Chapter VI: Introduction (5)

He bade them bring him a small stick, which they did, and then he began to beat the eagle. It screamed terribly beneath the lash, and turned round upon him with its mouth open, as if it would fight him, but he only beat it the harder. At last it did the thing he wanted it should do, and dropped a little heap of seeds, white, flat, and not so large over as the nail upon the little finger of a full-grown man. The man did not beat the eagle any more after this, but stroked down its feathers gently, and told it he was very sorry for what he had done. "Now," said he to the Indians, "take the seeds to the water and wash them." They washed the seeds as he directed, and brought them back to him. "Build a fire," said he. They built a fire. Then he took some of the seeds and raked them up in the ashes of the fire, stirring them continually, until they were of the colour of a Narragansett's skin. When he had roasted them as much as he would, he called the tribe around him, and bade them taste the parched seeds. They all cried out that the seeds were good, very good, and begged him to beat the eagle, till they had procured enough to satisfy them all, but he would not. They asked him what the seeds were called. He told them "corn-maize," and said he would shew them another way to cook it. He bade them bring him a big, flat stone, and a little round one, and to fill their great stone-kettle with water, and to make it hot, while he pounded the corn. The man that rode the eagle pounded the corn, and the Narragansetts boiled the water. When the water was hot, he shook the pounded corn into the water, until it became quite thick, stirring it quickly all the while. When it had cooled, so that it could be eaten, he tasted it, bidding the Narragansetts do the like. "Charming _hominy_," said he. The Indians ate very heartily of it, and declared nothing was ever so good before, and again, one and all thanked the Great Spirit, and said he was very kind--much kinder than the Evil Spirit. They were, as once before, just about to declare themselves servants to the master of the man that rode the eagle and sent them the corn, when a very spiteful old woman--one who was always full of mischief--got up, and advised them to wait a little longer, and give the Little Man one more chance. "The longer the trial between the two spirits lasted, the more the Indians got, the better," she said, and our people said the same. Upon this the man got up on his winged horse, very sorrowful but not very angry, and flew away, leaving them the remainder of the seeds, which, he told them, must be planted in the earth when the winter had departed, and the trees were putting out their leaves, and the little blue and yellow flowers began to peep through their frost-nipped coverings.

The next sun, when the Narragansetts went out of their lodges, there sat the ugly little creature, with the moss-coloured beard and yellow ears, perched upon the top of a high tree. They spoke to him, but he made no answer--asked him what he had brought them--still no answer. All the while his eyes were intently fixed upon the waters of the Great Lake, which began to be tossed about with a high wind. At last, when they were tired of watching his motions, and some of the boldest, now grown familiar with him and no longer chilled with fear, talked of stoning him from his roost, he cried out, pointing with his finger, "Look yonder!" They now beheld, in the direction he bade them look, far away on the foaming bosom of the Great Lake, something resembling a great, white fowl. It was moving very swiftly towards the land of the Narragansetts. The nearer it approached, the more our people were puzzled to tell what it was; some said it was a duck, some thought it a cloud, and others that it was the Good Spirit who had taken a new form, and was coming to offer more proofs of his love for the Narragansetts. They asked the ugly little man upon the tree what it was, but he only showed his teeth like a dog that guards a bone, and would not make answer.

The strange creature was now very near, and seemed a more wondrous object than ever. It had a body shaped very much like the canoe which the Great Spirit had given the Indians; but it was as much larger as an old bear is larger than a cub, the minute it is born, or an eagle is larger than a humming-bird. It had wings, white as the wings of the sea-gull, and as large over as a small lake. When it had come near the shore, its many wings were drawn up and hidden, and in their stead three tall poles were displayed, with many short ones crossing them, to one of which the Little Man jumped from his perch on the tree.

The Indians were more astonished at this object than they had been at any of the others. It did not appear to possess life, yet how came it thither. Unable to tell what it meant, our people fled, startled and frightened, into the deep thicket, and there held a council, and debated what was best to be done. At length, encouraged by the thought that, of all the strange creatures which had visited them, none had ever attempted to harm them, they called up courage, and returned to the shore. They now beheld a canoe, moved by long paddles and filled with men, approaching the shore where they stood. It struck on the beach, and out of it came many savages, the colour of whose faces was like that of the stranger who is with us. They commenced talking to the Narragansetts in a language which none of them understood, any more than they understood the cry of the catamount. The Narragansetts were preparing to use upon the strangers the bows and arrows which the Little Man had given them, when one of them, laughing very loudly and sillily, held up a strange-shaped thing, which had a long neck to it like the ugly bird which cries in the brakes in the beginning of darkness. This he often raised to his mouth, turning the top of the neck into it, and drinking something from it, which he seemed to love very much. At last, down he tumbled on the ground, singing very badly, and making very hideous mouths, though the Indians could not tell what he laughed and mouthed about. There he lay on his back, kicking as a frog swims, till the Little Man went up to him, and took away the thing which held the maddening draught. The Narragansetts demanded of the Little Man what he had there.

"A bottle," he replied.

"What is there in it?" they asked.

