NOTE.
(1) Courage of his race.—p. 205.
The North American Indian knows nothing of fear, he is perfectly insensible to danger. I am not now referring to the wonderful fortitude he displays while his enemies are exercising their cunning and dexterity in devising, and carrying into effect, torments which baffle description, but to the quality which is denominated courage among civilised nations. Tecumseh was one of the bravest men that ever lived, so was the celebrated Mackintosh. They must, however, be allowed to display their valour in their own peculiar manner. I shall further illustrate their remarkable and peculiar use of this quality by referring to some well attested instances of almost superhuman daring. The first is of a young Andirondack or Algonquin chief named Piskaret. The story will further illustrate the mode of warfare used in these bloody expeditions.
"Piskaret set out for the country of the Five Nations, about the time the snow began to melt, with the precaution of putting the hinder part of his snow-shoes forward, that if any should happen upon his footsteps, they might think he was gone the contrary way; and, for further security, went along the ridges and high grounds, where the snow was melted, that his track might be often lost; when he came near one of the villages of the Five Nations, he hid himself till night, and then entered a cabin, while every body was fast asleep, murdered the whole family, and carried their scalps into his lurking-place. The next day, the people of the village searched for the murderer in vain. The following night he murdered all he found in another cabin. The inhabitants next day searched likewise in vain for the murderer; but the third night a watch was kept in every house. Piskaret, in the night, bundled up the scalps he had taken the two former nights, to carry, as the proof of his victory, and then stole privately from house to house, till at last he found an Indian nodding, who was upon the watch in one of the houses; he knocked this man on the head: but, as this alarmed the rest, he was forced immediately to fly. He was, however, under no great concern from the pursuit, being more swift of foot than any Indian then living. He let his pursuers come near him from time to time, and then would dart from them. This he did with design to tire them out with the hopes of overtaking him. As it began to grow dark, he hid himself, and his pursuers stopped to rest. They, not being apprehensive of any danger from a single man, soon fell asleep, and the bold Piskaret observing this, knocked them all on the head, and carried away their scalps with the rest."—Colden's History of the Five Nations, Lond. 1747, p. 26.
Another instance which I shall relate of courage and intrepidity will at the same time show the abolition of a bloody rite said to have been peculiar to the Pawnee Loups, of making propitiatory sacrifices to Venus, or the Great Star.
"An Ietan woman, who was brought captive into the village, was doomed to the Great Star, by the warrior, whose property she had become by the fate of war. She underwent the usual preparations, and, on the appointed day, was led to the cross, amidst a great concourse of people, as eager, perhaps, as their civilized fellow-men, to witness the horrors of an execution. The victim was bound to the cross with thongs of skin, and the usual ceremonies being performed, her dread of a more terrible death was about to be terminated by the tomahawk and the arrow. At this critical juncture, Petalesharoo (son of the Knife Chief), stepped forward into the area, and, in an hurried but firm manner, declared that it was his father's wish to abolish this sacrifice; that, for himself, he had presented himself before them, for the purpose of laying down his life upon the spot, or of releasing the victim. He then cut the cords which bound her to the cross, carried her swiftly through the crowd to a horse, which he presented to her, and having mounted another himself, he conveyed her beyond the reach of immediate pursuit; when, after having supplied her with food, and admonishing her to make the best of her way to her own nation, which was at the distance of at least four hundred miles, he was constrained to return to his village. The emancipated Ietan had, however, the good fortune, on her journey of the subsequent day, to meet with a war-party of her own people, by whom she was conveyed to her family in safety.
"Another display of the firmness and determination of the young warrior was required to abolish this sacrifice, it is to be hoped for ever. The succeeding spring, a warrior, who had captured a fine Spanish boy, vowed to sacrifice him to the Great Star, and accordingly placed him under the care of the magi for that purpose.
"The Knife Chief, learning the determination of the warrior, consulted with his son, respecting the best means of preventing a repetition of the horrible ceremony. 'I will rescue the boy,' said Petalesharoo, 'as a warrior should, by force;' but the Knife Chief, unwilling that his son should again expose himself to a danger so imminent as that which he had once encountered in this cause, hoped to compel the warrior to exchange his victim for a large quantity of merchandize, which he would endeavour to obtain with that view. For this purpose, he repaired to Mr. Pappan, who happened to be in the village for the purposes of trade, and communicated to him his intentions. Mr. Pappan generously contributed a considerable quantity of merchandize, and much was added by himself, by Petalesharoo, and other Indians.
"All this treasure was laid in a heap together, in the lodge of the Knife Chief, who thereupon summoned the warrior before him. The chief armed himself with his war-club, and explained the object of his call, commanding the warrior to accept the merchandize, and yield up the boy, or prepare for instant death. The warrior refused, and the chief waved his club in the air towards the warrior. 'Strike!' said Petalesharoo, who stood near to support his father; 'I will meet the vengeance of his friends.' But the more prudent and politic chief added a few more articles to the mass of merchandize, in order to give the warrior another opportunity of acquiescing without forfeiting his word.
"This expedient succeeded; the goods were reluctantly accepted, and the boy was liberated."—James's Account of an Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, ii, 81.
II. THE WARNING OF TEKARRAH.
It was at early nightfall, on a warm and beautiful day, in the month which the white man calls June, but which the red man calls the Hot Moon, that a little fleet, consisting of three small bateaux, fitted out at Montreal, and conveying a body of pale-faced warriors, under the command of one whose hair was white and whose face was seamed with scars, entered the mouth of the Oswego[46]. This petty armament was joined at the beginning of the following season of sleep by a great number of canoes that contained the traders, artizans, and labourers, with their families, together with such tools and utensils as had been deemed necessary for the commencement of a new settlement, which it was the design of the chief of the strangers to establish on the south side of Lake Ontario. They brought with them, besides a great quantity of provisions, the usual articles wherewith to traffic with the possessors of the soil. The Oswego—as my red brothers know—is principally formed by the confluence of the outlets of those numerous lesser lakes that diversify and adorn the vast space of country that lies between the Great Ocean and the Lake of Storms[47]. Its course is northward, and, after whirling and foaming along the narrow and obstructed channel that nature seems to have grudgingly lent for its passage, it finds repose in the small harbour bearing its name, which mingles its contributions with the placid but mighty waters of the west.
On the eastern part of this harbour, and on a site sufficiently elevated to command its entrance, this party of daring adventurers began to construct a defence against the attacks of your race. Before the frosts of winter had robbed the surrounding forest of its foliage, or compelled the wild-duck to seek a retreat in the secluded waters of the warm south, or the deer had gathered to their couch of leaves in the thicket, a rude but effectual barrier to hostile attack was raised and completed. The intervening summer had been passed by the artisans and labourers, not only in the building of the fortress, but in the erection of such cabins and lodging-places for warriors within its enclosure, as were deemed requisite for the protection of its inmates from the piercing winds, and cold rains, and chilling frosts, of winter. In the mean time the traders had been diligently and successfully employed in exchanging their beads and trinkets, their knives, blankets, and strong waters, with the men of the adjacent woods, for fish and venison to supply the immediate wants of the warriors, and furs and skins to send to the land of their birth. The Indians, with whom this intercourse and barter was carried on, were of the tribe of the Onandagas. They inhabited a valley as fair as the sun ever shone upon. From a point in the interior—distant more than a sun's journey to the south, this capacious valley opens and widens as it advances northwardly—presenting, in its general outline, an immense space, with three sides, the base of which, for the distance of half a sun's travel, is washed by the waters of the beautiful Ontario. As it recedes from the lake, its surface rises gradually to the point or tip, whence, did the strength of vision and the shape of the earth permit, the eye might command a complete survey of the valley, and of the inland ocean that spreads before it. On either side, it is bounded by steep and high hills that verge towards each other as they stretch to the south, and whose elevation increases, until they are lost among a range of lofty mountains, at the termination of the valley.
