Living Our Language_ Ojibwe Tales & Oral Histories - Anton Treuer [19]
[1] When I first saw that black man the Indians already talked about here in town, here where I live, those black people floated down [the river] to settle there too, the children of that man, his wife, they moved here, this here barber, that is [to say] that black man. He lived here at Balsam Lake for a long time, the one who was the barber when I first saw him, that makadewiiyaas as he was named.
[2] And he thought well of the Indians there. There where they lived, they never told the man that he couldn’t be here where he lived. But they could’ve told him. And he only talked in a certain way in spite of the fact that he spoke Ojibwe as we taught him that Ojibwe language too. At that time I first saw that black person. Over across the ocean towards this certain island, he was from over there, that makadewiiyaas as the Indian called him.
[3] And that’s all I’m going to say for now.
The Makadewiiyaas Goes Rabbit Hunting
[1] Once a certain man came with us when we went about rabbit hunting. There is a swamp out there, and there is where the white rabbits were. And then he told him there, “Right here you lie in wait,” he told him, “The rabbits will come [to you].”
[2] Then that black man stood right there. But none of those rabbits approached him, he who the Indian had brought along. He [the Indian] abandoned him out there and went home. That’s why that happened to that black man.
The Stuffed Rabbit
[1] And one time it’s the black man, that man brought him along. Then he snared that rabbit and stuffed him. Then out there where he must have wanted to bring him, out there he placed that rabbit.
[2] And as they started to go home, walking along he thusly spoke to him, “See that rabbit sitting over there,” he told him. That rabbit had been stuffed for a long time, as that black man stood there, shooting—that stuffed rabbit.
When They Ate Puppies
[1] One time when I went over there to the Sioux lands, the Indians were dancing over there. When I went in the evening I saw them eating. Then over there near the river, there was a campsite over there. That’s where they were eating. Then as we were waiting there, a certain man came to sit there where I was sitting at the table, talking there, telling stories. This is what he told me:
[2] There’s a house there. They were walking slowly from where they must have lived. And three men were drunk here. There outside they made a fire, warming themselves up by the fire.
[3] A white man came driving up there. He had puppies there in his car. Then he told the Indians, “Did anybody there own [these] puppies?” He tells those three men too. “We don’t own those puppies,” [one] tells him. Then the white man tells him, as he picked them up, “I’m going to leave them with someone who wants to have them.” That’s what he told the Indians.
[4] Then he left those puppies, perhaps three of them as it was told to me. Then those men, the drunks, they must have been hungry. They wanted to eat a certain puppy. And that was this one man’s intention, that one guy. Then that one man wanted to singe the puppies. Maybe then that puppy came to, coming back to life. [That man] got bit here on his hand. He throws him over there among the grass. It burst into flames. Everything burned up.
[5] That [guy] burned down two houses when those old men were going to drive up. A certain boy was cruising by there on his bicycle. The air was parched and then that leader asks the boy, “And why did the fire start here,” he tells him in order to ask him this. “I wonder how,” he says. “I don’t know,” he says. “Only those men over there, the ones sitting,” he says. “They wanted to singe puppies there. He was going to throw one among that old grass. That’s why the fire started there,” he tells that white man. “Oh they really got everything consumed in flames. They burned down two houses.”
When I Was Stabbed by My Fellow Indian
[1] I was going to town when I left. At this time halfway here towards where the Indians lived, a woman came running out of the house there. “A man is fighting my husband