The Twin Stars

How the Twin Stars came to be in the constellation Scorpion, and why two larger stars continually pursue them.

ONCE upon a time-a very long time ago a little boy and girl lived on a beautiful island, far away in the warm, sunny South Pacific Ocean.

They were twins, and so fond of each other that they were always together. They had a kind father, who was very fond of them, but their mother was often unkind to them.

All through the long warm days the little boy and his sister, Piri, used to play on the yellow sands of the seashore. Sometimes they would bathe and swim in the sea, and sometimes they played a game of which children born in the South Sea Islands are very fond. Each would ride upon a board on the top of the long waves that rolled in upon the coast, and see which would first reach the shore.

Sometimes, when Piri was hot and tired, her brother would climb the tall cocoanut palms to get her the fresh nuts full of sweet milk, and sometimes they would go together into the palm-woods, and be very happy all the day long.

One evening, when the twins and their mother were at home in their hut, their mother told them she was going to spear fish by torchlight on the coral reef. All the islands in that part of the world have reefs around them, built by the tiny coral in- sects. She told them she would not be home until late, and when it was dark they were to go to bed. "But, mother, we are hungry," the children said; "we have not had any supper, for we could not catch any fish today. Won't you give us some supper before you go?"

"You must find your own supper,"said the un- kind mother. "I have no supper for you."

"But we are so tired, mother," said the poor children. "We cannot climb the trees for cocoa-nuts to-night, and it is so late we cannot get any- thing else to eat. If we go to bed, will you give us some fish when you come back?"

"The fish I bring home will not be cooked," said the mother. "Get out of my way, and don't bother me about your supper."

"But you will cook some fish for yourself and father,"persisted the children. "Please wake us up to have some, too."

"Perhaps I will," the mother replied, crossly. "Now get me my cocoanut torch and my spear, for I must be off."

So the mother went away to spear fish on the reef, and the children lay down on their little grass beds in the corner, feeling very sad.

About midnight the mother came home with plenty of fish, and, after she had awakened the children's father, she cooked the fish for their sup- per. The father knew that the children were hun- gry, and wanted to wake them, so that they might have a share of the fish; but the mother said:

"They will do very well without any supper. They are tiresome little things, always wanting something."

"Put some fish in their baskets, then," replied the father. "They will be very hungry when they wake in the morning." In that island everyone used to have a little food-basket, made of grass and reeds, beside them at night.

The unkind mother grumbled a good deal about having to do this; but at last she did put some fish in the children's baskets.

Now, the poor children had been awake all the time, and had heard how unkindly their mother spoke. When she put the fish in their baskets they were crying bitterly; but they did not dare to cry aloud, lest she should hear them and be still more angry.

When their father and mother had gone to bed, and all was quiet, Piri whispered to her brother: "Let us run away. Mother does not love us." "Father loves us, and would be unhappy if we ran away," replied her brother.

"But father is often away for a long time,"said Piri, "and mother is nearly always at home, and she often beats me and says I am always in the way." "I don't know where to go," said the boy. "The island is so small that they would soon find out where we are."

Then Piri said: "I have heard that there is a way through the deep blue sea that leads to a very beautiful country. Let us go and look for it."

So they took their baskets with the food in them and slipped out quietly. It was very early in the morning, long before dawn, but the great silver moon and the beautiful stars shone so. brightly that the children easily found their way down the rough path through the palms and ferns to the shore, where the long, white, curling waves came rolling in.

On the beach, under a palm tree, the children sat down and began to eat their fish; for they were hun- gry, as well as sad at leaving their father.

"Where shall we go, Piri?" asked the boy, when they had finished eating.

"Let us go to the rocks, over there, where the water is deep and clear, and see if we cannot find the path to the beautiful country," replied Piri. "We will go, but I do not think we shall find it," replied her brother. "I have often fished off those rocks, and I never saw any path through the waters. Besides, I would rather not go down into the caves below the sea, for they are full of monsters that seize people, and then will not let them go. I do not see how we can leave the island. The canoe is too high up on the beach, and is too heavy for us to pull down to the sea, and if we hide in the woods, they will be sure to find us."