"Good stuff! good rum(3)--very good rum," said he, shaking the bottle, and winking with both eyes. "Here, taste and see," and he held out the the bottle.

"T-a-s-t-e and s-e-e," cried the man who had fallen down, hiccuping.

The Narragansetts tasted of the rum, and liked it so well, that in a little time they had drunk all there was in the bottle, and ask the Little Man if he had any more. "Oh, great plenty," answered he, "the White Men, like those who came in the canoe, let me have it dog-cheap. I get almost all my worshippers by it; oh, I buy a great many worshippers by it. Yes, plenty of good rum--Indians may have it almost for nothing. The white men will bring me plenty of good rum."

"If you will let us have plenty of drink, like that in the bottle, plenty of rum, you shall be our master," said the Indians. "It is a great deal better than the Good Spirit's corn."

The bargain was soon made between the Evil Spirit and the Narragansetts. The Evil Spirit agreed that his white men should let the Indians have as much rum as the Narragansetts wanted, and they in return were to be his servants. So, from that day to this, the Narragansetts have served the Evil Spirit. They get from the Good Spirit the canoes which enable them to cross rivers and catch fish, and the corn which fills their bellies, but the bows and arrows which lead them to engage in bloody wars, and the rum which makes dogs, and bears, and hogs, and wild cats of them, they get from the Devil and the pale faces. Yet it must be told that neither spirit has exactly kept his word. The Great Spirit sometimes withers the corn by withholding rain from it, or sweeps it away by sending too much; and the Evil Spirit often lets the pale faces drink up all the rum before it reaches the Indians.

NOTES.

* * * * *

(1) _Hobbamock_--p. 120.

This was the Indian Devil. "Another power they worship, whom they call _Hobbamock_, and to the northward of us, _Hobbamoqui;_ this, as farre as wee can conceive, is the Devill; him they call upon to cure their wounds and diseases. When they are curable, hee perswades them hee sends the same for some conceiled anger, but, upon their calling upon him, can and doth help them; but, when they are mortall, and not curable in nature, then he perswades them Kiehtan is angry, and sends them diseases whom none can cure; insomuch, as in that respect onely they somewhat doubt whether hee bee simply good, and therefore in sicknesse never call upon him. _This Hobbamock appears in sundry formes unto them,_ as in the _shape of a man, a deare, a fawne, an eagle, &c., but most ordinarily at a snake_."--_Purchas' Pilgrims_.

Dr. Jarvis, a shrewd and learned American theologian and writer, observes, "This Hobbamock, or Hobbamoqui, who "appears in sundry forms," is evidently the _Oke_ or _Tutelary Deity,_ which each Indian worships; and Mr. Winslow's narrative affords a solution of the pretended worship of the devil, which the first settlers imagined they had discovered, and which has since been so frequently mentioned on their authority, without examination. The natives, it was found, worshipped another being besides the Great Spirit, which every one called his _Hobbamock_, or _Guardian Oke_. This the English thought could be no other than the _Devil_, and accordingly they asserted, without farther ceremony, what they believed to be a fact."

(2) _Conjurors_.--p. 121.

Both Charlevoix and Heckewelder have treated of Indian priests, and conjurors, and jugglers, as though they were separate professions, and several late writers have fallen into the same error. Hear Carver:

"The _priests of the Indians are at the same time their physicians, and their conjurors_; whilst they heal their wounds, or cure their diseases, they interpret their dreams, give them protective charms, and satisfy that desire which is so prevalent among them, of searching into futurity. ***** When any of the people are ill, the _person who is invested with this triple character of doctor, priest, and magician, sits by the patient, &c."--Carver,_ 251, 252.

My opinion is decidedly with Carver, that the two professions are conjoined. The physician never uses his simples, without invoking, in his quality of priest, the aid of the Supreme Being.

The appearance which they make, and the dress in which their incantations are performed, deserve mention for their singularity. The following passage from Mr. Heckewelder describes their appearance, and is the original of those in Mr. Cooper's Novels of The Prairie and Last of the Mohicans: "The dress this juggler had on consisted of an entire garment, or outside covering, made of one or more bear-skins, as black as jet, so well fitted and sewed together that the man was not in any place to be perceived. The whole head of the bear, including the mouth, nose, teeth, ears, &c., appeared the same as when the animal was living, so did the legs with long claws; to this were added a huge pair of horns on the head, and behind a large bushy tail, moving as be walked, as though it were on springs; but for these accompaniments, the man walking on all-fours might have been taken for a bear of an extraordinary size. Underneath there his hands were, holes had been cut, though not risible to the eye, being covered with the long hair, through which he held and managed his implements, and he saw through two holes set with glass."--_Hist. Account,_ p. 288, 289.

He then describes the practice of these medical gentlemen of the forest: "He approaches his patient with a variety of contortions and gestures, and performs by his side, and over him, all the antic tricks that his imagination can suggest. He breathes on him, blows in his mouth, and often makes an external application of the medicines which he has prepared, by throwing them over in his face, mouth, and nose; he rattles his gourd filled with dry beans or pebbles; pulls out, and handles about a variety of sticks and bundles, in which be appears to be seeking for the proper remedy; all which is accompanied with the most horrid gesticulations, by which he endeavours, as he says, to frighten the Spirit or the disorder away," &c.--_Hist. Acc._. 225.

