 | CHAPTER VIII. The Shoshonee Valley |  |
8. CHAPTER VIII.
And the forest is doffing its mantle of pride,
And its red leaves twirl in the wind's lightest breath.
M. P. F.
Not long after the burial of Lenahah, the consequences
of the brooded revenge and intrigues of Julius
began to assume a visible form. Some Black-feet
Indians had assaulted a party of the Shoshonee,
who had gone to the sources of the Sewasserna, to
set their winter traps. Two persons were killed, and
the remainder plundered of their horses, guns, traps,
provisions, and every thing appertaining to the party,
upon which their enemies could lay hands. The party
was obliged to return immediately, on foot, at the
risk of perishing with hunger by the way. A loud
cry for revenge arose. A detachment from both
tribes, in proportion to their respective numbers, was
ordered by Ellswatta to be levied, and to be commanded
by Areskoui, to make a campaign of reprisal
against the Blackfeet. The Shienne murmured
against the requisition, alledging, that it was the single
affair of the Shoshonee; and that the season was
so far advanced, that the expedition would, probably,
perish with cold and hunger on such a distant winter
campaign against an enemy, who would, after all, be
found invisible. The demonstrations of the Shienne
were so decidedly hostile on this occasion, that Ellswatta,
after consulting with William Weldon and
Elder Wood, on whose wisdom and fidelity he relied
much, determined to relinquish the expedition, until
spring; and to defer any notice of the openly refractory
occur, when he did not carry the voices of his people
with him. But a contumacious spirit, ripe for revolt
and rebellion, if it find itself thwarted, and circumvented
in one direction, will soon show itself in another.
From the time that Jessy gave a decided rejection to
the suit of Julius, he had preserved a distance almost
amounting to an entire cessation of intercourse. It
was a relief to her to have it so. Her conscience had
constantly reproached her, during the intimacy, with
the pain which, she perceived, it inflicted upon Areskoui.
She had more than once instituted a stern
comparison of the truth and magnanimity of the one,
with the specious manners and hollow character of
the other. She said to herself, `why should I be influenced
by the unworthy prejudice, which considers
the possessor of these qualities savage, because he
has not been bred in the schools of refinement and deception?
Can I retain self respect, while I am caught
in the fact of balancing a fair complexion and a polished
exterior with true greatness, as I see it in
this child of nature?'
Truth was, also, that she had made the discovery,
that Frederic possessed, with better principles and a
much sounder understanding, more to fix the affections,
than his friend. She saw in him unwavering
integrity of purpose, and uniform decorum of manners.
When he did converse, there was richness and
interest, in what he said, and the hearer always wished
him to speak again. She had not failed to remark,
that in her presence he was silent and constrained;
that when, in occasional courtesy, he had offered her
his hand, it always trembled; that he seemed to court
her society only in the presence of others, and disposed
to avoid being alone with her; and that, whenever
this occurred, however conversible before, he
become grave, and embarrassed. Such conduct, according
one construction. In some way, for some unimagined
cause, she concluded, that he had taken dislike to her.
A compliment from him would have had value with
her, for it would have been received as the tribute of
sense and sincerity. But compliment, be the occasion
as fair as it might, she never received. A little
pique, a great deal of respect, and no inconsiderable
portion of curiosity, to divine, why he had come
to estimates of her, so different from his friend's, induced
her to wish a more intimate acquaintance with
him. She had enough of the nature of our common
mother, after looking in her glass, not to derive any
particular gratification, from imagining it probable,
that she was disagreeable to the stern youth of high
forehead and reserved port.
So estranged had both her former visitants become,
that her father, little as he was in the habit of remarking
such circumstances, enquired of Yensi, `why
the two young gentlemen, formerly so sociable, were
now seldom seen at the house?' He answered his
own question by remarking, that he supposed, this
joining the Indians was but the passing freak of idle
and unstable young men, who would soon get weary
of it, and return again to society. His daughter had
become accustomed to the high treat of this instructed
and accomplished companionship. She was ashamed
to admit to herself, how much she suffered, from having
it broken off. She felt, more than all, in reference
to the imagined coldness of Frederic, more
keenly, than comported with the wonted repose of
her balanced character. `This, then, is society, she
asked? A beautiful face and person, with a hollow
head and heart. A fine understanding and capability
of exciting high interest, that is yet cold, capricious,
and estranged, it knows not why nor wherefore.
Alas! my father is right. There is no truth, except
other best. I see that I may explore farther, and find
worse. Let me remain satisfied with the frank and
noble nature of the unsophisticated Areskoui.'
It may be, too, that some almost unconscious disposition
to pique the young men in her turn, mingled
with her thoughts. The consequence of such thoughts
was, that, without any thing, that could be pronounced
trifling with the affection of the young chief, she
showed him more marked attention, and received his
courtesies with unwonted kindness, which, without inspiring
him with confidence, satisfied his humble expectations,
and rendered him again happy. Gladly
would the young chief have resigned his early expectations,
so that he might have been with her in the
innocent and confiding intercourse of their early years,
and been sure, that she would never be more to another,
than to him. `She has found, then,' he said to himself
with infinite satisfaction, `that they are not altogether
the children of the Wacondah, though they are so
fair. She avoids them, and she regards me with the
same look, as when we played together as children.'
As he indulged such thoughts, cheerfulness returned
to his visage and elasticity to his step.
An undefinable emotion of gladness swelled the
heart of Jessy, as she once more felt a return of the
full confidence and paternal affection of Ellswatta and
Josepha. It is true, they had never shown her unkindness
or marked avoidance, from the time of the
arrival of the young strangers. But it was not to be
expected of any form of human nature, that parents
could see a beloved and only son suffering all the tortures
of despairing love, on her account, and yet regard
her with affection. `How much misery,' she reflected
with herself, `results from the slightest transgression
of the laws of prudence and duty! How
much joy flows from a single act of self control and
she imparted to these faithful and devoted
friends, by desisting from more courtesy towards the
adopted guests, than Areskoui, she returned to the
pleasure of a self approving mind, and felt the pain
of these suspended enjoyments alleviated.
Rumor has a hundred tongues, with the Shoshonee,
as with the whites. The young men, with whom she
had for months past spent so many hours in her bower,
were now evidently held in estrangement. No more
wanderings to the blue lake. No more music, nor
painting. Areskoui visited William, as heretofore;
and Jessy received him, as in days gone by. Frederic
seemed to have become a disciple and convert of Elder
Wood's, so closely did he hold communion with
him. On the other hand, Nelesho, Julius, Baptiste
and Hatch, met in conclave, whispered, and appeared
to have a masonic tie, excluding the uninitiated.
From these strong changes in the deportment of
the Shoshonee guests, it soon came to be rumored,
that Wakona, on being pressed, had finally made up
her mind to discard both her white suitors, and
marry the Shoshonee chief. This rumor had obtained
undisputed currency and credit, as often happens,
while the parties chiefly interested had not the slightest
suspicion of the thing themselves. Nelesho heard,
and believed it, and his heart rankled with the rage
of a fiend. Baptiste announced it to him and Julius,
as they discussed their conclave projects. `May I
burn with a hundred fires, and may the Wahcondah's
lightning blast me, before I allow it,' said Nelesho.
`I would sooner see the little white men of the mountains
feed upon her cheeks.' `May I descend to the
burning abysses of Elder Wood's hell,' said Julius,
`if I do not anticipate them. Nevertheless, it were
better so, than, that she had chosen Frederic.' `You
must be prompt, and in earnest,' said Baptiste, `or you
purposes will shortly appear. Frederic heard the
report, and repaired to William Weldon's once more,
from whose house he had refrained for the unwonted
space of four days. Fortunately for his wishes, he
found the daughter of Yensi alone, as her parents
were visiting Ellswatta's cabin. He made bashful
apologies, as fearful of having intruded. She replied,
`that it was equally matter of surprise and regret, to
find it necessary, that they, who had until recently
met so frequently, should now deem it necessary to
frame apologies, when that converse was resumed.—
Circumstances, not necessary to be explained,' she
continued, `had induced her to deny herself hereafter
to his friend; but the same reasons not existing in his
case, she assured him, she should continue to find
pleasure in his society, whenever he found no better
way, in which to devote it, than in the house of her
father. But,' said she, `you seem sad, and as it were
the Knight of the woful countenance. I have observed
you drooping, for some time. You are, no
doubt, borne down with ennui. Your idle fancy of
domesticating among us has had its hour. More sober
views of duty have returned to you. Such an
one, as you, ought not to remain, thus wasting the
prime of your days to no purpose. I counsel you,
Frederic, to return to society. You have parents.
