There is a tundra Tungus, old man. He has five children: three sons, two daughters. They live in a plague on the river. There is only one deer.
The water began to melt, the old man went to the river to hunt. He has three hair salons. Threw them. I sat for a while, no fish. The old man returned home. I went into the tent and drank tea. He says later:
- Maybe there was a fish!
The old man went to the river again. He sees a polar bear sitting near the forest. He turns over and looks at it.
- Uk! - the old man shouted and grabbed a piece of driftwood. The bear also grabbed the stick. The old man says:
- Go away! Why are you playing with me, why are you making fun of me? Am I a fool, or what? Away, away! You'll tear up the forest!
The bear pulled the forest ashore. Both grabbed the floats of the pushchatel, pulled them in different directions, and waved their sticks. The old man says:
“Aren’t you a nguo?” Why do you ruin a poor man's business?
There was an old man on a branch on the water. The bear pulled the forest and pulled the old man along with the branch to the shore. On the ground, the old man sniffs tobacco and says:
- Get away, get away! Why don’t you even let go on earth? I now have Christ the God. Who will you leave? Am I going to die, or what?
The bear does not leave the forest. He grabbed the old man by the neck with his teeth and shook him.
- Well, eat me. “I’ll sit,” says the old man.
The bear did not eat the old man. The old man says:
- I am a baptized person! I will pray to the sun. Sun! The bear wants to eat me. Do you think this is okay?
The bear still won't let him in. The old man speaks again:
- When I was young, I walked quickly in the branch. Are you strong? Let's compare who is stronger. I'll leave you behind and you'll eat me. If you fall behind, I will kill you.
The bear heard this and swam. The old man in the branch swam quickly. Says:
- Trouble will come later. Overtakes me.
The old man has a palm tree. There is an iron cross. There was a pool in the water. Here we swam nearby.
The old man thinks: “The bear will go into the pool.” Says:
- Well, live!
The old man jumped out onto the shore and, when the bear swam up, hit him with a palm tree. The old man skinned the bear, took it to the tent and ate it.
The night has passed. The next morning the old man went to the forests again. He sees: a black bear has arrived and is looking at the forest. The old man shouted:
- Why are you tearing up the forests? You have a lot of food on earth. I ask my mother for water. Why are you like this?
The bear does not let out the forest. They grabbed the floats and tore apart the forest.
“You are not a god, but a fool,” says the old man. - Are you a child, or what?
The old man himself is in the branch, the bear is on the shore. The old man continues:
- Do you want to kill me? Kill!
The bear, like a man, reared up. The old man keeps saying:
- Do you need me? I have Mikolsky. Do you want to kill me today? Let's dance.
They began to dance. The bear dances and sings:
- Ontino! Montino! Hokoy, hokoy!
The old man sings:
- Heiro, heiro!
They danced all day. The bear is tired. He lowered his head and closed his eyes. The old man thinks: “Eh! His heart is close. Can I defeat him with a knife?”
He stabbed with a knife and, sitting down on a branch, quickly swam away.
The bear, rushing after him, almost caught him by his parka. But the bear died. The old man took the bear to the tent.
The old man's eldest son has a red painted hat. His name is Red Cap*124. Another has red bakari, his name is Red bakari*125.
Sons say:
- Father! We are afraid of something.
“Keep the deer at night if you are afraid,” says the old man.
“Keep it yourself,” the sons say.
At night the old man himself guarded the deer. The day has come. The sons stood up. The red hat says, the other says:
- Father! What did you find last night?
“I didn’t find anything,” the old man answers. - You just need to think about it. The bear in these places is very bad.
The sons saw their father's tracks. It can be seen that he went into the forest at night. Sons say:
-What was father doing in the forest? Let's see!
We went into the forest along my father's path. We found a garden with onions guarded against wild ones. There is something lying at the garden gate. Wild, or what? His leg is bleeding. There is blood on the skin on the side. Iron skin.
- What is this? - say the sons. - How did you get it with an arrow? Iron skin. This wild one is elky, it turns out!
The sons returned to the tent:
- Father! What is this? With what arrow did you kill such a wild one?
- Don't know! - the old man says. - Well, argishim, let's leave him.
They walked on foot. They joined many tundra Tungus.
The old man asks.
- Do you have a shaman?
“There is,” they say, “a young shaman.”
“Come on,” says the old man, “talk about me, the shaman.” Let him tell you what happened to me. I won't tell you myself.
A young shaman was shamanizing and said:
- You hunted bears. I caught two bears in the forests. From the Shitolitsy living in the forest, from their great shaman, you got the beast. I got an iron elk.
- Yes, yes. “My business,” said the old man.
“It’s not your fault,” says the young shaman, “even though you got it.” They themselves were looking for you.
In the spring they came to the old man with news: the great shaman of the Shitolits had died. There was blood on the side. Now that's it.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru