"You have been a good man," said Mrs. Woods, yielding to an impulse of her better nature. She presently added, as though she had been too generous, "And there aren't many good Injuns—nor white folks either for that matter."
"I have come to have a smoke-talk with you," said the old chief, taking out his pipe and asking Mrs. Woods to light it. "Listen! I want to go home. When a child is weary, I take him by the hand and point him to the smoke of his wigwam. He goes home and sleeps. I am weary. The Great Spirit has taken me by the hand; he points to the smoke of the wigwam. There comes a time when all want to go home. I want to go home. Umatilla is going home. I have not spoken."
The smoke from his pipe curled over his white head in the pure, clear September air. He was eighty or more years of age. He had heard the traditions of Juan de Fuca, the Greek pilot, who left his name on the straits of the Puget Sea. He had heard of the coming of Vancouver in his boyhood, the English explorer who named the seas and mountains for his lieutenants and friends, Puget, Baker, Ranier, and Townsend. He had known the forest lords of the Hudson Bay Company, and of Astoria; had seen the sail of Gray as it entered the Columbia, and had heard the preaching of Jason Lee. The murder of Whitman had caused him real sorrow. Umatilla was a man of peace. He had loved to travel up and down the Columbia, and visit the great bluffs of the Puget Sea. He lived for a generation at peace with all the tribes, and now that he was old he was venerated by them all.
"You are a good old Injun," said Mrs. Woods, yielding to her better self again. "I don't say it about many people. I do think you have done your best—considering."
"I am not what I want to be," said Umatilla. "It is what we want to be that we shall be one day; don't you think so? The Great Spirit is going to make me what I want to be—he will make us all what we want to be. My desires are better than I—I will be my desires by and by. My staff is in my hand, and I am going home. The old warriors have gone home. They were thick as the flowers of the field, thick as the stars of the night. My boys are gone home—they were swift as the hawks in the air. Benjamin is left to the Umatillas. He is no butcher-bird; no forked tongue—he will remember the shade of his father. My heart is in his heart. I am going home. I have not spoken."
He puffed his pipe again, and watched an eagle skimming along on the great over-sea of September gold. The Indian language is always picturesque, and deals in symbols and figures of speech. It is picture-speaking. The Indians are all poets in their imaginations, like children. This habit of personification grows in the Indian mind with advancing years. Every old Indian speaks in poetic figures. Umatilla had not yet "spoken," as he said; he had been talking in figures, and merely approaching his subject.
There was a long pause. He then laid down his pipe. He was about to speak:
"Woman, open your ears. The Great Spirit lives in women, and old people, and little children. He loves the smoke of the wigwam, and the green fields of the flowers, and the blue gardens of stars. And he loves music—it is his voice, the whisper of the soul.
"He spoke in the pine-tops, on the lips of the seas, in the shell, in the reed and the war-drum. Then she came. He speaks through her. I want her to speak for me. My people are angry. There are butcher-birds among them. They hate you—they hate the cabin of the white man. The white men take away their room, overthrow their forests, kill their deer. There is danger in the air.
"The October moon will come. It will grow. It will turn into a sun on the border of the night. Then come Potlatch. My people ask for the Dance of the Evil One. I no consent—it means graves.