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Updated: May 7, 2025
The Mice-people showed him the way, and when they all reached the spot there was OLD-man deep in the mud, with the big rock on his back. He was angry and was saying things people should not say, for they do no good and make the mind wicked. "Coyote said: 'Keep still, you big baby. Quit kicking about so. You are splashing mud in my eyes. How can I see with my eyes full of mud? Tell me that.
I am going to give my right to be chief to the man that OLD-man has made like himself. "That settled it. That made the man chief forever, and that is why he is greater than the animals and the birds. That is why we never kill the Mice-people. "You saw the Mice run into the buffalo skull, of course.
We found the other children already there, and almost before we had seated ourselves, Muskrat asked: "Grandfather, why must we never kill the Mice-people? Grandmother said that you knew." "Yes," replied War Eagle, "I do know and you must know.
This skull was in a grove of cottonwood-trees near the river, and as they approached two Mice scampered into it to hide. Muskrat, in great glee, secured a stick and was about to turn the skull over and kill the Mice, when his grandmother said: "No, our people never kill Mice. Your grandfather will tell you why if you ask him. The Mice-people are our friends and we treat them as such.
It poured into the den of the Bear among the rocks and he had to move. It crawled under the logs in the forest and found the Mice-people. Out it went to the plains and chased them out of their homes in the buffalo skulls. At last the Beavers' dams broke under the strain and that made everything worse. It was bad very bad, indeed.
Even small people can be good friends, you know remember that." All the day the boy wondered why the Mice-people should not be harmed; and just at dark he came for me to accompany him to War Eagle's lodge. On the way he told me what his grandmother had said, and that he intended to ask for the reason, as soon as we arrived.
Therefore I shall tell you all to-night why the Mice-people must be let alone and allowed to do as they please, for we owe them much; much more than we can ever pay. Yes they are great people, as you will see. "It happened long, long ago, when there were few men and women on the world.
There is where they have lived and brought up their families ever since the night the Mouse beat the Buffalo playing the bone game. Yes the Mice-people always make their nests in the heads of the dead Buffalo-people, ever since that night. "Our people play the same game, even today. See," and War Eagle took from his paint sack a small, polished bone. Then he sang just as OLD-man did so long ago.
My! how he screamed and called for aid. All the Mice-people ran away to find help. It was a long time before the Mice-people found anybody, but they finally found the Coyote, and told him what had happened. Coyote didn't like OLD-man very much, but he said he would go and see what he could do, and he did.
It was rather late when we left War Eagle's lodge after having learned why the Indians never kill the Mice-people; and the milky way was white and plain, dimming the stars with its mist. The children all stopped to say good night to little Sees-in-the-dark, a brand-new baby sister of Bluebird's; then they all went to bed.
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