Note 426 — SENECA FICTION, LEGENDS, AND MYTHS (continued 3)

Next morning the little boy, having spat upon one of his arrows three times, cast it out of the lodge through the smoke-hole, saying to it: “Go thou, then, hunt for a deer and kill it for our food.” Obeying him, the arrow flew out of the smoke-hole and disappeared. After being absent for only a short time, it returned through the smoke-hole. The boy seized it, and, finding on it traces of fresh blood, he turned to the little old woman, saying: “Oh, grandmother! go out and look for the dead body of a deer; it lies not far from here.” Not far from the lodge she found, indeed, the body of a deer, which evidently had been recently killed. Having brought it to the lodge, she dressed it. Then she cooked some of the venison for herself and her adopted grandchildren, and while they were eating the little old woman continually uttered words of thanksgiving to the Master of Life426 because she was again able to eat venison.