These are nearly all gloomy and terrible in some way. There are, however, some among them who have light hearts and brave attire. 1. The Lepricaun (Ir. Leith bhrogan, i.e. the one...
There was once a man who had one son, and he was so lazy that he would not work at all. The father apprenticed him to a tailor, but the lad went to sleep between the stitches. He a...
In a large village there lived a noted belle, or Ma-mon-da-go-Kwa, who was the admiration of all the young hunters and warriors. She was particularly admired by a young man who, fr...
The cuckoo is a sacred bird. It is safe from the gamekeeper's gun. Its advent is welcomed with pleasure. Have you heard the cuckoo? is a question put by the fortunate person who fi...
Hawaiians believe in "little people" that live in deep woods and peep and snicker at travellers who pass. This belief is thought to go back to the earliest times, and to hint at th...
There were many water gods about Lake Superior to whom the Indians paid homage, casting implements, ornaments, and tobacco into the water whenever they passed a spot where one of t...
Narahdarn, the bat, wanted honey. He watched until he saw a Wurranunnah, or bee, alight. He caught it, stuck a white feather between its hind legs, let it go and followed it. He kn...
Cows Kneeling on Christmas Morn. In the upland parishes of Wales, particularly those in Montgomeryshire, it was said, and that not so long ago, that cows knelt at midnight on Chris...
ODJIBWA. There lived a celebrated hunter on the southern shores of Lake Superior, who was considered a Manito by some, for there was nothing but what he could accomplish. He lived...
In a certain tribe in the far West there was a maiden who was very beautiful. Many warriors loved her, but she would listen to none of them. In the same tribe there was a young man...
The Bunnyyarl and Wurrunnunnah were relations, and lived in one camp. The Wurrunnunnah were very hardworking, always trying to gather food in a time of plenty, to lay in a store fo...
It was thought that the devil could assume any animal's form excepting that of the sheep. This saying, however, is somewhat different from what a farmer friend told me of black she...
“St. Martin’s summer, halcyon days.” King Henry VI, i. 2, 131. “Halcyon days”—how often is the expression made use of, how seldom do its users realise from whence they have borrowe...
The cataract of Niagara (properly pronounced Nee-ah-gah-rah), or Oniahgarah, is as fatal as it is fascinating, beautiful, sublime, and the casualties occurring there justify the tr...
Hercules perform ten labors that Eurystheus shall assign him. When
Hercules perform ten labors that Eurystheus shall assign him. When
Young Goolahwilleeel used to go out hunting every day. His mother and sisters always expected that he would bring home kangaroo and emu for them. But each day he came home without...
“He was of mankind In might the strongest.” Longfellow’s Translation. Whether those who read it be scholars who would argue about the origin and date of the poem, ingenious theoris...
Mooregoo the Mopoke had been camped away by himself for a long time. While alone he had made a great number of boomerangs, nullah-nullahs, spears, neilahmans, and opossum rugs. Wel...
Niobe, Queen of Thebes, was proud of many things. Amphion, her husband, had received from the Muses a wonderful lyre, to the music of which the stones of the royal palace had of th...
Through the tropic nights their sonorous, bell-like booming can be heard coming up from the marshes, and when they are unseen, the song of the bull-frogs would suggest creatures fu...
King Nidung had one daughter and three sons. The oldest son, Otvin, was away from court, guarding the outposts of the country; the other two sons were still children. One day the t...
“The road, to drive on which unskilled were Phaeton’s hands.” Dante—Purgatorio. To Apollo, the sun-god, and Clymene, a beautiful ocean-nymph, there was born in the pleasant land of...
Any of the noble rivers and secluded lakes of Wisconsin were held in esteem or fear by the northern tribes, and it was the now-forgotten events and superstitions connected with the...
At the beginning of winter, the iguanas hide themselves in their homes in the sand; the black eagle hawks go into their nests; the garbarlee or shingle-backs hide themselves in lit...
The country was stricken with a drought. The rivers were all dry except the deepest holes in them. The grass was dead, and even the trees were dying. The bark dardurr of the blacks...
From the deck of any vessel passing up the southeast coast of Mindanao, the voyager can see the gold-crowned summit of Apo, rising like a gilded cone high above the dense vegetatio...
The tories of Berkshire, Massachusetts, were men who had been endeared to the king by holding office under warrant from that sacred personage. They have been gently dealt with by h...
“... Like Niobe, all tears.” Shakespeare. The quotation is an overworked quotation, like many another of those from Hamlet; yet, have half of those whose lips utter it more than th...
In an early age of the world, when there were fewer inhabitants than there now are, there lived an Indian, in a remote place, who had a wife and two children. They seldom saw any o...