At this precise point, there gushes forth, from beneath a huge and precipitous rock, a large spring of pure and clear water, cool and refreshing as the dark forest through which it glides, and which, after a sinuous course along the centre of the dell, receiving as it flows the contributions of numerous lesser springs and streams, communicates its waters to the foaming current of the Oswego. Whether this singular but beautiful region now presents the form in which it was first fashioned by the Master of Life, or has since received the shape and appearance it bears from the disruption of some mighty mass of waters, from frightful earthquakes, or some other great convulsion of nature—neither I nor my red brothers can say. Yet does it appear plain that no convulsive heavings of an earthquake could have left its outline or its surface so smooth or regular. No bursting of waters from the top of a mountain (a mountain too, having no capacious bosom for its reception) could have borne away such an immense body of earth as must have been scooped out from between the high and wide-spreading hills.
But, if this region was singular in its formation, it was not less so in the character and manners of the tribe by which it was peopled. They claimed direct descent from the Great Spirit—the Creator of the world. Regarding themselves as his offspring, they deemed themselves the especial objects of his fatherly care. Deeply possessed with a sense of this superhuman relation, it will not be matter of surprise to my brothers that they should refer to it all the more important events of their lives, and that it should impart its influence even to the minuter circumstances of their daily intercourse both with strangers and with each other. From their belief of their relationship to the Good Spirit, they were a good people. Hence they were, according to their crude notions of religion, strictly a religious people; and, although they worshipped the supposed founder of their race, rather with the qualified adoration that one pays to a good father watching over, and guiding from his dwelling among the stars, the destinies of his earthly children; and, although they were insensible to the deep and humble devotion, and piety, which belong to the worshippers of the same Being in the land of the pale-faces; yet was their superstition free from much of the grossness in which the idolatry of the people of the wilderness is usually buried. Their idols and images were indeed numerous and of rude workmanship, but, like the images before whom kneel no small portion of the people of the land which was mine, they were professed to be worshipped only as the visible representations of invisible spirits. Human sacrifices were not known among them—for they rightly held that the Great Spirit was a kind and affectionate Father, and could not delight in the shedding of the blood of his children, or seeing them sacrificed on his peaceful altars. They had numerous fasts and feasts, but they were accompanied by no cruel rites. Those who presided over the religious ceremonies and observances of this simple people, united, as is usual among most, if not all unenlightened nations, the character and office of priest and prophet—of expounders of visions and dreams—and had the ordering of fasts in the acceptable manner, and at the proper time. They were few in number, and universally revered, beloved, and feared. Their influence and authority were felt in every cabin in the nation. No restraint being imposed upon them, as it is upon the priests in the City of the Rock, they had no inclination to impose any unnatural restraint upon others. Assailed by no external temptations to indulgence themselves, their prohibitions were limited to the very few gratifications that are inconsistent with the habits of Indian life. Avarice was a passion of which neither they nor their tribe had, as yet, felt the influence. All things were in common; and individual appropriation of property was unknown. The "strong waters" of the white man, the fire which hath eaten into the bowels of the race of the red man, had not yet diffused their poison, and drunkenness was a vice of which these people did not understand the meaning. A moral influence over the minds of their tribe was the only distinction to which the priests of Onondaga had aspired. This influence they sought to attain, not by inflicting penance upon the people, but by pretending to immediate intercourse and communication with the Great Spirit. Reverencing that Spirit, these good sons of the forest could not forbear to respect the channels through which his wise and benevolent communications were made.
Not only did these priests of the Manitou direct the devotions of the people, and convey to them the responses of the same mighty Being in times of peril, but won their love and confidence by professing to heal their maladies. Identified with them in their ordinary pursuits, they were, on common occasions, distinguished from them in exterior decoration only by a bone which they wore on the left arm, like a bracelet, just above the wrist, and by the method of arranging their hair. On their bracelets were carved, in rude outline, the representations of certain beasts; and on that of the eldest of the prophets were other cabalistic inscriptions, of which none but the wearers themselves could penetrate the meaning. Their hair, instead of hanging loosely over their foreheads and shoulders, as was usual with their tribe, in common with the other red men of the forest, was collected into a roll at the top of the head, and tied round with a string of red wampum, its extremities being suffered to fall on either side, as nature or accident might dispose it. When they would intercede with the Great Spirit, or know his will by divination, they assumed other dresses; the skins of bears or buffaloes, or mantles curiously woven of feathers. They usually dwelt together on a sort of consecrated ground, set apart for their special accommodation, and which was as unlike the rest of the valley, as the valley itself was unlike the ordinary conformation of the earth. The allotted ground, or space set apart for their use, was called The Prophets' Plain, and was situated on a projecting declivity of the western side of this beautiful glen, whose banks, although they presented, as they opened and widened to the north, a regular outline, were, nevertheless, varied in their actual surface by occasional deviations and sinuosities, arising as well from the unexplainable curvatures of its original structure, as from the narrow, deep ravines, that had been worn by the autumn floods and perennial streamlets from the adjacent hills. In like manner the surface of the bed of the valley was subject to frequent inequalities, produced, perhaps, by the nature of the soil on which it rested. It was formed of a soft stone and a hard stone. Where the latter prevailed, the surface was usually more elevated and undulating than where the former was found; and of that description was the spot appropriated to the prophets of Onondaga. It was situated about half a day's journey up the valley from the lake, and was sufficiently elevated above the circumjacent level to command a view of the broad bosom of the Ontario over the tops of the forest. Along its outer extremity glided the beautiful stream of the glen. Upon one side of the plain, where it was united to the hills, were the cabins of the prophets.
The whole range of the valley, including its bed, and steep lofty sides, was overspread with a dark and umbrageous forest. With this circumstance, the few scattered patches appropriated to the cultivation of maize, and "the openings," as they are denominated in the western world, present a problem of no very easy solution. They are unique in the vegetable kingdom, being midway between the nakedness of a prairie and the thick gloom of a wilderness. The few scattered trees that grow upon them are uniformly oak. They are separated from each other at unequal distances, but are rarely less than sixty yards apart. They do not shoot up to a lofty height, and destitute of branches like the tenants of the thick woods, but bow their heads, and spread their arms, as if conscious of their dependence upon the precarious charity of a long-cultivated country. Beneath them grows a coarse thin grass; but they are never encumbered with the shrubs and underwood that usually form very serious obstacles in the way of the forest traveller. The Prophets' Plain was the only exception. Along the junction of the plain with the western hill, its margin was thickly set with stunted pines, hemlocks, cedars, and, beneath, tangled briars. No one ventured to penetrate these sacred recesses, for there were extended, near the inner border, the few scattered wigwams of the prophets. Such was the character and description of the plain where the religious ceremonies of the Onondagas were performed, and where their council fires were lighted.
In the interval of eighteen seasons, that had rolled away since the erection of the fortress at Oswego, the character of the red men of the valley had undergone a great and disastrous change.
From the most peaceable, inoffensive, and happy, of all the sons of the forest, they had become the most dissolute, quarrelsome, and drunken. They were constantly seen about the villages of the whites begging, bartering every thing they possessed, and performing every drudgery, however servile or degrading, for the strong waters of the pale-face. The free and lofty spirit that once animated the nation was gone; a spirit which, though it had not been often aroused to action, was yet susceptible of the highest efforts of Indian heroism. Their encounters with the neighbouring tribes had not been frequent, yet, when they did take place, the Onondagas had displayed a spirit of intrepid daring, of craft, of patience, and of hardihood in suffering, that had seldom been surpassed among the nations of the forest. But now the spirit of the tribe was broken, and they were no longer numbered among the fierce resenters of wrong. The Oneidas trespassed upon their hunting-grounds and slaughtered their people, yet their warriors were too debased and abject to avenge the insult, or wipe away the memory of their wrongs with blood. They were, evidently, hastening to ruin. Their numbers were rapidly diminishing, as well from the usual effects of intoxication as from the exposures and accidents to which they were subjected from its influence; and, more than all, from the constant quarrels and murders which daily took place among them. In a few more years, if the course they then pursued had been continued, the whole tribe must have become utterly extinct; their name existing but in the recollection of the story-teller, and the green turf alone marking the lands they once inhabited. It fortunately happened, however, at the period alluded to, that the prophets, together with a few of the elder chiefs, who had stood aloof from the contaminating influence of the white men, were enabled to arouse the almost extinguished energy of the people, so far as to assemble them round a council-fire, that was lighted at early dawn one frosty morning, in the Moon of Falling Leaves, on the Prophets' Plain. The whole tribe was called together. A solemn gravity, even beyond the ordinary measure of Indian deliberation, sat upon the countenance of each chief and prophet, indicating that matters of high importance were impending. These sat in a circle around the great fire, their eyes cast upon the earth, and all silent as a grove of oaks in a calm morning. Without the circle of chiefs and prophets stood promiscuously grouped the remainder of the tribe—men, women, and children—all discovering more than common anxiety to learn the reason of the extraordinary call.