An Indian physician never applies his medicines without accompanying them with mysterious ceremonies, to make their effect supernatural. He therefore prepares his roots and herbs with the most singular ceremonies, and, in mixing them up, invokes the aid of the Great Spirit. He also accompanies his directions with various gesticulations and enigmatical expressions. The ceremonies he uses are various. Sometimes he creeps into the oven where he sweats, howls, and roars, and now and then grins horribly at his patient. Altogether I cannot conceive of a more irrational manner of performing Esculapian duties, than that adopted by the "faculty" of the Western Wilderness.

(3) _Rum_.

That the Indians were made drunk by Hendrick Hudson, at his first interview with them, seems well settled. A tradition also prevails among the Iroquois, that a scene of intoxication occurred with a party of the natives on the arrival of the first ship in their waters.

The same tradition prevailed among the tribe named in the tale. See also the tradition of The Coming of Miquon in the second volume.

THE RESURRECTION OF THE BISON.

The men of my nation, the Minnitarees, believed that the bones of the bison, which they had slain and divested of their flesh, rose again, clothed with renewed flesh, and quickened with life, and became fat and fit for slaughter in the succeeding hot month. To us it appeared incomprehensible that thousands should be slaughtered every year by the many tribes of red men that roam over the country of the bisons, yet that they should increase yearly. When we asked our priests about this, they replied that they did not die, but rose again from the plains and the _prairies_, the same in flesh and form as when they were slaughtered and stripped by us. For a long time, very few of us believed the words of the priests, they had lied to us so often.

Once upon a time a party of the people of our nation, who were out upon a hunting-excursion, lost one of their number, a boy, and returned to the village lamenting his loss. Believing him to have been killed or taken prisoner by the cruel Sioux, with whom they were then at war, and who had been seen prowling about their village they assembled a war-party, and set out to avenge his death. They had marched a weary way, and were just entering the country of the Sioux, when they espied a herd of bisons, one of which they succeeded in killing. Guess their astonishment, when, on opening the belly of the animal, they found the long-lost boy, alive, well, sleek, and hearty, after having been imprisoned there one entire year. Relieved from his captivity in the belly of the bison, the boy told us how it happened.

He said that when he left his hunting, companions, he proceeded onward a considerable distance in search of game, till he found a bison, which he was so fortunate as to kill. He removed the flesh from one side of the animal, but had not time to remove that from the other side, when night came on, and a great rain set in. Finding that he could not reach his village that night, and it being in the middle of a prairie, where no bark or branches could be had with which to form a hut, he was for some time at a loss to know what he should do to avoid the pelting of the storm which raged in the skies. At last, he bethought himself of a method, which was, to remove the entrails from the bison, and creep into the hollow space: he did so. But, during the night, and while he slept, the flesh of the bison that he had cut off grew over the side again. In the morning when he awoke he found himself in darkness. For many nights there was no motion of the animal. At last the various intestines and viscera began to grow. He felt from time to time with his hands to learn their increase, rightly judging that, when they had arrived at full size, the animal would return to life. That period at length arrived. His residence began to grow warm, at first moderately so, but increasing in heat till respiration became difficult. At length he began to feel with his hand a pulsation in the heart of the animal, and to hear the sound of wind in its veins, its arteries, and its intestines. Soon he found himself rocking about as a canoe is tossed on the waves of the great water; and then he knew the animal had returned to the full enjoyment of life.

THE WAHCONDA'S SON.

Brothers, I am an Otto, and a chief. I am a man of courage and truth. I have been a warrior, and a hunter of the bear and wolf ever since the great meeting of aged counsellors and brave-warriors pronounced me a man. I never fled from a foe; and none ever saw me afraid. Who will say that the Guard of the Red Arrows was ever other than a man in his heart? When the Padoucas bound him to the stake, and kindled fires around him;--when they thrust sharp, heated stones into his flesh, and tore off his nails with fiery pincers, did they force a cry from him? did they see his cheek wear the badge of a woman's weakness? No, I am a man. Brother, I will tell you a tale. While the nation of the Ottoes had their hunting-grounds in the shade of the Mountains of the Great Being, they were led in war to battle--in peace were advised in council by a brave and warlike chief, who was called Wasabajinga, or the Little Black Bear. He was the head chief of the nation, and its greatest warrior. His martial exploits and daring deeds were the theme of all the tribes who roamed through the vast woods between the Mississippi and the Mountains of the Setting Sun, the Missouri, and the Lake of the Woods. All had heard of his great deeds; and many had seen and felt his prowess. He was stronger than the bear, he was swifter than the deer, he was nimbler than the mountain-cat or the panther. Who was so expert at stealing horses(1) as Wasabajinga?--by his cabin-door stood the best in all the land; and they had belonged to the Konzas, the Pawnees, the Omawhaws, the Puncas, the Sioux, and other tribes whose eyes were sharp and arrows long, but neither so sharp nor so long as those of the Otto warrior. He had entered alone the camp of the Missouries, at the time when the stars are the sole torches of night, and had brought thence many scalps; he had crept to the lodge of an Arrowauk, and taken the beloved maiden. He had struck dead bodies(2) of all the nations around--Osages, Padoucas, Bald-heads, Ietans, Sauxs, Foxes, and Ioways. And who had such eyes for the trail and the chase as he? He could show you where the snake had crawled through the hazel leaves; he could trace the buck by his nipping of the young buds; he could spring to the top of the tallest pine with the ease of the squirrel, and from thence point out unerringly where lay the hunting-lodges and grounds of all the tribes of the land; he could endure as much fasting as the land-tortoise, or the bear of the frozen north, and march as long as the eagle could fly; never hungry till food was placed before him; never tired when there was more glory to be won. Strong, healthy and nimble, Wasabajinga lived to learn that there was no one in the wilds able to cope with him in battle, and to have his wisdom as loudly applauded as his valour.