Then they walked down to the rocks and looked into the water.

"The waters are dark, and I do not see any path," said the little girl. "I am afraid we cannot get away." Then she sat down and cried for a long time.

The brother stood silently beside her, looking into the deep waters. He, too, felt very miserable, and presently he sat down beside his sister and cried with her, and their tears fell into the hollows of the rocks and made two small, bright pools.

After a while Piri stopped crying, and then she noticed the two shining pools, and wondered why they should be so bright. Looking up at the sky, she saw that a beautiful star was shining right down upon them.

"I know what we will do!" she cried. "We will go far, far away, up into the sky. We shall not get in mother's way there, and we can still see father." "So we will," said her brother. "We will go up to the sky."

The thought of living in the sky made the boy very happy, for he believed that it was peopled with the spirits of the great chiefs who had once ruled over his island, and were still keeping watch over the people in it.

He had not quite liked the idea of running away and hiding from his father, but he was delighted at the thought of going to join the great chiefs who were up there in the sky.

In the South Sea Islands the sky at night is often a deep blue, like indigo. Soon the little girl said: "How beautiful the deep blue sky is. I can see more and more stars every minute that I look. Perhaps the bright little stars so far away are little boys and girls running to meet us.

"I wonder if the gods in the heavens will let us be two little stars. If they do, we will ask them to let us always be close together. I should be lonely, even in the beautiful sky, without you."

Her brother hardly listened to what she said. He sat quite still, looking up at the blue sky and the silver stars. At last he said:

"Take hold of my girdle, Piri, and hold on tightly. We will jump up to the sky," and, looking straight at the stars, the children jumped up into the sky.

The gods were so sorry for these two poor little children, who loved each other so much, that they changed them into two lovely bright stars, which ever since have been close together--side by side and always will be, for ever and ever.

The children's father and mother woke in the morning to find the children's beds empty and quite cold, so that the mother knew they must have left the hut a long while before, and she felt very un- happy, for she remembered how roughly she had spoken to them the night before.

The father went down to the shore, to see if he could find out where the children had gone, and the mother followed him. Together they traced their footsteps to their favorite spot on the sands, and then to the rocks, but they could find no further trace of them. There were the empty baskets, and when they saw the two bright pools on the rocks, they knew that they were the children's tears. Then the mother forgot that she had ever found her children troublesome, and only remembered that she used to have a little boy and girl, but now had none. And she cried very long and very bit- terly.

All day long the father and mother wandered about the island, looking for the children, and call- ing them; but no children answered them. When the sun set below the sea, they went back to the lit- tle hut, and the mother began once more to hope. Perhaps the children were hungry, she thought. Surely they would be hungry by night time and would come home. But the hut was empty, and that night the mother had no children to trouble her by asking her for supper.

She sat down by the little grass beds, and moaned and rocked herself to and fro. The father stood at the door of the hut, straining his eyes into the dark- ness, with a last hope that the children might be there.

Suddenly he cried out in great joy; "My chil- dren! my children!" For overhead, in the deep blue sky, he had seen two beautiful new stars shining close together, and somehow he knew that they were his children looking down upon him, and he felt comforted.

Then he called to their mother, and, pointing to the two stars, he said: "There are our children.. We will go to them."

And the mother said, through her tears: "Yes, we will go to them."

Then the father and mother took hold of each other's hands and leaped up into the heavens.

When the twin-star children saw their father and mother coming, they were afraid they were angry. They did not want to go back to earth, for they were very happy, shining up there in the sky.

"Mother will say we are in her way," said the lit- tle girl; "let us get away." So they moved quickly to another place.

When the father and mother reached the sky,the gods changed them into stars. They followed their children through the cloudless heavens, but never could overtake them. They are in the sky to this day, and you may see them, for they are the two large stars in the constellation called the Scorpion, and they are ever moving after the Double Star, their twin children.

So the two large stars must forever pursue the twin-stars, but they never shall overtake them. And the twin-stars shall always be together, for so greatly do they love each other that the gods have decreed that through all the ages they shall never be parted.