Page:The Pima Indians.pdf/247

242 

At the time when the Rsârsûkatc Â-âtam confined the game animals in the cave at Aloam mountain our people were living between Casa Grande and Tucson. Among them were two unhappy brothers, one blind and the other lame. One day as the elder was lamenting, crying, "Why am I lame?" and the other was saying, "Why am I blind?" they suddenly heard a peal of thunder and a voice said, "Take care! Take care!" At this they were frightened, and the younger opened his eyes to see and the elder sprang to his feet and walked.

Then they went to hunt for game, but the Rsârsûkatc Â-âtam had cleared the ranges of every living thing that could supply the Pimas with food, so that the brothers wandered over mountain and mesa without success until they were gaunt with hunger. Then the elder told his brother that he would die for the latter's sake and that after a time the younger brother should return to see what had been the result of his sacrifice. When the young man returned he found two horses, a male and a female.



Five little Indians (not Pimas) were once left orphans because their parents had been killed by Apaches, and they got their aunt (their mother's younger sister) to come and live with them. She had no man, and it was very hard for her to take care of them. One day the children all went away to hunt, and they were met by five little rabbits (cottontails) in the mountains. The oldest of the rabbits came running to the children and crying, "Don't shoot me; I have something to tell you." So the children stood still and the rabbit said, "The Apaches have come to your place and burned down all the houses; you had better go home now." But the children surrounded the rabbit and killed it with an arrow and took it home.

When they reached home, they saw their aunt lying outside the ki in the shade, and something bloody near her. The oldest boy said, ‘"Just look what auntie has been doing! She's been eating our paint and poisoned herself." But it was blood they saw coming out of her mouth; for the Apaches had come and killed her. When they came closer, they saw that a bunch of her hair had been cut off, and she looked so unnatural in death that they thought it was somebody else, and that their aunt had gone away. They had never seen a dead person before. So they said, "Let us dig a big hole and make a fire all day long and put hot stones in it, for she has gone to the mountains to