READ the Fountain of Youth

Tall Tale STRATEGIES & SKILLS Comprehension ELL Vocabulary Strategy: Visualize behave, territory, wandered Skill: Point of View Vocabulary Pecos commenced, deed, exaggeration, heroic, impress, posed, sauntered, wring Bill Word Count: 1,961 Kisack by Ali Mac illustrated by Jon Davis mheducation.com/prek-12 Copyright © 2014 McGraw-Hill Education All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written consent of McGraw-Hill Education, including, but not limited to, network storage or transmission, or broadcast for distance learning. Send all inquiries to: McGraw-Hill Education Two Penn Plaza New York, New York 10121 ISBN: 978-0-02-119109-3 MHID: 0-02-119109-3 PAIRED Printed in the United States of America. The Fountain of Youth READ 8 9 10 11 12 DOC 22 21 20 19 18 D Genre Tall Tale CHAPTER ONE Essential Question The Early Years of What kinds of stories do we tell? Pecos Bill Why do we tell them? When Pecos Bill was born, his mother thought her new baby was special. She was right. At one month old, Pecos Bill could talk. At three months old, he could walk. He wandered over the hills and wrestled with bear cubs and mountain Pecos lions. He loved adventure, and that’s the truth! When settlers moved within 50 miles of the family farm, Bill’s father decided the area was too Bill crowded. So Bill’s family packed their things into their wagon and left Texas to find a place with by Ali MacKisack illustrated by Jon Davis more space. During the journey, their wagon hit a rock in the middle of the Pecos River. Bill was flung out of the Chapter 1 wagon. He flew through the air and landed 12 miles The Early Years of Pecos Bill................ 2 away. Bill’s brothers and sisters were making so Chapter 2 Pecos Bill, Cowboy.......................... 6 much noise that nobody heard Bill yell. By the time Chapter 3 they looked for Bill, he was gone. Pecos Bill and the Tornado.................. 12 Respond to Reading ........................ 16 PAIRED READ The Fountain of Youth ............ 17 Focus on Genre .......................... 20 Seide Preis/Photodisc/Getty Images Seide Preis/Photodisc/Getty 2 Images Seide Preis/Photodisc/Getty coyote What happened to Bill? “I’m a coyote,” Bill finally answered. An old coyote saw Bill and The cowboy laughed. He said, “You’re not a coyote. took Bill with him to live You’re a man.” with his pack of coyotes. Bill lived with the coyotes for 15 Bill replied, “But I have fleas, and I howl at years. He grew up howling the moon.” and hunting with the coyotes. The cowboy said, “Most people in Texas have fleas Soon Bill could howl and and howl at the moon. Also, coyotes have tails.” hunt better than any coyote in the Southwest! Bill looked behind him and saw that the cowboy was right. Bill didn’t have a tail. Pecos Bill grew up to be Pecos Bill stronger, smarter, and faster Bill decided he would leave the coyotes and learn than any other creature on the continent. While he to be a cowboy. He thanked his coyote family. Then lived with the coyotes, Bill never saw another human. Bill and the cowboy left on a new adventure. Then one day a cowboy rode by, and he saw Suddenly a 15-foot rattlesnake came out of a pile Bill. The cowboy couldn’t believe his eyes. Bill was of rocks. Pecos Bill narrowed his eyes. “I’ll teach you wrestling with a bear, and he was winning! how to behave,” he said to the snake. “Who are you?” the cowboy asked. Bill swung the rattlesnake in the air, until the snake grew twice as long and four times as skinny. Then he Bill had not heard human language for a long wound up the snake like a rope and hung it over his time, so he had to think about what to say. shoulder, and rejoined the cowboy on their journey. In Other Words could not believe what he was seeing. En español, couldn’t believe his eyes quiere decir no podía creerlo. 