How far the prediction has been verified any one who has seen the compact, sinewy form of the young soldier will understand.
Henry Glazier reveled in everything sensational. His ideal of heaven was a succession of tableaux in which he was to play the principal part.
At one time he joined another eccentric character named Tom Lolar, an Indian of the Seneca tribe, whose lands in the long ago of Indian history bordered the blue waters of Lake Seneca in central New York. This peculiar pair proceeded to electrify certain rural communities in their immediate neighborhood with huge posters, announcing that on a given night:
KAW-SHAW-GAN-CE,
OR
THE RED WILD CAT,
THE
Great Chief of the Walaitipu Indians,
Now traveling for the benefit of his tribe, proposes to exhibit
to an enlightened public the
Trophies won by his Braves,
In their battles with other Ferocious Tribes beyond the Rocky
Mountains, and the Great Chief will likewise give an
exhibition of the
WAR DANCES OF HIS NATION.
Accordingly upon the night in question Tom Lolar as "Kaw-shaw-gan-ce," and Henry Glazier as ticket agent, reaped such an excellent harvest that the latter concluded to start a "live Indian" upon his own account.
This he accordingly did, dubbing the prodigy of his creation "Quaw-taw-pee-ah," or the "Red Wild Cat."
Whether this venture was successful or not we have failed to learn, but there is one story connected with it which is too good to be lost, though it lacks satisfactory evidence of authenticity.
The legend runs that our enterprising manager went three miles away and hunted up a genuine old native of Erin who had deserted from the British army, where he held some position in one of the military bands attached to a regiment stationed in Canada. With true Irish instinct this exile of Erin had brought his trombone across the border, and "the enterprising manager"—to use the language of the bills—"secured in him the services of an eminent musician, late of Her Majesty's Royal Band," to discourse sweet music during the entire performance. This and other attractive announcements drew a goodly crowd of lads and lasses from far and near to the place appointed, and when the doors—otherwise tent-flaps—were open, the assemblage marched in to the entrancing strains of the trombone, as played by "Professor Muldoonati" alias Billy Muldoon.
Everything passed off well. "Quaw-taw-pee-ah" presented to the elite of the locality a type of the aboriginal American, which at least possessed the merit of originality. If the audience expected to be astonished they were not disappointed; for such an Indian as they then beheld no living eye had ever looked upon before.
Mr. Catlin would have admitted that this noble red man was alien to any of his tribes, and even Cooper's Leather-Stocking would have conceded that his was a new revelation of savage humanity. It is barely possible that Buffalo Bill may have dreamed of something like him, and it is not impossible that the late Edwin Forrest may have actually been on speaking terms with his brother, but outside of these two gentlemen, we do not believe that human imagination ever conceived a child of the forest in any respect resembling "Quaw-taw-pee-ah" on his opening night.