Carolyn Sherwin Bailey

“ At these cruel words the grasses became still. They loved their life on the hill, with their roots in the earth and their green blades reaching up to the sunshine. Now they knew that they were going to die in the morning. They could neither sing nor talk any more. But the Butterflies knew the grasses’ peril. They flew away, one by one, so that the hunters would suspect nothing, until they came to the Fox’s den. They told him of the great danger of the talking grasses. ”

“ It had been a frosty night when he had gone to sleep, and now the woods were green. Old Bear had slept all winter.
“That was a fine, long sleep,” said old Bear, as he set out for little Brother Rabbit’s house to see if he had anything good for breakfast; “I shall sleep again, next fall.”
So every summer, old Bear plays tricks on little Brother Rabbit, but when the fall comes, he creeps away to a warm, dark place to sleep until spring.
And so have his grandchildren, and his great-grandchildren ever since. ”

“ Now little Brother Rabbit never troubled his neighbors in those days, nor meddled with their housekeeping, nor played any tricks the way he does now. In the fall, he gathered his acorns, and his pig nuts, and his rabbit tobacco. On a frosty morning, he would set out with Brother Fox for the farmer’s; and while Brother Fox looked after the chicken yards, little Brother Rabbit picked cabbage, and pulled turnips, and gathered carrots and parsnips for his cellar. When the winter came, he never failed to share his store with a wandering field mouse, or a traveling chipmunk. ”

“ Son-of-a-Brave felt very proud, because his father was one of the big chiefs of the tribe. He was proud, too, that he, twelve years old, could shoot an arrow as straight as the young braves. So he found it hard to understand the medicine man.
“What does the clumsy Bear teach us?” Son-of-a-Brave asked.
“The value of sleep,” replied the medicine man. “You like to sit up late at night, listening to the talk of your parents around the camp fire. In the morning you have dull eyes and heavy limbs. The Bear comes out from her winter sleep ready to rule the den and fight the whole forest.” ”

“ The Beaver woman raised her brown head out of the water, and looked up at the Eagle.
“The Beaver family would be hungry, too, sir,” she said, “if we did not work, all of us, to get a living.”
“But think of the kind of work you do,” screamed the Eagle, going up to the branch of a tree to sit so that he need not step in the mud.
“Look at your hands,” he went on. “They are not the hands of a person of rank, like myself, but are stained with earth. You live in houses that are made of mud. You cut down trees with your teeth, and eat weeds and bark. ”

“ Then, too, the Manito made the Squirrel the little harvester of the woods, gathering nuts in the fall and digging holes in the earth in which to bury them for the winter. It was planned that the Squirrel should be an example to man of the wisdom of working while others feasted. He gathered food for the days when the wind would howl and the snow drift about his lodge. So the Squirrel spent his days looking for nuts and laying them away for cold weather. With him went his friend, the Woodchuck. ”

“ The Story of Ibbity is one of the few obtainable Madagascar folk tales, and symbolizes the search of a primitive people for the source of natural phenomena. Our own southern negroes have given us the stories of Mr. Elephant and Mr. Frog, Why the Bear Sleeps All Winter, Little Bear, and Brother Wolf and the Rock. The American Indians have given us a varied collection of animal myths including How the Rabbit Tried to Coast, How the Squirrel Got Wings, The Talking Grass, and many other camp fire tales that have a nature background. ”

“ At that Bruin, the Bear, was very angry. “Then I must eat your two little grandchildren, Janko and Mirko,” he growled.
This frightened old Mother Red Cap greatly. She thought and thought, and then she said: “My two little grandchildren, Janko and Mirko, are very thin indeed. I must give them three fine meals or they will not be fat enough for you to eat. In the meantime, do you run about through the forest to get yourself a better appetite.”
So Bruin, the Bear, went away and ran about in the woods all the rest of the day. ”

“ The stones in the road began to come skipping by. Brother Wolf peeped out from under the tree. There was old Rock rolling down the road. The rain had started him, and he was coming so hard that he tore great furrows of earth, and uprooted the trees. He came so fast that he could not stop himself.
Brother Fox scampered into a hole to hide, but he left the tip end of his tail sticking out. Old Rock just grazed it as he went by, and that is why the tip of Brother Fox’s tail is pointed. ”

“ He crawled up wet, his teeth chattering, and his fur freezing all over in tiny icicles.
The Otter had come across the river to the Rabbit’s dinner party and he stood laughing on the bank as he saw the Rabbit.
“What ails him?” the Otter asked of the Rabbit’s grandmother.
“He saw somebody fishing,” she explained, “and he tried to do the same. He never thinks for himself.”
The Otter laughed harder than before, as they helped the Rabbit into the lodge and warmed him beside the fire. ”

