The Monster Mosquitoe

They have some pretty big mosquitoes in New Jersey and on Long Island, but, if report of their ancestry is true, they have degenerated in size and voracity; for the grandfather of all mosquitoes used to live in the neighborhood of Fort Onondaga, New York, and sallying out whenever he was hungry, would eat an Indian or two and pick his teeth with their ribs.

如今在新泽西州和长岛一带，也有不少个头挺大的蚊子，可要是关于它们祖先的传说属实的话，它们如今的体形和凶猛程度，其实都已经大大退化了；因为所有蚊子的祖爷爷，当年住在纽约奥农达加堡附近，只要肚子饿了就出来觅食，一顿能吃掉一两个印第安人，还拿他们的肋骨剔牙。

The red men had no arms that could prevail against it, but at last the Holder of the Heavens, hearing their cry for aid, came down and attacked the insect. Finding that it had met its match, the mosquito flew away so rapidly that its assailant could hardly keep it in sight. It flew around the great lake, then turned eastward again. It sought help vainly of the witches that brooded in the sink-holes, or Green Lakes (near Janesville, New York), and had reached the salt lake of Onondaga when its pursuer came up and killed it, the creature piling the sand into hills in its dying struggles.

红种人手上没有任何武器能对付得了它，可最终，那位苍天之主听见了他们的求援哭喊，便降临凡间，向这只怪虫发起了进攻。这只蚊子发现自己遇上了对手，便飞快地逃走，快得连追它的人都几乎跟不上它的身影。它绕着那片大湖飞了一圈，然后又转向东方。它先是徒劳地向盘踞在陷坑里的女巫们求救，那些陷坑也叫“绿湖”（靠近纽约詹尼斯维尔），接着一路飞到奥农达加的盐湖边，追赶它的人这才赶上，将它杀死，这怪物在临死挣扎中，把沙子堆成了一座座小山。

As its blood poured upon the earth it became small mosquitoes, that gathered about the Holder of the Heavens and stung him so sorely that he half repented the service that he had done to men.

它的血洒落在大地上，化作了无数小蚊子，聚集到苍天之主的身边，狠狠地叮咬他，叮得他几乎有些后悔当初为人类做下的这件好事。

The Tuscaroras say that this was one of two monsters that stood on opposite banks of the Seneca River and slew all men that passed. Hiawatha killed the other one. On their reservation is a stone, marked by the form of the Sky Holder, that shows where he rested during the chase, while his tracks were until lately seen south of Syracuse, alternating with footprints of the mosquito, which were shaped like those of a bird, and twenty inches long. At Brighton, New York, where these marks appeared, they were reverentially renewed by the Indians for many years.

塔斯卡洛拉人说，这原本是塞内卡河两岸各盘踞一只的两个怪物之一，它们杀尽了一切路过此地的人。另一只是被海华沙杀死的。在他们的保留地上，有一块石头，上面刻着苍天之主的形状，标记着他在追逐途中歇脚的地方；他的脚印，直到不久之前，还能在锡拉丘兹以南的地方看见，与那只蚊子的脚印交替出现，后者形似鸟爪，长达二十英寸。在纽约的布赖顿，这些印记也曾出现过，多年来印第安人一直心怀敬意地重新描绘它们。