At home it was the good fortune of this famous chief to be equally prosperous and happy. He had nine wives, all beautiful as the path of the Master of Life[A]--all good and amiable. Though they all lived in the same cabin(3), ate out of the same bowl, warmed themselves at the same fire, and slept' on the same skins, there was a fair sky among them--it never thundered and lightened in the cabin of the Otto warrior. One nursed another's child as kindly as if it were her own; one performed the field-tasks allotted to another, who in return prepared the bison meat for the fire, and drew home the fuel from the woods. There was peace, and the calmness of a summer day, in the cabin of Wasabajinga--he lived the happiest of his nation.

[Footnote A: The Milky Way, the Galaxy.]

His children were many--ten sons were in their father's cabin; each could bend his father's bow, each poise his father's spear, and each wield his father's war-club. Daughters he had but one, who grew up the most beautiful of all the maidens of the land. She had a skin much whiter than that of Indian maidens generally; her teeth were white and even; her hair long, black, and glossy, as the feathers of the raven; her eyes mild as the dove's in the season of its mating; and her step was that of a deer who is scared a little. And she was good as she was beautiful. No one ever saw her cross or sulky like other women; nothing made her angry. Though she was beloved by her parents, and a great favourite with all the wives of her father, yet she never claimed exemption from the duties which belong to Indian females. Willingly would her little hands have laid hold of the faggot, and her small feet have travelled forth with her mother to the labours of the field of maize; but the fond affection of all around her, and their belief that she was something more than mortal, protected her from a call to share in their labours. She was allowed no part in the cutting-up of the bison; she was not permitted to pound the corn, or winnow the wild rice, or bring firing from the woods. It was the pride of the youthful part of the tribe to prepare ornaments for her person. The young maidens (for she was envied by none) wove wampum, and made beads for her; the young men passed half their time in hunting the red and blue heron for the gay tuft upon his crown, and the Spirit Bird for his train of yellow, green, and scarlet, that her hair might vie in colours with the beautiful bow that rests upon the mountains after the rains. They made her bracelets for her wrists, and anklets for her legs, of the teeth of the fish with shining scales, and pendants for her ears of the bones of the birds of night and music. Thus lived Mekaia, or the Star-flower, which was the name of the beautiful Otto, till she had reached her seventeenth summer.

It was a little before sunset upon a pleasant day in the month of green-corn, that a young man riding upon a noble white horse was seen entering the great village of the Ottoes. He appeared to be very young, but he was tall and straight as the hickory-tree. He was clothed as our brother is clothed, only his garments were scarlet, and our brother's are black. His hair, which was not so dark as that of the Indians, was smooth and sleek as the hair on the head of a child, or the feathers on the breast of the humming-bird. His head was encircled with a chaplet made of the feathers of the song-sparrow and the red-headed-woodpecker. He rode slowly through the village without stopping till he came to the lodge of Wasabajinga, when he alighted, leaving his good horse to feed upon the grass which grew around the cabin. He entered the lodge of the chief. The stern old warrior, without rising from his bed of skins, asked him who he was, and whence he came. He answered that he was the son of the great Wahconda, and had come from the lodge of his father(4), which lay among the high mountains towards the setting-sun.

"Have you killed any buffaloes on your journey?" demanded Wasabajinga.

"No," answered the young god.

"Then you must be very hungry," said the chief.

The young man answered that the son of the Wahconda had his food from the skies, because the flesh of the animals which lived on the earth was too gross for him. He lived, he said, upon the flesh of spirit beasts, and fishes, and birds, roasted in the great fire-place of the lightnings, and sent him by the hands of the Manitous of the air. His drink was the rain-drops purified in the clouds.

The chief asked him if he had come on a message from the Wahconda to the Little Black Bear of the Ottoes.

