THE SPIRIT OF THE CORN 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.