KATAHOTAN.
Old Town.
(To The Kickapoo Club.)
Behold the trail
Where many moccasinned feet have trod,
And many white mens weary steps
Have led to death untimely, or to long captivity.
Behold the village site,
Where once the Kickapoos
In pole-bark houses lived, and where
Their council-house
Stood from the others, somewhat larger,
And a little way apart.
Here Pemoatam and Masheena met
To choose for war or peace, and choosing war,
Set forth upon that dire ill-fated way
That led to Tippecanoe, and Tecumsehs fall.
Here also came
Frenchman and Spaniard in the early days,
Then our First Settlers in the later times,
To counsel with their distant Indian neighbors.
Black Robes and Couriers des Bois,
Long Knives and Rangers intermingled.
And here came traders from the far Detroit,
To barter white mens wares for Indian peltries.
Behold where once the Dance Ground was
Where many soft-shod feet have stepped
To rhythmic beating of the painted drums,
And rattling of the shaking, stone-filled gourds.
And here the head men lectured and exhorted them
To follow steadfast in their fathers ways,
Which they had practiced ere the white men came,
With hands against the whites eternally.