“N’hau, Dawn-woman! Prepare the guest place, spread robes behind the fire, dish out a bowl of soup! Some one of our people desires to enter!”
The noise ceased before the doorway, and Terrible-eagle, now hunched before the fire, paused before dropping a hot coal on the tobacco in his red stone pipe, to bid the guest to enter. “Yoh!” came the hearty response, and a tall, dark warrior, bareheaded save for a fillet of otter fur around his brows, ducked under the doorway and silently passed round the fire, on the left, to the guest place, where he seated himself, cross-legged, on a pile of robes. He was clad in a plain shirt of blue-dyed deerskin, deeply fringed on the seams, in flapping, leather leggings, high soft-soled moccasins, and a leather apron handsomely embroidered with colored porcupine quills wrought in delicate, flowered figures. He bore no weapon, and on his swarthy cheeks two round spots of red paint were seen in the firelight.
After the newcomer had eaten a bowl of steaming stew with the aid of a huge, wooden ladle, he lay back among the robes, puffing comfortably on a long-stemmed pipe with bowl of red stone, filled and lighted for him by the old man. As the cheerful odor of tobacco and kinnikinick permeated the lodge, the stranger began to speak. He informed the old people that his name was Muhwäsê, Little-wolf, of the Wave clan of the Menomini, that he had come all the way from Mätc Suamäko, the Great Sand Bar village on the Green Bay of Lake Michigan; that the young men had opened their war bundles, and danced preparatory to going to war against the Sauk, but that the Sauk had heard the news and fled southward. He ended with all the gossip and tittle-tattle of his band.
It was not until Dawn-woman slept, and the stars were visible in the winter sky through the smoke hole of the lodge, that Little-wolf went out abruptly, and returned bearing a huge bundle which he dumped on the floor at the feet of Terrible-eagle, and silently took his place on the lounge once more.
With trembling hands the old man undid the leathern thongs and unwrapped the bearskin with which the bundle was enclosed, and spread before him an array of articles that brought an avaricious sparkle to his red-rimmed eyes.
“Nimá, nékan! Well done, my colleague!” he exclaimed. “These are valuable gifts, and in the proper number. Four hatchets, four spears, and four knives of the sacred yellow rock (native copper), four belts of white wampum, and four garments of tanned deerskin, embroidered with quillwork, with much tobacco. Surely this gift has a meaning?”
“Grandfather! You to whom nothing is hard,” replied the visitor. “It is true that I am nobody. I am poor—the enemy scarcely know my name. Yet I am desirous of eating the food of the Medicine Lodge, as all the brethren have done who have passed this way before me!”
“N’hau, my grandson! I shall call together the three other Pushwäwûk, or masters, for their consent. What you have asked for, may seem as nothing to you—yet it is Life. These songs may appear to partake of the ways of children—yet they are powerful. I understand you well; you desire to imitate the ways of our own ancient Grand Master, Mä’näbus, who was slain and brought to life that we might gain life unending! Good! You have done well. In the morning I shall send invitation-sticks and tobacco to summon the leaders here, that your instruction may begin at once!”
II
THE INSTRUCTION
It was an hour after sunset. In the rear of the lodge sat Terrible-eagle and three other old men, with Little-wolf at their left. Before them lay the pile of valuable gifts, and, on the white-tanned skin of an unborn fawn, stood the sacred towaka or deep drum, hollowed by infinite labor from a short section of a basswood log, holding two fingers’ depth of water to make its voice resonant, and covered with a dampened membrane of tanned, buck hide. Across its head was balanced a crooked drumstick, its striking end carved to represent a loon’s beak. Before the drum, was placed a wooden bowl in the shape of a minature, log canoe heaped with tobacco, and four gourd rattles with wooden handles which shone from age and usage. A youth tended the fire and kept the air redolent with incense of burning sweet grass and cedar. Dawn-woman and Anäm, the dog, guarded the door.