Note 315 — LEGENDS

The next morning, after eating his repast of parched cornmeal, he started, directing his course southward. But when he was out of sight of his lodge he changed his course toward the north. Making a circuit around his home, he passed all three places where he had visited his uncles, and finally came to a fourth opening with a lodge standing in its center. Arriving at the lodge, he peeped into it; there he saw a man who was still older than his other uncles. Making his presence known, he said, “Well, uncle, I have come to visit you.” The old man answered, saying: “It is well, my nephew. Come in and sit down. I have a game which I play with all those who come to visit me. I play the bone-dice game. Each has only one throw, and we bet our heads on the result. So get ready.” The youth replied: “It is well, uncle; I will play with you. I will go out for a moment, but will return in as short a time as possible.” Going to the river bank, and seeing a flock of ducks, the youth called them to come to him. When they did so, he said to them: “I have a bet, and I want you to aid me with your magic power. I desire six of you to lend me your right eyes315 for a short time. I will bring them back as soon as I make my throw.” At once six of the ducks, removing their right eyes, gave them to the youth. On his way back to the lodge the youth said to the eyes, “When the old man throws, some of you drop into the bowl with your sight down, but when I play you must all drop with your sights turned up.” When he entered the lodge, he said to the old man, “We will play with my dice.” The old man objected to the use of the dice belonging to the youth, but the latter insisted on his right to use his own dice, as the person challenged. They spread a deerskin on the ground, on which they placed a bowl. When the youth had put his dice into the bowl, he asked his uncle to take the first throw, but the old man was not willing to do so. After disputing for some time, however, the old man shook the bowl, whereupon the eyes, as ducks quacking as they flew, rose slowly to the smoke-hole, and then fell back into the bowl as dice, some right side up and others the wrong side up. Then the youth shook the bowl, and the dice flew up as ducks, quacking loudly, and going out of the smoke-hole, they disappeared in the clouds. The old man, as was the custom, sat, saying: “Let there be no count. Let there be no count,” while the youth cried out: “Let the count be five. Let the count be five.” In a short time they heard the ducks coming in the distance, and then they soon dropped into the dish as dice again, all being right side up, at which the youth cried out, “I have won the game.” The old man begged to be permitted to take one smoke more, but the nephew, refusing him, proceeded to cut off the old man’s head with his flint knife. Then placing the head and body of the old man in the lodge, he set it on fire. When the head burst open, out flew an owl. Then the youth took the six eyes back to the river, and calling up the ducks to him, he moistened the eyes with spittle and replaced them in the heads of the ducks. Thanking the ducks for the aid they had given him, he dismissed them, and they flew far away.