Render them happy. You are capable of discharging
important duties to your country. I say nothing
of some fair one, whom providence has probably
written for you in the book of its decrees.'
`I am grateful,' he replied, `for such wise and disinterested
advice. I propose shortly to put some part
of it in practice. But I have one ungratified wish,
that will detain me for a few days in this fair valley.
I am informed, our chief expects soon to call you'—
`What?' asked Jessy, laughing through her blushes.
such difficulty, in pronouncing it.' `To call you his
own! I wait to see the nuptials; and when they are
over, I will away, no matter where; and I will no
longer annoy you with the sight of a recreant Knight
of the woful visage, loitering his useless days among
the Shoshonee. Though, to say truth, I know of no
place, where I should be of any more use than here.'
`If you wait for that event,' she replied gaily, `we
shall have the pleasure of your society for a long
time to come. You seem so much in earnest, that I
have a right to ask you, if there is really such a ridiculous
report, as you mention, current?' `There
certainly is, and I had not a doubt of the truth of it.'
`Well then, allow me to say, that I do not believe the
young chief has any more thought of such a thing,
than I. At any rate, there is not a shadow of foundation
for such a report, nor a word of truth in it.'
`Thank God! You have removed a load from my
mind.'
`I can hardly imagine, why it could have been to
you an object, to remain, until after the event, had it
been about to take place; or why denying the idle rumor
should remove a weight from your mind. After
the assurance, that no such event is likely to take
place, at present or hereafter, I may surely ask, why
the prospect of it was regarded by you with so much
horror? What is there so terrible in Areskoui? Is
it in his birth of a white and a Christian mother, or a
father the noblest of red men, with more sense and
worthiness to rule, than many, who have been in high
places among the whites? Is it in his understanding,
person, or deportment? Is it in his forbearance towards
you and your friend? Why, I ask again, should
it inspire so much horror to hear, that I, who seem
destined from my birth to pass my days in this valley,
should be about to become—yes, I will speak it out—
which, thank God, I am not, between him,
and your handsome friend, Julius, I assure you, I
should not hesitate a moment.'
`You have removed still another load from my heart,'
he added. `How I trembled, lest his beautiful person,
his specious manners, his birth and fortune, should
have proved temptations to you, as I may now say
without hesitation, they have to so many others! He
is not my friend, nor am I his. Understanding his
principles and character, I could no longer be his
friend. As to the chief, you misapprehend me too.
In view of the truth of the rumor, I might not be able
to control my envy; but I have never allowed it to
blind me for a moment to his pre-eminent worth. My
heart has done ample homage to his character. I
know, too, full well, that to be a gentleman is not the
gift of society, nor wealth, nor the result of manners,
or beauty of person; though these factitious circumstances
are generally deemed all, that is requisite.—
Areskoui carries in his mind, his heart and deportment,
his claims to that high appellation. I admire not to
see him, such as he is. Who could have been reared in
the midst of this inspiring scenery, and this patriarchal
people, with such a father for example, and such a
companion, as he has had from infancy, and not have
been all, that he is?' `All this,' she replied, `explains
not, why the refutation of this rumor removed such a
weight from your mind.' `And that,' he answered, `I
may never explain; nor, in fact, trust myself longer in
these dangerous confidential conversations.' Saying
this, his countenance betrayed extraordinary agitation,
as he suddenly arose, and took his leave.
`Can it be possible,' thought she, `that this man,
whom I thought so obdurate, and so unfavorably disposed
towards me, conceals an affection too deep and
timid, ever to have been committed to words?' A new
clouds gathering. Harbingers of danger were thickening
round her. `Oh!' she mentally exclaimed, `that
my parents would see, as I do; and remove from these
people to the land of law and of order; that we could
go under the guidance of this intrepid and wise young
man, whose last words and looks enabled me to divine
every thing; and who has yet, even beyond the
forbearance of Areskoui, the courage not only to have
been silent, but to have assumed the appearance of
the most perfect indifference.'
Next day the young guests were absent on a hunting
expedition, each with the parties of their customary
association. Her mind and her heart were full
of the meditations, inspired by the interview of the
former evening with Frederic. It occurred to her,
that the reasons, which had for some time banished
her from the bower of the blue lake, did not exist for
the moment. She was seized with a strong inclination
to spend one more afternoon in that delicious place.
She repaired thither with her drawing materials, followed
by her customary attendant. The dim and
misty air of Indian summer hung over the waning
landscape, above, and around. Glorious tinges of
orange, red, and green, were blended in the forests,
and the rustle of frequent falling leaves in the silence
of the woods proclaimed the decay of vegetable nature,
and raised the mind to `solemn thought and
heavenly musing.' The sun, broadened, and of the
hue of blood, threw a portentous glory behind him, as
he climbed over the western peaks. She was profoundly
meditating the character and person of Frederic.
She remembered the countenance, with which
he received the refutation of the idle rumor, in relation
to her and Areskoui, when the truth of his feelings,
in regard to her, flashed upon her in a moment,
speaking a language more emphatic, than any declaration.
heard him recite the lines of Byron.
In mercy ne'er again depart;
But onward with thee bear my soul,
Where winds can waft, or waters roll.
She was sketching his look and attitude, as he had
pronounced these words in one of their former interviews,
and was wishing, that she and her parents were
flying under his protection from these solitudes, where
savage violence had so often had the ascendency, and
where she dreaded the omens of mustering storms.
She was so intently occupied in this employment,
that she barely noticed the approach of horses to the
foot of the declivity. A moment afterwards, a powerful
Shienne Indian rushed upon her. He cried fiercely
in his own language, as he raised his hatchet over
her head, `be silent, or die.' He grasped her in his
sinewy arms, with a force, to which all her resistance
was powerless. Half a dozen Indians, discovered by
their dialect to be Shienne, aided him to bear her
down to the bank of the stream. Her cries were disregarded,
or only redoubled the rude brutality of the
force, by which she was borne along. She was lifted,
as she had been an article of lading, into a periogue,
which was instantly filled with the Shienne. Their
paddles struck the stream with unwonted force.—
Borne on, at once by the powerful current and this
rapid rowing, the periogue glided swiftly down the
stream. If she attempted to cry, savage hands were
applied to her mouth. If she attempted to struggle,
she was in the grasp of the brawny savage, who held
her, as if controlled to stillness by the iron machinery
of mechanic power. `Help, Father in heaven!' was
all the forlorn daughter could utter, as she saw the
peaceful smoke of her father's house disappear from
her vision. She glided by the trees with such fearful
made her brain dizzy to behold them. At the distance
of a league from the Shoshonee village, where pursuit
seemed no longer dreaded, the savages refrained from
attempting to stifle her cries, assuring her, that if she
remained quiet, and made no attempt to escape, no
harm should happen to her. She made efforts to soften
them. She fell on her knees, and uttered such
words, and made such appeals, as nature would dictate
to a child torn from the arms of parents, so honored
and loved. Their brutal laugh, their conversation
about their own matters, in the midst of her tears
and petitions, convinced her in a moment, that wisdom
and duty called for silence and resignation, in the
assurance, that whatever their purpose was, she might
as well expostulate against her fate in the dull cold
ear of death. She murmured in a low tone, `my parents!
my home! farewell.' A shower of tears relieved
her bursting bosom.
