Читать книгу The Mythology of Cherokee, Iroquois, Navajo, Siouan and Zuñi - James Mooney - Страница 127

Cloud-carrier was much perplexed at the act of his supernatural relative. He saw the medicine-men gather round the child and chant prayers for his recovery.

"It is the will of Manitou," said one priest, "that we offer a white dog as a sacrifice."

So they procured a white dog, skinned and roasted it, and put it on a plate. It flew up in the air and provided a meal for the hungry Cloud-carrier and his companion. The child recovered and returned to his play.

"Your medicine-men," said Nemissa's brother, "get a great reputation for wisdom simply because they direct the people to me. You think they are very clever, but all they do is to advise you to sacrifice to me. It is I who recover the sick."

Cloud-carrier found in this spot a new source of interest, but at length the delights of the celestial regions began to pall. He longed for the companionship of his own kin, for the old commonplace pastimes of the Earth-country. He became, in short, very homesick, and begged his wife's permission to return to earth. Very reluctantly she consented.

"Remember," she said, "that I shall have the power to recall you when I please, for you will still be my husband. And above all do not marry an Earth-woman, or you will taste of my vengeance."

The young man readily promised to respect her injunctions. So he went to sleep, and awoke a little later to find himself lying on the grass close by his father's lodge. His parents greeted him joyfully. He had been absent, they told him, for more than a year, and they had not hoped to see him again.

The remembrance of his sojourn among the Star-people faded gradually to a dim recollection. By and by, forgetting the wife he had left there, he married a young and handsome woman belonging to his own village. Four days after the wedding she died, but Cloud-carrier failed to draw a lesson from this unfortunate occurrence. He married a third wife. But one day he was missing, and was never again heard of. His Star-wife had recalled him to the sky.