Front Porch Tales with Barbara Belding Gibson. Come on, pull up a rocking chair, grab a glass of iced tea and let's visit a while. The Way it Could Have Been part 2 Last time we left Eagle Feather on his Medicine Quest. He has found the place he feels the Great Spirit has led him but first he must prepare himself. In anticipation of tomorrow, he began searching for a place to spend the night, a place where the first rays of the rising sun would strike. He could not intrude on his ancestors by sleeping in their home so he began walking east up a small side stream, passing Backbone Spring, the source of the water in the stream. As he turned north toward the cliffs near the river, he walked down the length of a long prairie. Suddenly he noticed a small herd of buffalo wallowing in a depression in the prairie, coating their hides with the mud from under the tall grass that grew in the moisture gathered there. As he watched the herd, they began moving south and east. He noticed a small, sacred, white buffalo calf following one of the cows and knew instantly he was to follow the herd. Soon they appeared to drop out of sight. When he arrived at the place where he had lost sight of them, he saw that they had moved down a draw leading to the river. There in the cliff wall he found a small cave* and knew that the Great Spirit was telling him to spend the night here. In preparation for the night, he carried clean, dry leaves and grass into the cave, carefully arranging them so that the first rays of the rising sun would strike him as he lay sleeping. Then he went to the pool at the bottom of the cliff and bathed in the clear stream in anticipation of the great event that was to take place tomorrow. He returned to the cave without any food because he intended to fast until the Great Spirit gave him his medicine. Until he could stay awake no longer, he sat on his fresh smelling bed and gazed into the darkening sky dreaming of what his medicine might be. The next morning, after his morning prayers to the sun, he climbed the cliff and walked quickly south to Backbone Spring. As he walked down the hill near the spring, he gathered several flint nodes to take back as his gift to his tribe. Then he moved on west until he reached a cliff overlooking the fire from the Nether World. He seated himself on the cliff and began to meditate. Soon he saw an eagle in the sky. The eagle began to circle, swooping down over the young man and on down through the smoke of the fire. As the eagle flew, a feather dropped from its tail and the young man knew without another thought that this was his medicine. He scrambled down the cliff face to the ground and retrieved the feather and lovingly placed it in his medicine bag. He stopped only long enough to ask the sun that was now shining over the rim of the little canyon to send his thanks to the Great Spirit. Then he started down the stream toward the gate, that massive cut through the cliff. He somehow felt that he should leave by the gate just as he had entered the day before. He returned to his tribe where he was honored with his medicine ceremony and given the name Eagle Feather. In his tales of his search for his medicine he included a description of the Gates of the Nether World and explained that any point made from the flint gathered from the hill near Backbone Spring would have the magical powers to kill whatever its owner chose as its target. * On a cliff face somewhere near the lake, there is a small cave which was the camp site for many people over the years. Here, in the remains of fires from ages past, has been found the small red bone from the head of a drum (fish, not instrument) as well as small bird points that were left behind when the camper left. In Gaines Bend where Mockingbird leaves Lake Shore Loop is a depression that holds water in wet weather. This has been known as The Buffalo Wallow for as long as I have listened to family stories.