But let me not anticipate the circumstances that attended, nor the events that followed, the Warning of Tekarrah[48], as recited by Wonnehush, chief of the Onondagas.
From a remote corner of the camp, this aged man intimated an intention to speak. A deep silence pervaded the whole crowd, and every eye was fixed upon him. After a short pause, he slowly rose, and cast an anxious eye around the room in which the fire was lighted. But his eye, although it retained proof of its former power and lustre, had now become dim with age. His furrowed brow, his whitened locks, and bended form, once as straight as the arrow that sped from his youthful bow, evinced the ravages which time had made on his noble form. Yet his voice was still strong and clear. At length, adjusting the folds of his blanket, he stretched forth his withered arm, and, with the dignity of one from the Land of Souls, and with all the eloquence of his race, thus addressed the wandering inmates of the camp:—
Brothers, shall Wonnehush tell you a lie? No! Let the white man, whose heart is the heart of a fawn, and whose ways are the ways of the serpent, let him speak with a forked tongue. It is for him that lives in great towns, and buys his bread by selling strong waters, to poison the red men—it is for him to deal in lies. The red man hunts the buffalo, and traps the beaver in the woods that were given him by the Great Spirit. He crosses the big mountain, and enters the deep valleys beyond it, and no man dares to stop his path. He has a great heart, and scorns to tell a lie. Hear, then, the words of Wonnehush!
Brothers, I am an oak of the forest. The snows of a hundred winters have fallen on my branches. Once the tree was covered with green leaves, but they have dropped at my side, and the sap, which once made the tree strong and flourishing, has left the trunk, and the moisture has decayed from my roots.
Brothers, I am an aged, a very aged man. I can no longer bend the bow of my youth, and my tomahawk falls short of its death-mark. But my ears have been open, and my tongue can repeat to you the traditions of the valley. Listen to the chief of Onondaga, and believe the words he will tell you, for he never spoke other than the truth. He never in youth had a forked tongue, or a faint heart, and why should he bear them now?
Brothers, the flowers of the prairie have blossomed and faded, and the leaves of the forest budded and withered, more than fifty times since the canoes of the white men entered the mouth of the Rapid River. My tribe was then spread from the lake to the mountain, and the smoke of their cabins curled over the tops of the hemlocks, from Skeneateles to Oneida. The Great Spirit was their kind father. He looked into their wigwams, and saw they were happy. They hunted the fat bear, the stately moose, and the delicious deer, through wide forests, and speared the juicy fish of many waters. Their hearts were very stout, and their arms were very long. In war, who were so brave as the Onondagas?—The scalps of their enemies were strung as thick upon their belt-girdles as the stars in the path of the Master of Life. Their wives were good and affectionate, their sons strong and brave, and their daughters sweet-tempered and beautiful. They were happy, for they were virtuous, and favoured by the Great Spirit, for they did all they could to deserve his love.
Brothers, the white man came over the Great Lake, and settled down upon all the best spots of the land, as the wild-duck lights upon the lake which contains his favourite food. Soon his brothers joined him, and, to protect their coward hearts from the red men, they built a fort at Oswego. To that vile spot they enticed our young men, and our women, to bring them the spoils of the water and the land—the fish, venison, and skins—and gave them wampum and the fire-eater in exchange. When they had swallowed the strong waters of the pale-faces, they became as beasts, and fell about the earth like trees shivered by lightnings, or prostrated by the tempest. When they arose from the earth, it was to quarrel with each other. The ground was wet, and the waters red, with the blood of Onandagas slain by the hands of their brothers. They sought the deer, and the bear, and the moose, and the wolf, no more, or, if they sought, their hands were so enfeebled by the strong waters that the quest was fruitless, and the maize which was planted was suffered to be choked with weeds. Instead of the noble pastimes of war and the chace, they loitered around the cabins of the white men; and, instead of the tongue which had been given them by their father, the Great Spirit, and with which they had spoken for many, many ages, they learned the tongue of the stranger. The words and wise sayings of the prophets had no longer a charm for them, and the traditions which once flowed from their lips to patient, and pleased, and attentive, hearers, were neglected for the lying tales of the stranger. The knees of the once swift runner shook like a reed in the wind. The heart of the once fearless warrior had become softer than woman's. The blood of his enemies no more reddened his tomahawk; his shout of onset was heard no more among the hills of the Iroquois. He became a prey to the cunning hatred of the strangers, whose anger was kindled against him because he was the son of the Great Spirit. And they mixed the poisonous juices of herbs with the strong waters they gave him, that his death might be sure. Is it strange that our people have disappeared from the plain, as the dew in the morning or the snows of the Planting-Moon before the beams of the noontide sun?
Brothers, more than thirty years have passed since a council-fire was kindled on the Prophets' Plain, in the Moon of Early Frost. It was a great fire, for there were assembled all the people of the valley. In the middle of the assembly stood the priests, next the chiefs and warriors of Wonnehush, and without them the aged men and women, and the children, and the wives of the warriors. Then the priests began the dance and the howl, wherewith they commence their invocations to the Great Spirit. Suddenly there appeared in the midst of the people a stranger who was a head taller than the tallest man of the nation. His form was noble and majestic beyond any thing ever seen by our people. His eye had the brightness of the sunbeam, and his manner was graceful as the waving of a field of corn. Upon the border of his mantle were strange figures; and his belt of wampum glittered like the girdle of the heavens. He was one upon whom no Onondaga eye had ever before looked—a stranger in the valley—perhaps a warrior sent hither by one of the fierce tribes of the land to insult, by some reproach, for their effeminacy and weakness, the terror and sin-stricken Onondagas.
At length he rose to speak, and every sound was hushed, not only in the Indian camp, but in surrounding nature. Not a bird chirped; not a leaf was heard to rustle among the trees of the plain; the beasts of the forests were still; the busy bee desisted from its hum; even the winds were hushed and silent while the stranger delivered his solemn warning.
"I am," said he, "Tekarrah, the messenger of the Great Spirit. Onondagas, listen to my words! I am come from your father, that same Spirit, to speak the words of truth in your ears, and to tell you that he is exceedingly angry with you. You have exchanged your broad and rich lands for useless toys; you have taken the maize and the meat from the mouths of your starving children, to purchase from the strangers the strong waters which have made your warriors as timid as the deer you once hunted through the forests. You have thrown away the tongue which was given you by your Great Father, and have taken that of your destroyers. You have forgotten the deeds of your fathers, which made them feared and honoured from the Falls of the Mohawk to Lake Huron. The Great Spirit has spoken to you in his thunders, and by the mouth of his priests, but you have heard neither; and, though his blessings were showered thick upon you, you have been like adders, and stung the hand which dispensed them.
"Onondagas! hear the warning words of the Great Spirit. If you will return to your cabins, and forget the things that were taught you, and unlearn the tongue of the white man, to use again the language of your fathers—if, instead of the rifle, you will shoot with the bow, and cause the arrow to whistle instead of the bullet—if you will cease to give the spoils of the chace and the produce of your fields for beads and strong waters—if you will chase the Oneidas from your hunting-grounds, and again occupy them yourselves—then will the Great Spirit forgive you, and once more take you to his bosom. But, if you will not hearken to his voice, nor to the voice of his prophets, listen to the words of vengeance.
