{"collection":"Native American","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/nam/ca/dow/dow26.htm","path":"nam/ca/dow/dow26.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/nam/ca/dow/dow26.htm","text":"The Dawn of the World, by C. Hart Merriam, [1910]\nFRAGMENT OF A TALE OF THE WI'PA TRIBE\nPERSONAGES\nO-l\u0101'-nah the Coyote-man\nWek'-wek the Falcon\nO-hul'-le the Badger, wife of O-l\u0101'-nah\nWEK'-WEK the Falcon-man and O-l\u0101'-nah the Coyote-man lived a long time ago.\nWek'-wek did not like O-l\u0101'-nah because he was smart and always pretended that he could do everything. So one day Wek'-wek said to him, \"Let's go and get wood; you are so smart and know so much and can do so many things, let's see you take that big oak tree and bring it home.\"\nO-l\u0101'-nah answered, \"All right, I can do it.\"\nWek'-wek told him to go ahead and do it.\nThen O-l\u0101'-nah ran around and around the big oak tree and the roots cracked and made a noise, and the tree shook, but it did not fall; O-l\u0101'-nah could not get it up; he made it shake four times but could not make it fall.\nWek'-wek, who was watching from the top of a sycamore tree, said, \"Do that again; make the big oak tree shake again, the same as you did before, you are so strong.\"\nO-l\u0101'-nah tried but could not do it.\nThen Wek'-wek said: \"What you said was not true; you bragged that you could do everything but\nyou can not do any thing; now I have beaten you, haven't I?\"\n\"Yes,\" answered O-l\u0101'-nah, \"You have beaten me; I am going away.\" Then O-l\u0101'-nah turned and howled as Coyotes howl and cried and said \"how-loo'-loo-e, how-loo'-loo-e, how-loo'-loo-e,\" and turned into a real Coyote like the coyotes we have now. But he was angry and set upon O-hul'-le, his wife (O-hul'-le was the Badger-woman), and whipped her, and she ran away. O-l\u0101'-nah followed and tried to hiring her back, but she refused and would not come.\nAfter Wek'-wek had beaten O-l\u0101'-nah he had to get fire. So he went up the Sacramento River to the place where trees grow, where the creeks come down from the mountains, and took a piece of wood and made a small hole in it and sprinkled in the hole some dry leaves of Kutch'-um the sage-herb, and took a stick of Lap'-pah, the elderberry tree, and whirled it between his hands, with one end in the hole in the wood, and fire came in the dry Kutch'-um leaves and he had fire.","title":"The Dawn of the World: Part I: Ancient Myths: The Defeat of O-la'-nah the Coyote-Man","type":"page"}