Sketch of the Mythology of the North American Indians | Page 6

the ice-dust to fall upon the earth. In the winter-time it falls as snow, but in the summer-time it melts and falls as rain, and the Shoshoni philosopher actually sees the serpent of the storm in the rainbow of many colors.
The Oraibi philosopher who lives in a pueblo is acquainted with architecture, and so his world is seven-storied. There is a world below and five worlds above this one. Mui?wa, the rain-god, who lives in the world immediately above, dips his great brush, made of feathers of the birds of the heavens, into the lakes of the skies and sprinkles the earth with refreshing rain for the irrigation of the crops tilled by these curious Indians who live on the cliffs of Arizona. In winter, Mui?wa crushes the ice of the lakes of the heavens and scatters it over the earth, and we have a snow-fall.
The Hindoo philosopher says that the lightning-bearded Indra breaks the vessels that hold the waters of the skies with his thunder-bolts, and the rains descend to irrigate the earth.
The philosopher of civilization expounds to us the methods by which the waters are evaporated from the land and the surface of the sea, and carried away by the winds, and gathered into clouds to be discharged again upon the earth, keeping up forever that wonderful circulation of water from the heavens to the earth and from the earth to the heavens--that orderly succession of events in which the waters travel by river, by sea, and by cloud.
Rainbow.--In Shoshoni, the rainbow is a beautiful serpent that abrades the firmament of ice to give us snow and rain. In Norse, the rainbow is the bridge Bifrost spanning the space between heaven and earth. In the Iliad, the rainbow is the goddess Iris, the messenger of the King of Olympus. In Hebrew, the rainbow is the witness to a covenant. In science, the rainbow is an analysis of white light into its constituent colors by the refraction of raindrops.
Falling stars.--In Ute, falling stars are the excrements of dirty little star-gods. In science--well, I do not know what falling stars are in science. I think they are cinders from the furnace where the worlds are forged. You may call this mythologic or scientific, as you please.
Migration of birds.--The Algonkian philosopher explains the migration of birds by relating the myth of the combat between Ka-bi-bo-no-ki and Shi?gapis, the prototype or progenitor of the water-hen, one of their animal gods. A fierce battle raged between Ka-bi-bo-no-ki and Shi?gapis, but the latter could not be conquered. All the birds were driven from the land but Shi?gapis; and then was it established that whenever in the future Winter-maker should come with his cold winds, fierce snows, and frozen waters, all the birds should leave for the south except Shi?gapis and his friends. So the birds that spend their winters north are called by the Algonkian philosophers "the friends of Shi?gapis."
In contrast to this explanation of the flight of birds may be placed the explanation of the modern evolutionist, who says that the birds migrate in quest of abundance of food and a genial climate, guided by an instinct of migration, which is an accumulation of inherited memories.
Diversity of languages.--The Kaib?bit philosopher accounts for the diversity of languages in this manner: Si-tcom'-pa Ma-só-its, the grandmother goddess of the sea, brought up mankind from beneath the waves in a sack, which she delivered to the Cin-aú-?v brothers, the great wolf-gods of his mythology, and told them, to carry it from the shores of the sea to the Kaibab Plateau, and then to open it; but they were by no means to open the package ere their arrival, lest some great disaster should befall. The curiosity of the younger Cin-aú-?v overcame him, and he untied the sack, and the people swarmed out; but the elder Cin-aú-?v, the wiser god, ran back and closed the sack while yet not all the people had escaped, and they carried the sack, with its remaining contents, to the plateau, and there opened it. Those that remained in the sack found a beautiful land--a great plateau covered with mighty forests, through which elk, deer, and antelope roamed in abundance, and many mountain-sheep were found on the bordering crags; piv, the nuts of the edible pine, they found on the foot-hills, and us, the fruit of the yucca, in sunny glades; and n?nt, the meschal crowns, for their feasts; and tcu-ar, the cactus-apple, from which to make their wine; reeds grew about the lakes for their arrow-shafts; the rocks were full of flints for their barbs and knives, and away down, in the ca?on they found a pipe-stone quarry, and on the hills they found ?r-a-?m-piv, their tobacco. O, it was a beautiful land that was given to these, the favorites of the