The Little People live in the woods, underground. You can hear them; they cry like children.
They eat acorns and mushrooms, tadpoles and mud-turtles.
Sometimes they steal children.
They'll tie you by your hair to a tree; they make braids in horse's tails.
Long ago they stole my brother and put him on a tree-stump in the pond. They sucked the blood out of his arm. They taught him medicine, but he nearly died.
Me? I rub tobacco juice on my head. "Leave me be," I say to them. "I am alone here, I am old." They don't bother me.
This is another story told by Margaret Brown in Catawba Texts; she uses the word yehasuri for these little people; click here for more Catawba stories.
You can find out more about "little people" traditions among different Native American traditions in this book by John Bierhorst, available for check-out at Internet Archive: The Deetkatoo: Native American Stories about Little People.
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