Tale #22 -- Charles' Story

When Stacy finished her story, all the children clapped. "Did you write that all by yourself?" Dancing Bear asked.

"I got some help from my big sister," Stacy said. "She's in high school."

"I helped too!" Tracy said.

"I didn't write my story," Charles said. "I found it in a magazine called Spellbound. This is a story the Inuit people tell. They live near the North Pole, just like Santa Claus."

"Let's hear it," Ben said.


How Light Came to the North

When the world was first born, it was always dark in the north. The people did not know there was such a thing as daylight until an old crow told them about it. They begged him to go and bring them some.

The crow flew for a long time until he came to a place where the sky was bright. He sat and rested in a tree beside a river. When the daughter of the chief of the nearby village came to the river for water, he turned himself into a speck of dust and rode on her shoulder into her father's snow lodge. He floated into the ear of the chief's young grandson and began to scratch. The little boy started to cry.

"What's wrong?" the chief asked.

"Say you want to play with a ball of daylight," whispered the speck of dust.

The chief told his daughter to fetch the daylight balls. He wrapped a string around a small one and gave it to the child. While the little boy was playing with it, the dust scratched his ear again.

"Tell your grandfather you want to play outside," the speck said.

As soon as the little boy left the snow lodge, the speck of dust turned into back into a crow. He grabbed the string in his claws and flew away with the ball of daylight.

When he reached the land of the Inuit, he let go of the string and let the ball drop. It shattered into tiny pieces, spilling light everywhere.

The people ran out of their houses. They could see in all directions! They thanked the crow again and again for bringing them daylight.

However, the ball of daylight was very small, so the people had daylight for only half the year. But they were grateful, and always treated crows with respect.


"Is that really true?" Jeanne asked. "Do the people up north have daylight for only half the year?"

"Yes," said Carol. "In the north, the summer days are very long and the winter days are very short. Above the Arctic Circle, there are days when the sun doesn't rise at all."

"I wouldn't like that," Jeanne said. "I don't think my mother would let me go outside to play in the dark."

"But there would be more time for telling stories," Dancing Bear said.