|
In a very large village
there lived two sisters. They had lost their parents when the younger
child was but a babe and the eldest a child of about twelve years of
age. This good girl took entire charge of her little sister, and also
worked for the women of the village, and they gave her food in return
for her help. When the little girl was old enough to play with the other
children, her sister begged her never to play the game that the children
were fondest of, and that Avas calling out, “Bear! Bear!” and
frightening themselves with pretending that they were being chased. So
the little girl was very careful to obey her sister, as she loved her
greatly; and when the game was to be played, she would run back to her
sister: At length the children noticed it, and said: “Hoay, it is your
turn to be bear.” She begged them not to ask her to play it. Children
are sometimes cruel, and they insisted on her taking her turn, so she
had to submit or be cruelly used. Well, she went into the hiding place,
and when the children shouted “Bear! Bear!” out she came, growling at
them, and chased them and then ran home to tell her sister what she had
been compelled to do. There, owing to this unfortunate game, when she
reached home she found that her poor sister had been transformed into a
bear. The poor bear was crying at this horrid change, and asked her
sister to go with her to the river side and live in a cave in the bank.
They both wept together, and then they went to find this cave and make
it their home. Then the people heard of the sister being changed into a
bear, and came and mocked the little sister, and out rushed the bear and
destroyed many of the people. The rest got very much alarmed, and tried
in many wTays to kill the bear, but all their efforts were in vain. At
last they tried making a fire before the cave’s mouth, but she only
rushed out and attacked them. They could not kill this enchanted bear.
They waylaid the poor sister and asked her where the bear kept her
heart.
“Oh, I don't know; indeed I don't," she would say. At last they insisted
on her asking the bear where her heart was. So one evening she began
asking questions, and at last came to ask where the bear's heart was
kept. “Now, my sister, the people have told you to ask me."
“No, sister, they have not."
At last she told where her heart was. It was in her forepaw, in the
little toe of it. So the next day when the little sister went to draw
water, she was waylaid and compelled to tell where the bear's heart was.
Tor many days the men were very busy making little sticks, pointed at
both ends, and when they had finished they went towards the bear's cave,
and stuck these sharp points into the ground, as closely together as
they could. Then they shouted to the bear to come out, and roused the
bear at once, who came rushing out, right on these sharp sticks. One
pricked her little toe, and she fell dead, to the bitter grief of her
younger sister. |
