Page 97 - Animals of the Sakhalin Region in myths and legends

Once upon a time, two brothers lived in the same village. The

youngest was honest and hard-working, and the older one was angry
and lazy. When a stork came to the older brother’s house roof, he
scared it away. The youngest, however, was not only delighted with
the bird, but also attached a wheel on the roof so that a nest could be
built.

Since the stork settled with the younger brother, his harvest became
better, the cow began to give more milk, his sons grew up healthy and
did not get sick. The elder, on the contrary, was unlucky in everything.
The hail beat the bread, then the sparrows bit the cherries, then the
illness came. Black envy got to him, and he decided to take revenge

on his brother.
Once, when everyone was asleep, he set fire to his brother’s hut.
The storks were the first to be alarmed, roused the owners. Suddenly
they hear screams from the elder brother’s yard. They see: a pair of
black storks circling him. Everyone understood — he was the culprit.

They thought that the storks became black from ashes and soot.
They were waiting for the storks to wash themselves, but time passed,
and the birds remained black. So people understood: the storks were
blackened from grief, as people turn gray. Since then, the black stork

has been nesting away from people in a deep forest thicket.

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