except when the wind stirred and made the sparks fly out.
They kept very quiet, and no one thought of their trying to escape,
when, on the seventh night, they suddenly rose from the ground like
balls of fire and were soon above the tops of the trees. Higher and
higher they went, while the wondering hunters watched, until at last
they were only two bright points of light in the dark sky, and then
the hunters knew that they were stars. •
10. ORIGIN OF THE PLEIADES AND THE PINE
Long ago, when the world was new, there were seven boys who
used to spend all their time down by the townhouse playing the
gatayu'sti game, rolling a .stone wheel along the ground and sliding a
curved stick after it to strike it. Their mothers scolded, but itthat their feet were off the earth, and that with every
round they rose higher and higher in the air. They ran to get their
children, but it was too late, for they were already above the roof of
the townhouse — all but one, whose mother managed to pull him down
with the gatayu'sti pole, but he struck the ground with such force
that he sank into it and the earth closed over him.
The other six circled higher and higher until they went up to the
ORIGIN OF STRAWBEEE] ES 2 >9
sky, where we see them now as the Pleiades, which the Cherokee
stiil call A.ni'tsutsa (The Boys). The people grieved long after them,
but the mother whose boy had gone into the ground came every
morning and every evening to cry over the spot until