That long night, which seemed to her an age, elapsed,
as she still continued to be borne rapidly down the
stream. As the beams of the morning began to tinge
the orient, and the distant mountains, she perceived,
that she was passing the gap of the Sewasserna. The
frowning and iron-bound mountains here present a
fearful spectacle to a person descending the river,
which laves either side of the cleft mountain, that towers
with its dark cliffs from the bosom of the stream to
an immense height above. The view, dimly discernible
by the uncertain dawn, seemed to her imagination
in keeping with the inexorable beings, who were hurrying
her through these frightful scenes, she knew not
whither. Dark and interminable shadows rested upon
every part of the outline, except where morning
had begun to scatter the light of her watch-fires in
her triumphal march.
A mile or two beyond the gap, the periogues came
to shore in a thick wooded bottom. The same powerful
constantly near her, during the descent, bade her follow
him on shore. She answered in his own speech,
`thou canst kill, bad Shienne; but the heart defies thy
power. I will not move for thee.' `We will see to
that,' he quickly answered. `The young bird does
not easily resist the bald eagle.' He once more seized
her in his arms, and bore her through the woods, preceded
by three savages and followed by the same number.
Just as a belt of gold began to mark the eastern
horizon, they emerged from the wooded alluvion to a
little prairie, bounded by a magnificent black parapet
of rocks, which sprang up, as it were, to the sky, from
the level of the prairie. Amidst the terror, exhaustion
and overwhelming sensations of her forlorn condition,
she discovered by a glance, that she was
brought to the roots of that range of mountains, awful
and interdicted to Indian thoughts, sacred to the little
white men of the mountains, and known in the Shoshonee
dialect by the name Manitouna, the spirit's
dwelling, or as Elder Wood rendered it, the devil's
house. She had more sensible evidence of the fact,
a moment afterwards. Her savage bearer relaxed his
grasp, and seated her on the grass at the foot of this stupendous
wall. The savages all paused, and clapping
their hands to their mouths, and passing them rapidly
backwards and forwards, gave forth that sharp and
terrible Indian yell, which is so well remembered by
those, acquainted with the red men. The mountains
rung. The wolves heard in their dens, and answered
by a long dismal howl, waking up the sleeping morning
echoes. This was repeated two or three times.
Soon afterwards, a movement appeared in a small orifice
in the wall, a few feet before them. A stone
sunk, and left a narrow chasm. The Indians entered
one by one, inclining to a position almost horizontal.
After three had disappeared in this way, under the
superincumbent wall, her muscular tormentor signed
Indians who had preceded her. As she demurred,
she was compelled to enter as before, the savage without
placing her in the grasp of invisible arms within,
by which she felt herself rapidly drawn through a
long dark chasm, from which she emerged to the
bright light of morning, and was released, as she raised
herself erect upon a tender, green sward, and
looked round with equal amazement and terror upon
a little square prairie, walled in on every side by perpendicular
walls of stone, reaching, as it seemed, to
the clouds. She saw herself a prisoner in the Manitouna,
or spirit house. Renewing the yell, with
which they had entered, the sharp notes of which reverberated
in a thousand sounds, inflicting pain upon
the ear, as they came back like electric strokes from
the frowning walls, they disappeared, telling her,
that she was now the charge of the little white men
of the mountains.
This strange spot, in Shoshonee dialect, Manitouna,
was a result of one of those astonishing freaks, that
nature is sometimes seen to take in the transition region
of mountains, when she seems hesitating between
lime stone and sand stone formation. The prairie
might contain six acres, of which a parallel belt of
two acres was a thick wood. From the roots
of the mountain welled a pure spring, which gurgled
across the prairie, just on the margin of the wood, and
parallel with it, and disappeared on the opposite side,
sinking there, in the same manner as it had risen.—
The wood was vocal with the song of thousands of
birds, the barking of squirrels, and the joyous cries of
various small quadrupeds. Sheltered by the high
walls from the rude blasts, and open to the influences
of the sun, nature had here formed a kind of green-house,
where spring and autumn showed as in a covenant,
to linger, the one until replaced by the other;
and, while all beyond this strange enclosure was sear
as if returned without the intervention of winter.—
On the thousand flowers, that convered the verdant
carpet of the prairie, hummed innumerable wild bees,
who were here, unbidden, and unwitnessed of man,
pursuing their solitary labors; and here hovered the
gay butterflies, seeking admiration from each other,
rather than the fairest daughters of women. This
strange prison was walled in, nearly in a quadrangular
form, by walls on three sides eight hundred feet
high; and on the fourth, where it constituted the foot
of the mountain, at least half that height. To this
there was but one entrance, except from the sky, and
that was by the orifice, through which Jessy had been
compelled to enter. A huge poised rock, which a
single hand was sufficient to move, so as to incline it
downwards on a pivoted point, opened sufficient space,
to allow but one person at a time to enter the chasm,
and pass through it into the interior. The stone required
the same force to incline it back, so as that its
outer face again completely closed the chasm. The
person who commanded the entrance within, had but
to block up this pivoted point with rocks, and it remained
firmly and immovably barred against mortal
power, however great. There was then neither ingress
nor escape, except such, as was practicable to
the mountain eagle.
This spot bore marks of having formerly been occupied,
as a fortress. But for immemorial duration
of the Shoshonee annals, it had been a medicine place,
interdieted to Indian feet by dread of its invisible terrors,
and a consecration to the little white men of the
mountains. For some years past, the sole known occupant
had been a Shienne woman. From a number
of singularly ugly and ill-tempered old women, who
had been burned, as happens among most Indian
tribes at intervals of some years, as witches, she had
been spared, from superstitious dread, on account of
skins of female opposums, the most monstrous of quadrupeds.
She was belted in the middle with the sloughed
skins of yellow rattle snakes; and her whole body,
and especially her legs, were ornamented with the
crustaceous and crackling bags of their rattles, which,
as she moved, subserved the purposes of the favorite
Indian brass leg-tinklers, and caused her step to imitate
the rattling of a thousand of the horrid serpents.
Her grizzly black locks were ornamented with little
dried scorpions, newts, chameleons, and other diminutive
and loathsome lizards. Dried bull-frogs and toads
were reserved, as jewels for days of gala festival, and
extra ornament.
Nature had done much to form a body, for which
all this was in keeping. Her shrivelled face was
adorned with blue and green paint. Her nose was
an exact resemblance of an eagle's beak. Her tall,
muscular and powerful frame was bent in the middle,
so as to leave the beholder in doubt, whether the
bending were the work of continual spasm, or of age.
The eye almost invariably is of one color among the
savages. But nature had awarded her one of green,
and the other of blue, for the sake of variety. These
were the outlines, which words can catch. But there
was a diabolical j'ne scais quoi of ugliness, which
would baffle all power of language. Years before she
left her people, she had dwelt alone. Even the Indian
dogs howled, and fled, as she came in sight. She
turned her terrors to account, and muttered incessantly
about her communion with the little white men
of the mountains. She calculated wisely her influence
upon the superstitious race. On returning from
an unfortunate expedition, some sixteen years before,
the Indians in a panic instituted a witch ordeal. Many
old women perished in the flames. But this frightful
object, called in their language Maniteewah, or
the devil's aunt, was spared, on condition, that she
and thus as perpetual priestess, dwell alone, to
avert the wrath of the little white men of the mountains
from her people.
She had been transported here, thrust into the cavity,
and left to her native ingenuity to subsist herself
on the numerous animals, with which her inaccessible
residence abounded. Here she had dwelt alone, till
the late intrigues had reminded Julius, and Nelesho,
and some infidel spirits of the Shienne, whom the very
hardihood of guilt had raised above invisible terrors,
how fit a place it was, both by nature and opinion, for
the perpetration of their purposes in relation to the
daughter of Yensi.