The young man answered that he had. He said his father had shewn him from the high mountains of the west the beautiful daughter of the Otto chief--had told him she was good as she was beautiful, and bidden him come and ask her for his wife. His father, he said, bade him tell the Bear of the Ottoes, that, though his daughter must now leave her father, and mother, and nation, and accompany his son into the regions of ever-bright suns, and balmy winds, yet, in a few seasons more, when the knees of the chief had become feeble, and his eyes dim with the mists of age, and his time had come to die, that he should rejoin his daughter and tend her little ones, and be as joyful as the bird of morning on the banks of the rapid river that glided through the valley of departed souls.

"How shall I know that the Wahconda has said this?" asked the chief.

"I will do these things for a sign," answered the boy-god. "To-morrow, when the sun first rises from his slumbers behind the hills of the east, he shall show himself in a cloudless sky. In the space of a breath, darkness shall cover the face of the heavens, the thunder(5), which is the voice of my father, shall roll awfully, but the lightnings, which are the glances of his eye, shall be spared. Before the Indians shall have time to raise themselves from the earth, upon whose cold bosom, in their terror, they will prostrate themselves, the darkness shall be recalled from the earth and shut up in the cave of night. The moment the thunders cease, the lightnings, which are the glances of his eye, shall commence their terrific play over the face of the cloudless sky. By these signs ye shall know that I am the Wahconda's son."

"If these things shall be done," said the chief, "the maiden shall be yours."

It was soon told in the village, that the Wahconda's son had come from his father's lodge among the mountains, to ask the beautiful Star-flower for his wife. And it was also told, that with the rising of the sun on the next morning, he would convince the Little Black Bear, that he had not a forked tongue, nor spoke with the lips of a mocking-bird. There was little sleep that night in the Otto village. Our nation awaited with great dread and much trembling the coming of the morning, fearing danger to themselves and the very earth on which they dwelt, from the threatened waking of the Wahconda's voice, and the glancing of his eye.

The nation had assembled beside the cabin of the warrior, when the sun came out from behind the mountains. The young man kept his promise. When the sun first came in view, there was not a cloud on the face of the sky. In the space of a breath, thick darkness overspread the earth, rendering it as dark as the darkest night, and the thunders rolled so awfully, that the very earth seemed to reel like a man who has drunken twice of the fire-eater, which the brothers of our friend sell us in the Village of the High Rock.[A] But what astonished our people most was, that no lightning accompanied the thunder. In a few minutes the darkness was driven away by the same mighty hand which called it forth; the thunder became as mute as the sleep of a child which is filled with its mother's milk, and the sun shone out full and clear as before the Wahconda had shut his mouth. Then succeeded most terrific lightnings; lightnings which rent the solid trees, and clove asunder the flinty rocks. A moment, and they too were called back;--the Great Being had closed his eyes, and the lightnings were imprisoned between their lids. The Indians stood for a moment aghast, and then fell on their faces in worship of the Being who could command all things so promptly to do his bidding, and who kept his mouth shut, and his eyes closed, in mercy to the poor creatures of the earth.

[Footnote A: Quebec--Heights of Abraham.]

When they had recovered from their fright, they rose to an upright posture, and paid their obeisance to the stranger, now proved to be the Wahconda's son by signs that no one would dare dispute. He showed his love for them by the kind look he gave them. Turning to the Little Black Bear, he said, "Has the Wahconda's son proved himself worthy to have the beautiful daughter of the Otto chief to be his wife?"

Wasabajinga answered, "The Wahconda's son has proved himself worthy to have for his wife the daughter of the head chief of the Ottoes. The chief gives her to him (6), in the presence of all his nation."

The chief went into his lodge, and brought out his daughter. The son of the Wahconda then went up to the beautiful maiden, and fondly pressing her in his arms, called her his wife, and told her that, moved by her beauty and goodness, he had left the pleasant skies of his dwelling, to come into the cold and misty region where the Ottoes had their lodges. She wept, but the tears came not from her heart, and smiles beamed through them, as the stars of night shine through mist, or the sun of a spring morning looks, through a cloud of vapour. Then the beautiful couple went through the Indian form of marriage(7). When this was ended, the tribe gathered to the feast in the cabin of the chief. Rich and juicy was the bear's meat, set out on the buffalo robe, and ripe were the berries, and sweet was the roasted corn, which the women brought to feed the guests. They sung, and danced, and recounted their warlike exploits in the ears of the listening boy. They told of their hostile visits to the countries of the Padoucas and Bald-heads; they mimicked the cry of terror which burst from the letans when a painted man of the Ottoes crept with an uplifted hatchet into their camp by midnight, and took five scalps as they slept. Then one arose and sung a song of marriage. Brothers, this was the song he sung:

OTTO SONG OF MARRIAGE.

Who is that?
Oh, it is the Master's fair-haired son,
Come to wed the warrior's beauteous daughter.
Tall and manly is his form;
Beautiful and fair is she;
See his step how light,
See his eyes how bright with love and joy;
How glad he looks:
So turns his eyes the husband-dove
Upon its gentle little wife.

He came and caught the maiden in his arms,
He pressed her to his bosom as a mother
Presses her infant.
She was pleased, and wept,
But her's were tears of joy;
Hung her head, and hid her beautuous face,
Yet was she not ashamed.
Her's was maiden bashfulness.
Blushes she to be so caught in love?
See her stolen glances! sunlit glances! see!
She doth not altogether hate the youth.

