Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 6 1888.djvu/57

Rh How, indeed, could a child continue to be called by such a name when its father had become a dead man, and consequently one not to be mentioned without tears?—(Written down from memory. Told by Penri and Ishanashte, July, 1886.)

At the beginning of the world the ground was very hot. The ground was so hot that the creatures called men even got their feet burnt. For this reason, no tree or herb could grow. The only herb that grew at that time was the mugwort. Of trees, the only ones were the oak and the pine. For this reason, these two trees are the oldest among trees. Among herbs, it is the mugwort. This being so, these two trees are divine trees; they are trees which human beings worship. Among herbs, the mugwort is considered to be truly the oldest.

Listen well to this, too, you younger folks!—(Translated literally. Told by Penri, 19th July, 1886.)

My very earliest ancestor kept a deer. He used to tie the divine symbols to its horns. Then the deer would go to the mountains, and bring down with it plenty of other deer. When they came outside the house my ancestor would kill the deer which his deer had brought from the mountains, and thus was greatly enriched. The name of the village in which that deer was kept was Setarukot.

There was a festival at a neighbouring village. So the man who kept the deer went off thither to the festival with all his followers. Only his wife was left behind with the deer. Then a man called Tun-uwo-ush [i.e. "as tall as two men"], from the village of Shipichara, being very bad-hearted, came in order to steal that deer. He found only the deer and the woman at home. He stole both the woman and the deer, and ran away with them. So the man who kept the deer, becoming angry, pursued after him to fight him. Being three brothers in all, they went off all three together. So Tun-uwo-ush