Tibby: A novel dealing with psychic forces and telepathy

by Rosetta Luce Gilchrist

Little nude children ran about here and there, or ducked in the waters of the river, like so many young goslings. Stalwart Indian-braves sauntered to and fro lazily about the wigwams or squatted on the ground under cover of their tents. The Indian industries seemed to be confined to the women, who were laboriously employed roasting corn in holes in the ground or scraping and rubbing the bison skins which had been recently brought in from the plains; for the braves were just home from their summer hunt, and preparations were going forward for their great green-corn festival.

In vain our Eastern woman looked for the beautiful Indian maiden of poesy and song. She concluded no poet could find inspiration to write of these dirty humans, with unpleasant faces and tangled locks.

Presently they rode to the tent of the chief of the tribe, who invited them to dismount and enter.

As Lissa followed Nathan into the small tent she confessed to an instinctive desire to flee in the opposite direction, for as she sat down upon the cushion her host placed for her, six Indian warriors entered and squatted down in a circle around her husband and herself. A timid look at Nathan, however, met assurance, and she tried to banish fear, but the thought of the white man flayed on the banks of the river would force itself upon her, and she found herself looking at their hands with a feeling of horror, which with an effort she sought to keep from appearing in her face.

Two women were laboring assiduously at a large bison skin at the door of the tent, scraping, pounding, and rubbing it, until it was white as a piece of cotton, but paying little attention to her, save now and then a stolen glance up from their work.

Then Lissa was attracted to the movements of the chief, who took a long-handled, red-clay pipe and filled it from several bone cups, filled apparently with a variety of herbs, then lighted it, and after taking two or three whiffs passed it to the Indian at his right, and thus it was handed around the circle. The herbs gave out a pungent odor as they burned, which to Lissa was sickening, and she was thankful that she was passed by and only Nathan invited to smoke with them their calumet.

The chief then took another of the odd-looking cups, and filling it with a kind of chowdered, dried meat gave it to Lissa.

She was embarrassed, for she dared not refuse it, yet shuddered at the thought of tasting it. Nathan answered her imploring looks by laughing and explaining to the donor that the white squaw was from the land of the rising sun and had not learned to appreciate such a treat. The chief, too, smiled, a little contemptuously Lissa thought, at her ignorance of this dainty, and called to one of the squaws to bring her corn.

Lissa was glad to accept the shining ear of maize, roasted within its husk to an appetizing brown, and she ate it with a relish, much to the satisfaction of the Indians and the woman who brought it.

In the mean time, Nathan, his eyes twinkling with amusement, was carrying on an animated conversation with one of the Indians in their dialect, and gesticulating toward Lissa, as if she might be furnishing the topic of discussion. She felt relieved when her husband arose and proposed their departure.