The Hunters of the Hills

by Joseph A. Altsheler

The priest spoke with intense fervor, using the tongue of the Indians with the greatest clearness and purity. His sincerity was obvious. Neither Robert nor Willet could doubt it for an instant, and they saw, too, that it was making an impression. Deep murmurs of approval came often from the converts, and now and then the whole multitude stirred in agreement. But the fifty sachems, all except the nine Mohawks, sat as expressionless as stones. The Mohawks did not move, but the stern, accusing gaze they bent upon the priest never relaxed. As Robert had foreseen, the most eloquent orator might talk a thousand years, and he could never bring them a single inch toward France.

Willet followed the priest. He attempted no flights. He left the future to itself and emphasized the present and the past. He recalled the facts, so well known, that the English had always been their friends, and the French always their enemies. The English had kept their treaties with the Hodenosaunee, the French could not be trusted.

The hunter, too, received applause, much of it, and when he finished he took his position in the audience beside Tayoga. Then the Chevalier de St. Luc stood before the fifty sachems, as gallant and as handsome a figure as one could find in either the Old World or the New, clothed in a white uniform faced with gold, his hair powdered and tied in a knot, his small sword, gold hilted, by his side.

The chevalier knew the children of the forest, and Robert recognized at once in him an antagonist even more formidable than he had expected. His appeal was to the lore of the woods and to valor. The French adapted themselves to the ways of the forest. They practiced the customs of the Indians, lived with them and often married their women. They could grow and flourish together, while the Englishmen and the Bostonnais held themselves aloof from the red men, and pretended to be their superiors. The French soldier and the Indian warrior had much in common, side by side they were invincible, and together they could drive the English into the sea, giving back to the red races the lands they had lost.

He was a graceful and impassioned speaker, and he, too, made his impression. The principal point of his theme, that the French alone fraternized with the Indians, was good and all were familiar with the fact. He returned to it continually, and when he sat down the applause was louder than it had been for either Willet or the priest. It was evident that he had made a strong appeal, and the Onondaga and Seneca sachems regarded him with a certain degree of favor, but the nine fierce and implacable Mohawk sachems did not unbend a particle.

Then Robert rose. Despite the fewness of his years, the times and hard circumstance had given him wisdom. He was surcharged, too, with emotion. He was yet an Iroquois for the time being, despite his white face. He still saw as they saw, and felt as they felt, and while he wished them to take the side of Britain and the British colonies, or at least not join the side of France and the French colonies, he was moved, too, by a deep personal sympathy. The fortunes of the Hodenosaunee were dear to him. He had been adopted into the great League. Tayoga, as the red people saw it, was his brother in more than blood.

He trembled a little with emotion as he looked upon the grave half-circle of the fifty sachems, and the clustering chiefs behind them, and then upon the people, the old men, the warriors, the women and the children. As he saw them, they were friendly. They knew him to be one of them by all the sacred rites of adoption, they knew that he had fought by the side of the great young warrior Tayoga of the clan of the Bear, of the nation Onondaga, of the mighty League of the Hodenosaunee, and after the momentary silence a deep murmur of admiration for the lithe, athletic young figure, and the frank, open face, ran through the multitude.

He spoke with glowing zeal and in a clear, beautiful voice that carried like a trumpet. After the first minute, all embarrassment and hesitation passed away, and his gift shone, resplendent. The freshness and fervor of youth were added to the logic and power of maturer years, and golden words flowed from his lips. The Indians, always susceptible to oratory, leaned forward, attentive and eager. The eyes of the fifty sachems began to shine and the fierce and implacable Mohawks, who would not relax a particle for any of the others, nodded with approval, as the speaker played upon the strings of their hearts.

He dwelled less upon the friendship of the English than upon the hostility of the French. He knew that Champlain and Frontenac were far away in time, but near in the feelings of the Hodenosaunee, especially the Mohawks, the warlike Keepers of the Eastern Gate. He said that while the French had often lived with the Indians, and sometimes had married Indian women, it was not with the nations of the Hodenosaunee, but with their enemies, Huron, Caughnawaga, St. Regis, Ojibway and other savages of the far west. Onontio could not be the friend of their foes and their friends also. Manitou had never given to any man the power to carry water on both shoulders in such a manner.

The promises of the French to the great nations of the League had never been kept. He and Willet, the hunter whom they called the Great Bear, and the brave young warrior, Tayoga, whom they all knew, had just returned from the Stadacona of the Mohawks, which the French had seized, and where they had built their capital, calling it Quebec. They had covered it with stone buildings, palaces, fortresses and churches, but, in truth and right, it was still the Stadacona of the Mohawks. When Tayoga and Willet and he walked there, they saw the shades of the great Mohawk sachems of long ago, come down from the great shining stars on which they now lived, to confound the French, and to tell the children of the Ganeagaono never to trust them.