Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Volume 07 : Along the Rocky RangeSkinner, Charles M. (Charles Montgomery)
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Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Volume 07 : Along the Rocky Range
Skinner, Charles M. (Charles Montgomery)
Folklore -- United States
Again they scoffed, and on the next night the west wind cautioned them.
But this third warning was equally futile. On the fourth night came the
south wind. It breathed into Suha's ear that he alone had been good and
should be saved, and bade him make a hollow ball of spruce gum in which
he might float while the deluge lasted. Suha and his wife immediately set
out to gather the gum, that they melted and shaped until they had made a
large, rounded ark, which they ballasted with jars of nuts, acorn-meal
and water, and meat of bear and venison.
On the day assigned Suha and his wife were looking regretfully down into
the green valleys from the ledge where the ark rested, listening to the
song of the harvesters, and sighing to think that so much beauty would
presently be laid waste, when a hand of fire was thrust from a cloud and
it smote the Blue Cliffs with a thunder-clang. It was the signal. Swift
came the clouds from all directions, and down poured the rain.
Withdrawing into their waxen ball, Suha and his wife closed the portal.
Then for some days they were rolled and tossed on an ever-deepening sea.
Their stores had almost given out when the ark stopped, and breaking a
hole in its side its occupants stepped forth.
There was a tuna cactus growing at their feet, and they ate of its red
fruit greedily, but all around them was naught but water. When night came
on they retired to the ark and slept—a night, a month, a year, perhaps a
century, for when they awoke the water was gone, the vales were filled
with verdure, and bird-songs rang through the woods. The delighted couple
descended the Superstition Mountains, on which the ark had rested, and
went into its valleys, where they lived for a thousand years, and became
the parents of a great tribe.
But the evil was not all gone. There was one Hauk, a devil of the
mountains, who stole their daughters and slew their sons. One day, while
the women were spinning flax and cactus fibre and the men were gathering
maize, Hauk descended into the settlement and stole another of Suha's
daughters. The patriarch, whose patience had been taxed to its limit,
then made a vow to slay the devil. He watched to see by what way he
entered the valley. He silently followed him into the Superstition
Mountains; he drugged the cactus wine that his daughter was to serve to
him; then, when he had drunk it, Suha emerged from his place of hiding
and beat out the brains of the stupefied fiend.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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