. She laughed. "Did I not tell
you the donkey was for the children," she cried. "He knows the
babies are the chief's children. Think you he will be dishonored
with pots and kettles?" and she fetched the children and slung them
over the donkey's back, when he became at once quiet again.
The camping party left the village and went on their journey. But
the next day as they passed by a place overgrown with bushes, a
band of enemies rushed out, lashing their ponies and sounding their
war whoop. All was excitement. The men bent their bows and seized
their lances. After a long battle the enemy fled. But when the
camping party came together again--where were the donkey and the
two babes? No one knew. For a long time they searched, but in
vain. At last they turned to go back to the village, the father
mournful, the mother wailing. When they came to the grandmother's
tepee, there stood the good donkey with the two babes in the saddle
bags.
THE RABBIT AND THE ELK
The little rabbit lived with his old grandmother, who needed a new
dress. "I will go out and trap a deer or an elk for you," he said.
"Then you shall have a new dress."
When he went out hunting he laid down his bow in the path while he
looked at his snares. An elk coming by saw the bow.
"I will play a joke on the rabbit," said the elk to himself. "I
will make him think I have been caught in his bow string." He then
put one foot on the string and lay down as if dead.
By and by the rabbit returned. When he saw the elk he was filled
with joy and ran home crying: "Grandmother, I have trapped a fine
elk. You shall have a new dress from his skin. Throw the old one
in the fire!"
This the old grandmother did.
The elk now sprang to his feet laughing. "Ho, friend rabbit," he
called, "You thought to trap me; now I have mocked you." And he
ran away into the thicket.
The rabbit who had come back to skin the elk now ran home again.
"Grandmother, don't throw your dress in the fire," he cried. But
it was too late. The old dress was burned.
THE RABBIT AND THE GROUSE GIRLS
The rabbit once went out on the prairie in winter time. On the
side of a hill away from the wind he found a great company of girls
all with grey and speckled blankets over their backs. They were
the grouse girls and they were coasting down hill on a board. When
the rabbit saw them, he called out:
"Oh, maidens, that is not a good way to coast down hill. Let me
get you a fine skin with bangles on it that tinkle as you slide."
And away he ran to the tepee and brought a skin bag. It had red
stripes on it and bangles that tinkled. "Come and get inside," he
said to the grouse girls. "Oh, no, we are afraid," they answered.
"Don't be afraid, I can't hurt you. Come, one of you," said the
rabbit. Then as each hung back he added coaxingly: "If each is
afraid alone, come all together. I can't hurt you
all."
And so he coaxed the whole flock into the bag. This done, the
rabbit closed the mouth of the bag, slung it over his back and came
home. "Grandmother," said he, as he came to the tepee, "here is a
bag full of game. Watch it while I go for willow sticks to make
spits."
But as soon as the rabbit had gone out of the tent, the grouse
girls began to cry out:
"Grandmother, let us out."
"Who are you?" asked the old woman.
"Your dear grandchildren," they answered.
"But how came you in the bag?" asked the old woman.
"Oh, our cousin was jesting with us. He coaxed us in the bag for
a joke. Please let us out."
"Certainly, dear grandchildren, I will let you out," said the old
woman as she untied the bag: and lo, the grouse flock with
achuck-a-chuck-achuck flew up, knocking over the old grandmother
and flew out of the square smoke opening of the winter lodge. The
old woman caught only one grouse as it flew up and held it,
grasping a leg with each hand.
When the rabbit came home with the spits she called out to him:
"Grandson, come quick. They got out but I have caught two."
When he saw what had happened he was quite angry, yet could not
keep from laughing.
"Grandmother, you have but one grouse," he cried, and it is a very
skinny one at that."
THE FAITHFUL LOVERS
There once lived a chief's daughter who had many relations. All
the young men in the village wanted to have her for wife, and were
all eager to fill her skin bucket when she went to the brook for
water.
There was a young man in the village who was industrious and a good
hunter; but he was poor and of a mean family. He loved the maiden
and when she went for water, he threw his robe over her head
while he whispered in her ear:
"Be my wife. I have little but I am young and strong. I will
treat you well, for I love you."
For a long time the maiden did not answer, but one day she
whispered back.
"Yes, you may ask my father's leave to marry me. But first you must
do something noble. I belong to a great family and have many
relations. You must go on a war party and bring back the scalp of
an enemy."
The young man answered modestly, "I will try to do as you bid me.
I am only a hunter, not a warrior. Whether I shall be brave or not
I do not know. But I will try to take a scalp for your sake."
So he made a war party of seven, himself and six other young men.
They wandered through the enemy's country, hoping to get a chance
to strike a blow. But none came, for they found no one of the
enemy.
"Our medicine is unfavorable," said their leader at last. "We
shall have to return home."
Before they started they sat down to smoke and rest beside a
beautiful lake at the foot of a green knoll that rose from its
shore. The knoll was covered with green grass and somehow as they
looked at it they had a feeling that there was something about it
that was mysterious or uncanny.
But there was a young man in the party named the jester, for he was
venturesome and full of fun. Gazing at the knoll he said: "Let's
run and jump on its top."
"No," said the young lover, "it looks mysterious. Sit still and
finish your smoke."
"Oh, come on, who's afraid," said the jester, laughing. "Come on
you--come on!" and springing to his feet he ran up the side of the
knoll.
Four of the young men followed. Having reached the top of the
knoll all five began to jump and stamp about in sport, calling,
"Come on, come on," to the others. Suddenly they stopped--the
knoll had begun to move toward the water. It was a gigantic
turtle. The five men cried out in alarm and tried to run--too
late! Their feet by some power were held fast to the monster's
back.
"Help us--drag us away," they cried; but the others could do
nothing. In a few moments the waves had closed over them.
The other two men, the lover and his friend, went on, but with
heavy hearts, for they had forebodings of evil. After some days,
they came to a river. Worn with fatigue the lover threw himself
down on the bank.
"I will sleep awhile," he said, "for I am wearied and worn out."
"And I will go down to the water and see if I can chance upon a
dead fish. At this time of the year the high water may have left
one stranded on the seashore," said his friend.
And as he had said, he found a fish which he cleaned, and then
called to the lover.
"Come and eat the fish with me. I have cleaned it and made a fire
and it is now cooking."
"No, you eat it; let me rest," said the lover.
"Oh, come on."
"No, let me rest."
"But you are my friend. I will not eat unless you share it with
me."
"Very well," said the lover, "I will eat the fish with you, but you
must first make me a promise. If I eat the fish, you must promise,
pledge yourself, to fetch me all the water that I can drink."
"I promise," said the other, and the two ate the fish out of their
war-kettle. For there had been but one kettle for the party.
When they had eaten, the kettle was rinsed out and the lover's
friend brought it back full of water. This the lover drank at a
draught.
"Bring me more," he said.
Again his friend filled the kettle at the river and again the lover
drank it dry.
"More!" he cried.
"Oh, I am tired. Cannot you go to the river and drink your fill
from the stream?" asked his friend.
"Remember your promise."
"Yes, but I am weary. Go now and drink."
"Ek-hey, I feared it would be so. Now trouble is coming upon us,"
said the lover sadly. He walked to the river, sprang in, and lying
down in the water with his head toward land, drank greedily. By
and by he called to his friend.
"Come hither, you who have been my sworn friend. See what comes of
your broken promise."
The friend came and was amazed to see that the lover was now a fish
from his feet to his middle.
Sick at heart he ran off a little way and threw himself upon the
ground in grief. By and by he returned. The lover was now a fish
to his neck.
"Cannot I cut off the part and restore you by a sweat bath?" the
friend asked.
"No, it is too late. But tell the chief's daughter that I loved
her to the last and that I die for her sake. Take this belt and
give it to her. She gave it to me as a pledge of her love for me,"
and he being then turned to a great fish, swam to the middle of the
river and there remained, only his great fin remaining above
the water.
The friend went home and told his story. There was great mourning
over the death of the five young men, and for the lost lover. In
the river the great fish remained, its fin just above the surface,
and was called by the Indians "Fish that Bars," because it bar'd
navigation. Canoes had to be portaged at great
labor around the obstruction.
The chief's daughter mourned for her lover as for a husband, nor
would she be comforted. "He was lost for love of me, and I shall
remain as his widow," she wailed.
In her mother's tepee she sat, with her head covered with her robe,
silent, working, working. "What is my daughter doing," her mother
asked. But the maiden did not reply.
The days lengthened into moons until a year had passed. And then
the maiden arose. In her hands were beautiful articles of
clothing, enough for three men. There were three pairs of
moccasins, three pairs of leggings, three belts, three shirts,
three head dresses with beautiful feathers, and sweet smelling
tobacco.
"Make a new canoe of bark," she said, which was made for her.
Into the canoe she stepped and floated slowly down the river toward
the great fish.
"Come back my daughter," her mother cried in agony. "Come back.
The great fish will eat you."
She answered nothing. Her canoe came to the place where the great
fin arose and stopped, its prow grating on the monster's back. The
maiden stepped out boldly. One by one she laid her presents on the
fish's back, scattering the feathers and tobacco over his broad
spine.
"Oh, fish," she cried, "Oh, fish, you who were my lover, I shall
not forget you. Because you were lost for love of me, I shall
never marry. All my life I shall remain a widow. Take these
presents. And now leave the river, and let the waters run free, so
my people may once more descend in their canoes."
She stepped into her canoe and waited. Slowly the great fish sank,
his broad fin disappeared, and the waters of the St. Croix
(Stillwater) were free.
THE ARTICHOKE AND THE MUSKRAT
On the shore of a lake stood an artichoke with its green leaves
waving in the sun. Very proud of itself it was, and well satisfied
with the world. In the lake below lived a muskrat in his tepee,
and in the evening as the sun set he would come out upon the shore
and wander over the bank. One evening he came near the place where
the artichoke stood.
"Ho, friend," he said, "you seem rather proud of yourself. Who are
you?" "I am the artichoke," answered the other, "and I have many
handsome cousins. But who are you?"
"I am the muskrat, and I, too, belong to a large family. I live in
the water. I don't stand all day in one place like a stone."
"If I stand in one place all day," retorted the artichoke, "at
least I don't swim around in stagnant water, and build my lodge in
the mud."
"You are jealous of my fine fur," sneered the muskrat. "I may
build my lodge in the mud, but I always have a clean coat. But you
are half buried in the ground, and when men dig you up, you are
never clean."
"And your fine coat always smells of musk," jeered the artichoke.
"That is true," said the muskrat. "But men think well of me,
nevertheless. They trap me for the fine sinew in my tail; and
handsome young women bite off my tail with their white teeth and
make it into thread."
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