"Before twelve moons shall have faded from the skies, your tribe shall have passed away. Not an Onondaga shall be left to tell the proud story of the glory of his nation. The cabin of the pale-face shall be built on the burial spot of your fathers, and his herds and flocks shall feed on the consecrated ground of the priests. The white man shall say to his children—'Here once lived a people called the Onondagas. They once were the bravest of all the tribes of the land, but they became the most feeble and cowardly. It was the cunning of whites which wrought their ruin. We gave them strong waters—they tasted the poison—they loved it—and lo! we dwell upon their ashes.'"
Brothers, a sudden blast of wind shook the branches of the trees, a black cloud overspread the plain, and, although every eye seemed fixed upon the place where Tekarrah had stood, yet he was gone. He had come and vanished like one of those fiery balls that we see on a summer's evening, travelling in the misty valleys.
Brothers, we returned to our cabins, and pondered upon his words. They sunk deep into our hearts, and our tribe profited by the warning. We forsook all trade with the white men, and forgot their tongue. We threw away the rifle which was heard no more in our woods, and made the bow and arrow, and the tomahawk, and the war-club, again our weapons. Again we were clothed with the skins of the animals we slew in the chace, and the meat we killed in the woods was applied as it should be, to feed our young ones. The snows of more than thirty winters have whitened our valley, since we have abstained from the strong waters of the pale-faces. Our nation have since grown like the oak, firm and strong-rooted, and the Oneidas dare no longer kindle their fires on our border. Our warriors have hearts as stout as our fathers in the olden time; our runners outstrip the wild cat for agility, and the roebuck for speed. Our people linger no more round the settlement at Oswego, but are happy and contented in the deep shades of the forest, with the coarse but healthy enjoyments of Indian life. The Great Spirit again smiles upon his children, and they smoke in the calumet of peace. Our tribe is strong and war-like, in the full vigour of health, while the red men of other nations are perishing around us.
Brothers, hear me, for I am old, and your fathers were wont to hear the council of the elders. Remember the tale of Wonnehush; he tells you no lie. Carry his words to your tribes, and let the warning of Tekarrah be heard in every wigwam beyond the mountains.
Much has been said and written of the eloquence of the Indians, but it all conveys a very imperfect and inadequate idea of the beauty and excellence of their orations. They are untranslatable by whites, for we are without the nice perception of natural beauty and sublimity which the Indian possesses, and therefore cannot convey with accuracy and fulness his ideas of the external objects from which his figures and metaphors are drawn. If a bird flits before him, he discerns hues, and remarks circumstances in its notes and motions, which are imperceptible to the white man. The same acuteness which enabled an Indian scout to apprise his commander, and to apprise him correctly, that an "Indian, tall and very cowardly, with a new blanket, a short gun, and an old dog," had passed[49] where the utmost industry of his employer could find no trace or footstep, is carried into every pursuit, and forms a part of every faculty and quality of the Indian. But to return to his elocution.
That was a beautiful figure of Tecumseh's to an American, who speaking of the President of the United States had used the expression "Your Great Father." "My great father!" exclaimed the indignant chief; "the Sun is my father, and the earth is my mother, and I repose on her bosom."
When the Seminoles were defeated by General Jackson, their chief came into the presence of the victor with all the pride and firmness that belong to an Indian warrior. The conqueror demanded why he had surrendered so soon. "I have not surrendered soon," answered the chief; "I planted and harvested my corn on the right bank of the river of my people, while I fought the pale-faces on the left." This history of a warfare protracted to four months—for the period between the planting and harvesting of maize is of that or greater duration—was beautiful, though brief, but it was literally true. A gentleman present assured me that the dignity of his manner, as well as the matter of his speech, sent a thrill of awe to the bosom of every one of the assembly.
One of the most beautiful Indian speeches on record is that of Logan, the Mingo chief. It is one of the most affecting narratives of individual sorrow that I ever read. It has been frequently quoted—nevertheless there may be some to whom it may be new, and I shall transcribe it for their use. It is the language of truth and nature clothed in its most beautiful form.
"In the year 1774, a robbery having been committed by some Indians upon the white settlers on the Ohio, the latter undertook, in a summary way, to punish the outrage. They surprised, at different times, several of the Indian hunting parties, with their women and children, and murdered many of them. Among these was the family of Logan, a celebrated chief, who had always distinguished himself as the friend of the whites. This ungrateful return provoked his vengeance, and in the war which ensued he highly signalized himself. In the autumn of that year, the Indians were defeated in a decisive battle, and sued for peace. Logan, however, disdained to be seen among the suppliants. But, in order that no distrust might arise in the treaty on account of the absence of so celebrated a warrior, he sent, by the hands of General Gibson, the following speech, to be delivered to Lord Dunmore, the governor of Virginia:—
"I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry, and he gave him not meat: if ever he came cold and naked, and he clothed him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love for the whites, that my countrymen pointed as they passed, and said, 'Logan is the friend of white men.' I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injuries of one man. Colonel Crespal, the last spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not even sparing my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge; I have sought it; I have killed many; I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace; but do not harbour a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan?—Not one."
III. THE LEGEND OF POMPERAUG.
Three suns, and no more, would it take the feet of a fleet Mohawk to journey to the spot which contains the dust of Pomperaug, the last man of his tribe. The spot where that chief drew his breath was a small and level valley, surrounded by lofty and thickly wooded hills, with a cool, clear, bright, little stream, rippling through its green and flowery meadows. When he first saw the light of the great star, this spot was not divested of its trees; my countrymen, from the distant regions over the great waters, came with their sharp axes and lithe arms, and swept away the loved retreats of the red inhabitants of the land. The beautiful trees which hung over the quiet little river of Pomperaug and his people, like a mother bending over her sleeping infant, fell before them like a field of corn bowed to the earth by a tempest of wind. And very soon was the tribe itself swept away by the same resistless torrent which divested their land of its sylvan adornments. The Great Sachem of the East, who dwelt on the lofty Haup, having engaged in a war with my brethren, the Pomperaugs took part with the king of the Pequods, and a large part of them shared in his destruction. The chief fell, pierced by the arrow of the Great King. His son, still a boy, with a remnant of his father's people, when the war was finished by the death of the warlike and cunning Sachem of Haup, returned to their native valley: and, submitting themselves to their conquerors, sat down by the beloved river, and, apparently were content to toil for the white man in the fields which had once been their own. Yet it was with a deep remembrance of their wrongs, and a determination, at a convenient opportunity, to take a deep and bloody revenge. The period had now arrived when the young chief had reached the age of manhood. He took, as was the custom of his fathers, the name of his tribe, and was accordingly called Pomperaug. A nobler youth was never seen, either red or white. He was tall, and finely formed, with an eye that gleamed like the flashes of the diamond, and a brow, upon which were stamped the greatness of his mind, the lofty and honourable feelings which filled his soul. He was such a one as the Indian contemplates with delight, and gazes upon with idolatry. His foot was swift as that of the deer; his arrow was sure as the pursuit of the eagle; his sagacity penetrating as the light of the sun. The maidens of his own tribe looked upon him with eyes of love; and there were not a few among the maidens of my own colour who confessed that he was "beautiful, and noble in form, and worthy to be loved by red and white."
Such was Pomperaug. But his nation was passing away, and but fifty of his own tribe now dwelt in the valley in which his fathers, numberless as the leaves upon the oaks under which they dwelt, had hunted for many ages. The day of their dominion was past. There was a spell over the dark warrior. The Great Spirit had sealed his doom. He had sent strange men to his shores—and a change had come over the face of the land. The thickly settled town—the lofty spire of the house where men assembled to worship the Great Being—the fields, green, and glowing with the deep verdure of spring—the slopes of the hills, made smooth with cultivation—had taken the place of the lofty forest, from which arose the cry of the red warrior, as he rushed on his foes, or the plash of his oar, as he swept his light canoe on his expeditions of war or love. The stranger had built his house upon the margin of his favourite streams, whence a portion of his daily food was procured; and he, whose soil it was, had fled from the profanation of his father's bones. One by one, like leaves in the Harvest-Moon, had they dropped from the vision of those around them. To-day, you saw a son of the forest with an eye like the eagle's, and a foot like the antelope's; to-morrow, he was gone, and gone without a token. The waters that lave the thirsty sands of the seashore sink not more silently in their ebb than the Indians have disappeared from the vicinity of the abodes of white men. And in this same silent way floated down the stream of oblivion the Indians of the valley of Pomperaug. Perceiving that their doom was sealed, they patiently submitted to a fate which they could not avert.
