That night was the hardest one that the warrior had ever known. If he slept, it was only to dream of the war-whoop and attack; but at last he found himself broad awake, the sun well up, and yes! there were his two little sons, playing outside their teepee as of old. The next moment he heard the voice of his wife from the deep woods wailing for her husband!
“Oh, take us, husband, take us with you! let us all die together!” she pleaded as she clung to him whom she had regarded as already dead; for she knew of the price that had been put upon his head, and that some of the halfbreeds loved money better than the blood of their Indian mothers.
Tawasuota stood for a minute without speaking, while his huge frame trembled like a mighty pine beneath the thunderbolt.
“No,” he said at last. “I shall go, but you must remain. You are a woman, and the white people need not know that your little boys are mine. Bring them here to me this evening that I may kiss them farewell.”
The sun was hovering among the treetops when they met again.
“Atay! atay!” (“Papa, papa!”) the little fellows cried out in spite of her cautions; but the mother put her finger to her lips, and they became silent. Tawasuota took each boy in his arms, and held him close for a few moments; he smiled to them, but large tears rolled down his cheeks. Then he disappeared in the shadows, and they never saw him again.
The chief soldier lived and died a warrior and an enemy to the white man; but one of his two sons became in after-years a minister of the Christian gospel, under the “Long-Haired Praying Man,” Bishop Whipple, of Minnesota.
VI. THE WHITE MAN’S ERRAND
Upon the wide tableland that lies at the back of a certain Indian agency, a camp of a thousand teepees was pitched in a circle, according to the ancient usage. In the center of the circle stood the council lodge, where there were gathered together of an afternoon all the men of years and distinction, some in blankets, some in uniform, and still others clad in beggarly white man’s clothing. But the minds of all were alike upon the days of their youth and freedom.