Chilled alike with terror and the cold dews of the
preceding night, and rendered almost incapable of
movement, by confinement to a single position on
board the periogue, the fair and frail girl surveyed at
a glance the walls of her prison. She knew the terrors
of the place by report. `No entrance or escape'
was written visibly on every side. `Let me not sink,'
she thought. `I owe it to my dear parents, not to
yield to imbecile and childish terror. Omnipotence
dwells here, and the strength of Israel hath already
scaled these walls. Let me confide in my Father in
Heaven.'
Thus fortified, she arose, and moved onward, in efforts
to bring circulation to her benumbed limbs.—
With what delight would she have surveyed this beautiful
and astonishing solitude, had her parents, and
friends been with her. As it was, the pleasant hum
of the bees, the sportive flutter of the thousand butterflies,
the charming verdure of the sward, the magnificence
of the wood, enlivened with a thousand joyous
cries, the beautiful and brilliant morning, brought
to her desolate heart the cheerful omen of the presence
of the Author of good, as traced by these marks
of his presence in this inaccessible and strange prison.
alone, can protect and rescue me,' was her inward
ejaculation. Step by step, she advanced towards the
wood, and was already beside the pellucid little
brook, when suddenly she saw various figures emerging
from the wood, and moving with shouts of laughter
towards her. Among them she clearly distinguished
Baptiste and Julius. The whole purpose of
her abduction stood unveiled before her. A chill
perspiration started from every pore; dizziness seized
her head; the trees, every thing whirled; she escaped
misery in the loss of consciousness.
When she recovered recollection, she found herself
on a mattrass, in a large tent. The finest linen
was spread under her. Her mattrass was enveloped
with the richest damask curtains. Beside her was a
table, spread with refreshments, all denoting arrangement
got up from Astoria. In the tent was a female
voluptuously dressed on one side, and, moving and
muttering on the other, the horrible vision of Maniteewah,
of whom she had heard so much, that she instantly
recognized the frightful original. She hid her
eyes with her hands, and uttered a feeble cry of horror.
The two figures disappeared, and Julius entered
alone. He took her languid hand, which she had
not strength to withdraw. `Have I frightened thee,
my pretty Wakon-bird?' he asked. `Has that hell-fiend
taught thee by comparison, that there are persons
uglier than thy Julius?' She answered by a
look of astonishment, and eyes swimming in tears.—
`Weepest thou, pretty one?' he asked. `What a beautiful
hand, I hold!' `I have no protector, to punish
thee, wretch, nor strength to withdraw it. Findest
thou thy prize beautiful, coward,' she faintly replied.
`Indeed is it, Wakona, the prettiest I ever handled;
and I have felt pretty ones before.' `Would it restore
me to those, who would protect me, I would cheerfully
cut off this hand, and give it thee.' `No! No!
living hand, as thou art.' At the same time he gathered
in his palm, the silken curls, that hung on her
neck. `These curls,' he said, `are divine, and fit ornaments
for Venus at the drawing room of Jove.'—
`Give me scissors, Julius, and I will cut these curls,
and give thee, or aught else, that might bribe thee
from thy robber purpose.' `No. Sweet one; the
locks, the lovely head, the hand, the person, all, are
mine, without thy giving. In a little time, I dare
swear, the heart will follow; and those eyes will survey
me with love and pleasure, as marked, as the disdain,
that now flashes in them.' `Julius, is it indeed,
then, a monstrous and horrible fact, that such a
form can contain not a bad mind only, but the heart of
a fiend?' `Am I then handsome, pretty one, and a
fiend, at the same time? I do not take, my bird. I
swallow neither the compliment, nor the fiend. Ah!
Wakona, canst thou say in thy heart, that it is fiendish,
to love to distraction and death, that face, that
love-kindling eye—that admirable form—those curls,
that hand? Why, dear, there is nothing more of a
fiend in it, than there is in loving honey, and sugar,
and wine, and disliking vinegar and rhubarb.' `I
would not say to you, Julius, that this is not witty, for
I would soothe you. Time was, when I had even
kind thoughts, and a partial preference for you, when,
in the face and person, I imagined the mirror of a
mind as fair.' `Dear—dear; I do not take, I say—
bird of paradise. I love thee to distraction and death;
and time was, when I wished your love in return—
and offered you, as the boon, what the proudest have
sought in vain. But such compliments are now apart
from business. My sweet one, my love, my dove, my
undefiled, my Wakona, thy handsome Julius had done
with wooing and kneeling, and is all for action. When
the shades have descended upon this pretty, snug,
country-seat—ah, my dove, thou wilt no longer think
after a day or two, the next time I propose marriage,
to say ay, and amen.' `Julius Landino, thou art, indeed,
a fiend. A very vampyre fiend hath taken residence
in this form. Would, that all could see externals,
as I see them now. I should loathe you less,
abhorred wretch, were you in the form of Maniteewah.
There would be no mockery then, no label of
heaven, on the essence of hell.' `Ah! pretty one, now
I take—thou art thrice more fair, with that pretty
glow of indignation and contempt, than when attempting
to wheedle me with a compliment.' `Julius, I
fear you not. A mind, poised on its If, is out of the
reach of outrage or debasement. I have no more
words for you, Sir. You shall know more of me,
when occasion calls for it.'
She discovered, that high minded daring, in this
way, awed him, and that his licentious and cowardly
spirit quailed under the flashing of her eye. She said
sternly to him, `let me pass, and resist at your peril.'
His color changed; he shrunk back, and stood aside,
and allowed her to pass.
`You see, Jessy,' he observed in a manner, that evidenced,
he was struggling for calmness, `I allow you
the customary indulgence of a lover on the bridal day.
These hours, and this range are yours. Go and amuse
yourself, where you please. You may search for the
means of elopement. Nothing, but Omnipotence can
deliver you. If you return not to this tent by noon,
my faithful Shienne will bring you here by force.—
Go, then, and allow me to hope, that, ere night arrives,
your good sense will have distated to you submission,
if not affection.'
The hated form of his licentious and base female
minion of pleasure was out of her sight; and as she
once more respired the free and open air, her suffocating
palpitations gradually became less distressing;
and she commenced a faithful survey of the means,
for what was before her. They, who are gifted with
a sound mind, and who retain in the last extreme of
pressure the firmness and self-possession of innocence,
find within them powers of preparation for such emergencies,
of which, in the hours of calmness and security,
they dreamed not; and could not have believed,
that such dormant treasures were locked up within
them. It occurred to her, even in the distraction of
the moment, when she first saw Maniteewah, that she
had imagined, she discovered pity for her in the expression
of her countenance, loathsome as it was.—
`The beauty of this wretch,' she reflected, `has proved
the Apple of Sodom. Why may not the other
extreme be a false semblance? I have found a fiend
iu Julius. May not heaven have sent me deliverance
in this odious form?' The hope radiated through her
heart, like a ray from above—and, such is the power
of association, she directed her steps towards this
loathsome being, almost with feelings of affection.
From afar she saw the deformed and dreaded object
approaching her, and renewing within her childish
terrors, as she again neared her. She felt how unworthy
it would be, to shrink from the harmless repulsiveness
of mere appearance. She rather approached,
than shunned this deformed mockery of woman.
The strange being seemed flattered by this mark of
daring. She came in front of the fair captive. `Knowest
thou our speech, fair pale face?' she said. Jessy
answered, `she did.' `Thou fliest me not, Wakona,
like yonder vile slave of her own cowardly terrors.
I will reward thy confidence.' So saying, in a tone
sufficiently like other Indian women, to show her of
their race, but otherwise grating and unearthly, she
began to sing—`The wild creatures of the woods destroy
not their own kinds. But the accursed pale faces
prey upon each other. The white eagle would
clutch the Wakon bird.' Then the deep Indian chorus
`Mind the word of the Maniteewah, fair daughter of
the pale face, change the cup—change the cup!—give
him the sleep, which he hath medicined for thee. The
Wahcondah will help. The little white men of the
mountains will help. Courage, fair daughter of the
pale face.' Another chorus followed. She then
added. `Go, daughter of the pale face—Hold a talk
with thy Wahcondah. The noble chief will come,
with the help of the little white men of the mountains.
