PROLOGUE
O my reader, rest a while at our Council Fire before you set your feet upon the long trail which leads into the dim regions of Ta-de, which is—or was—Yesterday.
See, we will sprinkle tobacco leaves upon the flames and on the spirals of the smoke ascending upward our words shall be carried to the ears of Ha-wen-ne-yu, the Great Spirit.
Behold, O my reader, we give you a White Belt in token that our words are straight.
That which has been is no more. We of the Ho-de-no-san-nee, the People of the Long House, are scattered so that only Ga-oh, the Old Man of the Winds, can tell where the remnants dwell. The Long House, where our women sowed and reaped and our warriors hunted, is the spoil of the white man. His roads have wiped out the trails stamped by our war parties in the days of our power. His towns have replaced our villages. He has chased the wild things into the recesses of the Adirondack hills.
The Great League itself, which Da-ga-no-we-da and Ha-yo-wont-ha, the Founders, intended should live for all time, is no more than a memory locked in our breasts. The Council Fire which they kindled no longer burns at Onondaga. Gone is the Ho-yar-na-go-war, the Council of the Roy-an-ehs, whose word was supreme from the shores of the Great Lakes to the lands of the Wa-sa-seh-o-no, whom the white men call the Sioux, and the O-ya-da-ga-o-no, whom the white men name the Cherokees. The Seneca Wolves have abandoned their watch at the Western Door of the Long House which opens upon the Thunder Waters of Jagara; the Mohawk Wolves no longer guard the Eastern Door by the shores of the Ska-neh-ta-de, which the white men have renamed the Hudson.
It is meet that we should mourn. But hear us, O my reader, hear us further.
Once we were a nation. Once we were strong. Once even the white man feared us. Once it was for us to say who should rule the land outside the Long House, Frenchman or Englishman. The white men were weak then. They clamored for our aid. We chose the side of the Englishman. He triumphed.
Remember, O my reader, but for us you might not have been here to sit by our Council Fire to-night. Black Robe and de Veulle, Murray and Joncaire, would have won the struggle; the French King would have become master. All that has come to pass would never have been. The unfolding years would have told another story. But the People of the Long House cast their fortunes with Governor Burnet, who in our tongue was called Ga-en-gwa-ra-go, and Ormerod, whom the Keepers of the Faith renamed O-te-ti-ani. It was Ta-wan-ne-ars and the warriors of the Eight Clans who helped O-te-ti-ani and Corlaer, the Dutchman with the fat belly, to break down the barriers of "The Doom Trail" and overcome the "Keepers of the Trail."
Remember that, O my reader. This tale which follows is true talk. It was as it is written.