The Man-Fish - Page 2

dwelt. For a great many suns they dared not venture upon the water in quest of food, doing nothing but wander along the beach, watching the strange creature as he played his antics upon the surface of the waves, listening to his songs and to his invitation--

"Follow me, and see what I will show you."

The longer he stayed the less they feared him. They became used to him, and in time looked upon him as a spirit who was not made for harm, nor wished to injure the poor Indian. Then they grew hungry, and their wives and little ones cried for food, and, as hunger banishes all fear, in a few days three canoes with many men and warriors ventured off to the rocks in quest of fish.

When they reached the fishing-place, they heard as before the voice shouting--

"Follow me, and see what I will show you."

Presently the man-fish appeared, sitting on the water, with his legs folded under him, and his arms crossed on his breast, as they had usually seen him. There he sat, eying them attentively. When they failed to draw in the fish they had hooked, he would make the water shake and the deep echo with shouts of laughter, and would clap his hands with great noise, and cry--

"Ha, ha! there he fooled you."

When a fish was caught he was very angry. When the fishers had tried long and patiently, and taken little, and the sun was just hiding itself behind the dark clouds which skirted the region of warm winds, the strange creature cried out still stronger than before--

"Follow me, and see what I will show you."

Kiskapocoke, who was the head man of the tribe, asked him what he wanted, but he would make no other answer than--

"Follow me."

"Do you think," said Kiskapocoke, "I would be such a fool as to go I don't know with whom, and I don't know where?"

"See what I will show you," cried the man-fish.

"Can you show us anything better than we have yonder?" asked the warrior.

"I will show you," replied the monster, "a land where there is a herd of deer for every one that skips over your hills, where there are vast droves of creatures larger than your sea-elephants, where there is no cold to freeze you, where the sun is always soft and smiling, where the trees are always in bloom."

The people began to be terrified, and wished themselves on land, but the moment they tried to paddle towards the shore, some invisible hand would seize their canoes and draw them back, so that an hour's labour did not enable them to gain the length of their boat in the direction of their homes. At last Kiskapocoke said to his companions--

"What shall we do?"

"Follow me," said the fish.

Then Kiskapocoke said to his companions--

"Let us follow him, and see what