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When he came too near with his fierce heat the people were scorched, and when he hid away in his cave for a long time, too idle to come forth, the night was long and the earth cold. Once upon a time Ta-wăts, the hare-god, was sitting with his family by the camp-fire in the solemn woods, anxiously waiting for the return of Tä-vi, the wayward sun-god.
After a long journey of many adventures the hare-god came to the brink of the earth, and there watched long and patiently, till at last the sun-god coming out he shot an arrow at his face, but the fierce heat consumed the arrow ere it had finished its intended course; then another arrow was sped, but that was also consumed; and another, and still another, till only one remained in his quiver, but this was the magical arrow that had never failed its mark.
Wearied with long watching, the hare-god fell asleep, and the sun-god came so near that he scorched the naked shoulder of Ta-wăts. Foreseeing the vengeance which would be thus provoked, he fled back to his cave beneath the earth. Ta-wăts awoke in great anger, and speedily determined to go and fight the sun-god.
Then Ta-wăts, the hare-god, fled before the destruction he had wrought, and as he fled the burning earth consumed his feet, consumed his legs, consumed his body, consumed his hands and his arms all were consumed but the head alone, which bowled across valleys and over mountains, fleeing destruction from the burning earth until at last, swollen with heat, the eyes of the god burst and the tears gushed forth in a flood which spread over the earth and extinguished the fire.
This legend was something like the story of Noah's ark, but seems in some form or another to have existed in the mind of all the North-American peoples before the arrival of Christian missionaries. Much the same story was told by the Ojibwés about the Great Hare-God, Nainiboju.
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