Why dost thou weep, mother of the bride?
Weepst thou to be parted from thy daughter?
Weep no more.
What is life?
A reed beat down by every wind that stirs,
A flower nipt by the first autumnal blast,
A deer that perishes by prick of thorn,
Here at morning,
Gone at evening.
Weep not, tender mother of the bride;
Soon thou'lt meet her in the happy vales
Beyond the setting sun:
Ask the lover, he will tell thee so.

Then mounting the noble Horse they bade farewell.]

When the feast was concluded, the songs and dances, and sacrifices, finished, the Wahconda's son prepared to take his departure to the mountains where his father dwelt. The tribe attended him to the edge of the forest, which had been the hunting-grounds of the Ottoes ever since the rivers ran, and there they left him to pursue his journey with his beautiful and happy wife to the abodes of spirits, and great warriors, and just men. But before the chief parted from his daughter, he made her husband a long speech, and prayed that peace might ever be between them and their people. He told him he had given him his all--his dearly beloved daughter, to whom he must be kind and affectionate. He must not put heavy burdens upon her; he must not send her to cut wood, nor bring home the bison's flesh, nor pound the corn, for her hands had never been hardened in tasks like these, nor her shoulders bowed in her father's house to the labours of the field, or forest, or cabin. "She had been," he said, "the darling of her father's household, and knew not labour but by name."

The Wahconda's son smiled at the words of the old chief, and told him "that services, like those he had mentioned, were never required of women in the Wahconda's dwelling. The people of the happy vales and the spirits of the mountains fed not," he said, "upon bison's meat, nor pounded corn; and the sun, which was the same at all seasons, beamed so warm, that they kept no fires. It was a lovely land, far pleasanter than that which the Ottoes abode in, nor was it subject to those dreadful storms and tempests which terrified and annoyed those who dwelt upon the banks of the Great River." And then, mounting his noble horse, and taking his little wife behind him, he again bade them farewell and rode away.

He had been gone two moons--the third was in its wane, and the parents had become consoled for the loss of their daughter. It was upon a clear and beautiful evening in the Moon of Harvest, when the forest was losing its robe of green, and putting on its garment of brown and scarlet, and cool and steady winds were succeeding to the hot and parching breezes of summer, that the Ottoes assembled to dance and feast in the cabin of their chief. It was one of the most beautiful nights ever beheld. Nothing was heard to break the stillness of the hour, save the rustling of the branches of the cedar and pine, the slight music of a little rivulet, and the mournful singing of the wekolis,[A] perched in the low branches of the willow. The feast was prepared, the Master was propitiated, and they were sitting down to partake of the good things of the land and water, when suddenly the earth began to move like the waters of lake Huron, when agitated by winds from the regions of the frozen star. Upon every side of them, above them, and beneath them, the earth thundered, with a rattling sound. In vain did the Ottoes attempt to leave the cabin; they rolled about like a canoe launched upon a stormy river, or a ball tossed upon frozen water. The rocking of the earth continued throughout the hours of darkness. When light came, it was frightful to behold the disfigured face of the earth. In some places lakes were scooped out, and mountains piled up on their brink. Trees were rooted up and broken; little streams had disappeared, even large rivers had ceased to be. The tall magnolia lay broken in many pieces, the larch tree had been snapped like a rotten reed. The flowers of the meadows were scorched and seared, the deer in the thicket lay mangled and bruised, the birds sat timid and shy on the broken bough. The people called their priests together, and demanded why these things were. The priests answered, "Because the Master of Life was angry, but with whom they knew not. Yet soon should they learn, for there was one coming hither who would be able to tell them."

[Footnote A: Wekolis--the whip-poor-will.]

Three suns had passed, and the knowledge of the cause still remained hidden from them. On the morning of the fourth day, when the chief went out of his lodge, he found his beloved daughter weeping by the door of the cabin. Oh! how changed was the beautiful Mekaia--she was no longer a Star-flower. The brightness of her eye had departed, as the beauty of the green fields and leafy forests is driven hence by the chills of winter, her cheek was sunken and hollow, her long black locks lay uncombed upon her shoulders, and the joy and cheerfulness which once warmed her heart, and made her foot lighter than the antelope's, were no more. She, whose feet were fleeter than the deer's, now walked feebly, and rested oft; she, whose tongue outchirped the merriest birds of the grove, and warbled sweeter music than the song-sparrow, now spoke in strains as gloomy and sad as the bittern that cries in the swamps when night is coming on, or the solitary bird of wisdom perched among the leaves of the oak. The father sat down by her, and asked her whence she came.

"From the valley upon this side of the mountains," she answered.

"Where is thy husband?" demanded Wasabajinga.

"Dead," answered the Starflower, and wept afresh.

