Stories of Birds Part 8

"We reline the old nest and repair it beautifully every housecleaning time.

"My babies are good children, but they do not in fact look much like me. Perhaps you might think them better looking than their parents.

They are black and white.

"Their mother says that the raven babies will outgrow the white feathers soon. She declares that she and I had once as many white feathers as our babies. It seems hard to believe, but perhaps she is right.

"At any rate, they are my children and I do the best I can for them.

To me they are very dear, but I fear they will go through life as unloved as I! Caw! Caw! Caw!"

The chicken-hawk ruffled his brown feathers carelessly. He drew in his breath, making a whistling noise which to Phyllis, hiding so quietly below, sounded quite like escaping steam.

"People do not like me either," said the hawk, shrugging his shoulders.

"But for all that I shall not sit and mourn.

"I know that my feathers are handsome. I know that I am a good husband and father. I know that I can sail about in the air as gracefully as any bird in the world.

"I sometimes eat insects, but I wonder, Mr. Raven, at your fondness for corn and grain. You should try some of these small birds which are flying about."

"I fear--" began the raven.

"Fear?" cried the hawk, striking out with his strong curved claws. "I do not know what fear is! Look at my short curved bill! Look at my sharp claws! Look at my long wings, which can carry me so swiftly and so far!

"There is scarcely a bird of the air which does not fear me. They skim out of sight at my approach.

"You should see me pounce upon young ducks. It is great fun.

Yesterday I was soaring above the pond, when I saw a whole family of young ducks out for their first swim. Without a sound I dropped down, seized one, and bore it off in my claws. I sat in the tree-top to eat it. It was very tender, but also very small. I decided to have another. This time the young ducks saw me. They dived head first into the water.

"I laughed to myself. I knew that they would soon come up. When in half a minute one appeared, I was quick enough to catch him.

"Later I carried a small chicken home to my nest in the big oak on the hill yonder. My nest is a very simple affair,--just a few crooked sticks. The lining is of leaves and a few pieces of loose bark which we picked up.

"Come and see me sometime, Mr. Raven. I will show my babies to you.

They are wonderful birdlings with bright yellow eyes and bluish bills.

"Just now I must be off. I see Mrs. Speckle has ventured out from the bushes again and that little girl with the flapping hat--"

The little girl and the "flapping hat" sprang up from the fence-corner with such a shout that the chicken-hawk circled away into the air and did not return that day.

The raven flew away, crying sadly, "Caw! Caw! Caw!" Mother Speckle went on quietly catching bugs for her downy babies.

THE FIRST HAWK

During the short Greenland summer the Eskimos live along the seacoast.

They put up their strange skin huts and hunt and fish and make merry through the season when the sun shines at midnight.

Now in places along the Greenland coast there are steep high cliffs.

Here the birds which fly farther north in summer make their nests.

Often, as the Eskimo sits by his campfire, he hears the half-angry, half-sad cry of "Kea! Kea! Kea!" Looking up then, he often sees a lonely hawk sitting on the highest, most desolate cliff.

The Eskimo father laughs when he hears this cry and sees the lonely bird on the cliff top. Then the little Eskimo children creep nearer to their father with certainty that a new story is in store for them.

"Tell us the story of the hawk!" the Eskimo children cry eagerly.

This then is the story which the Eskimo father tells to his little ones "in their funny furry clothes."

"Long, long ago in a tiny Eskimo village, there lived a strange-looking old woman. Her neck was so short that she really looked as though she had no neck at all and as though her head was set upon her shoulders.

"People laughed when they saw the funny-looking old woman. Some were so unkind as to make fun of her strange appearance.

"This unkindness made the old woman very unhappy.

"By and bye the children of the village went every day to the hut of the old woman to play.

"They teased and tormented her. If she raised the bearskin curtain at the doorway and spoke to them they did not heed her.

"'Short neck! Short neck!' the rude children shouted. Then they stood and laughed at her.

"So it came that the poor old woman grew more and more unhappy. To escape her tormentors she often climbed to the cliff tops and sat on the edges of high rocks where it was difficult to follow.

"Here, safe and quiet, she would sit for hours. Sometimes in her loneliness she raised her arms above her head and cried aloud.

"The people of the tiny Eskimo village often saw the lonely figure on the cliffs. They noticed that the old woman stayed less and less in her little snow hut in the village.

"Then one morning an Eskimo child, looking up, thought she saw the old woman sitting as usual on the rocks. But the child's brother said that he saw only a strange bird with a very short neck.

"At that moment the bird raised its wings and flapped them above its head.

"'Kea! Kea! Kea!' cried the strange new bird. 'Kea! Kea! Kea! who was it called me short neck?'

"'Ah,' said the children's father, looking up from his fishing-nets, 'I think you both were right.'"

ORIGIN OF THE RAVEN AND THE MACAW

(ZUNI CREATION MYTH)

Long, long ago there were but few Indians on the earth. The world was not as it is now. The earth people did not understand things as they now understand them.

It therefore happened that a beautiful Indian prince came to live with the earth people.

In his hand he carried a plume stick. It was a magic wand and was covered with feathers of beautiful colours.

There were yellow feathers. There were red feathers. There were blue-green feathers. There were black and white and gray feathers.