STORIES 449

from which radiated flashing light, and would be certain to come back for
them shortly. She suggested a way by which the child could kill her
captor.

“Put on the gloves,” she said, “and stand in the doorway, opening
and closing your hands in the szumg’s face as she returns across the
chasm.”

The little girl eagerly obeyed, put on the gloves and awaited the
smumg’s return. Soon she saw her coming, and as she was half-way across
the bridge the child began to open and close her hands, so that the flashing
light struck the monster in the face. She also sang, as the old woman
had bidden her:

“Saogatsgima.” “Open your eyes, mother!”

The smug grew terrified.

“Stop! Stop! I shall fall,” she cried out.

But the girl continued until the brute fell from the log into the chasm
and was killed. Then the old woman said to the girl:

“Take one end of this long rope and climb down the chasm, while I
hold the other. Cut off the smuzug’s breasts and I will haul you up again.”

The girl did as she was told. She found the corpse of the swung and
cut off the breasts; then the old woman drew her up by the rope, and
said:

“The szimig’s four children, who are wolves, are away hunting at
present, but they will soon return. You must hurry to cook their mother’s
breasts for them so that they will eat and die.”

The girl had just finished cooking when the four wolves came in,
laden with their spoil of mountain goat. The girl gave them the meal
which she had prepared, and at the first mouthful, the eldest said to the
others:

“This is queer meat. It tastes like our mother’s breasts.”

The others hastened to sample the food and agreed with him. They
all fell dead. At the old woman’s bidding the little girl threw the four
corpses over the brink of the chasm.

“You had better go home now,” the old woman said to her. “Be sure
to keep hold of one end of this rope, made of mountain goat hair, which
I will spin out as you travel, otherwise you will never be able to return.
When you reach your home, tie the cord to a tree before you go into
your house. Tell your friends what you have seen and done, and they
can all come here, using the rope as a guide.”

So the little girl set out for home, taking one end of the rope with her,
while the old woman kept spinning out at the other end, singing as she
did so,

“Make yourself long by your efforts, wool.”

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