"Wah!" exclaimed the warrior, and hid his face with his hands. When he had sat thus awhile, he inquired the manner of his death. She told him, that, before they reached the mountains of the Wahconda, they saw a pale man coming towards them, mounted on a low, black horse. When he came up them, he asked her husband if he would buy blankets, and beads, and the fire-eater. That the Wahconda's son answered, "No;" and told him it was very--very bad in him to carry the fire-eater, to destroy the poor misguided Indians. The man upon the black horse answered, "That he was a better man than the Wahconda's son, for he was no heathen, but lived where men worshipped a greater Wahconda than his father in a beautiful house built with hands, and not beneath the shade of the cypress and the oak." Upon this, her husband did but smile, when the pale man elevated the spear he carried in his hand, and, with the bolts which issued from it, struck him to the earth, from which he never rose again. Then there came a cry of mourning from the cabin of the Little Black Bear. The women rushed out, and tore their hair, and cut their flesh with sharp stones, through grief for the death of the husband of their beloved Starflower. And they sung a melancholy lament, for the youth who had perished in the morning of life, while the down was yet upon his cheek, and his heart had never felt the shaft of sorrow. They sung how happy the lovers were, ere the malice and cruelty of white men destroyed their joys; ere their sacrilegious hands had laid one low in the dust, and left the other to pine under the bereavement, till death would be a blessing. They painted the anger and grief of the great Wahconda when he found the darling of his house numbered with the slain. They sung that, exasperated with the children of earth for the murder of his beloved son, he called upon his earthquakes to deface and lay waste their country. They bade the eye note how well these ministers of his wrath had performed his dread commands. So they sung--"For many a weary day's journey upon the banks of the Mighty River, for many a long encamping in the direction of the setting sun, the land lies in ruins. The bough is broken, and the solid trunk is rent. The flower lies bleeding, and the voice of the dove is hushed. But see, he has bidden the marks of havoc be effaced from the country of the Ottoes, because it is the native land of the beautiful woman who had become the wife of his son."

Long was the mourning continued, and deep the grief, which for many a moon pervaded the cabins and camp of the Ottoes. The Great Wahconda did not permit the Starflower to remain long upon the earth, but soon called her away to be re-united to his beloved son in the land of spirits. Yet she often returns to look upon the place of her birth, to breathe on the things she loved, and to sit beneath the shade of the trees she planted. In the season of flowers, she is often seen by moonlight, binding together the choicest which grow on the prairie, and her voice is often heard in the sighs of the breeze in spring. The Wahconda's son never comes with her, for he fears the treachery and violence of the pale faces.

NOTES.

(1) _Stealing horses_--p. 148.

Stealing horses is one of the most meritorious acts an Indian can perform, and is boasted of at his feasts among his other praiseworthy deeds. Next to scalping, it is the greatest feat of the Indian warrior. Before going out to war they pray to the Great Spirit to favour them, among other things, with the ability to steal horses.

(2) _Struck dead bodies._--p. 148.

Striking the dead, or the disabled body of a living person, is considered the third in the scale of honours. These things are regulated, among the Indians, with the nicety which attends the distribution of academical prizes at the Universities.

(3) _Lived in the same cabin, &c._--p. 149.

All the wives of an Indian reside under the same roof. As an Indian is despotic in his family, there is seldom any domestic disagreement in his cabin; if there be, the whip is called in to arbitrate the difference, and the dispute is soon adjusted. I shall notice this subject in a note in another part of the work.

(4) _Lodge of his father._--p. 152.

The dwelling-place of the Supreme Being is variously located by the Indians. I shall not notice their reported belief, which places the Good Spirit "above the blue sky," and gives the Evil Spirit the Antipodes. Such, as it is mentioned by Loskiel and by Purchas, are the opinions of the Eastern Indians. These are obviously derived from the white people. The following may be pronounced the unsophisticated traditions of the different tribes on this point, and they are very curious.

"About thirty miles below the falls of St. Anthony, at which I arrived the tenth day after I left Lape Pepin, is a remarkable cave of an amazing depth. The Indians term it Wakon-teebe, that is, the Dwelling of the Great Spirit. The entrance into it is about four feet wide; the height of it fire feet. The arch within it is near fifteen feet high, and about thirty feet broad. The bottom of it consists of fine, clear sand. About twenty feet from the entrance begins a lake, the water of which is transparent, and extends to an unsearchable distance; for the darkness of the cave prevents all possibility of acquiring a knowledge of it. I threw a small pebble towards the interior parts of it with my utmost strength: I could hear that it fell into the water, and, notwithstanding that it was of so small a size, it caused an astonishing and horrible noise, that reverberated through all those gloomy regions. I found in this cave many Indian hieroglyphics, which appeared very ancient, for time had nearly covered them with moss, so that it was with difficulty I could trace them. They were cut in a rude manner upon the inside of the walls, which were composed of a stone so extremely soft, that it might easily be penetrated with a knife; a stone every where to be found near the Mississippi." _Carver's Travels_, p. 39, 40.

Very many of the Western Indians believe that the Supreme Being has his residence in the Rocky Mountains; and some of them make him the Sun.--_Charlevoix_, ii, 180, 117.

The Chippeways suppose the islands in Lake Superior to have been, from their first formation, the residence of the Great Spirit, and relate many stories of enchantment and magical tricks that had been experienced by such as were obliged, through stress of weather, to take shelter there.--See one of them further on.

