Slaying The Monsters By Fire

The following data is extracted from Traditions of the Caddo.

    In the olden time the world was full of all kinds of wild animals who ate people and tame animals. In those times Coyote called all the people together to a council to see what could be done with the wild animals, because they were getting so bad that the people could not go away from their homes to hunt food or to visit each other. At the council they decided to set fire to all the grass, which was as high as trees, and so burn the wild animals and everything on the earth. They chose White-Headed-Hawk and Crow, because they were the swiftest of all the people, to fly to some bright Star and tell the Star that they were coming to his home to live. The Star told them that there was room for the people in the heavens if they could get up there. The messengers returned and reported to the people. They decided to make a long rope out of soap weed and go to heaven on that. They began to gather the soap weed and twist it into a strong rope. The rope was finished; then White-Headed-Hawk and Crow took it and again flew to the heavens. They gave the end of the rope to the Star, who put one end of it under a big stone and let it hang down. It was so long that it reached the earth, and the people saw it hanging ready for them to crawl up when the time came. They appointed two men, Gray and Black Snakes, to carry the fire over the world. One was to carry the fire to the east, then to the south; the other was to carry it to the west, then to the north. Soon the people noticed a cloud of smoke, and then the sun began to fade and look dim, and a great noise of all the wild animals arose. The people saw the fire coming nearer, and so they began to climb the rope. After all the people were on the rope and had climbed up a little way the wild animals came and began to climb up. The people saw the animals coming up, and so they appointed Bat to cut the rope just above the wild animals, and they gave him sharp teeth to cut the rope with. Bat began to fly around as though looking for a place on the rope to stay. Finally he asked the first wild animal to let him in by him, and he did. After a while the animal noticed that Bat was eating something, and he asked him what it was, and Bat said that he was eating a parched grain of corn that his grandmother had given him. He kept on chewing the rope when the animal was not looking, and finally the rope broke and let all of the wild animals down and many were killed. Bat went down to make sure that all were killed or burned. He saw an immense animal on the ground and all the other animals crawling into it to escape the fire. Bat went into the animal's nose and pulled out some hairs. This made the animal sneeze and blow all of the other animals out and they burned to death. Bat flew up to tell the people that all the wild bad animals were killed, and so they all came down the rope again.

Source: Traditions of the Caddo

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