All medicine men have something that will help them in their dreams; that is so. Long ago a certain medicine man had a female bear in his dreams in this manner. Once this man was going hunting. Four companions were going around in one group. They discovered where a bear, a female bear, and her cubs were apparently denned up. As they were about to poke a stick down into the bear den, the old male bear plunged out in anger. He came among them like a great wind. While they were thinking, "Not yet," he came upon them before they knew it. They fled from him in all directions. The female bear too came out like a windstorm, but then she saw that man whom she had as a dream companion, trembling in fear. "Come!" she said to him, and took him quickly back into her den. She quickly pushed aside the grass along the walls of the den and hid him under it. The old male bear was doing his work as usual outside. Since there were no good weapons (i.e., guns) then, that rotten one always overcame humans, so they say. He soon left the torn men Iying scattered on the ground in their blood and went back in to his wife. "I have certainly proven who is the boss around here," he said, and licked his chops repeatedly. And then he said, "I thought four men were walking, up to here. How is it I have only killed three?"
"The sun is still high, are you talking about their shadow?" she said slowly.
owly."Yes, I suppose it must have been their shadow," he replied, and flopped onto his back. "Hey! How is it that there is a smell of man?" he said.
"Ugh! I suppose he ate a little human (flesh), and that is why he says there is a smell of it."
The one who lay concealed among the grass spent the whole winter there. Once in a long while the female bear would give him a ground squirrel for food. Winter passed but he did not know it, for he thought that only one night had passed3; and then he heard the female bear say to her husband, "What are you doing? Water is dripping out there." He (the male bear) stuck his head out, and far down the valley he saw a dog team.
"I will eat well again," he said, and he galloped straight down toward the people. "There, the slimy one is coming! Get him all together!" they said, and they quickly let out a shout. While he was leaping high above the ground, someone shot him through the armpit with several arrows. Right there he flopped down like a sack, and the no-good dogs piled onto him and tore him into pieces; and then the dog teams started off again.
The female bear said to the man, "Now the thaw has come and if you want to go back, do so. If you see people again, don't tell them about me and where my den is, where my children barely toddle along nose to tail. Now my husband is gone. My children are poor and pitiful. If you tell about me, you will cause me great trouble, so I said to you, truly, don't talk like that."
Saying "Thank you," he left there. When he saw people again, they asked him "Where did you spend the winter?" but he did not say a word about it.
After several years, there was a famine. All winter there was no game. Finally it seemed they would all starve. "Let us go back to where I saw a bear den a long time ago," he said. When he came to where the bear den was, the female bear rushed out in anger. She leaped at the one who was leading the group and tore him to pieces, and then she galloped madly down the valley. As it was winter, she made herself into a ch'atth'an, an "ice bear." She repeatedly went into open water and then crawled into the snow, and became entirely covered with ice. In this manner she transformed herself into a very fearsome animal. Since she was covered with ice, it was hard to shoot her, since the arrows just slid off her. In this form she overcame humans for a long time, until old age carried her off.