knows,” replied they. “He rushed off after the deer and antelope, and that was the last of him.”
“Of course the beast will make a Coyote of himself. But he can go till he can go no longer, for all I care,” added the Mountain Lion, as he sat down to eat.
Presently along came the Coyote.
“Where’s your game, my fine hunter?” asked the Mountain Lion.
“They all got away from me,” whined the Coyote.
“Of course they did, you fool!” sneered the Mountain Lion. “The best thing that you can do is to go home and see your wife. Here, take this meat to sister,” said he, slinging him a haunch of venison.
“Where’s the road?” asked the Coyote.
“Well,” said the Wolf, “follow that path right over there until you come to where it forks; then be sure to take the right-hand trail, for if you follow the left-hand trail it will lead you away from home and into trouble.”
“Which trail did you say?” cried the Coyote.
“Shom-me!” again exclaimed the Mountain Lion.
“Oh, yes,” hastily added the Coyote; “the right-hand trail. No, the left-hand trail.”
“Just what you might expect,” growled the Mountain Lion. “Already the fool has forgotten what you told him. Well, as for me, he can go on the left-hand trail if he wants to, and the farther he goes the better.”
“Now, be sure and take the right-hand trail,” called the Wolf, as the Coyote started.
“I know, I know,” cried the Coyote; and away he went with his heavy haunch of venison slung over his shoulder. After a while he came to the fork in the trail. “Let me see,” said he, “it’s the left-hand trail, it seems to me. No, the right-hand trail. Well, I declare, I’ve forgotten! Perhaps it is the right-hand trail, and maybe it is the left-hand trail. Yes, it is the left-hand trail. Now I’m certain.” And, picking up his haunch of venison, away he trotted along the left-hand trail. Presently he came to a steep cliff and began to climb it. But he had no sooner reached the middle than a lot of Chimney-swallows began to fly around his head and pick at his eyes, and slap him on the nose with their wings.
“Oh, dear! oh, dear!” exclaimed the Coyote. “Aye! aye!” and he bobbed his head from side to side to dodge the Swallows, until he missed his footing, and down he tumbled, heels over head—meat, Coyote, and all—until he struck a great pile of rocks below, and was dashed to pieces.
That was the end of the Coyote; but not of my story.
Now, the brothers went on hunting again. Then, one by one, they returned home. As before, the Mountain Lion came in last of all. He smelt all about the room. “Whew!” exclaimed he. “It still smells here as if twenty Coyotes had been around. But it seems to me that our fine brother-in-law isn’t anywhere about.”
“No,” responded the rest, with troubled looks on their faces. “Nobody has seen anything of him yet.”
“Shom—m-m!” remarked the Mountain Lion again. “Didn’t I tell you, brothers, that he was a fool and would forget your directions? I say I told you that before he started. Well, for my part, I hope the beast has gone so far that he will never return,” and with that he ate his supper.
When supper was over, the sister said: “Come, brothers, let’s go and hunt for my husband.”
At first the Mountain Lion growled and swore a great deal; but at last he consented to go. When they came to where the trails forked, there were the tracks of the Coyote on the left-hand trail.
“The idiot!” exclaimed the Mountain Lion. “I hope he has fallen off the cliff and broken every bone in his body!”
When at last the party reached the mountain, sure enough, there lay the body of the Coyote, with not a whole bone in him except his head.
“Good enough for you,” growled the Mountain Lion, as he picked up a great stone and, tu‑um! threw it down with all his strength upon the head of the Coyote.
That’s what happened a great while ago. And for that reason whenever a Coyote sees a bait of meat inside of a stone deadfall he is sure to stick his nose in and get his head mashed for his pains.
Thus shortens my story.
How the Coyotes Tried to Steal the Children of the Sacred Dance
In the times of the ancients, when our people lived in various places about the valley of Zuni where ruins now stand, it is said that an old Coyote lived in Cedar Canyon with his family, which included a fine litter of pups. It is also said that at this time there lived on the crest of Thunder Mountain, back of the broad rock column or pinnacle which guards its western portion, one of the gods of the Sacred Drama Dance (Kâkâ),13 named Kʻyámakwe, with his children, many in number and altogether like himself.
One day the old Coyote of Cedar Canyon went out hunting, and as he was prowling around among the sage-bushes below Thunder Mountain, he heard the clang and rattle and the shrill cries of the Kʻyámakwe. He pricked up his ears, stuck his nose into the air, sniffed about and looked all around, and presently discovered the Kʻyámakwe children running rapidly back and forth on the very edge of the mountain.
“Delight of my senses, what pretty creatures they are! Good for me!” he piped, in a jovial voice. “I am the finder of children. I must capture the little fellows tomorrow, and bring them up as Coyotes ought to be brought up. Aren’t they handsome, though?”
All this he said to himself, in a fit of conceit, with his nose in the air (presumptuous cur!), planning to steal the children of a god! He hunted no more that day, but ran home as fast as he could, and, arriving there, he said: “Wife! Wife! O wife! I have discovered
