The Indian Fairy Book Part 11

"Now stretch yourself up and be very tall."

The tree, at this bidding, rose up so far that Owa.s.so would have imperiled his neck by any attempt to get to the ground.

"Listen, ye eagles!" continued Mishosha. "You have long expected a gift from me. I now present you this boy, who has had the presumption to climb up where you are to molest your young. Stretch forth your claws and seize him."

So saying, the old magician, according to his custom in such cases, turned his back upon Owa.s.so, and going off in his canoe at a word, he left his son-in-law to shift for himself.

But the birds did not seem to be so badly-minded as the old magician had supposed; for a very old bald eagle, quite corpulent and large of limb, alighting on a branch just opposite, opened conversation with him by asking what had brought him there.

Owa.s.so replied that he had not mounted the tree of himself, or out of any disposition to harm his people; that his father-in-law, the old magician who had just left them, had sent him up; that he was constantly sending him on mischievous errands. In a word, the young man was enlarging at great length upon the character of the wicked Manito, when he was interrupted by being darted upon by a hungry-eyed bird, with long claws.

Owa.s.so, not in the least disconcerted, boldly seized this fierce eagle by the neck and dashed it against the rocks, crying out:

"Thus will I deal with all who come near me."

The old eagle, who appeared to be the head of the tribe, was so pleased with this show of spirit that he immediately appointed two tall birds, uncommonly strong in the wings, to transport Owa.s.so to his lodge. They were to take turns in conducting him through the air.

Owa.s.so expressed many obligations to the old eagle for his kindness, and they forthwith set out. It was a high point from which they started, for the pine-tree had shot far, far up toward the clouds, and they could even descry the enchanted island where the old magician lived; though it was miles and miles away. For this point they steered their flight; and in a short time they landed Owa.s.so at the door of the lodge.

With many compliments for their dispatch, Owa.s.so dismissed the birds, and stood ready to greet his wicked father-in-law who now arrived; and when he espied his son-in-law still unharmed, Mishosha grew very black in the face. He had but a single charm left.

He thought he would ponder deeply how he could employ that to the best advantage; and it happened that while he was doing so, one evening, as Owa.s.so and his wife were sitting on the banks of the lake, and the soft breeze swept over it, they heard a song, as if sung by some one at a great distance. The sound continued for some time, and then died away in perfect stillness. "Oh, it is the voice of Sheem," cried Owa.s.so. "It is the voice of my brother! If I could but only see him!" And he hung down his head in deep anguish.

His wife witnessed his distress, and to comfort him she proposed that they should attempt to make their escape, and carry him succor on the morrow.

When the morning came, and the sun shone warmly into the lodge, the wife of Owa.s.so offered to comb her father's hair, with the hope that it would soothe him to sleep. It had that effect; and they no sooner saw him in deep slumber than they seized the magic canoe, Owa.s.so uttered the charmed words, "Chemaun Poll!" and they glided away upon the water without need of oar or sail.

They had nearly reached the land on the opposite side of the lake, and could distinctly hear the voice of the younger brother singing his lament as before, when the old magician wakened. Missing his daughter and her husband, he suspected deception of some kind; he looked for his magic boat and found it gone. He spoke the magic words, which were more powerful from him than from any other person in the world, and the canoe immediately returned; to the sore disappointment of Owa.s.so and his wife.

When they came back to the sh.o.r.e, Mishosha stood upon the beach and drew up his canoe. He did not utter a word. The son-in-law and daughter entered the lodge in silence.

The time, walking along in its broad open path, brought the autumn months to a close, and the winter had set in. Soon after the first fall of snow, Owa.s.so said:

"Father, I wish to try my skill in hunting. It is said there is plenty of game not far off, and it can now be easily tracked. Let us go."

The magician consented; they set out, and arriving at a good ground for their sport, they spent the day in hunting. Night coming on, they built themselves a lodge of pine-branches to sleep in. Although it was bitterly cold, the young man took off his leggings and moccasins, and hung them up to dry. The old magician did the same, carefully hanging his own in a separate place, and they lay down to sleep.

Owa.s.so, from a glance he had given, suspected that the magician had a mind to play him a trick, and to be beforehand with him, he watched an opportunity to get up and change the moccasins and leggings, putting his own in the place of Mishosha's, and depending on the darkness of the lodge to help him through.

Near daylight, the old magician bestirred himself, as if to rekindle the fire; but he slyly reached down a pair of moccasins and leggings with a stick, and thinking they were no other than those of Owa.s.so's, he dropped them into the flames; while he cast himself down, and affected to be lost in a heavy sleep. The leather leggings and moccasins soon drew up and were burned.

Instantly jumping up and rubbing his eyes, Mishosha cried out:

"Son-in-law, your moccasins are burning; I know it by the smell."

Owa.s.so rose up, deliberately and unconcerned.

"No, my friend," said he, "here are mine," at the same time taking them down and drawing them on. "It is your moccasins that are burning."

Mishosha dropped his head upon his breast. All his tricks were played out--there was not so much as half a one left to help him out of the sorry plight he was in.

"I believe, my grandfather," added Owa.s.so, "that this is the moon in which fire attracts, and I fear you must have set your foot and leg garments too near the fire, and they have been drawn in. Now let us go forth to the hunt."

