Traditions of the North American Indians Volume I Part 4

Then the Old Eagle got up, but he could not walk strong, for he was the oldest warrior of his tribe, and had seen the flowers bloom many times, and the infant trees of the forest die of old age, and the friends of his boyhood laid in the dust. He went to the woman, and laid his hands on her head, and wept(8). The other warriors, who had lost their kindred and sons in the war with the Walkullas, did the same, shouting and weeping very loud. The women also wept, but they did not come near the prisoner.

"Where is the Young Eagle?" asked the Old Eagle of the Mad Buffalo. The other warriors, in like manner, asked for their kindred who had been killed.

"Fathers, they are dead," answered the head warrior. "The Mad Buffalo has said they are dead, and he never lies. But let my fathers take comfort. Who can live for ever? The foot of the swift step, and the hand of the stout bow, become feeble; the eye of the true aim grows dim, and the heart of many days quails at the fierce glance of warriors.

'Twas better that they should die like brave men in their youth, than become old men and grow faint."

"We must have revenge. We will not listen to the young warrior, who pines for the daughter of the sun[A]; revenge we will have!" they all cried. Then they began to sing a very mournful song, still weeping. The Mad Buffalo offered them the pipe of peace, but they would not take it.

[Footnote A: "Daughter of the Sun."--See the Tradition _infra_.]

Song.

Where are our sons, Who went to drink the blood of their foes?

Who went forth to war and slaughter, Armed with tough bows and sharp arrows?

Who carried long spears, and were nimble of foot As the swift buck, and feared nothing but shame?

Who crossed deep rivers, and swam lakes, And went to war against the Walkullas?

Ask the eagle--he can tell you: He says, "My beak is red as the red leaf, And the blood of the slain of your land has dyed it."

Ask the panther if he is hungry?

"No," he shall say; "I have been at a feast."

What has he in his mouth?

Look! it is the arm of a Shawanos warrior!

Why do our old men weep, And our women, and our daughters, and our little ones?

Is it for the warriors who went forth to battle?

Is it for them who went forth in glory, And fell like the leaves of the tree in autumn?

Is it for them?

What doth the Indian love?--Revenge.

What doth he fight for?--Revenge.

What doth he pray for?--Revenge.

It is sweet as the flesh of a young bear; For this he goes hungry, roaming the desert, Living on berries, or chewing the rough bark Of the oak, and drinking the slimy pool.

Revenged we must be.

Behold the victim!

Beautiful she is as the stars, Or the trees with great white flowers.

Let us give her to the Great Spirit; Let us make a fire, and offer her for our sons, That we may have success against the Walkullas, And revenge us for our sons.

When the strange woman saw them weeping and singing so mournfully, she crept close to the head warrior for protection. Tears rolled down her cheeks, and she often looked up to the house of the Great Spirit, and talked; but none could understand her, save Chenos, who said she was praying to her G.o.d. All the time, the Old Eagle, and the other warriors, who had lost their sons, were begging very hard that she should be burned to revenge them. But Chenos stood up, and said:

"Brothers and warriors! our sons did very wrong when they broke in upon the sacred dance the Walkullas had made to their G.o.d, upon the coming in of the new corn, and he lent his thunder to the strange warriors, and they killed ours easily. Let us not draw down his anger farther upon us by doing we know not what. It may be if we offer this woman upon his fire, he will himself come with his thunder and strike us, as he did the sacred tree, and we shall all die. Let the beautiful woman remain this night in the wigwam of the council, covered with skins, and let none disturb her. To-morrow we will offer a sacrifice of deer's flesh to the Great Spirit; and, if he will not give her to the raging fire and the torments of the avengers, he will tell us so by the words of his mouth.

If he do not speak, it shall be done to her as the Old Eagle and his brothers have said."

The head chief said, "Chenos has spoken well; wisdom is in his words.

Make for the strange woman a soft bed of skins, and treat her kindly, for it may be she is the daughter of the Great Spirit."

Then the Indians all returned to their cabins and slept, save the Mad Buffalo, who, fearing for the life of his prisoner, laid himself down at the door of the lodge and watched.

When the morning came, the head warrior went to the forest and killed a deer, fat and proper for an offering, which he brought to Chenos, who prepared it for a sacrifice; and he sang a song while the flesh lay on the fire:--

Song of Chenos.