It was, therefore, without resistance that they received into the heart of their little territory a company of the people of my nation. They were in number about thirty. Their governor, who was also their priest, was a man of great age, though possessed of all the mental and bodily vigour of youth. His years were more than three score and ten, and his hair as white as snow, yet his feet were sprightly as those of a young deer. His tall and broad form was still erect; his eye had lost none of its fire, nor his temper any of its energy; he was old in years, but young in the vigour of his soul.
This aged priest had brought to the valley of Pomperaug the remnant of a family of many souls. It was a maiden—the daughter of his only son who, with his wife, had slept many years in the house of death. Her name was Mary, and well might she be the object of all the earthly affections which still beat in the bosom of one whom death had made acquainted with sorrow, and who but for her had been alone.
Mary had now seen the harvest gathered in seventeen times. She was the most beautiful of all the maidens of the land. She was tall and slender, with a dark expressive eye, whose slow movements seemed full of soul and sincerity. Her hair was of a glossy black, parted upon a forehead of dazzling whiteness, and shading a cheek which vied in its blush with the pale rose of the wilds. And snow was not whiter than her stately neck, and rounded arm, and little hand.
They had been settled in the valley of Pomperaug but a few moons, when an application from the aged priest to purchase a portion of the young chief's lands brought him to the cabin of the former. It was a bright morning in autumn, and, while he was talking with the priest at the door, the lovely maiden, who had been gathering flowers, the late flowers of the season, in the adjacent woods, passed by them, and entered the hut. The eye of the young chief followed her with the gaze of entrancement. His face shone as if he had seen a vision of more than earthly beauty, some bright spirit of the air. But this emotion was visible only for a moment. With the habitual self-command of those who are trained in the wilds, he turned again to the aged priest, and calmly pursued the subject which occasioned their meeting.
Pomperaug went away, but he carried the image of the beautiful maiden with him. He retired to his wigwam, but it did not please him—a vacant and dissatisfied feeling filled his bosom. He went to the top of the high rock, at the foot of which his hut was situated, and, seating himself upon the broad flat stone, cast his eyes over the river, upon which the beams of the morning were just beginning to cast their quivering light. The scene, once so pleasing, afforded him no joy. He turned away, and sent his long gaze over the checkered leaves of the forest, which spread like a sea over the beautiful valley. He was still dissatisfied. With a bound he sprang from the rock into the valley, and, alighting on his feet, snatched his bow, and took the path which led into the forest. In a few moments he returned listless and vacant, and, seating himself upon the rock, brooded for many hours in silence.
The sun of the next morning had been but a few minutes abroad on the earth, when Pomperaug repaired to the house of the aged priest to finish the business of the preceding day. He had before signified his intention to part with his land on the terms offered him, but he now declined.
"Why will not the son of the chief, who fell in the Moon of Green Corn, give to the pale-face for the things he wants the lands he does not plough, the woods that are bare of game, the waters whose fish glide unharmed by his spear?" demanded the priest.
"Listen, father—hear a red man speak," answered the young chief. "Mark yonder eagle—how joyous his flight among the clouds. The sky is his home, he loves it, and grief seizes his heart when he leaves it. Will he barter it for the sea? No. Look into the river, and ask the fish that sports so happy in its clear bosom, if he will sell his birth-place, and he will, if he speak at all, answer No. Shall the red man sell for a few strings of beads, and a piece of red cloth, the spot that contains his father's bones? No. Yet, father, I will part with my forests, if thou wilt give me the beautiful singing-bird that is in thy nest."
"Savage," said the priest indignantly and haughtily, "shall the lamb lie down in the den of the wolf? shall the fawn knock at the lair of the panther, and enter and take up her abode? Never! Name not the thing again—I would sooner see her die! Name it not." As he spoke he struck his cane forcibly on the ground, and his broad figure seemed to expand and grow taller, while his eye gleamed, and the muscles of his brow contracted, with a lowering and stern expression. The air and manner of the Indian were changed. His countenance while pleading his suit had worn an air of supplication unusual with his race, but his eye flashed fire at the reproof and the refusal of the priest to sanction his love, and his manner assumed a proud dignity which it had not before. As the dull colours of the snake, when he becomes enraged, are succeeded by the glowing hues of the rainbow, so was the meek look which Pomperaug had at first worn followed by one better befitting the untamed and stern lord of the forest.
The priest and the chief parted, and Pomperaug refused to sell his lands. He was now changed to all around him. With the white people he held no further communication, and said little to his own people, unless to cultivate in them a hatred of their neighbours. His whole soul was filled with love for the beautiful pale-face. His old and cherished pursuits and pastimes no longer gave him pleasure; the bow lay unstrung in a corner of his cabin, and his canoe was no longer seen, impelled by his strong arm, gliding over the river.
As might have been expected from the bitter disappointment of Pomperaug in not being able to obtain the maiden, and that of the priest at failing to obtain the coveted lands, difficulties soon grew up between the Indians and their neighbours, and violent feelings were shortly excited on both sides. This soon broke out into open quarrels, and one of the white men was shot by the arrow of an Indian hunter, as he was returning through the woods to his home. The whites determined to seek instant revenge, and accordingly, gathering their men together, they followed the Indians into the broken and rocky regions which lie east of the valley of Pomperaug, whither, expecting pursuit, they had retreated.
It was about an hour before sunset, when the Yengeese, consisting of twenty men well armed after the fashion of the whites, and led by the aged priest, who, old as he was, still retained the spirit of a youthful warrior, were marching through a deep ravine, about two miles east of their village. The rocks on either side were lofty, and so narrow was the dell, that the shadows of night had already gathered over it. The pursuers had sought their enemies the whole day in vain, and, having lost all traces of them, they were now returning to their homes. Untaught by dear bought experience, they marched along heedless of the dangers which surrounded them—disregardful of the advantages offered to their cunning foes by the rocks and thickly wooded eminences around them. Suddenly the shrill war-whoop burst from the rocks at their feet, and many armed Indians sprang up before them. An arrow pierced the breast of the aged priest, and he fell dead in front of his band. Two Indians met their death at the hands of their foes, the remainder sought the forest. Several of the Yengeese were wounded, but none mortally, save the priest.
With mournful silence they bore back the body of their father to the dwelling his aged feet had left but a few hours before. He was buried in a lonely and sequestered nook of the valley, and the orphan maiden turned away with a desolate and breaking heart, to be for the first time alone in the humble cabin in the wilderness.
A season had passed away, and another harvest had come. The tribe of Pomperaug had disappeared, and the rock on which the priest met his death had been consecrated by many prayers of those who loved him. His blood was still visible upon the spot, and thither his people often repaired to kneel, and offer up petitions for the repose of his spirit. They believed that their hearts were softened, and their spirits visited with the richest gifts of heavenly grace, when they came to the spot where he had met his death.
It was a mild and beautiful evening in summer, when the maiden for the last time went to spend an hour at this holy spot. Long had she knelt, and most fervently had she prayed to her kind creator. The sun went down, and, as the veil of evening fell, the full moon climbed over the ridge of rocks which rose on the east side of the valley, pouring its white light into the lone and quiet recesses and solitudes around her, and the good and beauteous maiden was still kneeling, still communing with that Being whom every nation and tongue, civilized and savage, red and white, delight to honour and worship—at least with their lips, though their hearts may be far from him.
