{"collection":"Native American","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/nam/sw/ain/ain43.htm","path":"nam/sw/ain/ain43.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/nam/sw/ain/ain43.htm","text":"THERE was a woman who lived in the mountains, who was very beautiful, and had many suitors, but she never married anyone.\nAnd one day she was making mats of cane; and she fell asleep and a rain came and a drop fell on her navel.\nAnd she had twin babies, and all the men claimed them, but when the babies were old enuf to crawl she told all the claimants to get in a circle, and she would put the babies in the middle, and if they crawled up to any man he would be the father.\nBut the babies climbed upon nobody, And she never married.\nAnd when these twin boys were old enuf their mother showed them a cloud in the east, and said: \"That is your father, and his name is Cloud, and the Wind is your uncle, your father's older brother.\"\nBut the children paid little attention, but when they got older they asked their mother if they could go and see their father. And their mother let them go.\nAnd they went, and came to a house, and the man who lived there asked them where they were going, and they said they were looking for their father, whose name was Cloud.\nAnd the man pointed to the next house, and\nsaid: \"That man, there, is your father.\"\nAnd they went to that man, but he said: \"It is not so. He is your father. He is Cloud.\" and sent them back again.\nBut the first man sent them back once more to the second, who was really Cloud.\nAnd Cloud said, that time; \"I wonder if it is so that you are my children!\"\nAnd the boys said: \"That is what they say.\"\nAnd Cloud said: \"I want you to do something to prove it.\"\nThen the oldest boy thundered loud and lightened, and the other lightened a little, and Cloud said, \"It is true, you are my children!\"\nAnd before night Cloud fed them, and then wept into his kee and shut it up and left them outside all night. And it rained and snowed all night, but they staid outside.\nAnd in the morning Cloud came out, and said: \"It is really so, that you are my children.\"\nAnd the next night he took them to a pond, where there was ice, and left them there all. night, And the next day, when he came there and found they had staid in the water all night he said: \"It is really so--you are my children.\",\nSo Cloud acknowledged them for his children and took them into his kee. And after a while the boys wanted to go back to their mother. and Cloud said: \"You may go, but you must not speak to anybody on the Way. And I will be with you on the journey.\"\nSo the boys started, and cloud was over them, in the sky, shadowing them.\nAnd after a while they saw a man coming, and the younger boy said: \"We must ask him how our mother is.\"\nBut the older brother said: \"Don't you remember that our father told us not to speak to anyone?\"\nThe younger said: \"Yes, I remember, but it would not be right not ask how our mother is.\"\nSo when the Man came the boy asked: \"How is everybody at home, and how is the old woman, our mother?\"\nAnd then the cloud above them lightened and thundered, and they were both turned into century plants.","title":"Aw-aw-tam Indian Nights (Myths and Legends of the Pimas): Stories of the Fourth Night: The Story of the Children of Cloud","type":"page"}