'" I have shown in this
chapter how large is the number of white men who "too much lie" in
attributing to Indians stories, thoughts, and feelings, which no
Indian ever dreamt of.[251]
The genuine traditional literature of the Indians consists, as Powers
remarks (408), almost entirely of petty fables about animals, and
there is an almost total lack of human legends. Some there are, and a
few of them are quite pretty. Powers relates one (299) which may well
be Indian, the only suspicious feature being the reference to a
"beautiful" cloud (for Indians know only the utility, not the charm,
of nature).
"One day, as the sun was setting, Kiunaddissi's daughter
went out and saw a beautiful red cloud, the most lovely
cloud ever seen, resting like a bar along the horizon,
stretching southward. She cried out to her father, 'O
father, come and see this beautiful [bright?] cloud!' He did
so.... Next day the daughter took a basket and went out into
the plain to gather clover to eat. While picking the clover
she found a very pretty arrow, trimmed with yellow-hammer's
feathers. After gazing at it awhile in wonder she turned to
look at her basket, and there beside it stood a man who was
called Yang-wi'-a-kan-ueh (Red Cloud) who was none other than
the cloud she had seen the day before.
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