inding
the little vine carried it back to its sunny fields. And ever since then
the strawberry plant has lived and thrived in the fields and woods. But
the Fruit-Elves, fearing lest the Evil One should one day steal the
vine again, watch day and night over their favorite. And when the
strawberries ripen they give the juicy, fragrant fruit to the Iroquois
children as they gather the spring flowers in the woods.

THE CANYON FLOWERS

BY RALPH CONNOR (ADAPTED)

At first there were no canyons, but only the broad, open prairie. One
day the Master of the Prairie, walking out over his great lawns, where
were only grasses, asked the Prairie: "Where are your flowers?"

And the Prairie said: "Master, I have no seeds."

Then he spoke to the birds, and they carried seeds of every kind of
flower and strewed them far and wide, and soon the Prairie bloomed with
crocuses and roses and buffalo beans and the yellow crowfoot and the
wild sunflowers and the red lilies, all the summer long.

Then the Master came and was well pleased; but he missed the flowers he
loved best of all, and he said to the Prairie: "Where are the clematis
and the columbine, the sweet violets and wind-flowers, and all the ferns
and flowering shrubs?"

And again the Prairie answered: "Master, I have no seeds."

And again he spoke to the birds and again they carried all the seeds and
strewed them far and wide.

But when next the Master came, he could not find the flowers he loved
best of all, and he said: "Where are those, my sweetest flowers?"

And the Prairie cried sorrowfully: "O Master, I cannot keep the flowers,
for the winds sweep fiercely, and the sun beats upon my breast, and they
wither up and fly away."

Then the Master spoke to the Lightning, and with one swift blow the
Lightning cleft the Prairie to the heart. And the Prairie rocked and
groaned in agony, and for many a day moaned bitterly over its black,
jagged, gaping wound.

But a little river poured its waters through the cleft, and carried down
deep, black mould, and once more the birds carried seeds and strewed
them in the canyon. And after a long time the rough rocks were decked
out with soft mosses and trailing vines, and all the nooks were hung
with clematis and columbine, and great elms lifted their huge tops high
up into the sunlight, and down about their feet clustered the low cedars
and balsams, and everywhere the violets and wind-flowers and maiden-hair
grew and bloomed ti