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Algonquin Legends of New England by Charles Godfrey Leland
page 62 of 357 (17%)
returned and had dried meat for supper. So they were married.

Now Turtle seemed to be very lazy; and when others hunted he lounged at
home. One day his young wife said to him that if this went on thus they
must soon starve. So he put on his snow-shoes and went forth, and she
followed him to see what he would do. And he had not gone far ere he
tripped and fell down, and the girl, returning, told her mother that he
was worthless. But the mother said, "He will do something yet. Be
patient."

One day it came to pass that Glooskap said to Mikchich, "To-morrow
there will be a great game at ball, and you must play. But because you
have made yourself enemies of all the young men here, they will seek to
slay you, by crowding all together and trampling upon you. And when
they do this it will be by your father-in-law's lodge, and to escape
them I give you the power to jump high over it. This you may do twice,
but the third time will be terrible for you, and yet it must be."

All this happened as he foretold; for the young men indeed tried to
take his life, and to escape them Mikchich jumped over the lodge, so
that he seemed like a bird flying. But the third time he did this he
was caught on the top of the tent-poles, and hung there dangling in the
smoke which rose from below.

[Illustration: THE MUD TURTLE JUMPING OVER THE WIGWAM OF HIS
FATHER-IN-LAW.]

Then Glooskap, who was seated in the tent, said, "Uncle, I will now
make you the _sogmo_, or great chief of the Tortoises, and you
shall bear up a great nation." Then he smoked Mikchich [Footnote: In a
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