The book of nature myths . and they will learnto love my mountains. When the stones were made and theGreat Spirit looked upon their beauty, hesaid, I will not hide you all away in theseams of the rocks. Some of you shall beout in the sunshine, so that the little chil-dren who cannot go to the mountains shallsee your colors. Then the southwind cameby, and as he went, he sang softly of forestsflecked with light and shadow, of birds andtheir nests in the leafy trees. He sang oflong summer days and the music of watersbeating upon the shore. He sang of themoonlight and the starlight. All the won-de
The book of nature myths . and they will learnto love my mountains. When the stones were made and theGreat Spirit looked upon their beauty, hesaid, I will not hide you all away in theseams of the rocks. Some of you shall beout in the sunshine, so that the little chil-dren who cannot go to the mountains shallsee your colors. Then the southwind cameby, and as he went, he sang softly of forestsflecked with light and shadow, of birds andtheir nests in the leafy trees. He sang oflong summer days and the music of watersbeating upon the shore. He sang of themoonlight and the starlight. All the won-ders of the night, all the beauty of the morn-ing, were in his song. Dear southwind, said the Great Spirit,• here are some beautiful things for you to 12 THE BOOK OF NATURE MYTHS. bear away with you to your summer will love them, and all the little chil-dren will love them. At these words ofthe Great Spirit, all the stones before himstirred with life and lifted themselves onmany-colored wings. They fluttered away. in the sunshine, and the southwind sang tothem as they went. So it was that the first butterflies camefrom a beautiful thought of the Great Spirit,and in their wings were all the colors of theshining stones that he did not wish to hideaway. THE FIRST WOODPECKER. 13 THE STORY OP THE FIRST WOOD-PECKER. In the days of long ago the Great Spiritcame down from the sky and talked withmen. • Once as he went up and down theearth, he came to the wigwam of a went into the wigwam and sat down bythe fire, but he looked like an old man, andthe woman did not know who he was. I have fasted for many days, said theGreat Spirit to the woman. Will you giveme some food ? The woman made a verylittle cake and put it on the fire. You canhave this cake, she said, if youwill waitfor it to bake. I will wait, he said. When the cake was baked, the womanstood and looked at it. She thought, It isvery large. I thought it was small. I willnot give him so large a cake as that. Sosh
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectanimals, bookyear1902
