When the Great Spirit brought the red men from the Happy Hunting-Grounds and left them upon the earth, they were filled with fear lest they could never make him hear their wants and could not reach his ears when they desired to tell him of their joys and sorrows. The sachems went before him and said: "Oh, our Father, how will thy children tell thee of the deeds they have performed that will please thine ear ? How will they ask thee to their homes to help them drive away the bad spirits; and how will they invite thee to their feasts and dances ? Oh, our Father, thou canst not at all times be awake and watching thy children, and they will not know when thou art sleeping. Thy children do not know the trail to the Happy Hunting- Grounds by which to send their wise men and sachems to talk with thee, for thou hast covered it with thy hands and thy children cannot discover it. How will the words of thy children reach thee, oh, our Father, the Manito; how will what they say come to thine ears?"
Then the Great Spirit created for each one of the red men a second self, to whom he gave a home in the air. He provided these beings with wings and swift feet so they could move very rapidly. To them he imparted the secret of the entrance to his home and made them guides to his children whom he had called on the long journey so that they should not lose the paths leading to their future home. Finally, the Great Spirit told these creatures ofthe air that they should be message-bearers for his children, and convey their words exactly as spoken from one point to another until they reached the ears of his sachems in the big wigwam by the side of the council-fire that never lost its light. They must be ready at all times to answer the calls of the red men, so that none of their words might be lost. Messages to the loved ones who had left the earth and gone to the Happy Hunting-Grounds must be transmitted with the same watchful care as were those intended for his ears alone. If any of his children spoke idle and untruthful words they, too, must be repeated that their father might know whether they were worthy to be admitted to the grand council-fire. When he had finished his instructions, the Great Spirit told the sachems that he would return to his home and that they could go with his children to the bank of a beautiful river near which they dwelt, and there talk to him. Slowly and with a loud voice, the chief sachem began to speak. From the opposite bank of the river the waiting message-bearer caught up the sachem's words as they were spoken and with a strong voice shouted them to another dweller of the air who crouched in the tree-tops far down the river, ready and alert to do the Great Spirit's bidding. On and on, rolling along the ravines and valleys, leaping from hill-top to mountain-side, and from mountain-side to lake, striding over the forests at a bound—fainter and yet fainter, until lost in the blue distance of the plain—the message of thankfulness and love was borne from the lips of the grateful sachem until it reached the ears of the ever listening and loving father, and was told to the chiefs who sat in the light of the council-fire that never grows dim.
A Haudenosaunee Legend
