is well known among the Cherokee east and west. The generic word
for mill is dista'sti, including also the self-acting pound-mill or
ûlskwûlte'gi. In the original version the mill was probably a wooden
mortar, such as was commonly used by the Cherokee and other eastern
and southern tribes.
In a variant recorded in the Hagar Cherokee manuscript there are
two hunters, one living in the north and hunting big game, while the
other lives in the south and hunts small game. The former, discovering
the latter's wife grinding corn, seizes her and carries her far away
across the sky to his home in the north. Her dog, after eating what
meal is left, follows the pair across the sky, the meal falling from
his mouth as he runs, making the Milky Way.
With the Kiowa, Cheyenne, and other plains tribes the Milky Way is
the dusty track along which the Buffalo and the Horse once ran a race
across the sky.