3 4 CHAPTER TWO Next, a mountain lion leaped out at Bill and the cowboy. The cowboy’s horse threw the cowboy off its Pecos Bill, back and galloped away. Bill wrestled the mountain cowboy lion to the ground and leaped on the lion’s back to chase after the horse. Bill took the snake from his Bill and the cowboy traveled across the prairie. shoulder. He swung it to make a loop. He threw the They were entering a territory that was no place for loop of snake over the horse’s head and pulled tight. weak men. In this place men were very tough. They crushed rocks with their teeth and ate nails for supper. Pecos Bill But Pecos Bill wasn’t afraid. When they arrived at a camp, Pecos Bill made himself right at home. He sauntered to the campfire, ate beans, drank coffee, and picked his teeth with a cactus spine. loop of snake In Other Words made himself comfortable. En español, quiere decir sintió como en su casa. mountain lion (t) Seide Preis/Photodisc/Getty Images (t) Seide Preis/Photodisc/Getty The cowboy was amazed. “I’ve never seen anything campfire like that!” Pecos Bill answered, “That’s because nobody’s invented the lasso before.” STOP AND CHECK What happened when Bill met the cowboy? 5 6 Pecos Bill asked, “Who’s the boss around here?” Pecos Bill needed a A big man stepped forward. The man looked at horse. He decided to catch canyon Bill’s rattlesnake and the mountain lion. The man said, a stallion that no one “I was the boss, but you are the boss now.” could catch. cliffs After that, Bill invented everything a person Bill chased the stallion needed to be a cowboy. from Texas to Montana. He hid in a narrow canyon and He invented spurs, cowboy songs, and ten-gallon waited. When he saw the horse hats. Bill invented the lasso. He practiced using a galloping toward him, lasso with his snake. Soon, he could lasso the feathers Bill jumped out. off an eagle’s wing. The stallion was surprised. Bill learned that the ranchers had few cattle It skidded to a stop. Pecos Bill stallion because they couldn’t catch them. He lassoed a herd jumped on the horse and rode of cattle. Soon, the ranchers had so many cattle that the stallion home. they couldn’t keep them together. So Bill invented fence posts, cattle branding, and hitching rails. Bill was the only man who could ride the horse. The stallion flung all the other cowboys off its back. Bill’s ranch in Texas got so big that he used all The cowboys were flung so high that nobody saw of New Mexico as pasture. He used Arizona to raise them again. Bill named the horse Widow Maker. calves. He dug out the Rio Grande because he was tired of carrying water from the Gulf of California. Language I and you are pronouns. Language He is a pronoun. What is Detective Identify the antecedents. Detective its antecedent? 7 8 After they had their wedding and posed for a One day, Pecos Bill fell in love with a woman wedding photograph, Slue-Foot Sue jumped on Widow named Slue-Foot Sue. Sue said she would marry him Maker’s back. if he let her ride Widow Maker. When Sue got on Widow Maker, the stallion Slue-Foot Sue was almost as good at riding horses commenced bucking like he’d sat on a cactus. The as Bill. The first time Pecos Bill saw her, Slue‑Foot Sue stallion threw Sue 40 miles up into the sky! was riding a giant catfish on the Rio Grande. Bill knew instantly that Sue was the woman for him. Slue-Foot Sue was wearing a bustle under her dress. A bustle is a kind of frame that keeps a Bill did not want Slue-Foot Sue to ride Widow woman’s dress in a nice shape. The bustle saved Maker, but he promised that she could ride Widow Sue’s life. When she came down to the ground, she Maker after they were married. landed on her bustle. Then she bounced back into the sky again. Up, down, up, down—Sue bounced on her bustle. No one knows what happened next for sure. Some people say Pecos Bill lassoed Slue-Foot Sue back Slue-Foot Sue down to earth and they lived happily ever after. catfish STOP AND CHECK What did Pecos Bill invent? river 9 10 CHAPTER THREE Pecos Bill and the tornado Pecos Bill could ride anything. However, he got thrown when he tried to ride a tornado. There was a terrible drought near Kansas. The ground was so dry that if a man stepped in a crack, he wouldn’t stop falling for three days. The cows and horses were so dried up that even a small puff of wind blew them away. It was no exaggeration to say that even the cactuses were packing up and leaving. When Pecos Bill saw a tornado, he decided to have some fun and do a good deed at the same time. Bill planned to get the water that was inside the tornado. The tornado was the biggest tornado anyone had ever seen. It turned the sky dark purple and green and roared like a lion.

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