The Project Gutenberg EBook of Indian Why Stories, by Frank Bird Linderman

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Title: Indian Why Stories

Author: Frank Bird Linderman

Posting Date: August 3, 2008 [EBook #606]
Release Date: July, 1996

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INDIAN WHY STORIES ***

Produced by Judith Boss. HTML version by Al Haines.

INDIAN WHY STORIES

SPARKS FROM WAR EAGLE'S LODGE-FIRE

FRANK B. LINDERMAN

[CO SKEE SEE CO COT]

I DEDICATE THIS LITTLE BOOK TO MY FRIEND
CHARLES M. RUSSELL
THE COWBOY ARTIST
GEORGE BIRD GRINNELL
THE INDIAN'S FRIEND

AND TO ALL OTHERS WHO HAVE KNOWN AND LOVED OLD MONTANA

FOR I HOLD THEM ALL AS KIN
WHO HAVE BUILDED FIRES WHERE NATURE
WEARS NO MAKE-UP ON HER SKIN

PREFACE

The great Northwest--that wonderful frontier that called to itself a
world's hardiest spirits--is rapidly becoming a settled country; and
before the light of civilizing influences, the blanket-Indian has
trailed the buffalo over the divide that time has set between the
pioneer and the crowd. With his passing we have lost much of the
aboriginal folk-lore, rich in its fairy-like characters, and its
relation to the lives of a most warlike people.

There is a wide difference between folk-lore of the so-called Old World
and that of America. Transmitted orally through countless generations,
the folk-stories of our ancestors show many evidences of distortion and
of change in material particulars; but the Indian seems to have been
too fond of nature and too proud of tradition to have forgotten or
changed the teachings of his forefathers. Childlike in simplicity,
beginning with creation itself, and reaching to the whys and wherefores
of nature's moods and eccentricities, these tales impress me as being
well worth saving.

The Indian has always been a lover of nature and a close observer of
her many moods. The habits of the birds and animals, the voices of the
winds and waters, the flickering of the shadows, and the mystic
radiance of the moonlight--all appealed to him. Gradually, he
formulated within himself fanciful reasons for the myriad
manifestations of th