THE BOUND CHILDREN

There once lived a widow with two children--the elder a daughter
and the younger a son. The widow went in mourning for her husband
a long time. She cut off her hair, let her dress lie untidy on her
body and kept her face unpainted and unwashed.

There lived in the same village a great chief. He had one son just
come old enough to marry. The chief had it known that he wished
his son to take a wife, and all of the young women in the village
were eager to marry the young man. However, he was pleased with
none of them.

Now the widow thought, "I am tired of mourning for my husband and
caring for my children. Perhaps if I lay aside my mourning and
paint myself red, the chief's son may marry me."

So she slipped away from her two children, stole down to the river
and made a bathing place thru the ice. When she had washed away
all signs of mourning, she painted and decked herself and went to
the chief's tepee. When his son saw her, he loved her, and a feast
was made in honor of her wedding.

When the widow's daughter found herself forsaken, she wept
bitterly. After a day or two she took her little brother in her
arms and went to the tepee of an old woman who lived at one end of
the village. The old woman's tumble down tepee was of bark and her
dress and clothing was of old smoke-dried tent cover. But she was
kind to the two waifs and took them in willingly.