Having created the earth and the grass and the trees, the Great Spirit took a piece out of his heart, near which had been taken the earth, and formed the fragment into a man. The woman then was made, but a bit of flesh sufficed for her; therefore it is that the man became great in wisdom, but the woman1 very much wanting in sense. To the man was given the tobacco seed, that, thrown upon the fire, it might propitiate the messenger-manittos to convey prayers or supplications; to the woman a seed of every kind of grain was given, and to her were indicated the roots and herbs for medicine. Now the Spirit commanded the two to look down; and they looked down, when lo! there stood a child between them. Enjoining the pair to take care of all the children which they might obtain in the future, he created the male and female the first parents of all tribes upon the earth. He then informed them, in the language of the Winnebagos, that they should live in the centre of the earth. The Spirit afterward created the beasts and birds, for the use of all mankind; but the tobacco and fire were given to the Winnebagos.

It is to the Cubans we are indebted for the following version of man's origin":

It was from the depths of a deep cavern in the earth that mankind issued. There were two apertures to this cavern, one large and the other small: out of the large aperture passed the men who are of tall, majestic proportions; and from the small issued the men of diminutive size. Now these men were a long time destitute of women. Wandering on one occasion near a small lake, they saw certain animals among the branches of the trees, which proved to be women. On attempting to catch them, however, they were found to be

1 In the Winnebago, Ho-gahah'; and that of the Dacotah, Wee-ah. — Archæologia Americana, vol. ii.

2 Washington Irving.

slippery as eels, so that it was impossible to hold them. At length they employed certain men whose hands were rendered rough by leprosy; and these succeeded in securing four of these slippery females, from whom the world was peopled.

It is with a different spirit we find woman spoken of in the traditions of the Chinese; but perhaps it may be considered equally unflattering:

Tien (the Creator) placed man upon a high mountain, which Tai-Wang (the first man) rendered fruitless by his own fault. He filled the earth with thorns and briers, and said: "I am not guilty, for I could not do otherwise. Why did he plunge us into so much misery? All was subjected to man at the first; but a woman threw us into slavery. The wise husband built up a bulwark of walls; but the woman, by an ambitious desire of knowledge, demolished them. Our misery did not come from heaven, but from a woman. lost the human race. Ah, unhappy Pao See! [first woman] thou kindlest the fire that consumes us, and which is every day augmenting. Our misery has lasted many ages. The world is lost. Vice overflows all things like a mortal poison."

She

Yet among this people the idea obtains that melody of tones arises from their opposite sex, through which is harmony delighting the ear! This accusation of woman recalls the record in Genesis, which expresses the same idea in a few words:

The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I did eat.

In accordance with which, Milton speaks of

innumerable

Disturbances on earth through female snares.

It was a reason given by the Indians for making the moon a feminine deity, that woman was not equal to man; for they believed that, as the celebrated Persian poet, Firdousi, says,

However brave a woman may appear,

Whatever strength of arm she may possess,

She is but half a man!

Père Brebeuf states that he was informed by an Indian that a package of immortality was presented to one of his race, but with an injunction that it should not be opened. A woman, with more curiosity than respect to the gods, disobeyed the command. She opened the package, and the flight of the spirit of immortality ensued.

It is related by one of the Jesuits that he heard an Indian exclaim,- forgetting his hereditary in a national prejudice, when he had learned of the defection of Eve and the wily temptations she presented to Adam: "They say the first woman brought death into the world. That which they say is true; the women of their country are capable of such malice."1

The Indians of California held a belief that formerly, when one of their number died, the body became full of little animal manittos; and, after these little creatures had crawled over the body for some time, they took all manner of shapes, some of them a deer, others an elk, an antelope, and other animals. But, on its being discovered that a great many were taking wings, and with these, after having fluttered about a little while, eventually sailed away, the wise men,

1 Relations des Jesuites, 1639, p. 12.

the old Coyotes, who were the first Indians that ever existed, and were in the shape of wolves, fearing the earth might become depopulated in this way, concluded to make a change in the manner of their disposal of the dead, and ordered that, when one of their number died, the body should be burned. After this was practised the Indians began to assume the shape of men, although very imperfect in all their parts. At first they walked on all fours; then they began to have some members of the human frame, one toe, one finger, one eye, one ear. After a time they had two fingers, two toes, two eyes, and two ears. Finally, by slow progression, they became perfect men and women. The habit of sitting upright gave them the disadvantage of a loss of the tail, which nevertheless was repaired by borrowing from the foxes, wolves, and other animals. After this, when they had taken the shape of men and women, the manner of their spirits' exit from the body became more uncertain. Some of the aged females of this tribe assert that the spirit neither goes up nor down, but on leaving the body takes a straight course over the earth towards the east, where they come to a great sea, and are launched in a large boat that awaits there to carry the departed across.

1 Coyotes, from coyoto, a wolf.

2 It is possible that the Indian attributed to his family-progenitor the disposition rather than the form of the animal whom he claimed as ancestor. There is a legend among some tribes, that their ancestors were changed into wolves and other animals, and that these were yet to be transformed into men.

This account of the use of fire, as the agent in attaining human shape, affords an example of the universal belief in the supernatural power of that element.

F

The Me-da-e-ki, or Medicine-tree.

THE MYSTIC TREES.

On the celebrated quarry of red pipe-stone, tradition relates that the Great Spirit, in ancient times, was accustomed to slay the buffalo; and hence its color. Here now is seen the impress of his feet, in the form of those of a large bird. It happened one day that a serpent, in pursuit of food, crawled into this bird's nest. In the nest lay an egg, that was suddenly hatched in a peal of thunder. The Great Spirit, then busy at his work, caught a piece of the red pipe-stone and threw it at the serpent. The serpent rose transformed into a man, with all his endowments and privileges, except that of locomotion. His feet were rooted deep in the ground. In this position he grew for ages. He was older than a hundred men of to-day. At length, at his side, equally rooted to the ground, appeared a feminine form, when the serpent came, and, by releasing their feet, permitted them to walk upon the plains of the world. From these two sprang the children of men.

Dr. Brinton relates a myth, found among the Huarochisi Indians on the coast of Peru, in which it is stated that at the beginning of things there were five eggs on Mount Condocate; these eggs opened, and from them came forth five falcons, who were none other than the Creator of all things, Pariacaca, and his brothers, the four winds. The Persians give, as the origin of the

1 Dr Brinton's "American Hero Myths."