The old magician was compelled to follow him, and they pushed out into a great storm of snow, and hail, and wind, which had come on over night; and neither the wind, the hail, nor the snow, had the slightest respect for the bare limbs of the old magician, for there was not the least virtue of magic in those parts of old Mishosha's body. After a while they quite stiffened under him, his body became hard, and the hair bristled in the cold wind, so that he looked to Owa.s.so--who turned away from him, leaving the wicked old magician alone to ponder upon his past life--to Owa.s.so he looked like a tough old sycamore-tree more than a highly-gifted old magician.

Owa.s.so himself reached home in safety, proof against all kinds of weather, and the magic canoe became the exclusive property of the young man and his wife.

During all this part of Owa.s.so's stay at the lodge of Mishosha, his sister, whom he had left on the main land with Sheem, their younger brother, had labored with good-will to supply the lodge. She knew enough of the arts of the forest to provide their daily food, and she watched her little brother, and tended his wants, with all of a good sister's care. By times she began to be weary of solitude and of her charge. No one came to be a witness of her constancy, or to let fall a single word in her mother-tongue. She could not converse with the birds and beasts about her, and she felt, to the bottom of her heart, that she was alone.

In these thoughts she forgot her younger brother; she almost wished him dead; for it was he alone that kept her from seeking the companionship of others.

One day, after collecting all the provisions she had been able to reserve from their daily use, and bringing a supply of wood to the door, she said to her little brother:

"My brother, you must not stray from the lodge. I am going to seek our elder brother. I shall be back soon."

She then set the lodge in perfect order, and, taking her bundle, she set off in search of habitations. These she soon found, and in the enjoyment of the pleasures and pastimes of her new acquaintance, she began to think less and less of her little brother, Sheem. She accepted proposals of marriage, and from that time she utterly forgot the abandoned boy.

As for poor little Sheem, he was soon brought to the pinching turn of his fate. As soon as he had eaten all of the food left in the lodge, he was obliged to pick berries, and live off of such roots as he could dig with his slender hands. As he wandered about in search of wherewithal to stay his hunger, he often looked up to heaven, and saw the gray clouds going up and down. And then he looked about upon the wide earth, but he never saw sister nor brother returning from their long delay.

At last, even the roots and berries gave out. They were blighted by the frost or hidden out of reach by the snow, for the mid-winter had come on, and poor little Sheem was obliged to leave the lodge and wander away in search of food.

Sometimes he was enforced to pa.s.s the night in the clefts of old trees or caverns, and to break his fast with the refuse meals of the savage wolves.

These at last became his only resource, and he grew to be so little fearful of these animals that he would sit by them while they devoured their meat, and patiently await his share.

After a while, the wolves took to little Sheem very kindly, and seeming to understand his outcast condition, they would always leave something for him to eat. By and by they began to talk with him, and to inquire into his history. When he told them that he had been forsaken by his brother and his sister, the wolves turned about to each other, lifted up their eyes to heaven, and wondered among themselves, with raised paws, that such a thing should have been.

In this way, Sheem lived on till the spring, and as soon as the lake was free from ice, he followed his new friends to the sh.o.r.e.

It happened on the same day, that his elder brother, Owa.s.so, was fishing in his magic canoe, a considerable distance out upon the lake; when he thought he heard the cries of a child upon the sh.o.r.e. He wondered how any human creature could exist on so bleak and barren a coast.

He listened again with all attention, and he heard the cry distinctly repeated; and this time it was the well-known cry of his younger brother that reached his ear. He knew too well the secret of his song, as he heard him chaunting mournfully:

"My brother! My brother! Since you left me going in the canoe, a-hee-ee, I am half changed into a wolf, E-wee. I am half changed into a wolf, E-wee."

Owa.s.so made for the sh.o.r.e, and as he approached the lament was repeated.

The sounds were very distinct, and the voice of wailing was very sorrowful for Owa.s.so to listen to, and it touched him the more that it died away at the close, into a long-drawn howl, like that of the wolf.

In the sand, as he drew closer to the land, he saw the tracks as of that animal fleeing away; and besides these the prints of human hands. But what were the pity and astonishment that smote Owa.s.so to the heart when he espied his poor little brother--poor little forsaken Sheem--half boy and half wolf, flying along the sh.o.r.e.

Owa.s.so immediately leaped upon the ground and strove to catch him in his arms, saying soothingly, "My brother! my brother! Come to me."

But the poor wolf-boy avoided his grasp, crying, as he fled, "Neesia, neesia. Since you left me going in the canoe, a-he-ee, I am half changed into a wolf, E-wee. I am half changed into a wolf, E-wee!" and howling between these words of lament.

The elder brother, sore at heart, and feeling all of his brotherly affection strongly returning, with renewed anguish, cried out, "My brother! my brother! my brother!"

But the nearer he approached to poor Sheem, the faster he fled, and the more rapidly the change went on; the boy-wolf by turns singing and howling, and calling out the name, first of his brother and then of his sister, till the change was complete. He leaped upon a bank, and looking back, and casting upon Owa.s.so a glance of deep reproach and grief, he exclaimed, "I am a wolf!" and disappeared in the woods.