The Hurons believe that Michabou, the God of the Waters, and sometimes their Great Spirit, formerly dwelt at Michillimackinac where he was born.

(5) _The thunder_.--p. 153.

The Indians have but one way to account for atmospherical phenomena; it is always by the intervention of a Supreme or Spiritual Being of the earth, the air, or the waters. Thus they ascribe earthquakes to the moving of the Great Tortoise which bears the _Island_ (continent) on its back. They say he shakes himself or changes his position. The Missouri Indians believe earthquakes to be the effect of supernatural agency, connected like the thunder with the immediate operations of the Master of Life. Thunder and lightning impress them with inconceivable terror. Their opinions of the cause are various. Some take it for a voice of a particular species of men who fly in the air. Others say the noise comes from certain birds that are unknown to them. The Montagnais say it is the effort of a genius to bring up a snake which he hath swallowed; and they found this notion on observing that when the thunder falls upon a tree, it leaves something like, the shape of a snake.

The Konzas believe that, when a man is killed in battle, the thunder takes him up, they do not know whither. In going to battle each man traces an imaginary figure of the thunder on the soil, and he who represents it incorrectly is killed by the thunder.

The Delawares, who knew nothing of the cause of natural phenomena, nor do they desire to be informed of them, conceived thunder to be a spirit dwelling in the mountains, and now and then sallying forth to make himself heard. Some of them imagined it to proceed from the crowing of a monstrous turkey-cock in the heavens; others from enraged evil spirits.

Carver says in his _Travels_: "We had just landed, and were preparing to set up our tents for the night, when a heavy cloud overspread the heavens, and the most dreadful thunder, lightning, and rain, issued from it that ever I beheld. The Indians were greatly terrified, and ran to seek such shelter as they could. The Indian chiefs themselves, though their courage in war is usually invincible, could not help trembling at the horrid combustion."--_Carver_, 56. The southern Indians believe thunder to be the voice of the Almighty.--_Adair,_ 86. They believe that Minggo Ishto Eloa, "the great chieftain of thunder" sometimes binds up the clouds and withholds rain.--_Ibid_., 89.

Eclipses they attribute to the attempts of the Evil Spirits to embarrass the labours of the luminary which is eclipsed. "The first lunar eclipse," says Adair, "I saw, after I lived with the Indians, was among the Cherokees in 1736; and, during the continuance of it, their conduct appeared surprising to one who had not seen the like before; they all ran wild, this way and that way, like lunatics, firing their guns, whooping and hallooing, beating of kettles, ringing horse-bells, and making the most horrid noises that human beings possibly could. This was done to assist the suffering moon."--_Adair_, 65.

(6) _The chief gives her to him_.--p. 156.

Marriages among the Indians are proposed and concluded in different ways. Thus, among the Delawares, the parents on both sides, having observed an attachment growing up between two young persons, negotiate for them. This generally commences from the house where the bridegroom lives, whose mother is the negotiatrix for him, and begins her duties by taking a good leg of venison or bear's meat, or something else of the same kind, to the house where the bride dwells, not forgetting to mention that her son has killed it. In return for this, the mother of the bride, if she otherwise approves the match, which she well understands by the presents to be intended, will prepare a good dish of victuals, the produce of the labour of women--such as beans, Indian corn, or the like--and then, taking it to the house where the bridegroom lives, will say, "This is the produce of my daughter's field, and she also prepared it." From this time (if the presents be accepted) not only presents of this kind are continued on both sides, but articles of clothing are presented to the parents of each party by way of return for what they have received, and of these the young people always have a share. The friendship between the two families daily increasing, they do their domestic and field-work jointly, and when the young people have agreed to live together, the parents supply them with necessaries, such as a kettle, dishes, bowls, &c. &c.

The men who have no parents to negotiate for them, or who otherwise choose to manage the matter for themselves, have two simple ways of attaining their object. The first is by stepping up to the woman whom they wish to marry, saying, "If you are willing, I will take you as wife;" when, if she answers in the affirmative, she either goes with him immediately, or meets him at an appointed time or place. The other method is--(I give it in their bad English)--"Indian, when he see industrious squaw, which he like, he go to _him,_ place his two fore-fingers close aside each other, make two look like one--look squaw in the face--see _him_ smile, which is all one _he_ say _yes!_ So he take _him_ home."

Among the Iroquois, Miamis, &c. treaties of marriage are entirely carried on by the parents; the parties interested do not appear at all, but give themselves up entirely to the will of those on whom they depend. The parents, however, do not conclude any thing without their consent, but this is only a formality. The first advances must be made by the matrons. Not but that, if any girl were to continue too long without being sued for, her family would act underhand to procure her a suitor.

In some places the young man is contented to go and sit by the side of the young woman in her cabin; and, if she suffers it and continues in her place, it is taken for her consent, and the marriage is concluded. The customs of the different tribes do not essentially vary. What should you say, my fair readers, at being "wooed and won" in this way?

(7) _Indian farm of marriage_.--p. 156.