They would not listen to the young men.
The chief of the tribe had a fine son, a great hunter, and skilled in
mysteries. [Footnote: In Passamaquoddy, _N'paowlin_: a man learned
in mysteries, a scholar. This is my own Indian name. It is apparently
the same with: _boo-oin_; that is, pow-wow man.] The young man
wanted one of the girls. His father went to their parents and obtained
their consent, but the girls refused to be married.
There lived in the village a young man who was neither strong,
handsome, nor clever at any kind of work. Hearing that the chief's son
had failed to get one of the shy or proud girls, he said--but all in
jest, for he had but a poor opinion of himself--that he was the right
kind of a man to get them. "If they had, for example, only seen
_me_, now," he exclaimed, "they would have wished to be married at
once!" Then they all laughed, and proposed that they should go that
night and try to see the girls, and how they would receive the plain
looking youth.
So they went quietly, about supper-time, and entered so suddenly that
the girls had not time to hide behind the curtain, and so were obliged
to receive the visitors. After supper they engaged in playing
_Mingwadokadjik_. In this game a ring is hidden in the ashes or
sand, and each player, with a pointed stick, makes a plunge until the
ring is hit, and brought out.
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