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| Frogs Once upon a time we had no fire for our dances and the only fire in the world was contained within Tree. Tree did not want to share. He liked to pretend he was the god of fire. All of the creatures of the world felt sorry for us that Tree would not share his fire. They knew he wasn't a god and thought he should share the warmth (hang in there with me I haven't forgotten about the frog). The creatures sent Coyote to find the true god of fire. He didn't find the god of fire but he did find a wandering fire spirit. When the spirit wasn't looking Coyote hid one of the spirit's coals between his toes and ran away with it. The coal was so hot he couldn't hold onto it very long. To help him all the other creatures took turns carrying the hot piece of coal. Frog was the last in line to carry it. But Frog was very scared. So carrying the hot piece of coal she jumped into the water and hid under some willow roots. Every since then the frog's skin has looked burned and we have had fire by rubbing the sticks of dry willow. Bibliography (Frogs is a summary of the original source) Lake-Thom, Bobby, Spirits of the Earth, 1997, Penguin Group, "Reptile and Snake Signs and Omens" p145. |