Tribe Activities Z05 The Oricin of the Bluebird* Ninna-bo-jou, the Sun-god, was sleeping his winter's sleep on the b z island just above the thunder-dam that men call Niagara. Fotur moons had waned, but stiU he slept. The frost draperies of his couch were gone; hi:; white blanket was burned into holes; he turned over a little. Then the ice on the river cracked like near thunder. When he turned again it began to slip over the big beaver-dam of Niagara, but still he did not awake. The great Er-Beaver in his pond flapped his tail, and the waves rolled away to the shore and set the ice heaving, cracking, and groaning, but Ninna-bo-jou slept. Then the Ice-demons pounded the shore of the island with their clubs. They pushed back the whole river-flood till the cha. -^1 was dry, then let it rush down like the end of all tUngs, and t ' - shouted together: Nmna-bo-jou! Ninna-bo-jou! Ninna-bo-jou I But still he slept cahnl^ on. Then came a soft, sweet voice, more gentle than the naatmg turtle of Miami. It was in the air, but it was nowhere, and yet it was in the trees, in the water, ^d it was in Ninna-bo-jou, too. He felt it, and it awoke him. He sat up and looked about. His v/hite blanket was gone; only a few tatters of it were to be seen in the shady places. In the snowy spots the shreds of the fringe with its beads had taken root and were growing into little flowers with beady eyes. The small voice kept crying: "Awake; the Spring is commg! " Nmna-bo-jou said: "Little voice, where are you? Come here." But the little voice, being eversrwhere, was noiriiere, and could not come at the hero's call. So he said: "Little voice, you are nowhere because you have no place to live in; I will make you a house." So Ninna-bo-jou took a curi of Birch bark and made a little wigwam and because the voice came from the skies he painted the wigwam with blue mud, and to show that it came from the Sunland he painted a red sun on it. On the floor he spread a scrap of his own white blanket, then for a fire he breathed into it a spark of life, and said: "Here, Rttle voice, is your wigwam." The little voice entered and took possession, but Ninna-bo-jou had breathed the spark of life into it. The smoke-vent wings began to move and to flap, and the little wigwam turned into a beautiful Bluebird with a red sun on its breast and shirt of white Away it flew, but every Spring it comes, the Bluebird of the
- See FootB^ p. 106.