Change the cup—change the cup! Go forth, and
feel the beams of the sun.' With these words the
song closed, and the horrible object returned to her
recesses, motioning her not to follow.
Obeying the mysterious intimations, Jessy walked
into the open prairie, and felt the cheering influences
of the sun, banishing chill from her frame. Her heart
ascended above the hills, `whence our help cometh,'
for direction and firmness. She revolved all the chances
of events before her, tasked her purposes, probed
her conscience, and made her final resolves for such
emergencies, as her apprehensions pointed out to her.
She had little heart to survey, or to feel the beauty
and grandeur of this strange and solitary prison. But
so deep was her admiration of the beautiful and the
wonderful of nature, that it may not be said, that she
sauntered round the walls of the enclosure, without
some occasional gleams of pleasant sensation, in view
of the singular character of this smiling, rock-walled
garden, scooped out of the mountains. In prayer, in
self communion, in humble attempts to establish unshaken
resolve for probable trials, the hours passed,
while she sometimes stooped, and plucked a flower,
and scattered its petals to the wind; sometimes sat
by the little transparent spring, percolating from the
base of the mountains; and sometimes walked listlessly
forward, every moment looking, as the convict
the firmament. The sun had passed the meridian,
when she saw two Indians approaching her. Having
taken no sustenance since her departure from the valley,
she felt herself sinking from faintness. `I will
go with them,' she said; `I will take food, and strive
to sustain myself for whatever I have to encounter.
I will even make efforts to soothe this abandoned
wretch—and may God support the oppressed.' The
Indians, with a manner of as much respect and humanity
as their office would allow, motioned her to
follow them in silence. As they passed on, they were
joined by Baptiste, who bowed, and babbled, as was
his fashion. His object appeared to be, to persuade
her to be courteous and complaisant to Julius. `He
was all kindness to them,' he said, `who pleased him,
and only headstrong and farouche to those, who
thwarted his fancies, or wounded his vanity.' Upon
the word the unhappy prisoner, calling in aid all her
powers, implored him to have mercy upon her, and in
some way to aid her, in escaping from his persecutions.
He affected, as usual, the most entire devotion
to her purposes; but she saw clearly enough, that it
was all hollow affectation, and that he was the base
and polluted instrument of all the purposes of Julius.
He was unwearied in the theme of his beauty and
wealth, and the extent, to which he had been courted
in his own country, and the honor, he conferred on
the object of his preference, and the happiness she
ought to find, in being favored with it.
In the endurance of such odious soothing, she arrived
at the tent. She entered it with a cheek alternately
flushed and pale. Julius was sitting there, in
company with his Indians. He instantly motioned
them to retire, and ordered Baptiste to remain in waiting.
The table was spread with venison, wild fowl, and
various kinds of food, from Indian supply, and from
the whole, to one whose palpitations of heart, and
whose extreme terror had been less, would have had
in contrast with the position and circumstances, a
strange mockery of the semblance of comfort and even
luxury. He begged her to be seated, and to take refreshments.
With apparent docility, she seated herself
at the table. `I shall take food, Julius, thanking
the despicable robber, that in tearing me away from
my parents, his purpose seems not to have been, to
starve me to death. Man of gallantry! Man of honor!
I shall take food with far different purposes, from
those, to which you will attribute the act;' and she
began, without waiting for entreaty, or ceremony, to
eat of the plainest food before her. Deportment so
wide from his preconceived expectations, he was
pleased to observe, astounded him. She saw that he
was at a loss for words, that he bit his lips, and evinced
the meditations and the sufferings of a fiend. He
occasionally took a piece of the foreign cake, and sipped
wine, apparently at a loss for discourse. At
length he spoke quick, and with effort. `I am charmed,
however, notwithstanding your compliments, to
see you eat so heartily. I wish, I could persuade you
to pledge me in this wine.' `Most certainly I will,' she
replied, `for I am both faint and thirsty, and since I
have been dragged away by your Indians, I have
suffered through the long night and day from fatigue
and exhaustion and agony of heart. I have been
suffocated by the ruffian Shienne, and then turned
over to the society of Maniteewah. I shall need all
the sustentation that wine and high purpose can impart.
Fair faced and honorable friend, repair, I pray
you, to yonder spring, and with your own knightly
hands bring me water, with which to dash my wine,
for I am unused to take it unmixed; and I will pledge
you to all generous and honorable purposes.' His
`By — said he, `you are the most d—m—d rarity,
with which I have ever met—a queer one, by heaven.
What infinite vivacity of spirit! What a charming
bride I shall have! I fly, for your purposes;' and he
took a goblet, and moved towards the spring, which
gurgled along at the distance of twenty paces. The
song of Maniteewah had rung in her ear in its unearthly
tones, from the moment she had heard it;
`change the glass; change the glass.' A large, and
full glass sat by her plate, and another by his. She
changed them in a moment, and before he was so on
the return as to notice it. He sat down the goblet,
and she poured her wine into a tumbler, and filled it
with water. `You dilute it too much,' said he. `You
are unused to wine, I see.' `I am exceedingly thirsty,
my very honorable friend,' she replied. `I pledge
you, sir, to this sentiment—May Areskoui storm the
dastardly oppressor in his den, and put him to the
trial by fire at the stake.' `I pledge you my dove,
my Wakona, but not exactly to that sentiment; may
you solicit my hand. May I have the satisfaction of
passing you over, a despised and humbled thing, according
to my purpose, to Nelesho, to whom you are
promised. You are mine, pretty one, understand
me, for lawless love. Thy beloved Areskoui is neither
eagle to scale the mountains, nor omnipotent to
remove the poised stone. Long before the half breed
recreant can be here, I shall have accomplished all
my wishes. He may besiege this impregnable fortress
for a month; I should play the while with thy curls,
and laugh at him. But I have cared for that too; and
he will have sufficient occupation with thy future
master, Nelesho, at home.' They bowed in derision
to each other. The one raised his glass, and the
other the tumbler, and drank their contents together.
She continued to eat, and he in the same strain, to
the utter hopelessness of rescue or relief.
Let her indescribable joy be imagined, as she observed
his cheek flush, and his eye become glossy and
swimming, and his words maudlin and unconnected.
`By —' said he, `I believe you have played me a
trick of hell. I must sleep. My bird, you have
changed glasses.' `Indeed have I, vampyre; and I
hope for your sake, that yours contained poison more
deadly, than that of the asp. I have no doubt, that
you are capable of giving poison.' He attempted an
answer in the same spirit; but the weight of unconquerable
sleep already pressed upon his eye-lids.—
His begun words fell half formed from his lips, and
occasional stertor indicated, that some narcotic of
potent medication, infused in his wine, had taken irresistible
effect. He reeled from his seat, and sank in
profound sleep on the ground.
She poured thanksgivings to the Almighty from a
full heart, and walked forth, receiving what had happened,
as an omen of escape from the power of the
villain. As she advanced in the direction of the cave,
she again met Maniteewah. `Hast thou heeded my
song, pale face?' she asked. `I have; and he sleeps,'
was the reply. `Go, then, to thy Wahcondah, and
implore him to send thee aid by the little white men
of the mountains. Thy tormentor will sleep, till this
time to-morrow's sun.' She again beckoned her to
go forth into the open prairie, and left her, as before.
The desolate heart of the fair captive, now relieved
from the pressure of intolerable and immediate apprehensions,
gave itself up to dreams of hope and relief.
She sat down in meditation on a rock, where the
spring issued from the mountains. It becomes necessary,
to turn back and contemplate the position of
things in the valley, where her abduction had brought
indescribable misery.
