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_Therefore from that time it has not been very cold_."
Of course, any attempt to interpret such a crude myth must be
guess-work. It shows, however, that the Indians believed that there
was a time when the winter was much more severe than it is now; it
was very cold and dark. Associated with it is the destruction of men
and cannibalism. At last the Rabbit brings a round object, (the
Sun?), the head of a Rocky Mountain sheep, and the Winter looks on
it, and perishes.
Even tropical Peru has its legend of the Age of Ice.
Garcilaso de la Vega, a descendant of the Incas, has preserved an
ancient indigenous poem of his nation, which seems to allude to a
great event, the breaking to fragments of some large object,
associated with ice and snow. Dr. Brinton translates it from the
Quichua, as follows
"Beauteous princess,
Lo, thy brother
_Breaks thy vessel
Now in fragments_.
From the blow come
Thunder, lightning,
Strokes of lightning
And thou, princess,
Tak'st the water,
With it raineth,
And _the hail_, or
_Snow dispenseth_.


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