Page:Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society V.djvu/211

Rh the appearance of being four days old, and from this he concluded that the turkey had left the same day he had. It took him four days, travelling sunwise and going spirally up the mountain, to reach the summit, where he found many turkey tracks, but still no turkey. He fancied his pet might have descended the mountain again, so he went below and examined the ground carefully, but found no descending tracks. He returned to the summit and, looking more closely than at first, discovered where the bird had flown away from a point on the eastern edge of the summit and gone apparently toward the east.

515. The Navaho sat down, sad and lonely, and wept. "Dear pet," he said, "would that I had taken you with me that day when I set out on my journey. Had I done so I should not have lost you. Dear pet, you were the black cloud; you were the black mist; you were the beautiful he-rain;225 you were the beautiful she-rain;137 you were the beautiful lightning; you were the beautiful rainbow; you were the beautiful white corn; you were the beautiful blue corn; you were the beautiful yellow corn; you were the beautiful corn of all colors; you were the beautiful bean. Though lost to me, you shall be of use to men, upon the earth, in the days to come—they shall use your feathers and your beard in their rites." The Navaho never saw his pet again; it had flown to the east, and from it we think the tame turkeys of the white men are descended. But all the useful and beautiful things he saw in his pet are still to be seen in the turkey. It has the colors of all the different kinds of corn in its feathers. The black of the black mist and the black cloud are there. The flash of the lightning and the gleam of the rainbow are seen on its plumes when it walks in the sun. The rain is in its beard; the bean it carries on its forehead.

516. He dried his tears, descended the mountain, and sought his old hut, which was pnly a poor shelter of brush, and then he went to visit his farm. He found his corn with ears already formed and all the other plants well advanced toward maturity.226 He pulled one ear from a stalk of each one of the four different kinds of corn, and, wrapping the ears in his mantle of wood-rat skins, went off to see his wife. She saw him coming, met him at the door, and relieved him of his weapons and bundle. "What is this?" she said, pointing to the bundle after she had laid it down. He opened it. She started back in amazement. She had never seen corn before. He laid the ears down side by side in a row with their points to the east, and said: "This is what we call natán, corn. This (pointing to the first ear—the most northerly of the row) is white corn; this (pointing to the next) is blue corn; this (pointing to the third) is yellow corn, and this (pointing to the fourth) is corn of all colors."227