Page:The Pima Indians.pdf/234

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RUSSELL]
MYTHS
229

Elder Brother told his army to capture Vulture alive. "How can we identify him? We do not know him," said they. Elder Brother told them to capture the warrior with white leggings; they were the distinguishing mark of Vulture. They obeyed and brought the defeated leader to Elder Brother, who scalped him: this accounts for the naked head of the vulture of to-day.

Moving on to Gila Crossing, Elder Brother and his party sang:

I am the magician who with the sacred pipe
Of Tcu-unarsat increase my magic power,
I am the magician of the downy feathers.
With the soothing sacred pipe
I bring sleep upon my enemy.

In the battle which ensued Tcu-unarsat Siʼvany was defeated, whereon the victors proceeded to Mesa; and before the pueblo of Aʼ-an Hiʼtûpaki Siʼvany they sang:

The small Blue Eagle alights;
The small Blue Eagle alights.
After emerging from the middle of the land.
To and fro he moves before me
As my staff already has foretold.

After capturing this pueblo the conquerors moved against the Viʼ-iki-ial Ma’kai Si’vany near Tempe, singing:

Look for him! Look for him!
Poor distracted enemy; take him!
Poor fear-stricken enemy; take him!

They then proceeded westward against other pueblos, which they destroyed, and afterwards returned to take possession of the Gila valley.

While the war raged along the Gila some of the inhabitants of the Salt River pueblos sought safety in flight toward the Colorado. They descended that stream to the Gulf of California, the east coast of which they followed for some distance, then turned eastward and finally northeastward, where they settled, and their descendants are the Rio Grande pueblo tribes of to-day.

Kâʼkânyĭp married Kold Ha-akam, the daughter of Kâk Siʼsivĕlĭkĭ, and lived with his father-in-law in the Salt River valley near where Phoenix now stands. There his wife became pregnant and would eat nothing but green plants and game found in the mountains. So one day Kâʼkânyĭp went to the mountains to search for provisions for his wife. He killed a deer which it took him some time to dress. In the meantime the Apaches surrounded him. He fought bravely, but they succeeded in killing him. His father-in-law awaited his coming during the evening and through the night; then he called the people together and told them that his son-in-law had disappeared. All searched until his body was found. This they burned to ashes before