Children Stories - The Spirit Of The Corn

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The Spirit Of The Corn

from Good Stories For Great Holidays - THANKSGIVING DAY

AN IROQUOIS LEGEND

BY HARRIET MAXWELL CONVERSE (ADAPTED)

There was a time, says the Iroquois grandmother, when it was not needful
to plant the corn-seed nor to hoe the fields, for the corn sprang up of
itself, and filled the broad meadows. Its stalks grew strong and tall,
and were covered with leaves like waving banners, and filled with ears
of pearly grain wrapped in silken green husks.

In those days Onatah, the Spirit of the Corn, walked upon the earth. The
sun lovingly touched her dusky face with the blush of the morning,
and her eyes grew soft as the gleam of the stars on dark streams. Her
night-black hair was spread before the breeze like a wind-driven cloud.

As she walked through the fields, the corn, the Indian maize, sprang up
of itself from the earth and filled the air with its fringed tassels and
whispering leaves. With Onatah walked her two sisters, the Spirits of
the Squash and the Bean. As they passed by, squash-vines and bean-plants
grew from the corn-hills.

One day Onatah wandered away alone in search of early dew. Then the Evil
One of the earth, Hahgwehdaetgah, followed swiftly after. He grasped her
by the hair and dragged her beneath the ground down to his gloomy cave.
Then, sending out his fire-breathing monsters, he blighted Onatah's
grain. And when her sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and the Bean,
saw the flame-monsters raging through the fields, they flew far away in
terror.

As for poor Onatah, she lay a trembling captive in the dark prison-cave
of the Evil One. She mourned the blight of her cornfields, and sorrowed
over her runaway sisters.

"O warm, bright sun!" she cried, "if I may walk once more upon the
earth, never again will I leave my corn!"

And the little birds of the air heard her cry, and winging their way
upward they carried her vow and gave it to the sun as he wandered
through the blue heavens.

The sun, who loved Onatah, sent out many searching beams of light. They
pierced through the damp earth, and entering the prison-cave, guided her
back again to her fields.

And ever after that she watched her fields alone, for no more did her
sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and Bean, watch with her. If
her fields thirsted, no longer could she seek the early dew. If the
flame-monsters burned her corn, she could not search the skies for
cooling winds. And when the great rains fell and injured her harvest,
her voice grew so faint that the friendly sun could not hear it.

But ever Onatah tenderly watched her fields and the little birds of the
air flocked to her service. They followed her through the rows of corn,
and made war on the tiny enemies that gnawed at the roots of the grain.

And at harvest-time the grateful Onatah scattered the first gathered
corn over her broad lands, and the little birds, fluttering and singing,
joyfully partook of the feast spread for them on the meadow-ground.

Next: The Horn Of Plenty
Previous: The Pumpkin Pirates

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