Birch Bark Legends of Niagara

by Owahyah

"It was the wolf the chief saw first; 'twas the wolf the Manitou wanted."

So many endorsed the young chief that confusion for the time prevented Great Oak from speaking, which might have been mistaken for yielding; when that crafty chief springing from among the ever-green bushes, confronted the chiefs, and in a loud voice of ferocious exultation and of triumph, tauntingly demanded:

"What says the Sagamore? Does he tell the young warriors a lie? The wolf was in the arms of Black Snake when the Fawn was in the arms of her father."

Turning with an annihilating look upon the base Indian, whose last sentence conveyed an unpardonable taunt to any Indian chief, the Sagamore, with the firmness of the rocks around him and in clear distinct words replied:

"Dare pass judgement upon the deeds of a sachem who hath sat in council with thy father's father? Look to thyself Black Snake, the hissing spirits in the boiling waters below are calling for thee. I have said."

Bestowing upon his daughter a long look of thwarted love and final resignation, in words at once unyieldingly firm, but full of, the Indians' bright hopes and promises for the future, he pronounced her doom, which none dared question.

"My child, the Manitou hath need of thee; thou must soon travel the bright path and join thy mother beyond the clouds. The big moon shows the path brightest now; and that thou mayst not stumble or lose thy way, go prepare thyself at once as the child of thy father should, to joyfully carry the gifts most precious to the Great Manitou for the welfare of thy people. I have said."

The real or pretended indifference to pleasure or pain, one of the great characteristics of the American Indian, even to the joyful manner they would yield, without resistance and evidently without sufficient cause, to torture and death, was owing greatly to the sudden and unalterable decisions of their chiefs, governed by customs formed from their views of a future state, over-ruling all earthly ambitions of these untutored people. Such terrible dooms! The sentence and execution so quickly following each other, and apparently falling upon the poor victim at once, the shock paralyzing their faculties, while pride concealing their softer feelings, transforms them so suddenly into what appears beings indifferent and insensible to the suffering and distress of death and separation or to the expectation of enjoyment and happiness here on earth to themselves or others.

Thus comprehending her inevitable situation and feeling it an honor to be the selected of the Manitou to guide the birchen-bark with precious gifts over the precipice to the happy forest in eternity, where she would meet her long remembered mother, the doomed maiden replied, with tearful smile and subdued voice, "I go my father," and immediately disappeared among the wild vines and bushes that border the banks of Niagara, followed closely by her faithful wolf.

The setting sun that day shed its last rays and warmth upon a busy and sorrowful scene, around thy roaring cataract, Oh, cruel unrelenting fall of waters softly painting with mellow light the trees, rocks and thy wild children, unmindful alike, of the sad though customary, preparations for the sacrifice hurriedly proceeding: the women decking with shells and flowers the fairest maiden in their tribe, so soon to pass from them forever; the chiefs wrapped in the pride of Indian endurance hide from each other their feelings no tear betrays, or thoughts even mar the serenity of their countenances, which indicated only submission to fate while the necessary ceremonies were being provided for; and they filled the flower decked bark, moored in the little eddy above the rapids, with highly valuable contributions; and lighted the great pine-fires for the feast and dance, so well furnished and prepared by Black Snake, while daylight faded into night, heralded by invisible singers from the surrounding trees, pouring forth their sleepy monotonous songs, varying only at times in a higher and wilder key, then dying away in the endless roar of the turbulent waters around them.