We have built the fire; The deer we have kill'd; The skin and the horns we have parted from the flesh; The flesh is laid on the burning coals; The sweetness thereof goes up in the smoke:-- Master of Life, wilt thou come and claim thine own?

Wilt thou come, Great Spirit of our fathers, And say if we may harbour revenge, and not anger thee?

Shall we plant the stake, and bind the fair-one?

The beautiful maid, with her hair like bunches of grapes, And her eyes like the blue sky, And her skin white as the blossoms of the forest-tree, And her voice as the music of a little stream, And her step as the bound of the young fawn?

Shall her soft flesh be torn with sharp thorns, And burn'd with fiery flames?

"Let us listen," said Chenos, stopping the warriors in their dance. "Let us see if the Great Spirit hears us."

They listened, but could not hear him singing. Chenos asked him why he would not speak, but he did not answer. Then they sung again:--

Shall the flame we have kindled expire?

Shall the sacrifice-embers go out?

Shall the maiden be free from the fire?

Shall the voice of revenge wake no shout?

We ask that our feet may be strong In the way thou wouldst have us to go; Let thy voice, then, be heard in the song, That thy will, and our task, we may know.

"Hush," said Chenos, listening; "I hear the crowing of the Great Turkey-c.o.c.k[A]; I hear him speaking." They stopped, and Chenos went close to the fire, and talked with his master, but n.o.body saw with whom he talked. "What does the Great Spirit tell his prophet?" asked the head chief.

[Footnote A: Thunder, also called the "hissing of the Great Serpent."]

Chenos answered, "He says the young woman must not be offered to him; he wills her to live, and become the mother of many children."

Many of the chiefs and warriors were pleased that the beautiful woman was to live. They wished to make her their daughter; but those who had lost their brothers and sons in the war were not appeased. They said, "We will have blood. We will have revenge for our sons. We will go to the priest of the Evil Spirit, and ask him if his master will not give us revenge."

Not far from where our nation had their council-fire there was a great hill, covered with stunted trees, and moss, and rugged rocks. There was a great cave in it, how great none of the Indians could tell, save Sketupah, the priest of the Evil Spirit, for no one but he had ever entered it. He lived in this cave, and there did worship to his master.

It was a strange place, and much feared by the Indians. If a man but spoke a word at the mouth of it, somebody from within mocked him in a strange, hoa.r.s.e voice, which sounded like the first of the thunders. And just so many and the same words as the man at the mouth of the cave spoke, the spirit in the cave repeated.[A]

[Footnote A: The Indians think that echoes are the voice of a spirit.]

Sketupah was a strange old creature, whom the oldest living man of the nation never saw but as he now was. He would have been very tall if he had been straight, but he was more crooked than a warped bow. His hair looked like a bunch of snakes, and his eyes like two coals of fire. His mouth reached from ear to ear, and his legs, which were very long, were no bigger than a sapling of two snows. He was, indeed, a very fearful old man, and the Indians feared him scarcely less than the Evil One.

Many were the gifts which our nation made to Sketupah, to gain his favour and the favour of his master. Who but he feasted on the fattest buffalo hump? Who but he fed on the earliest ear of milky corn?--on the best things which grew on the land or in the water? The fears of the Indian fed him with the choicest things of the land.

The Old Eagle went to the mouth of the cave, and cried with a loud voice, "Sketupah!"

"Sketupah," answered the hoa.r.s.e voice of the Evil Spirit from the hollow cave. Soon Sketupah came, and asked the Old Eagle what he wanted.

"Revenge for our sons, who have been killed by the Walkullas and their friends, who live beyond the Great Lake, and came on the back of a great bird. Revenge we must have."

"Revenge we ask, revenge we must have," said the hoa.r.s.e voice in the cave.

"Will your master hear us?" asked the Old Eagle of the priest.

"My master must have a sacrifice, he must smell blood," said the ugly old man. "Then we shall know if he will give you revenge. Go in the morning to the woods, and take a wolf, a rattlesnake, and a tortoise, and bring them to me at the mouth of the cave, when the great star of day is coming out of the Suwaney."

The Old Eagle, and the other chiefs and warriors who asked revenge, did as Sketupah bade them. They went to the woods, and took a wolf, a tortoise, and a rattlesnake, and brought them, the wolf growling, the snake hissing, and the tortoise snapping his teeth, to the priest.