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The rock projects outward above the cave, so that the mouth can not be
seen from above, and it seems impossible to reach the cave either from
above or below. There are white streaks in the rock from the cave down to
the water. The Cherokee call it Tla'nuwa, "the place of the Tlä'nuwä," or
great mythic hawk.
In the old time, away back soon after the creation, a pair of Tla'nuwa had
their nest in this cave. The streaks in the rock were made by the
droppings from the nest. They were immense birds, larger than any that
live now, and very strong and savage. They were forever flying up and down
the river, and used to come into the settlements and carry off dogs and
even young children playing near the houses.
No one could reach the nest to kill them, and when the people tried to
shoot them the arrows only glanced off and were seized and carried away in
the talons of the Tla'nuwa.
At last the people went to a great medicine man, who promised to help
them. Some were afraid that if he failed to kill the Tla'nuwa they would
take revenge on the people, but the medicine man said he could fix that.
He made a long rope of linn bark, just as the Cherokee still do, with
loops in it for his feet, and had the people let him down from the top of
the cliff at a time when he knew that the old birds were away.
When he came opposite the month of the cave he still could not reach it,
because the rock above hung over, so he swung himself backward and forward
several times until the rope swung near enough for him to pull himself
into the cave with a hooked stick that he carried, which he managed to
fasten in some bushes growing at the entrance. In the nest he found four
young ones, and on the floor of the cave were the bones of all sorts of
animals that had been carried there by the hawks.
He pulled the young ones out of the nest and threw them over the cliff
into the deep water below, where a great Uktena serpent that lived there
finished them. Just then he saw the two old ones coming, and had hardly
time to climb up again to the top of the rock before they reached the
nest.
When they found the nest empty they were furious, and circled round and
round in the air until they saw the snake put up its head from the water.
Then they darted straight downward, and while one seized the snake in his
talons and flew far up in the sky with it, his mate struck at it and bit
off piece after piece until nothing was left.
They were so high up that when the pieces fell they made holes in the
rock, which are still to be seen there, at the place which we call "Where
the Tlä'nuwä cut it up," opposite the mouth of Citico. Then the two
Tla'nuwas circled up and up until they went out of sight, and they have
never been seen since.
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