(10) COYOTE AND GRIZZLY-BEAR.
(Continued)After he had gone some distance, he heard the people laughing in the tent. He turned back, and saw dung on the floor. He was going to bite it, but said "No, it is very bad." Then the Bear went out. He went some distance, and heard people laughing. He turned back and entered. There was a little bush which scratched him. Then Coyote jumped out laughing and ran away. The Bear pursued him. Coyote transformed himself into a bush. The Bear went on, and saw the bush. After he had gone some distance, Coyote laughed at him. Coyote ran away again, and the Bear pursued him. He transformed himself into a stick. The Bear saw it, and said, "This is a nice stick. I will use it as a walking-stick." Then the Bear said, "No, it is too heavy. I will leave it." And he dropped it. The Bear went on some distance, and Coyote began to laugh, and ran away. The Bear pursued him. Coyote walked over a log that lay across a river. He paid the Woodworm, and said, "Make a hole in the middle of this log that lies across the river." When Grizzly-Bear arrived, he said, "Which way did you go?" Coyote replied, "I came over this log." Grizzly-Bear said, "Is it strong?" -- "Yes, it is very strong. Come!" The Bear jumped on the log and was walking along. When he reached the middle of the stream, the log broke in the middle, and he fell into the water. Then Coyote went on.
Old-One, or Chief, made the earth out of a woman, and said she would be the mother of all the people. Thus the earth was once a human being, and she is alive yet; but she has been transformed, and we cannot see her in the same way we can see a person. Nevertheless she has legs, arms, head, heart, flesh, bones, and blood. The soil is her flesh; the trees and vegetation are her hair; the rocks, her bones; and the wind is her breath. She lies spread out, and we live on her. She shivers and contracts when cold, and expands and perspires when hot. When she moves, we have an earthquake. Old-One, after transforming her, took some of her flesh and rolled it into balls, as people do with mud or clay. These he transformed into the beings of the ancient world, who were people, and yet at the same time animals.
These beings had some of the characteristics that animals have now, and in some respects acted like animals. In form, some were like animals while others more nearly resembled people. Some could fly like birds, and others could swim like fish. All had greater powers, and were more cunning, than either animals or people. They were not well balanced. Each had great powers in certain ways, but was weak and helpless in other ways. Thus each was exceedingly wise in some things, and exceedingly foolish in others. They all had the gift of speech. As a rule, they were selfish, and there was much trouble among them. Some were cannibals, and lived by eating one another. Some did this knowingly, while others did it through ignorance. They knew that they had to live by hunting, but did not know which beings were people, and which deer. They thought people were deer, and preyed on them.
Some people lived on the earth at the same time. They had all the characteristics that Indians have now, but they were more ignorant. Deer also were on the earth at that time, and were real animals as now.2 People hunted them. They were never people or semi-human ancients, like the ancestors of most animals. Some people say that moose and caribou were also animals, like the deer; and that elk, antelope, and buffalo were also animals, although stories are told of the last three as though they were ancients or semi-human.
Old-One made each ball of mud a little different from the others, and rolled them over and over. He shaped them, and made them alive. The last balls of mud he made were almost all alike, and different from any of the preceding ones. They were formed like Indians, and he called them men. He blew on them, and they became alive. They were Indians, but were ignorant, and knew no arts. They were the most helpless of all things created; and the cannibals and others preyed on them particularly. The people and animals were made male and female, so that they might breed. Thus everything living sprang from the earth; and when we look around, we see everywhere parts of our mother.
(Here my informant narrated the story of the Garden of Eden and the fall of man nearly in the same way as given in the Bible. Then he followed by saying the people were much oppressed and preyed on; and so much evil prevailed in the world, that the Chief sent his son Jesus to set things right. After travelling through the world as a transformer, Jesus was killed by the bad people, who crucified him, and he returned to the sky. After he had returned, the Chief looked over the world, and saw that things had not changed much for the better. Jesus had only set right a very few things. He had done more talking than anything else. Here the narrator tried to explain that Jesus worked only for the people's spiritual benefit; that he had tried to induce them to be good, and taught them to pray to the Chief. He taught them no arts, nor wisdom about how to do things, nor did he help to make life easier for them. Neither did he transform or destroy the evil monsters which killed them, nor did he change or arrange the features of the earth in any way.)
Now, the Chief said, "If matters are not improved on earth soon, there will be no people." Then he sent Coyote to earth to destroy all the monsters and evil beings, to make life easier and better for the people, and to teach them the best way to do things.
1 JE 8 : 320 et seq.
2 MAFLS 6 : 51.
