THE PEACEFUL NEPHEW
A middle-aged Comanche had two nephews, one of whom was an able and active warrior. The younger nephew, although able enough in other ways, did not see anything attractive in the warlike activities of the other young men of the tribe. While the tribe’s young men were eagerly participating in the tribe’s wars for plunder and the thrill of battle, the younger nephew was very content to go about enjoying the peaceful life, which were ordinarily left to the older and less active men of the tribe. His uncle and other relatives tried in vain to get him to stirring and change his peaceful ways for the usual warlike ways of the Comanche horsewarrior. The peaceful nephew would not be changed. He was able to get anything he needed without going on the warpath, so he was not going to change his peaceful outlook on life. His relatives, being accustomed to warlike activities, looked on their peaceful young relative as a very odd, if not courage-lacking, member of the family.
Other members of the tribe shared this opinion of the peaceful nephew. Once he was at a stream leisurely bathing and enjoying the serene scene. While thus happily occupied, an attractive young woman came up to the stream, just a little ways upstream from him, and began to prepare herself for bathing, seemingly unaware of his nearness.
Removing her garments except for a very scant part which she was going to take into the water with her, the black-tressed young woman waded into the water and started bathing. The sight of an attractive young woman, and almost nude at that, casually bathing a few horse lengths upstream from him, had the natural result, for the only thing wrong with him, if it can be called wrong, was that he was only a peace-loving member of a warlike tribe of nomadic plunderers.
The young man made the initial overtures of love that could be expected of any healthy young male who witnessed the sight that the young temptress had so unexpectedly displayed in the midst of the young Comanche’s peaceful outlook.
He had been thoroughly enjoying a refreshing and peaceful bath until the arrival and unexpected behavior of the saucy young female who was ignoring his very presence. The young man by now had completely for-
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