The customary guests, Frederic, Elder Wood and
Areskoui, were at William Weldon's dwelling, on
the evening of her departure. She, who was equally
the light of the eyes of each, did not appear. When
the dusk of evening had come, without her return,
Yensi became anxious. An alarm was raised. The
bower was explored. She was not to be seen. The
tracks of horses were remarked; and the footsteps of
men, who wore moccasins, leading to the bower. The
mystery was soon explained. Julius, Baptiste, and
a number of Shienne were gone. Some Shoshonee,
returning from their hunting, had seen too periogues
paddling rapidly down the river, and in one of them,
they had discovered a white woman, but too distant
to be recognized. To Areskoui every thing was explained
in the twinkling of an eye. Alarm and horror
and wailing filled the dwelling of William Weldon.
Yensi fainted, and lost the horror of the hour in unconsciousness.
Ellswatta repaired to the habitation
of Nelesho. He was gone with his select warriors, as
was said, on a trapping expedition. But the experienced
eye of the chief traced in the murky countenances
of the Shienne, that they were well acquinted
with all that had happened. William Weldon's stern
and philosophic bosom was moved to distraction and
and despair. He tore his gray locks, imprecated
vengeance on the villains, who had robbed him of his
daughter, and cried with the royal bereaved one of
old time, `would to God, I had died for thee, my
daughter, my daughter.'
The Shoshonee were summoned to a hasty counsel.
Torches gleamed in the dusk of twilight. Arms
and a party were expeditiously collected. Frederic
and Areskoui consulted together. The community
of suffering brought them to a confession of full confidence.
`We are one,' they said, `for life or death, to
recover her.' They would have persuaded Elder
But, he said, somewhat proudly, `I am a full blooded
Kentuckian, and you will not exclude me from a
partnership, at once for such righteous purposes, and
so full of danger.' Hatch, suspected to be in the interests
of Julius, gave some frivolous pretext, as a
reason for remaining behind. William Weldon suffered
from an agony, too acute, to allow him the requisite
calmness to join the expedition, and his stay
was pronounced necessary for the care of his unconscious
and half expiring wife. Ten warriors, thoroughly
armed with knives, pistols and yagers, together
with Elder Wood, Areskoui, and Frederic, were descending
the Sewasserna in a few hours after the abduction,
and with a rapidity not inferior to that of
those who bore Jessy away. It would be useless, to
think of depicting the misery of the bereaved family.
The Shoshonee, who witnessed the departing expedition
on the shore, were many of them affected to
tears, by witnessing the grief and distraction of William
Weldon. Wakona was the common idol of the
tribe; and loud and deep curses were imprecated upon
them, who had carried her off; and many charges,
counsels, and earnest good wishes were uttered for
the party thus attempting rescue. It would be equally
hopeless, to give the conversations, and describe the
mingled emotions of the pursuers, as under the dark
shadows of the mountains, and the light of the stars,
that twinkled above, they glided down the Sewasserna.
They passed the gap in nearly the same time with
those they pursued. As they opened on the prospect
beyond, `Yonder,' cried Areskoui, `are their periogues.'
To the eye of the whites no trace of periogues
appeared on the shore. But the more acute and observant
Indians remarked, as they glided along, near
the shore, a narrow bayou, scarcely wide enough to
admit a periogue. It had been choked with waterlilies,
a narrow line of clear surface, from which the twiny
stems of the aquatic foliage had been forced away,
that periogues had been pushed along that bayou.
The evidence was conclusive, and they landed, moved
a few rods up the bayou, and the whites saw that
the Indians had reasoned right. There were the two
well known periogues, marked with the Shienne totem,
drawn up in such a way as to be wholly invisible
to people descending the river. `There they are
yonder,' cried Areskoui, `in the impregnable fastness
of the Manitouna. We have not the strength of the
Wahcondah, to remove the huge rock at the entrance,
nor the wings of the eagle, to scale the high walls,
and light among them. There they are provisioned,
no doubt for a long siege. They can escape when
they choose, and we have no means of entering for
rescue.'
He led them to the well known entrance. The
poised rock was firm upon the orifice. The Shoshonee
clapped their hands to their mouths, and moving
them rapidly over their lips, uttered a war cry, that
fell away in a thousand broken snatches in echoes
among the mountains. In half a minute a well known
Shienne cry of counter defiance arose from within.
The countenance of the whole party evidenced their
desire of vengeance. Jessy also heard the cry from
within; and her acquaintance with Indian manners
informed her, that attempted rescue was at hand.—
Maniteewah heard it, and was directly beside her.
`Courage, pale face,' she cried, `the little white men
of the mountains will aid them.'
The rescue party paused for deliberation. No one
could propound the slightest chance of success, or
imagine any other expedient, than to besiege them
patiently in their own den. `That expedient is hopeless,'
replied Areskoui. `They are, no doubt, provisioned
water and shelter, and abundance of small game within;
and they could easily subsist there through all the
moons of the year.' Silent despondence sat upon every
countenance. `Is there no way to scale the walls
on any point?' asked Frederic. `No more,' replied
Areskoui, `than to ascend to the abode of the Master
of Life.' `Will you two follow me?' said he, addressing
himself to Elder Wood and Frederic. Frederic
sprang to him, and held him in close embrace. `I
will follow the noble young chief to the death; and if
Jessy should be recovered by your counsels and daring,
admit, that you are more worthy of her, than
myself.' `It is enough for me to say,' replied Elder
Wood, `that I was born in Kentucky; that I love Jessy,
as a daughter; that I shall never smile again, until
we recover her; and that I fear God, and have no
other fear.' `Of you, my red brethren,' said Areskoui,
turning to his select Shoshonee, `I need not ask
the question. We have been together by flood and
by field, on mountain and plain, in sport and in the
death struggle. Follow me, then. Let us go up to
the haunts of the eagle. Let us scale the abode of
the little white men of the mountains.' At the word
he sprang away, and began to ascend the mountain,
bounding from rock to rock, drawing himself up by
bushes and vines, outstripping all the rest, and from
more elevated points indicating to those behind the
proper mode of ascent. It was a long, wearying, and
most laborious effort to gain the lowest summit, that
overlooked the Manitouna. It might be twelve hundred
feet in height. They had some time since reached
the elevation, where winter now reigned. Here,
on a large table rock, whose shallow pan of earth was
in different places covered with laurels, they stopped,
at once for rest, and survey of the scene below. Frederic
had taken the precaution to carry with him a
object in the prairie of the Manitouna was as distinctly
visible, as if they had been at only ten paces distance.
`I see her! I see her!' he exclaimed. `There
she stands, holding forth her hands, as if she saw us,
and implored our aid.' He handed the telescope to
Areskoui. He saw her, too, as was seen by his flashing
eye, and near her Maniteewah, whom he recognized
by her uncouth and horrible appearance. The
smokes of habitancy were seen arising from the little
wood. Next, Elder Wood surveyed the scene below.
There could be no question. Jessy was there, and
her attitude was as of one imploring aid.
What was to be done? Frederic and Areskoui
were for a few moments too frantic in their eagerness,
to fix upon any thing. The young chief soonest regained
his self-possession. `My purpose is taken,'
said he. `Who of you will follow me? The attempt
is dangerous, and it may be fatal. But we owe one
death to the Wahcondah, and I am ready to put mine
on the issue of this enterprize. See you yonder wood
below us? To that point we can slide on the frozen
snow. It may be, we can neither advance, or recede
from that point, if we reach it. It may be, we shall
be dashed on the rocks, before we reach it. But, if
we descend safely there, we shall have made the
greater portion of the descent, and another hazard
may land us safely, beside Wakona.' As he said this,
he began to break off the leafy laurel branches, and
to invest himself in them, apparently, that in passing
over sharp and jagged points of rocks, the firm and
thick foliage might guard his body from being lacerated.
Frederic followed his example. `I am with
you by contract,' he said, `for life or death.' Some of
his followers pronounced the attempt hopeless, and
wavered for a moment. But, seeing the confident
countenance of their chief, they too tore off the laurel
and fearful declivity below them. Elder Wood, though
last, showed himself not least in firmness. `I was born
in Kentucky,' said he. `Shall these dare that for mere
human love, which I dare not for the love of God and
souls? We can die but once; and for me, I trust,
come when it may, death will be gain.' They were all
quickly enveloped in laurel branches, fastened in every
possible way to their bodies. Areskoui admonished
each to take a sharp pointed stick in his hand,
by which to guide himself, while gliding over the
ice. Each manifested his own way of preparation.
