Or their black beards with your blood will be red.'
"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. When the first chief of the Beard first trimmed the sacred fire in the temple, a voice was heard which said: 'As long as there lives a chief of the race of the Suns with a beard on his chin, no evil can happen to the Natchez nation; but if the white race should ever resume the blood which it gave in a bloody day, woe, three times woe, to the Natchez! Of them nothing will remain but the shadow of a name.' Thus spake the invisible prophet. Years rolled on, years thick on years, and none of the accursed white-faces were seen; but they appeared at last, wrapped up in their pale skins like shrouds of the dead, and the father of my father, whom tradition had taught to guard against the predicted danger, slew two of the hated strangers, and my father, in his turn, killed four.
"'Praise be to the chiefs of the Beard,
Who knew how to avenge their old ancestral injury,
When with the sweet blood of a white foe
Their black beards they proudly dyed red.'
"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. When I saw the glorious light of day there was born to them a great warrior of the race of their Suns—a warrior and a chief with a beard on his chin. The pledge of protection, of safety, and of glory stood embodied in me. When I shouted my first war-whoop the owl hooted and smelt the ghosts of my enemies, the wolves howled, and the carrion vultures shrieked with joy; for they knew their food was coming, and I fed them with Chickasaws' flesh and with Choctaws' flesh until they were gorged with the flesh of the red man. A kind master and purveyor I was to them—the poor, dumb creatures that I loved. But lately I have given them more dainty food. I boast of having done better than my father. Five Frenchmen have I killed, and my only regret in dying is, that it will prevent me from killing more.
"'Ha! ha! ha! that was game worthy of the chief of the Beard!
How lightly he danced. Ho! ho! ho!
How gladly he shouted. Ha! ha! ha!