“Every one knows,” continued the orator, resuming, “that the Crees are wise. They can tell a fox from a buffalo. They understand the difference between fire and water. No Paleface sage needs to come from the rising sun to tell them to eat when they are hungry—to drink when they are dry. But this Paleface chief comes with the eyes of the great northern owl, and says he comes to do us good. And how does he begin to do us good?”
Here there was a very decided “Waugh!” as though to say, “Ay, that’s the question,” and then a solemn pause for more—during which the man with the cold drew the reins very tight.
“How does he begin to do us good?” proceeded the orator. “By entering into an agreement with us for the use of our lands—and asking our enemies the Saulteaux to take part in that agreement!”
The sounds of indignation and ferocity that followed this statement are not translatable. After a gaze of unutterable meaning round the circle Rednose went on—
“This, this is the way in which the owl-eyed chief of the Palefaces begins to do us good! If this is the way he begins, in what way will he continue, and,”—here his voice deepened to a whisper—“how will he end?”
The ideas suggested by his question were so appalling that for some minutes the orator appeared unable to find words to go on, and his audience glared at him in dread anticipation, as though they expected him to explode like a bomb-shell, but were prepared to sit it out and take the consequences. And he did explode, after a fashion, for he suddenly raised his voice to a shout that startled even the sentinel on the distant knoll, and said—
“I counsel war to the knife! The great white chief—the owl-eyed fool!—will not blot from our agreement the names of the Saulteaux chiefs—chiefs! there are no Saulteaux chiefs. All their braves are cowards, on the same dead level of stupidity, and their women are—are nothing, fit for nothing, can do nothing, and must soon come to nothing! What then? The duty of Cree warriors lies before us. We will drive the Saulteaux into Lake Winnipeg and the Palefaces off the face of the earth altogether! Waugh!”
Having thus given vent to the opinions and feelings that consumed him, Rednose sat down, his audience breathed freely, the distant sentinel recovered his composure, and the young novitiate brave with the cold in his head sneezed with impunity.
It would be tedious to recount all that was said at that council of war. The next brave that rose to “address the house” very much resembled the first speaker, both in sentiment and personal appearance, except that he had chosen sky-blue for his nose instead of red. The only additional matter that he contributed worth noting was the advice that they should begin their bloody work by an immediate attack, in the dead of night, on the camp of the buffalo runners.
This advice was hailed with a good many “Waughs,” as well as approving nods and looks, and it seemed as if the plan were about to be carried into action without delay, when, as we have seen, Okématan arose to address the assemblage.