“Geronimo, my father,” he said, “speaks with great wisdom and out of years filled with experience, but perhaps he has forgotten many things that have happened during the long years that the Shis-Inday have been fighting to drive the enemy from the country that Usen made for them. Shoz-Dijiji, the son of Geronimo, has not forgotten the things that he has seen, nor those of which his father has told him; they are burned into his memory.
“Geronimo is right when he says that peace is better than war for those who may no longer hope to win, and I too would speak against the war-trail if the pindah-lickoyee would leave us in peace to live our own lives as Usen taught us to live them. But they will not. They wish us to live in their way which is not a good way for Apaches to live. If we do not wish to they send soldiers and arrest us. Thus we are prisoners and slaves. Shoz-Dijiji cannot be happy either as a prisoner or as a slave, and so he prefers the war-trail and death to these things.
“Na-chi-ta speaks against the war-trail because there will be no tizwin there but, instead, many hardships. Shoz-Dijiji knew well the great Cochise, father of Na-chi-ta. Cochise would be angry and ashamed if he could have heard his son speak at the council fire tonight.
“Chihuahua speaks against war. Chihuahua thinks only of the little farm that the pindah-lickoyee are permitting him to use and forgets all the wide expanse of country that the pindah-lickoyee have stolen from him. Chihuahua is a brave warrior. I do not think that Chihuahua will long be happy working like a slave for the Indian Agent who will rob him of the sweat of his brow as he robs us all.
“Nanáy is old and lives in memories of past war-trails when he fought with glory at the side of Victorio and Loco. His day is done, his life has been lived. Why should we young men, who have our own lives to live, be content to live upon the memories of old men. We want memories of our own and freedom, if only for a short time, to enjoy them as our fathers did before us.
“Ulzanna and Kut-le are brave men. They do honor to the proud race from which we all spring. They know that it would be better to die in freedom upon the war-trail against the hated pindah-lickoyee than to live like cattle, herded upon a reservation by the white-eyes.
“They think of the great warriors, of the women, of the little children who have been murdered by the lies and treachery of the pindah-lickoyee. They recall the ridicule that is heaped upon all those things which we hold most sacred. They do not forget the insults that every white-eyed man hurls at the Shis-Inday upon every occasion except when the Shis-Inday are on the war-trail. Then they respect us.
“Shall we wait here until they come and arrest and kill our chiefs, as Nan-tan-des-la-par-en has ordered them to do, or shall we take to the war-trail and teach them once more to respect us? I, Shoz-Dijiji, war chief of the Be-don-ko-he, speak for the war-trail. I have spoken.”
An old man arose. “Let us wait,” he said. “Perhaps the soldiers of the pindah-lickoyee will not come. Perhaps they will let us live in peace if we do not go upon the war-trail. Let us wait.”
The tizwin had not as yet spoken its final word, and there were more who spoke against the war-trail than for it, and before the council was concluded many had spoken. Among the last was Sago-zhu-ni—Pretty Mouth—the wife of Mangas, for the voice of woman was not unknown about the council fires of the Apaches. And why should it be? Did not they share all the hardships of the war-trail with their lords and masters? Did they not often fight, and as fiercely and terribly as the men? Were they not as often the targets for the rifles of the pindah-lickoyee? Who, then, had better right to speak at the councils of the Apaches than the wives and mothers of their warriors.