Elder Wood looked upwards. The lovers held out
their hands towards the captive below. The Shoshonee
sang a strain of the death song. It was settled,
that Areskoui should precede, and that the rest
should follow in an order, which was instantly arranged.
The noble countenance of the chief blenched
not, as he commenced the fearful experiment; and
fearful it was, to see the green mass, for such he seemed,
from his envelope of boughs, precipitated down
the glazed surface, with the swiftness of a descending
avalanche. In the twinkling of an eye, he had disappeared
behind a projection covered with green
moss. Frederic followed, and the Indians and Elder
Wood each in their turn. The descent might be
eight hundred feet, and the declivity a fourth of a
league. An approving providence guided them safely
down, though their invelope had been rudely dissipated,
and their leather dress had been much torn.
There was not one, who did not bleed from the
wounds received in the descent.
They found themselves brought up in a shelving
wood, the lower declivity of which overlooked the
wood below, and seemed little more than a hundred
feet from the level of the prairie. But that descent
was perpendicular, without a single apparent crevice
hold, or the fall be broken. Certain death, it seemed,
must be the result of a leap to the prairie. The descent,
by which they had slidden, it was hopeless to
think of ascending again. Thus were they placed
between the heavens and the earth, tantalized with
seeing themselves near the object of their pursuit,
and the level earth; and yet no way appeared, by
which that last descent could be accomplished, except
at the certain sacrifice of life. Add to this, that their
position no longer afforded them a view of the captive,
and the sun, sunk behind the peaks above them,
would soon be succeeded by the dimness and uncertainty
of twilight. Their last condition seemed to
the two white men the most deplorable and hopeless
of all. They admitted at least, that nothing could be
done, until another morning should throw light upon
their counsels. `Acknowledge,' said Areskoui, `that
there are emergencies, when the red and untaught
dweller of the solitude commands more resources and
forecast, than the pale face. We will be on yonder
plain, and rescue Wakona, before the last gleams of
twilight are faded.' Frederic embraced him once
more. `Areskoui,' he cried, `thou art to us both mind
and arm, and we are infants compared with thee. I
know, thou wouldst not encourage false hopes; and
yet my thoughts cannot fix on even the semblance of
the means of descent.' `Let us see,' said Areskoui,
and began cutting off and tearing from the trees, grape
vines, which inveloped almost every tree in this fertile
declivity. When detached and straightened, they
were of prodigious length. From the leather of his
dress he cut straps and thongs, by which they were
tied together, according to necessity. By many of
their twiny stems they were made fast to a tree near
the verge of the precipice, and the heavier trunks
thrown down. The Indians, delighted with the invention,
hushed them. `We must attack them by surprise, for
they are nearly our own numbers; and we descend
upon them precisely at the right moment of time,
when darkness will favor our attack.' `Thou art indeed,'
said Elder Wood, `as an angel of God, in counsel,
Areskoui.' `See now, Frederic, and acknowledge,
that all wisdom would not have died with us.
See there the science of the woods. There is a ladder
of ropes, such as I have descended in sport, a hundred
times in my young days.' Areskoui deliberately
prepared his weapons, his pistols, his dirk, and slung
his yager after the fashion of his people. He insisted
upon making the first descent himself. When at the
foot he was to shake the ladder of vines, to give notice
that it was ready for the descent of another.—
The order of succession in descent was settled, as before,
and the intrepid young warrior fell down, like a
sailor on his rope, on his own ingenious contrivance.
Scarcely two minutes elapsed, before the notice was
given, that he was on the firm ground. Another and
another followed, and all reached the prairie in safety.
The point of descent was at some distance from
the tent. `See that our weapons are all in order,'
said Areskoui; `and let our hands be active, our eyes
true, and our hearts firm. I know not the number of
the Shienne, nor the prowess of Baptiste and Julius.
But we must prepare for fight. Let us advance to
the smokes in profound silence. When there, I will
precede, and explore.' They each examined his
weapons, and marched in Indian file towards the
wood. Arrived there, Areskoui requested each individual
to lie close upon the leaves, while he crawled
cautiously in advance. He soon returned, informing
that the Shienne and Baptiste were all carousing
high. `Let us fall upon them in their perfect security,
and in the unguardedness of insanity from the medicine
unheeded, uttered the dire Indian yell, and rushed in
upon the astounded, and intoxicated party. Almost
before they could stand to their arms, two or three
were wounded, and the remainder offered the custom
ary signal of submission. `Where is Wakona?' the
all cried together, as they were binding the vanquish
ed Shienne. They replied, with Maniteewah. They
were at the entrance of her wigwam in a moment
and, all, unconscious of the observances of form, em
braced the fair rescued one, as she made for the arm
of Elder Wood. She kissed his hand, as he strained
her to his bosom. `God, I thank thee,' said he, a
the tears streamed down his cheeks, `that this, my
daughter, was dead, and is alive again; was lost, and
is found.' `My father, my father!' said Jessy, `it i
worth all, I have suffered, this single moment of rescue.
Oh God, accept my full heart.' Areskoui held
one hand in strong grasp, and Frederic the other; and
exclamations of affection, too mighty for control, were
the order of this joyous moment. The repulsive
spectacle of the bark wigwam looked on, and laughed
convulsively. `Am I worthy to be roeasted to death,
as a witch,' said she, `young chief? See, but for me
Wakona would have been the prey of a pale face of
her own race. I was in the power of the Shienne,
and dared no more. Enquire of Wakona, and if I
have deserved evil at your hand, I refuse not to die.'
This introduced questioning, what had become of Julius?
`The babbling pale faces,' said she, `are together;
the one in the deep medicine sleep, which he
had prepared for Wakona, and the other fled, like a
base coward, from his drinking to his master.'
As soon as Jessy had recovered calmness to relate
what was necessary for the elucidation of the earnest
curiosity of the moment, she explained, in a few words
the present posture of circumstances, and how it ha
were both ordered to be bound, and consigned,
as prisoners, along with the captured Shienne, to the
care of the Shoshonee. They found the villain, still
beautiful even in the stertor of intoxicated sleep from
the potent infusions of Indian narcotics. There holay
on his mattrass, his cheek flushed, and the expression
of anticipated villainy sealed upon his licentious
countenance. Baptiste begged mercy of Frederic
and Elder Wood. `Accursed villain,' said the former,
`you richly merit the halter, or the stake. Let Areskoui
decide. I shall not interfere.' `Nor I,' firmly
answered Elder Wood. `It is not in a Kentuckian's
heart to be particularly merciful to such a villain as
thou hast proved.' `O mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!' cried
the terror stricken coward, `ayez pitie. Certainement,
cher comerade, you will not allow a brother trapper
to be roasted alive;' and he continued to implore mercy,
until they left the tent.
The question was, whether they should immediately
commence their return, or remain, and take the
refreshment of a night's rest? Jessy, completely exhausted
with fatigue, watching, terror and endurance
of every sort, required an hour's repose. Supper was
prepared, of the sumptuous regale intended for other
uses. The sleeping wretch was dragged forth into
the open air, to recover, and awaken at his leisure.
A blessing being duly invoked by Elder Wood, they
sat down to a repast, which hunger, joy and rapture,
and the presence of the recovered Jessy, rendered delicious.
Questions without answers, and congratulations
and bursts of joyous emotion seasoned that supper.
Areskoui and Frederic and Elder Wood, in
their blankets round a fire that blazed high and bright
among the trees, kept watch at the tent door; while
Jessy, after having devoutly made her thanksgivings
to her Almighty deliverer, laid her down to sleep.
She awoke before midnight, aroused her friends,
and begged, if they were ready, to be on the return.
