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Main > Native American folktales > Fairy tale "Other Men"

Other Men

Raven went back to the pea-vine and there he found that three other men had just fallen from the pod out of which the first one had dropped. These men, like the first, were looking about in wonder not knowing what to make of themselves and the world about them.

"Come with me," said Raven; and he led them away in an opposite direction from the one in which he had led the first Man, and brought them to solid land close to the sea. "Stop here, and I will teach you what to do and how to live," said he.

He caused some small trees and bushes to grow on the hillside and in the hollows, and he took a piece of wood from one of these, and a cord, and made a bow and showed them how to shoot game for food. Then he taught them to make a fire with a fire-drill. He made plants, and gulls, and loons, and other birds such as fly about on the seacoast.

Then he made three clay images somewhat resembling the men, and waved his wings over them and brought them to life, and led each one of these women to one of the men, and then led each pair to a dry bank, and had three families started on three hilltops.

"Go down to the shore," he said to the three men and the three women, "and bring up the logs that the tide has brought in, and I will show you how to make houses."

They brought the drift logs, and he showed them how to lay them up for walls, and how to make a roof of branches covered with earth. Seals had now become numerous, and he taught them how to capture them, and what use to make of their skins. He helped them to make arrows and spears, and nets to capture deer and fish, and other implements of the chase. He showed them how to make kayaks by stretching green hides over a framework of ribs, and letting the hides dry.

"I have not made as many birds and animals for you as I made for First Man and his wife, but I have made you so many more plants and trees that it isn't quite fair to him. I must go back and fix up his land a bit," said Raven.

So he went over to where First Man and his children were living, and told them all he had done for the three men who had come out of the pea-pod, and how well he had them fixed up.

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