At length, a slight noise, like the crushing of a leaf, woke her from her trance, and, springing quickly on her feet, and filled with sudden and unusual fears, she set out on her return to the village. Alarmed at her distance from home at such an hour, and by the sounds from time to time repeated, she proceeded along with great rapidity. She was obliged to climb up the rocks with great care, as the darkness rendered it a critical and dangerous task. At length she reached the top. Standing upon the verge of the cliff, she then turned a moment to look back upon the valley. The moon was shining full upon the vale, and she gazed with a mixture of awe and delight upon the sea of green leaves, which slept in death-like repose beneath her. She then turned to pursue her path homeward, but what was her amazement to see before her, in the full moonlight, the tall form of Pomperaug! She shrieked, and swift as his own arrow, sprang over the dizzy cliff. The young chief listened—there was a moment of silence—then a heavy sound like the falling of a body upon the hard earth—and the dell was still as the tomb.
The fate of the beautiful maiden was known only to Pomperaug. He buried her with a lover's care, amid the rocks of the glen. Then, bidding adieu to his native valley, with a bursting heart, he joined his people, who had retired to the banks of the distant Housatonac.
Many years passed away, and the swift and stealthy hunter had been succeeded by the patient and industrious white cultivator. Few traces of the Indian were remaining. The weak and irresolute—they who could see unmoved the dwelling-places of their fathers usurped by strangers, had found unhonoured graves in their own woods—the brave and resolute had gone yet farther into the forest. The rotten bow and quiver, and the rusted arrow, were frequently turned up by the plough, and little fields of scarce the breadth of an arrow's flight disclosed where the red man had once tasted his narrow enjoyments of home and shelter, and these were all that marked where he had been. The bitter persecutors of the rightful possessors of these wide-spread lands were in possession of every fertile spot, while the Indian roved in strange lands, a wanderer, and an outcast.
It was in the pleasant month when the birds build their nests on the boughs of trees, that a white man, seated on the margin of the river which swept along by the grave of the deceased maiden, saw a train of men slowly approaching, bearing a human corpse. He crept into a sequestered spot, and watched their progress. Approaching the little hillock where the dust of the maiden reposed, they deposited their load on the earth, and commenced digging a fresh grave by its side. When it was finished, they placed the corpse in it, together with the implements commonly buried with an Indian warrior, his bow, quiver of arrows, spear, pipe, &c. The white man, fearing discovery, retreated, and left them to finish their solemn labours unobserved. In the morning, the funeral train had departed, but the fresh earth and the low heap of stones revealed the secret. They remain there to this day, and the two little mounds are shown by the villagers, as the graves of the beautiful Mary and the faithful Pomperaug.
IV. THE SON OF ANNAWAN.
The son of the white man sat in his house on the border of the Indian nations, when there came a red man to his door, leading a beautiful woman with a little child in her arms, and spoke thus:—
"Dost thou see the sun?"
"I see the sun," answered the white man, haughtily.
"Three times," said the Indian, "has that sun risen, and thrice has he sunk from my eyes behind the dark hills of the west, since I or mine have tasted food. For myself, I care little—I am a man of the woods, a patient warrior; I can fast seven suns; I am not even now faint—but a tender woman has not the soul of a strong warrior, and when she sees not meat every day, she leans her head upon her hand, and when her child droops for food she weeps. Give me food."
"Begone!" said the white man, "I earn my bread and meat by the sweat of my brow—"
"On the lands of the Indian," interrupted the stern warrior.
"On my own lands—lands reclaimed from wildness—lands suffered to lie waste for ages, and only made to be of use to human beings when my race came hither with hard hands and patient souls, and felled the trees, and rooted out the obstacles which kept out the beams of the cherishing and invigorating sun. Begone to thy den in the wilderness!"
"Give me but food for the Sparrow and her little one, and the Hawk will go without. He has yet strength enough left to enable him to carry his feet to the wilds stocked with deer, and the Great Being will himself direct the arrow which is to procure the means to sustain life. But my wife and child, whose lives I value beyond my own, will faint and die, ere that distant spot be gained."
"You shall have no food here; I will not feed lazy Indians," answered the white man.
The Indian said nothing, but the pale and fainting mother looked on her sick infant and burst into tears.
There was sitting on the greensward at the Englishman's door a beautiful little girl not yet grown to perfect womanhood, but on its verge—a fawn far in its second season—a tree wanting but a few more suns to be clothed with the blossoms of maturity. She was the only child of the white man—the only pledge of love left him by a beloved wife who slept in the earth. She was most tenderly beloved by her father, and seldom asked any thing in vain. At her side sat a boy, perhaps two or three seasons older, playing with her the games of childhood.
"Father," said she, rising and approaching him in a supplicating manner, "suppose your daughter was cast friendless and hungry among the sons of the forest, and they denied her food. Would not the wrath of the Great Spirit be upon them for their inhumanity?"
The father looked thoughtful, but made no reply.
"Father, do you love your child?—If you do, permit her to feed the good Indian father who would starve himself so those he loves could be fed. Permit me to wipe the tears from the dark cheek of the mother, and to take a crumb of bread from your plenteous store to put in the mouth of the famished child."
The father could deny nothing to his beloved daughter, and, besides, the little boy pleaded for the famished Pequods also, and he yielded. With a light and bounding step the two children pursued the fainting Indians and brought them back. Food was set before them till their hunger was appeased; the little girl laid the little Indian babe on her own knee and fed it with her own hand, nor were they permitted to depart till refreshed by a rest of two days. They then returned to their own homes in the wilderness, and their little benefactors attended them to the skirts of the forest, two miles from the cruel father's dwelling.
Several seasons had passed away; the little girl, who had so kindly interposed to feed the miserable Indians, had grown to womanhood, and had become the wife of that boy and a mother. Her husband was a cultivator of the soil, and with the disposition to seek new lands, and try untried regions, which every where belongs to white men, he had built himself a cabin very far from the spot where he and his wife drew their breath. On the banks of a distant river, on a pleasantly situated little hill, which enjoyed the bright morning sun, he erected his cabin and sowed his wheat. He went not, however, to the wilderness alone: many other white men went with him, and, for protection against the red men of the forest, whose wrongs had stirred them to bitter hatred and revenge, they built a fort, to which they might retreat in case of danger. The cabin of the benefactors of the starving Indian family was at a distance of a mile from the fort—the husband being the first who had ventured to reside at such a distance from a garrison or fortified house.
"I shall return before dark," said he one day to his affectionate wife, as he was preparing to go down to the fort on some business. "There is no danger, my beloved," continued he, as he took up his little son, and, kissing him, laid him in his fond mother's arms.
"But my dreams, my husband—my frightful dreams of tall savages and shrill war-whoops!" said she.
"Oh! that should not frighten you," he replied. "Remember, you had been listening all the evening to dark and terrific stories of what had been done by the native warrior when he raised his arm in defence of his birth-place. Dreams are caused by that which most engrosses our thoughts—particularly just as we are going to sleep. There have not been any traces of the Indians discovered this season, and I should be sorry to raise an alarm among our friends merely upon account of a dream."
"But you know, my husband," said she, "that they are a secret, as well as a terrible enemy—they are, you know, eagles for daring, panthers for fierceness, adders for secrecy, and foxes for cunning." And she raised her mild eyes to her husband's face with that pleading expression when tears seem ready to start, and are yet checked by the fear of giving pain to the one beloved. A fond husband finds it impossible to withstand the tears of his wife, and he said, quickly, "I will not go to the garrison to-day."
"But you promised your father, and he will expect you," answered she. "You must go. I know my fears are the fears of a child, but they shall not make me wicked. I am too apt to think my security depends on your presence. I forgot that the One mighty to save can defend me, and that trust in Him is a shield to the believer. You must go."
"But I will not go without you," said her husband, who now began to feel the fears she was endeavouring to shake off. "Come, prepare the child, and we will go down together. If there has been any alarm, we will not return to-night, but pass it under the protection of the fort."
The wife paused a few moments, as if considering what she should do. I need not tell you, for you know that nothing is so difficult to explain—nothing so contradictory as the feelings and wishes of the human heart. A few moments since she would have thought that if she could accompany her husband she should be perfectly safe—that his presence would obviate every danger ere it arose. But now other considerations presented themselves to her mind. If he went not to the council, he might incur reproof for listening to a woman's fears and dreams; and dread of ridicule prevented her from accompanying him.
