Traditions of the North American Indians (Vol. 1-3). James Athearn Jones

to think of, was the land of the happy hunting-grounds.¹²

      "Once upon a time, in the season of opening buds, and the singing of birds, and the whistling of the breeze among the wild flowers, the people of our nation were much terrified at seeing a strange creature, much resembling a man, riding along the adjacent waves upon the back of a fish. He had upon his head long green hair, much resembling the coarse weeds which the mighty storms of the month of falling leaves root up from the bottom of the ocean, and scatter along the margin of the feathery strand where we now dwell. Upon his face, which was shaped like that of a porpoise, he had a beard of the colour of ooze. Around his neck hung a string of great sea-shells, upon his forehead was bound another made of the teeth of the cayman, and in his hand was a staff formed of the rib of a whale. But, if our people were frightened at seeing a man who could live in the water like a fish or a duck, how much more were they frightened when they saw, that from his breast down he was actually a fish, or rather two fishes, for each of his legs was a whole and distinct fish. And, when they heard him speak distinctly in their own language, and still more when he sang songs sweeter than the music of birds in spring, or the whispers of love from the lips of a beautiful maiden, they thought it a being from the Land of Shades, a spirit from the happy fishing grounds beyond the lake of storms, and ran into the woods like startled deer. And this was his song:

      SONG OF THE MAN-FISH.

      I live in the depths of brine,

       Where grows the green grass slim and tall,

       Among the coral rocks;

       And I drink of their crystal streams, and eat

       The year-old whale, and the mew;

       And I ride along the dark blue waves

       On the sportive dolphin's back;

       And I sink to rest in the fathomless caves,

       Beyond the sea-shark's track.

      I hide my head, in the pitiless storm,

       In caverns dark and deep;

       My couch of ooze is pleasant and warm,

       And soft and sweet my sleep.

       I rise again when the winds are still,

       And the waves have sunk to rest,

       And call, with my conch-shell, strong and shrill,

       My mate to the Salt Lake's breast.

      "And there he would sit for hours, his fish-legs coiled up under him, singing to the wondering ears of the Indians upon the shore the pleasures he experienced, and the beautiful and strange things he saw, in the depths of the ocean, always closing his strange stories with these words, shouted at the top of his lungs: "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Every day, when the waves were still, and the winds had gone to their resting-place in the depths of the earth(1), to get sleep that they might come out refreshed for their race over the green vales and meadows, the monster was sure to be seen near the shore where our tribe dwelt. For a great many suns, they dared not adventure upon the water in quest of food, doing nothing but wander along the beach, watching the strange creature as he played his antics upon the surface of the waves, and listening to his charming songs, and to his invitation, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" But the longer he stayed, the less they feared him. They became used to him, and as, the oftener the tiger glares upon you from the thicket, the oftener you hear the whoop of death, the more you come to despise them, so in time they began to think him a spirit who was neither made for harm, nor wished to injure the poor Indian. Then they grew hungry, and their wives and little ones cried for food. And as hunger does away all fear, except that which relates to the satisfying it, in a few days three canoes, with many men and warriors, no longer decorated with war-paint, no longer armed with bows and arrows and sharp spears, but with the pale cheeks of men of peace, and bearing the implements of fishermen, ventured off to the rocks in quest of the finny brood.

      "When our fathers reached the fishing-place, they heard, as before, the voice shouting, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Presently the Man-Fish appeared, sitting on the water, with his legs, or the fins which served for legs, folded under him, and his arms crossed on his breast, as they had usually seen him. There he sat, eyeing them attentively, while they tried to bring up the fat things of the deep. When they failed to draw in the fish they had hooked, he would make the very water shake, and the deep echo with shouts of laughter, and would clap his hands with great noise, and cry, "Ha! ha! my boy, there he fooled you!" When they caught any he was very angry, and would scold like an old woman when her husband returns from hunting and brings no meat. When they had tried long and patiently, and taken little, and the sun was just hiding himself behind the dark clouds which skirted the Region of Warm Winds,¹³ the strange creature, popping up his head within a few paces of the canoe, cried out still stronger than before, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Kiskapocoke, who was the head man of the tribe, asked him what he wanted, but he would make no other answer than "Follow me!" Kiskapocoke said, "Do you think I will be such a fool as to go, I don't know with whom, and I don't know where?"

      ""Ah! but see what I will show you," cried the Man-Fish, throwing up one of his odd legs, and flirting the water all over the speaker in the boat.

      ""Can you show us any thing better than we have yonder?" asked the warrior, pointing to their cabins on the shore—"good wives, good children, good dogs—plenty of deer, plenty of train-oil, plenty of every thing?"

      ""Yes, and plenty of storms in the moons of falling leaves and melting ice, and plenty of snow in the time between them; and oftentimes plenty of hunger, and always plenty of danger from bears, and wolves, and painted warriors. But go with me, and see what I will show you—a land where there is a herd of deer for every one that skips over your ice-bound hills, where there are vast droves of creatures larger than your sea-elephants, called, in the language of the people of the land, bisons, where there is no cold to freeze you, where the glorious sun is always soft and smiling, where the trees and the fields are always in bloom, where the men always grow tall as stately pines, and the women beautiful as the stars of night."

      "Our fathers began now to be terrified, and wished themselves on the land. But, the moment they tried to paddle towards the shore, some invisible hand would seize their canoes, and draw them back, so that an hour's labour did not enable them to gain the length of their boat in the direction of their parted friends and relatives. Then there was much laughing all around them, and fins of all sizes, shapes, and colours, flirted the water over them, till they were as wet as if they had been swimming. At last Kiskapocoke said to his companions, "What shall we do?"

      ""Follow me!" said the Man-Fish, popping up his head as before.

      "Then Kiskapocoke said to his companions, "Let us follow him, and see what will come of it." So they followed him, he swimming and they paddling, until night came. Then a great wind and deep darkness prevailed, and the Great Serpent commenced hissing in the depths of the ocean. They were terribly frightened, and thought not of living till another sun, but of perishing in the great deep, far from the lands of their fathers, and without glory. But the Man-Fish kept close to the boat, and bade them not be afraid, for nothing should hurt them, if they only followed him and saw what he would show them. And thus they continued, amidst the raging of the winds and the waves, and the thunders and the lightnings, to paddle their slender canoes till the sun arose.

      "When morning came, nothing could be seen of the shore they had left. The winds still raged, the seas were very high, and the water ran into their canoes like melted snows over the brows of the mountains in the months of spring. But the Man-Fish handed them large shells, wherewith they were enabled to bale it out. As they had brought neither food nor water with them, and had caught neither fish nor rain, they had become both hungry and thirsty. Kiskapocoke told the strange creature they wanted to eat and drink, and that he must enable them to do both. "For," said he, "since you brought us here, you would be a very bad fish to let us starve or die of thirst."

      ""Oh! very well," answered the Man-Fish; "stop where you are then, while I go down, and get you victuals and water; and be sure, this time, that you do not follow me." With that he made a plunge into the depths of the wave. Down he went, how far our fathers could not say, only this they