“ One evening in the late fall the Manito went through the forest in the form of a night wind. He looked in the door of the Woodchuck’s house in the side of the hill. It was empty!
Taking his way through the trees the Manito saw a little creature in a gray fur [Pg 88] blanket creeping softly along from one spot to another. He had short legs, and feet shaped like shovels. It was the Woodchuck. As he came to a place for which he had been looking, the Woodchuck would dig deep down in the earth with his paws. He would bring up a store of nuts and carry them back to his hole in the side of the hill. ”

“ Since the childhood of the races, certain old-world stories have appeared in different form in the folklore of different nations, all bearing the stamp of the same source; the interest of primitive people in attributing human impulses and human lines of conduct to the animal world.
Perhaps the earliest of all is The Kid Who Would Not Go, which corresponds to the old New England nursery tale of the Old Woman and Her Pig, and which, in its original form, dates back to Hebrew translations. How They Brought Hairlock Home is a typical cumulative tale of Norway. ”

“ So Boots ran to Greylegs the wolf, and he said:
“Good Greylegs, bark at my nanny goat, Hairlock, who stands on the top of yonder crag, and will not come home to be milked.”
But Greylegs said, “Some other time, Boots, some other time. The night is cold. I must stay at home and sleep and cover my cubs.”
And Boots went back and told his mother what Greylegs had said.
“Then go to Bruin, the bear,” said his mother, “and bid him chase naughty Hairlock.” ”

“ All his sons, the Squirrel, the Beaver, the Wolf, the Deer, the Otter, the Fox, and the rest, sat in a circle around the fire. There was one vacant place, though. The Woodchuck had not yet come.
[Pg 89]
At the time for the council to open, the Manito stood up and spoke.
“We are gathered here as a court of law,” he said. “I have learned that my thrifty son, the Squirrel, has been the victim of a thief. He has been busy and saving, as I have taught him to be. He has done his harvesting for the winter. But while he slept a friend robbed him of his nuts. What shall we do to such a false friend?” ”

“ Trip trap, trip trap, his little feet pattered upon the boards.
“Who is that tripping over my bridge?” called up the Troll in a surly voice.
[Pg 59]
“Oh, it’s only I, the tiniest Billy Goat Gruff, going over to the hillside to make myself fat,” the Goat called back in a wee small voice.
“I am going to gobble you up, Billy Goat Gruff,” said the Troll.
“Oh, no, pray do not take me,” said the tiniest Billy Goat Gruff; “I am too little, that I am. Wait until the second Billy Goat Gruff comes along. He is ever so much bigger than I.”
“Well, be off with you,” said the Troll. ”

“ Then I met a wee mouse, and to the mouse I said:
[Pg 70]
“Mouse, gnaw tree, tree will not stop wind, wind will not put out torch, torch will not burn staff, staff will not drive kid. I see by the moonlight it is long past midnight. It is time kid and I were home an hour and a half ago.”
Then the wee, wee mouse began to gnaw the tree, the tree began to stop the wind, the wind began to put out the torch, the torch began to burn the staff, the staff began to drive the kid, and the kid began to go. ”

“ So Bruin went close to Brother Fox, and Brother Fox said:
“You must go to the river where the ice is thick, make a hole in the ice, sit down [Pg 139] with your tail in the hole, and wait for the fish to bite. When your tail smarts, pull it out, quickly. That is the way to fish.” ”

“ The tiger was sure that a fat lamb would [Pg 14] taste better than a wee, wee one with teetery legs, so he let Lambikin go along, but he said as he went:
“Be sure that you come back this way, Lambikin.”
Lambikin reached his granny’s house, and he told her how glad he was to see her, and then he said he was very hungry, and he would like something to eat.
“I must grow fat, granny,” said Lambikin.
So his granny led the way to the corn bin, and Lambikin ate and ate and ate until his sides stuck out, and his legs were not teetery any more, and he was a fat little lamb. ”

“ The reason for using these animal stories for story telling and supplementary reading lies in the instinctive interest which all children have in those stories that express the interpretation of life made by primitive races. ”

“ He had pockets in his cheeks, so he could chatter even when he came home with a mouthful of nuts. There seemed to be no way of keeping this young Chipmunk quiet, and at last his grandfather decided to speak to him about it.
“You are not using your voice as it was meant that you should, my son,” said the Chipmunk’s grandfather. “All the creatures in feathers and fur in the forest speak for a reason. The Ground Hog whistles to call his young, and the Frog croaks when [Pg 82] wild beasts creep toward the lodges, and the Robin sings of rain. ”

“ But Mother Bear taught Footsteps Upon the Water and the little cubs to run always when they saw a man with a bow and arrows. One day, a man came very close to the Bear’s house, but Mother Bear chased him with a forked stick, and he went away. ”

“ He was able to destroy man or beast at his will. But when he saw the eager, trembling little Fox, waiting outside, the Fire Manito asked him his errand. The Fox told him that the grasses were to be killed in the morning, unless something was done to save them. ”