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FAIRY TALES
FROM BRAZIL

HOW AND WHY TALES FROM
BRAZILIAN FOLK-LORE

BY

ELSIE SPICER EELLS

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY

HELEN M. BARTON

CADMUS BOOKS

E. M. HALE AND COMPANY

CHICAGO

COPYRIGHT, 1917,

By DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, Inc.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Thanks are due to the publishers of Little Folks,Kindergarten-Primary Magazine, Everyland, Mayflower and StoryTellers' Magazine for the privilege of reprinting stories which theyhave published.

ELSIE SPICER EELLS

[vii]

PREFACE

t is late afternoon in my Brazilian garden. The dazzling blue of seaand sky which characterises a tropical noonday has become subdued andalready roseate tints are beginning to prepare the glory of the sunsethour. A lizard crawls lazily up the whitewashed wall. The song of thesabiá, that wonderful Brazilian thrush, sounds from the royal palmtree. The air is heavy with the perfume of the orange blossom. Thereis no long twilight in the tropics. Night will leap down suddenly uponmy Brazilian garden from out of the glory of the sunset sky.

Theresa, the ama, stands before us on the terrace under the mangotrees, and we, her yáyázinhas and yóyózinhos, know that the storyhour has come. Theresa, daughter of the mud huts under the palm trees,ama in the sobrado of the foreign senhora, is a royal queen ofstory land. For her the beasts break silence and talk like humans. Forher all the magic wonders of her tales stand forth as living truth.Her lithe body sways backwards and forwards to the rhythm of her wordsas she unfolds her tales to us. She is a picture to remember as shestands under the mango trees on our terrace. Her spotless white"camiza" is decorated with beautiful pillow lace, her own handiwork.Her skirt of stiffly starched cotton is red and purple in colour. Acrimson flowered folded shawl hangs over her right shoulder and greatstrings of beads ornament the ebony of her neck and arms. To sit atthe feet of Theresa, the ama, is to enter the gate of story land.

CONTENTS