Often has he come to us with every variety of game, never breaking his word, whatever might be the state of the weather. But in coming or going, giving or receiving, his demeanour and countenance never changed; his eyes were wandering in vacancy, save when the fire-water, given by the white man in exchange for the soft furs he brought him, would tinge his sallow cheeks with the flush of madness, and lighten his eye with the glances of a fiend, and change from the sober quiet and calmness of the unhappy idiot to the noisy, reeling, hellish figure, which seemed a visitant from the world of darkness rather than a suffering inhabitant of earth.
O-ko-pee is dead. It is not mine to say whether or not, in another state of existence, he enjoys happiness sufficient in degree to make up for the heavy trials of life: I have only to do with him here; and as I have said he lived a sacrifice to the all-conquering and indomitable spirit of the Saxon race, so did he die.
Some years ago, a band of Sioux, distant from Fort Snelling, attacked a party of Winnebagoes, taking fourteen scalps. Hearing that the scalps were carried from village to village, and danced round day after day, there was a party sent from the Fort to take these scalps from the Indians, as there was a fear lest the hot blood of the young warriors should be roused, and serious difficulties would then occur between the two tribes. So the scalps were brought into the Fort; the affair was reported at Washington. The Winnebagoes asked for indemnity for the injuries they had received, and the authorities at Washington decided that four thousand dollars should be paid to the Winnebagoes out of the annuities received by the Sioux from our own government. It was in the summer: the Indian potato, hard and indigestible, was just ripening: the corn was green. The Sioux were without flour and other provisions; even if game had been abundant, they had neither powder nor shot. They pined away by fever and weakness; death stalked among them like a giant, laughing as he crushed to earth men who were like children beside him.
Was there no help for them? the mandate had gone forth. The children fell to the ground dying for want of nourishment; the strong man clung to the trees for support, and the gray-haired leaned against the insensible rocks. Few there were who could bring down the game with their bows and arrows as did their forefathers, and the white people were crowding in their country and driving the game back where they were too feeble to pursue it.
Then came forward the kind missionaries to the aid of their unhappy friends. How liberally they shared with them all that they possessed, striving too to quiet their minds, agitated by burning fever. They gave them medicine and food, supporting the dying mother and taking charge of the infant and the aged. They sought to assuage the agonies of exhausted nature, directing in its flight the restless spirit standing upon the borders of life to that happy place where hunger and sickness are unknown.
It was on one of the warmest days of summer when my little children, with their father, crossed the St. Peter's, and advanced towards the trading establishment at Mendota. On the shores of the river one wigwam was placed, and, attracted by the groans of anguish which proceeded from it, they entered. It was O-ko-pee dying; yes, dying as he had lived, a sacrifice to the white man's rule—dying as he had lived, alone.
No friend supported his aching head, which was burning with fever, or chafed the cold limbs covered with ashes. Indeed, his head was pillowed on a bed of ashes. He recognised his visiters, and seeing their young faces solemnized by what they had never before witnessed, the presence of death, he spoke to them by name, said he was sick, and asked them for medicine. It was too late for medicine or sympathy; in another hour O-ko-pee, the hunter of the Sioux, was gone for ever from the earth.
[15] It is customary, when an Indian advances towards manhood, for him to lose the name bestowed upon him in childhood, obtaining another by some peculiarity of appearance or conduct, some daring action or violent passion; thus, Sleepy Eyes, is the name of a chief among the Sioux, from the drowsy expression of his countenance.