[A] In his Algonquin Legends
the same author also alludes to small people.
[Footnote A: _Memoirs_, i. 34.]
Dr. Brinton tells me that the Micmacs have tales of similar Pigmies, whom
they call Wig[)u]l[)a]d[)u]mooch, who tie people with cords during their
sleep, &c. Mr. L.L. Frost, of Susanville, Lassen County, California, tells
us how, when he requested an Indian to gather and bring in all the
arrow-points he could find, the Indian declared them to be "no good," that
they had been made by the lizards. Whereupon Mr. Frost drew from him the
following lizard-story. "There was a time when the lizards were little
men, and the arrow-points which are now found were shot by them at the
grizzly bear. The bears could talk then, and would eat the little men
whenever they could catch them. The arrows of the little men were so small
that they would not kill the bears when shot into them, and only served to
enrage them." The Indian could not tell how the little men became
transformed into lizards.[A] Again, the Shoshones of California dread
their infants being changed by Ninumbees or dwarfs.
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