My penknife, pencil, note-book, purse, and handkerchief are duly examined and quietly commented upon, but a package of tablets packed in a silver paper, and small tube of cold cream, cause no small flutter in our circle. When I am through demonstrating their use, every one's breath is laden with the odour of mint, and their hands with that of roses. Um—m—m—mh!
The women feel my arms, try on my bracelet and rings, and ask me to take off my hat that they may see my hair, which, alas! is devoid of all waywardness and coquetry. I can see they are disappointed in this and think me what Artemus Ward calls "a he-looking female."
In one shack to which the girls accompany me, an emaciated, coughing boy is bed-ridden and near to death. Lili Abi has him in her arms, and he may not go free.
Who this Lili Abi, or Lilith, is does not certainly appear, but, according to the Rabbis who wrote of old time, she is the first wife of Adam and queen of the succubi. Some there are who declare this to be an ill-framed story, and a conceit of the fancy, but others hold it as a creed that she lives by sucking the blood of children till they fade away and die. It is from Lili Abi that we get our word lullaby. The malific lullaby she sings has come nigh to breaking the heart of humanity, but, one day, it shall happen that a sure and strong-handed scientist will get a strangle hold on Lili Abi and pierce her to death with his slender but omnipotent needle.
Amil, who is the lad's father, says, "I am mooch scare' 'bout leetle boy, for sure. I ees pray all tam to de holy mother. Mabbe he ees get well... la bonne chance ... mabbe non! Leetle boy sing all de tam when he ees well."
Amil has never been to the south, or over the mountains, but he has heard much about these countries. He has been told how, in the United States, they do not believe in the pope and get married many times. He has also heard that the Yankees mean to conquer Canada and pull down the tricolor.
Michele Daubeny, who once went across the mountains to where the fish-eaters are, told him that the ocean never freezes. But this Michele has a tongue which is not straight, also he has been known to steal fur out of the traps, so that Amil does not know what to believe.
"I have mak rip'ly," says Amil, "dat mabbe by'me by, I ees tak de trail dem queeck an' see kickekume, de great sea water, to myse'f."
And when I leave the shacks and go back towards the village, I fall in with some swart broodlings, who are shooting with arrows. At first, they will have none of me until I make the mortifying confession and concession that I cannot shoot and desire greatly to be taught. After this, nothing could exceed their pedagogic enthusiasm. Apollo, prince of archers, could do no better.
In the pale face, the hunting instinct, while never entirely lost, is still greatly modified. In the red man it is a passion. Watch this little lean-bellied Indian as he stalks his game. The bird rises and settles again a few yards away. The boy trails it up closer and closer with a feline softness of tread, a queer slurring movement that belongs only to animals of prey, and then, standing taut and tense as a finely-bred setter making game, he concentrates the whole energy of his body on one piercing point and sends his arrow home.