"I will have more fortitude," said she, smiling. "I will not make a fool of you, though I appear like one myself—you shall not have reason to be ashamed of your wife—I will not go." And she sat down resolutely, determined to conquer her fears. It was in vain that her husband urged her to accompany him. The more she saw his affectionate anxiety on her account, the more she laboured to suppress her fears, till finally she persuaded him, and herself too, that she felt no uneasiness at all from the prospect of passing a lengthened period alone, and he departed.
But she had affected resolution which she was far from feeling. She felt a presentiment that danger was nigh, and it weighed heavily on her heart. But she saw him depart without tears, and, after watching him from the door till he entered the forest, betook herself to the usual duties of a woman in the house of her husband. Yet she could not forbear going frequently to the door, and sometimes she would wander forth, and gaze all around their little field, and then watch the progress of the sun, with an expression of countenance, that, to an observer, would instantly have revealed the agitation and anxiety which her heart was suffering. But she saw nothing to inspire fears—indeed there was much to tranquillize them. Every thing abroad was in perfect quiet. There was scarcely a breath of air perceptible; and the waters of the beautiful Merrimack flowed without a ripple. The calm sky of the last month of summer looked of a deeper and more heavenly blue, seen as it was by her from a spot circumscribed by tall trees, now clothed with such a fulness of foliage as made the forest appear dark and almost impenetrable. Close around the house were planted corn and vegetables; and a field of wheat, in front of the dwelling, stretched in unbroken green to the river's brink. There was not a sound to be heard—save the chirping of a robin that had built her nest on a lofty chesnut which stood close to the south-east corner of the house—the only tree suffered to grow within the enclosure. The young birds were fully fledged, and, under the guidance of the parents, were about quitting their nest. The lovely wife watched their movements; the old birds now encouraging, now seeming to chide, their timid offspring, till finally they reached the woods, and all disappeared. Slight as the circumstance was, it touched her with a feeling of loneliness. "Even the birds have left me," said she to herself, and, pressing her boy closer to her bosom, she burst into tears. She might well be excused these tears and feelings, for, though a wife and mother, she had seen the leaves fall but seventeen times.
She watched the sun till it sunk behind the western hills, and then she watched its beams on the clouds till the last faint tints had departed: and, fixing her eyes stedfastly on that part of the forest, from which she expected to see her husband emerge, she sat at the door, with her child in her arms, watching, in vain, for his appearance. As the evening waxed later, and her fears increased, she sometimes imagined she saw strange figures and ferocious faces, with eyes beaming wrath and vengeance, such as she had beheld in her dream, moving about the dusky apartment. Ashamed of these fears, and knowing that her husband, when he came home, would chide her for thus exposing herself and her child to the evening dews, she breathed a short prayer to Him who stilled the tempest, and entered the house. Her first care, after placing her infant in his cradle, was, to light a candle, and then, more reassured, she took the sacred book from which white men gather their belief of the land of souls and of future happiness. That book is the "charm," and the protecting "medicine" of the white men. They believe that it guards them from evil, and guides them to good; its pages are a direction in every difficulty—its promises a resource in every trial. She read and prayed alternately, mingling the idea of her husband, his safety and return, with every thought and wish, but still he came not. She had no means of ascertaining the lapse of time, except by the stars, as there was no moon; but she conjectured that it must be past the hour of midnight. Again and again she went forth, and examined with a searching glance every thing around, but nothing could she see, except the dark forest in the distance, and, close around her dwelling, the black stumps that stood like sentinels on guard—while nothing was heard, save the soft murmur of the water, and, at times, a low rustling, as the breeze stirred the leaves of the chesnut-tree, or swept over the field of ripe wheat.
At length, as she stood at the corner of the cabin, beneath the shade of the chesnut, of which I have before spoken, looking earnestly towards the distant woods, she saw, or thought she saw, something emerge from their shadow. Whatever it was, it vanished instantly. She kept her eyes fixed on the spot. A bright starlight enabled her to discern objects distinctly, even at a distance, especially when her faculties were roused and stimulated, both by hope and fear. After some time, she again and plainly saw a human figure. It rose from the ground, looked and pointed towards her house, and then again disappeared. She recollected her light. It could be seen from the window, and probably had attracted the notice of the Indians, who, she could no longer doubt, were approaching. They had, as she fancied, waylaid and killed her husband—and were now coming to destroy herself and her child. What should she do? She never thought of attempting to escape without her babe; but in what direction should she fly, when, perhaps, the Indians surrounded the cabin? There was one moment of terrible agony, when the mangled form of her husband seemed before her, and she heard, in idea, the shrieks of her babe beneath the tortures of your race, till her breath failed, and reason seemed deserting her. But she made a strong effort to recall her wandering senses, and then, with her eyes and clasped hands raised to that place where the white man believes his God to reside, she took her resolution. With a noiseless step she entered her dwelling, extinguished the light, took her infant in her arms, and again stole softly forth, creeping along in the shadow of the house, till she reached the spot whence she had first seen the object which alarmed her. Here she stood perfectly still. Her infant lay on her bosom in profound sleep—as quiet and seemingly as breathless as though his spirit had already departed. She did not wait long before the same dark figure again rose, looked around, and then sank down as before. The moment it disappeared, she passed swiftly and softly, as a shadow, over the space that separated the cabin from the chesnut-tree. This tree was an uncommonly large one, and there was a separation of the trunk into two branches, about half the height of a tall man from the ground, where the shuddering wife thought it possible that she might conceal herself. She gained it, and placed herself in a position which allowed her to watch the door of her dwelling. All was silent for a long time—more than that space, which among my people, is called an hour, and she began to doubt the reality of what she had seen, imagining she had been deceived, and taken a stump for a human figure; and she was about to descend from the tree, where her situation had become uncomfortable, when suddenly a forest warrior stept by her, between the house and the tree. As another, and another, followed, it was with difficulty she suppressed her screams. But she did suppress them, and the only sign she gave of fear, was to press her infant closer to her bosom. They reached the door, and a sound of surprise at finding it open was muttered by the first who approached it, and replied to by the second. After a short consultation they entered, and she soon saw a light gleam, and supposed they had kindled it to search for her. Her pulse beat wildly; yet, still she hoped to escape. It was not probable that they would search a tree so near the cabin; they would rather suppose she had fled to a distance. Presently a crackling noise was heard in the cabin, and a bright light, as of flame, flashed from the door and window. Presently the Indians rushed out, and, raising their wild yell, danced around the cabin with their usual demonstrations of joy, when they have accomplished a purpose of revenge. The cabin was in flames.
Still the only sign she gave of fear was, as she unloosed the handkerchief from her neck and threw it over her child's face to screen his eyes from the glare of light that might awaken him, to press him closer and closer to her heart.
The house was unfinished; there was nothing to delay, for a moment, the progress of the fire which had been kindled in the centre of the apartment, and fed by all the combustibles that could be found in the dwelling. The flame very soon caught the rafters and boards, and it seemed that she had scarcely time to breathe a dozen times, before the blaze burst through the roof. The atmosphere, rarified by the heat around the burning building, suddenly expanded, and the cold and more dense air rushing in, it seemed as if a sudden wind was blowing violently. The current drove the thick smoke, and showered the burning cinders, directly on the chesnut-tree. She felt the scorching heat, while the suffocating vapour almost deprived her of the power of respiration. She grew dizzy; yet still the only movement she made was, to turn her child a little in her arms, that he might be more effectually shielded from the smoke. At that moment, one of the warriors approached, in the wild movements of his dance, close to the tree. An eddy of wind swept away the smoke; the light fell full on the pale face of the horror-stricken woman; her eyes, as if by the power of fascination, were rivetted on the tall and dusky form of the son of the forest; his fiery glance was raised toward her, and their gaze met. She gave a start; and the note of his wild war-song was shriller as he intently regarded his victim. Suddenly he turned away. Murmuring a short prayer to her God, the trembling woman resigned herself to death, as she heard them all send forth a prolonged whoop.
