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According to Indian legend, a young brave was riding his pony one day when he found an eagle egg. The egg had fallen from it’s nest and was lying at the foot of steep cliffs which, according to ancient Indian lore, reached up into the thin icy blue air where only gods and eagles dwelled. Unable to climb the towering cliffs and replace the egg, the brave took it along his journey. Later that day the Indian brave arrived on the prairie, far from the distant cliffs where gods and eagles dwelled. The prairie was, however, the home of mud hens. Unlike eagles, mud hens cannot fly. They spend their lives scratching for the seeds found among the dry weeds on the baked prairie soil. And since they must keep their heads down while gathering food, mud hens almost never look toward the sky. Finding no alternative, and taking it as the best he could do, the brave abandoned the egg to a mud hen’s nest. Some days later the egg hatched and a young eagle emerged to the promise of life. The orphaned eagle was readily accepted by the mud hens as one of their own. As time passed he grew, all the while learning and adopting the ways of mud hens. He learned to scratch and dig the harsh prairie basin, always keeping his head down. After a year’s time, after his first winter ;had come and gone, the eagle had grown to young adulthood, all the while believing himself to be a mud hen. Then one glorious spring day, although the little eagle had missed its beauty busying himself with the chores of digging and scratching, he happened to glance, upward, And up high in the deep blue sky, up so high it almost seemed beyond imagination, he saw a sight which filled him with wonder and astonishment. A mighty eagle soared in the heavens. The flightless little eagle felt a thump in his heart. His eyes opened wide; his wings instinctually began to flap; a rushing spirit lifted his soul; an unbearable longing pressed upon him. "Yes", he heard an inner voice trumpet, echoing down the chambered magazines of his heart—"Yes, I too could soar like that magnificent creature. Yes, I too could be like him!" The little eagle scurried to his neighboring mud hens, exclaimed in wild bewilderment and enthusiasm, "What is that" What is that wonderful bird up in the sky? Glancing upward, yet showing no recognition of the wonders they beheld, the young eagle’s companions answered, "Oh, that is an eagle. Eagles can fly." "but you, " they continued, " you are a mud hen like us, and you can never fly." "Flying is silly anyway," they told him, "for how can you collect seeds if you fly all day? It is better to scratch the earth and gather seeds and not be distracted by dreams of what you never can become. Tears swelled in his small mahogany eyes, the little eagle put his head back down and scratched once more at the hard prairie for seeds. For a while, the memory of the great bird lingered in his thoughts, haunting his days and nights. After a time, however, his memories of the great eagle faded, And so, resigned to the place nature had seemingly accorded him, the little eagle spent the rest of his days listening to what his fellow mud hens told him about how he should live, what he should do, and how foolish were dreams of flying. He spent the rest of his life digging and scratching at an alien prairie sod. When he was old, he died, having never once flown from the cliffs of his native land, having never soared among the wind-driven clouds in the icy blue altitudes of his home. And, most of all having never learned the great secret that continued all his days to whisper deep within his soul—never entirely fading form his thoughts—that he, too, was as an eagle.
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