“No man may enter my lodge and live,” said the Thunder, and he rose to strike him.  Then the man pointed the raven wing at the Thunder, and he fell back on his bed and shivered; but soon he recovered and rose again, and then the man fitted the elk-horn arrow to his bow and shot it through the lodge of stone.  Right through that stone it pierced a hole and let the sunlight in.

“Wait,” said the Thunder; “stop.  You are the stronger, you have the greater medicine.  You shall have your wife.  Take down her eyes.”

The man cut the string that held the eyes, and his wife stood beside him.

“Now,” said the Thunder, “you know me.  I have great power.  In summer I live here; but when winter comes I go far south.  I go south with the birds.  Here is my pipe.  It has strong power.  Take it and keep it.  After this, when first I come in the spring you shall fill this pipe and light it, and you shall smoke it and pray to me; you and the people.  I bring the rain which makes the berries large and ripe.  I bring the rain which makes all things grow, and for this you shall pray to me; you and all the people.”

Thus the people got their first medicine pipe.  It was long ago.

COLD MAKER’S MEDICINE

The last lodge had been set up in the Blackfeet winter camp.  Evening was closing over the travel-tired people.  The sun had dropped beyond the hills not far away.  Women were bringing water from the river at the edge of the great circle.  Men gathered in quiet groups, weary after the long march of the day.  Children called sleepily to each other, and the dogs sniffed about in well-fed content.

Lone Feather wrapped his robe more closely around him and walked slowly from his lodge door and from the camp, off toward the north.  He was thinking of many things, and hardly noticed where he was going.  Presently as he walked, he heard the sound of persons talking.  He stopped to listen.  The sound came from a lodge made of stone, close by the river.  Quietly he went toward the lodge and saw a thin blue line of smoke coming from the top.

As he approached, an old woman, bent with age and crippled, came from the lodge door and looked at him.

“Will you come into my lodge?” she said, greeting him.

Lone Feather looked at her for a moment in silence.  She spoke again.  He could not understand her speech, for she belonged to another tribe.  By signs she made him know that she wished him to come into her lodge and rest.  Lone Feather entered.

Far back from the door crouched two big grizzly bears.  She made signs to show that the bears were friendly, and Lone Feather sat down near the door.  She stirred the fire, and as she put on fresh wood the sparks flew up toward the smoke hole, which was opened only a little way.

By signs she told him she would go out and open the smoke hole wider, so that the fire might burn more brightly.  She was gone for some time, and Lone Feather sat looking into the fire, still thinking of many things, when the air became thick with smoke.  He looked up and saw that the smoke hole was closed.  He sprang up and went to the door, but the door covering was down.  He raised it, and as he put his head out the old woman hit him with a large stone club and he was dead.