Wednesday, February 25, 2009

The Boy who Became a Stone

_Tinguian_


One day a little boy named Elonen sat out in the yard making a bird
snare, and as he worked, a little bird called to him: "Tik-tik-lo-den"
(come and catch me).

"I am making a snare for you," said the boy; but the bird continued
to call until the snare was finished.

Then Elonen ran and threw the snare over the bird and caught it, and he
put it in a jar in his house while he went with the other boys to swim.

While he was away, his grandmother grew hungry, so she ate the bird,
and when Elonen returned and found that his bird was gone, he was so
sad that he wished he might go away and never come back. He went out
into the forest and walked a long distance, until finally he came to
a big stone and said: "Stone, open your mouth and eat me." And the
stone opened its mouth and swallowed the boy.

When his grandmother missed the boy, she went out and looked
everywhere, hoping to find him. Finally she passed near the stone
and it cried out, "Here he is." Then the old woman tried to open the
stone but she could not, so she called the horses to come and help
her. They came and kicked it, but it would not break. Then she called
the carabao and they hooked it, but they only broke their horns. She
called the chickens, which pecked it, and the thunder, which shook it,
but nothing could open it, and she had to go home without the boy.

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