“And this ever since has been my war song, and the song I sing at our great autumn ceremony in the Big House, where all who have been so blessed sing of their visions.”...
“So that,” I said, as Rumbling-wings finished, “is why you wear that little, red, war club hanging about your neck! Now tell me why I carry a little stone face in the same way. I have tried to take it off several times, but Whispering-leaves will not let me.”
“That,” replied the old man, “represents Misinghalikun, the living Mask-Being, and a powerful Manitou he is, for the Great Spirit has given him control of all the wild animals of the forest. He is the Guardian Spirit of Flying-wolf, whose body you occupy, but I cannot tell you the story of his vision. No one could tell you that story but Flying-wolf himself. And where is he? You occupy his body, but I doubt if Misinghalikun will help you as he did him. I believe Flying-wolf won his great fame as a hunter through the power of this Guardian Spirit, and without that, you may have a hard time to live up to his reputation.” And, I must say, so I found it.
Another evening I asked Rumbling-wings if his Guardian Spirit ever helped him in later years.
“Many times, and I will tell you some instances. When I had seen about twenty snows, I went with some of our kinsfolk to visit the Minsi, our allies living above us on Lenape River and in the mountains to the north and east of us here. You may have heard that, although their language is quite a little different from our Unami tongue, they too call themselves Lenape and their customs are almost the same as ours. From there we went with some of these people eastward across the mountains to see the Great River of the Mahicans of which we had often heard. Arriving at the river, we wished to cross to visit a Mahican village just opposite, but, although we made a signal smoke, no one dared put out from the village with a canoe to get us because there was a high north wind and the wide river was very rough. So I burned tobacco and prayed to my helper, the Thunder, and soon thunder-clouds arose in the west, and a west wind sprung up which killed the north wind and left the river smooth; and then the Mahican canoes came for us. We spent many pleasant days in their village, feasting and dancing, and visiting from one wigwam to another. Their language is very much like the Minsi, and enough like ours so that we could understand almost everything.
“Another time a war party of us Lenape set forth against the Susquehannocks, a tribe like the Mengwe. They lived on Muddy River in a big village circled about with a great stockade of sharpened logs, twice as high as a man, set on end almost touching one another. Time and time again we attacked them, but could not break through this stockade, nor could we pile fire against it to destroy it, so well did their bowmen defend it.
“At last we withdrew a little way to counsel and our war chiefs said to me, ‘We must depend on you, Rumbling-wings, to help us overthrow this people who have harassed us so long. Call on your Guardian Spirit; help us to take this village!’
“And so, as there were no thunder-clouds in sight, I drew from my medicine bag a few scales of the Great Horned Serpent and laid them on a rock beside a little creek. You know how the Thunders hate these great snakes, and always begin to gather, the instant one of them shows any part of himself above the water. Well even these scales seem to attract them; I always use these scales to call the Thunders when I need them.
“Immediately the sky began to darken in the west—so I built a little fire, threw an offering of tobacco upon it, and prayed to my Guardian.
“Blacker and blacker grew the sky, nearly as dark as night. We could hardly see the yellow scud flying overhead beneath the mass of cloud. The air near the earth seemed hot, choking. All at once a few great drops of rain splattered down, and then we heard the roar of a mighty rain approaching across the forest. Soon it was pouring down about us like a water-fall.