the magazine y - Desert Magazine of the Southwest

Coyote and
A Jlapi legend
As told to HARRY C. JAMES
Illustration by W. Mootzka, Hopi Artist
/ 4- UT toward Oraibi butte there lived i n the old days
\^y a coyote and his wife. They had six children. The
coyote children were so hungry they kept their mother
and father busy all the time getting food for them. One day
the mother coyote found some food that really belonged to
the bluejays. Being tired and hungry herself, she took the food
and brought her family a fine supper. The bh.ejays were very
angry with the coyote and determined to teach her a lesson.
A few days later the coyote was out looking for food again.
She circled all around the Oraibi mesa without success. Then
she climbed on top of the mesa and started hunting for rabbits
among the pinon and juniper trees. When sne got high on
the mesa back of the village, she came upen a number of
bluejays having a dance far up on the limb of a big dead
pifion tree. The bluejays looked fine and plurip. It made the
coyote's mouth water just to look at them. "My, what fine
meals those birds would make!" the coyote said to herself.
She did not know that they were the bluejays from whom she
had stolen the food only a few days before.
"Come on up and dance with us, " one of ths bluejays called
down to the coyote.
"I would like to, but I can't climb trees," ;he replied.
"That's all right! We will help you," said he jays.
Then the birds began taking out their fea:hers and wings
and tails and they dropped them down to tne coyote. Soon
there were enough feathers to make wings and a big feather
tail for her. The bluejays, though, were wise enough to keep
some leathers so they could still fly. The co"ote flapped her
new wings and ruffled the feathers of her new tail. After trying
a few times she found that she could fly.
"Now come up and dance with us!" the jays cried.
The coyote flew up on the branch and joir.ed the bluejays,
thinking that she would have a dance with them and play
with them before she gobbled them up. They danced together
on the pinon limb. As the dance finished, th; coyote made a
jump for the closest bluejay, but they had been expecting this
and the bird jumped aside quickly. Immediacy the jays flew
up from the limb and circled high above the :ree. The coyote,
proud of her new wings, flew after them. T:ie bluejays kept
dodging around her as they gradually circled liigher and higher.
The coyote felt sure she could catch them and they teased
her by flying just out of reach of her snapping jaws. Whenever
she was just ready to snap at one of them, the bluejays
would dart below or above her just out of reach.
When they had tormented the bad coyote for several minutes
and when they were flying right over a pile of rocks, the
jays suddenly turned on the coyote and began pulling out
the feathers they had given her. As the birds plucked out a
feather they put it back in their own bodies. Soon they had
taken back so many of the feathers that the coyote could fly
no more and she fell heavily on the sharp rocks below.
That is how the bluejays punished the mother coyote for
stealing.
KENNETH KREIGH
CREATIVE DESIGNER AND BUILDER
PATIOS • POOLS
FIREPLACES © BARBECUES
GROTTOS • BRIDGES
NATURALISTIC AND ALPINE GARDENS
UNIQUE BUILDING FRONTS & ENTRANCES
I have designed and built the largest Barbecue and Fireplace layout
in Santa Barbara County . . . Botanical Garden and rock
entrance to Ramona Pageant Bowl . . . Rock Masterpiece (San
Jacinto Museum) front . . . 1000 ton Indian rock garden at
Soboba Hot Springs . . . and colorful new rock garden at entrance
to Desert Magazine.
FREE ESTIMATES BY MAIL. Sketches and plans
reasonable. Write Kenneth Kreigh (Cree), Pioneer
Hotel, San Jacinto, California.
JULY, 1940 29
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