verhanging
the water. Upon the top of these rocks the old woman put up a swing,
and, having fastened a piece of leather round her body, she commenced
to swing herself, going over the precipice each time. She continued
this for a short while, and then, stopping, told her daughter-in-law
to take her place. She did so, and, having tied the leather round her,
began to swing backwards and forwards. When she was well going,
sweeping at each turn clear beyond the precipice, the old woman slyly
cut the cords, and let her drop into the lake. She then put on some of
the girl's clothing, entered the lodge in the dusk of the evening, and
went about the work in which her daughter-in-law had been usually
occupied at such a time. She found the child crying, and, since the
mother was not there to give it the breast, it cried on. Then the
orphan boy asked her where the mother was.

"She is still swinging," replied the old woman.

"I will go," said he, "and look for her."

"No," said the old woman, "you must not. What would you go for?"

In the evening, when the husband came in, he gave the coveted morsels
to what he supposed was his wife. He missed the old woman, but asked
nothing about her. Meanwhile the woman ate the morsels, and tried to
quiet the child. The husband, seeing that she kept her face away from
him, was astonished, and asked why the child cried so. His pretended
wife answered that she did not know.

In the meantime the orphan boy went to the shores of the lake, where
he found no one. Then he suspected the old woman, and, having returned
to the lodge, told the hunter, while she was out getting wood, all he
had heard and seen. The man, when he had heard the story, painted his
face black, and placed his spear upside down in the earth, and
requested the Great Spirit to send lightning, thunder, and rain, in
the hope that the body of his wife might arise from the water. He then
began to fast, and told the boy to take the child and play upon the
lake shore.

Meanwhile this is what had happened to the wife. After she had plunged
into the lake, she found herself in the hold of a water-tiger, who
drew her to the bottom. There she found a lodge, and all things in it
as if arranged for her reception, and she became the water-tiger's
wife.

Whilst the orphan boy and the child were playing on the shore of the
lake one day, the boy began to throw pebbles into the water, when
suddenly a gull arose from the centre of the lake, an