"My boy! My husband! We shall meet, we shall all meet in Heaven!" she cried.
But why did not the Indians approach? She listened, looked around, and soon saw them flying with the speed of frighted deer across the space of cleared land, illuminated by the bright glare, to the covert of the wood. She did not pause to consider what had caused their flight; but, obeying that instinct which bids us shun the present danger, perhaps to encounter a greater more remote, she sprang from the tree, and rushed towards the river. She recollected a spot where the bank projected, beneath which, during the summer months, the bed of the river was nearly dry; there she should, at least, be secure from the fire.
And there she sheltered herself. Her feet were immersed in water, and she stood in a stooping posture to screen herself from observation, should the Indians return to seek her. In the mean time, her little boy slumbered peacefully, and regardless of surrounding perils. None of her fears or dangers disturbed his repose; and, when the morning light allowed her to gaze on his sweet face, lit up by the smiles of infantile joy, as he beheld the maternal eyes beaming love upon him, tears of bliss and thankfulness flowed fast down her cheeks that she had been enabled thus to shield that dear innocent from death.
Soon after the sun had risen she heard sounds as of people approaching, and soon recognised the voices of her friends from the garrison. She was conveyed, with her child, to the fort, which her husband had left, she learned, about sunset the preceding evening. Nothing was known, or could be discovered, of his fate; no track nor trace remained to show whether he was to be reckoned among the dead or the living.
The husband of her, whose escape from the wrath of red men I have related to the Iroquois, was returning from the fort to his own habitation, soon after the damps of evening were abroad on the earth. He was joyous and merry at the thought of embracing his beloved wife and child, and whistled and sang, as he went, like a lark in the morning. Just as he was entering the edge of a deep valley, which lay between his cabin and the protected dwellings of his friends, four Pequods rushed from the thick woods upon him. One of them seized his rifle before he had time to use it; while another struck him a blow on the head with his tomahawk, which deprived him of recollection, until near the return of the light.
When he did recover, he found himself lying at the foot of a tree, his hands bound, and an Indian guarding him. All efforts to escape he found would be vain, and he silently submitted to his fate. About mid-day the other three of his captors joined the one who guarded him, and, after conversing hastily a few moments, they began a hurried march. The prisoner perceived one of them examining him often and attentively, viewing him in various situations, apparently endeavouring to make out a recognition of one formerly known. At length, on the fourth day, as he was alone with the prisoner, he seated himself upon the smooth sward, and, bidding the other do the same, he addressed him in the following language:—
"Listen!"
"I listen," said the prisoner.
"Where hadst thou thy dwelling-place when thine arm was first able to bend a healthy sprout of a single season, and thy heart first began to count upon its strength to look upon the glaring eye-ball of a mad wolf?"
"Far from here," answered the prisoner, his eyes filling with tears, and sighs bursting from his heart, at the image of youthful love and bliss recalled to his mind by the allusion to his birth-place. "Upon the bank of a distant river, more than three suns travel from the spot where I became the captive of the red man."
"White men have forked tongues," answered the Pequod; "but thou shalt mark it out on the smooth surface of the white birch, that my memory may tell me if thou hast spoken true."
The prisoner, with a piece of coal taken from their fire, marked out the dwelling in which he resided at the period alluded to by the Indian. He seemed satisfied.
"It is well," said he. "Now show me the cabin to which thou wert going, when the red man paid a small part of his debt of vengeance on thy race, by taking thee captive."
The prisoner made a second drawing, representing his little field and his cabin, including the chesnut-tree.
"Was there another bird in the nest of thy father when thy soul first began to feel the proud confidence and conciousness of approaching manhood?" demanded the Pequod, eyeing him intently.
"There was," answered the captive—"a little maiden."
"And where is that bird now?"
"She is the wife of my bosom. Is, did I say—Alas! she may not be living—she has undoubtedly perished by the hands of the accursed beings who fired my dwelling, and chained the feet that would have carried me, with the speed of a deer, to her side—and bound the hands that would have unsheathed the sword of vengeance for her rescue."
The Indian made no answer to this burst of passion, but looked for a moment kindly and compassionately on the poor captive, and then relapsed into silence.
Early the next morning, the prisoner was awakened by the same man, who motioned him to rise and follow him. The rest of the party were not in sight. He obeyed, and they set out on their return, retracing their steps with the ease and accuracy, which, in every clime, belong to the forest hunter. Travelling rapidly, in silence, for two days, they found themselves on the morning of the third on the banks of his own river, the dark rolling Merrimack. Before the sun had reached the highest part of the heavens, they came to a little hill, well and fondly remembered by the affectionate husband, though now conveying agonizing hopes and fears. It overlooked the little valley where once his cabin stood, and where the ripe wheat still bowed itself, in graceful undulations, before the light breeze of summer; and the mighty chesnut-tree, blackened by the smoke of his burning dwelling, still looked with lordly pride on all its less stately neighbours. "My wife!" he said, in an almost inaudible voice.
"Thy bird will meet thee on another bough," exclaimed the warrior. "A crust of bread, and a drink of cold water, offered to a famished Indian—a tear of pity, and a sigh of compassion, saved her and thee." And his own dusky countenance exhibited a touch of feeling but seldom suffered to cross the face of him who deems it dishonour to betray an emotion of pity, or compassion, or gratitude, or love(1).
"I do not understand you," said the white man, prisoner no longer.
"Listen," said the warrior—"The son of Annawan was caught, with the dove of his nest and her squab, far from his own dwelling, and among the men of thy colour. Thy race had killed or driven away the beasts of the chace; and there was nothing upon which the red archer could show the sleight of his hand and the truth of his eye. White men would give him no food, but drove him from their cabins, saying, 'You are an Indian.' At the door of thy father—"
"He was not my father," interrupted the other; "he was the brother of my mother."
"At the door of the brother of thy mother hard words were showered on the poor red man, and he was bidden to seek elsewhere the food for which his soul panted—not that he might eat it himself, but bestow it upon his famished wife and sick babe. Listen!
"There was a little maiden sitting at the door of the cabin—she was not grown to womanhood, nor dreamed yet of tender lovers—she was a fawn in its second season, a tree wanting but a few more suns to be clothed with the blossoms of maturity. By her side sat a boy, who might be two or three harvests older. The little maiden rose from the smooth sward where she sat, and throwing her white arms around the neck of her father, begged hard for the strangers. The boy came, and joined her in her prayers. The hardhearted man granted to the entreaties of his children what compassion would not bestow. The Indian was fed—his wife was fed—his babe was fed. Dost thou hear?"
"I hear," said the delighted hunter, grasping the hand of the noble warrior, while tears streamed down his sun-burnt cheek.
"That boy was the prisoner, whom the Pequods, four suns since, carried away from yonder vale—and the famished hunter was he who unbound thy limbs, and who saved that compassionate maiden, by the song he poured into the ears of his brothers, of an angry spirit, seen by the light of the blazing cabin among the boughs of the chesnut-tree.
"Learn, pale face, that an Indian can be grateful. A crust of bread, and a draught of water, bestowed upon the red man, or those he loves, weigh down the memory of a thousand wrongs—a kind look dispels the frown from his brow—a kind word checks the purpose of vengeance, which, unchecked, is like a fire carried by a high wind to a field of dry grass. Thou and thine did me a deed of kindness—preserved the life of her whose bright eyes are the light of my cabin—and of the boy who will, one day, bend the bow of a hunter, and be taught to utter the cry of vengeance on the hills—fear not, thou art safe in the land whence his fathers were banished. Thou and thine did this for the Son of Annawan, the Fleet Foot of his tribe, and he will never forget it—till the stars forget to shine, and the moon to become the lamp of the dark hours. Say, in the ears of the Fair Hair that I gave her cabin to the devouring flames, before I knew it was hers. But the season will soon come when the beaver will be sleek and glossy; and an otter worth more than an arrow—the spoils of the Fleet Foot's winter hunt shall rebuild the cabin of the flower of the the pale faces."
So saying, the Son of Annawan, the great chief, who once was the lord of those boundless regions, disappeared in the forest, and was seen no more among white men.