"Now again another thing, my offspring. I have spoken of the solemn event which has befallen you. Every day you are losing your great men. They are being borne into the earth; so that in the midst of blood you are sitting.
"Now, therefore, we say, we wash off the blood-marks from your seat, so that it may be for a time that happily the place will be clean where you are seated.
"And now, that our hearts may be prepared for the instructions of our forefathers and the memory of their greatness, we sing the hymn 'Yondonghs Aihaigh.'"
Almost a hundred voices boomed out the rhythmic lines:
"I come again to greet and thank the League;
I come again to greet and thank the kindred;
I come again to greet and thank the warriors;
I come again to greet and thank the women.
My forefathers—what they established—
My forefathers—hearken to them!"
And after the song was ended, Tododaho walked up and down the council house, crying out:
"Hail, my grandsires! Now hearken while your grandchildren cry mournfully to you—because the Great League which you established has grown old.
"Even now, oh, my grandsires, that has become old which you established—the Great League! You have it as a pillow under your heads in the ground where you are lying—this Great League which you established; although you said that far away in the future the Great League would endure."
A second time they sang the hymn, and then Tododaho called the roll of the founders, commencing with Tehkarihhoken and ending with Tyuhninhohkawenh, and after each name the Royanehs thundered the responses:
"This was the roll of you,
You who were joined in the work,
You who completed the work,
The Great League!"