`My parents, my parents!' she said. `I dare not indulge
longer in sleep. Let me be on the way to relieve
their agony.' Julius, removed to the keen air
of the night, had recovered consciousness, and was
slowly aroused by Baptiste, who lay bound fast, with
five of the ringleaders of the Shienne beside him, to
a full acquaintance with his situation. He, too, meanly
implored mercy, and insisted, that he had entertained
none, but honorable designs, in reference to
Jessy. He was told, that the baseness of his falsehood
would only tend to enhance the certainty and
severity of his punishment; and he remained as
straightly bound, as the rest.
As they were accelerating their preparations to be
on their return, Maniteewah appeared before them
in all her horrible decorations. `Young chief of the
Shoshonee and Shienne,' she said, `mercy and protection.
Wakona hath told thee, that I deserve it at
thy hand. Thou wilt not account it my crime, that I
have been a little while in the power of Nelesho and
the bad pale face.' `Thou hast performed that for
me,' replied the young chief, `which shall never be
forgotten. Ask, and whatever is in my power, I will
grant thee.' My demands are few, and easily granted,
she returned. `Allow me, when thou art chief,
after thy father has gone to the sunless valley, to remain
here unmolested in this medicine grove of the
little white men of the mountains, as I have been indulged
by thy father. Let the medicine men be subservient
to my stronger spells. Let my authority with
the little powerful dwellers above be always acknowledged.'
In short, the purport of her request was,
that she might be recognized, sustained, and continued
by the chief, to dwell there unmolested, unquestioned
and alone, as high priestess of the mysteries of
drew from Elder Wood and Frederic remarks of
astonishment, in view of the strong propensity of the
human heart every where to obtain prescribed authority,
and veneration. Here it was sought, at the expense
of living in this dreary solitude, this living sepulchre
of the mountains; and sustained by bearing
the form and wearing the habiliments of horrid and
disgusting ugliness. Such is superstition, and such
the love of spiritual power. The prisoners, with their
arms pinioned closely behind them, were driven before
their victors; and Jessy, led by Elder Wood, followed
them. Maniteewah brought up the rear, singing
in her shrillest and most unearthly tones, `go forth,
red and pale face, joyfully. The little white men
guard you. The moon shine brightly on you. The
south breeze waft you. Wakona shall see her parents
in joy.' The poised rock was removed. The
parties were extricated. The periogues raised their
sails to the breeze. The moon came forth, with her
broad disk resting on the mountains to illumine the
dark rolling stream. The bland south pushed them
rapidly against the current, constantly inspiring the
pleasant sensation of triumphing over nature and difficulty.
Elder Wood discoursed of the deep things of
God and eternity; and their unfailing obligations of
gratitude to the deliverer of the rescued one. The
pale gleams of the planet of night on the mountain
ices, the black peaks casting their shadows in the
stream, the frequent rustling of the falling leaves in
the water and in the forest, the position of the rescued
one, wrapped warmly in buffalo robes, and between
two lovers, the thought that she was returning to her
native valley and her parents, the dim, but glorious
perspective between the mountains, the season, the
deep noon of night, the long, dismal, famished howl of
wolves, far up the rock-bound mountains, the dark outline
the blue between—all conspired to fill her heart with
devotion and rapture.
The periogue which carried Julius and Baptiste
was rowed close beside that of the young chief and
his company. The two miscreants, the one in broken
English, and the other in the most earnest and humble
tones of entreaty, were attempting to excite compassion.
The one implored them, pour l'amour de Dieu,
to forgive him; promising to redeem his misconduct
by the most undeviating fidelity in future. Julius,
in stammering accents, and in the humiliation of
conscious guilt, went into a defence of his conduct,
averring, that love was the impulse, and marriage his
ultimate purpose. Jessy requested the chief, that
she might not be subjected to the persecution and agony
of hearing his voice; and his boat was ordered to
advance beyond the rest, until they should be out of
the reach of his entreaties.
A sustained southern breeze wafted them steadily
on, until the sun arose, and poured his cheering and
glorious radiance upon the sublime spectacle, and rolled
away the mists from his march over the mountains.
`Yonder,' said Jessy, `are the Eagle peaks
above my native dwelling. Oh God, I thank thee!
Heaven grant, that the hearts of my parents may not
be broken.' It would be long, such was the strength
of the current, before they would reach home, even
if the up-stream breeze did not lull; and some part of
that precious time must elapse in the necessity which
compelled them to land, and take breakfast. A fire
was kindled on shore, and a sumptuous breakfast prepared
from the ample supply, provided by Julius at
the Manitouna. `Behold,' said Elder Wood, as the
venison smoked, and the coffee gave forth its fragrance,
`how God spreadeth for us a table in the wilderness,
and exalteth our horn, and hath put all our enemies
ordered to sit down on the rocks, and receive the
coarse fare, which regarded only the circumstance of
necessary sustenance. `This is the happiest breakfast,'
said Elder Wood, `I have ever made. I shall
never forget it.' `And mine;' `and mine,' said Frederic
and Areskoui; `and mine,' added Jessy, with
swimming eyes, `but for a single deficiency.' The
heart of each had been softened, first by endurance of
danger, and fatigue; and now by excess of joy; and
story and congratulation, and sketches of the joy preparing
for William Weldon and Yensi, and of their
future modes of spending their time together, now
that Areskoui and Frederic perfectly understood each
other, furnished their theme. Emotions of the heart,
that are estranged from words, were deeply felt, and
joy sparkled in every eye.
The guilty Julius passed pinioned before them on
his way to his periogue. It would be difficult to imagine
a situation more humiliating and taunting, or
more calculated to place the party in the position,
which of right belonged to his guilt. Elder Wood
moralized upon the natural wages of inquity, in his
hearing, as he passed. `In that unhappy being,' said
he, `you see a picture and a demonstration of that totally
corrupt human nature, of which I preach, and
the bible speaks. See heaven in the face, and hell in
the heart. Do you not remember, Jessy, the passage
which I marked for you? Ne crede nimium colori.
What a lesson to those, who choose merely by external
beauty. See, in this order of things, the righteous
reaction of a just and avenging providence. See the
lost, but externally fair son of sin and Satan caught in
his own devices, and the jaw teeth of the oppressor broken.
See, too, the innocent sufferer returning in joy
to her father's house, and not an hair of her head
harmed. See, and admire in all this, the beautiful
unshaken trust in it.'
A Shoshonee runner had been previously dispatched,
to precede them to Shoshonee town, and premonish
the bereaved parents of all, that had happened. It
would be as useless, to attempt description of what
her parents felt, on learning that she was returning
safe and unharmed, as it would be to paint the agony
occasioned by her abduction. Horses were dispatched
for them; that by avoiding the meanders of the Sewasserna,
and crossing the mountains, they might be
able to reach home in half the time which would be
required to ascend the stream. The horses arrived,
while they were still at breakfast. On rising from
their joyful repast, they sent the prisoners on in their
periogue, under a sufficient guard, and took their own
pleasanter and shorter conveyance on horseback.
As they began to ascend the mountains, now glazed
with ice and glittering in the sun beams like a surface
of diamonds, the air indeed was keen, but bracing and
exhilarating, and inspired those delightful sensations
that spring from breathing an atmosphere highly
oxygenated, from feeling the consciousness of strong
and spirit-stirring existence, and from surveying the
summits of a hundred mountains from their own level,
and looking down upon a prostrate world. The sublime
position causes man to feel himself an ethereal
being; and brings to his heart the high and animating
conviction, that, in ascending towards the sky, new
thoughts and aspirations, and the instinctive movements
of his being admonish him, that he is advancing
towards his native home.
On the summit of the last mountain to be crossed,
far to the west was seen, at the same view, the sacred
mountain of the `little white men;' and to the east the
smokes of the Shoshonee habitations, rising up in lines
from their valley; just as they showed on the day of
silence, pointing towards the smokes; and nature
claimed her full tribute of tears. While she wistfully
gazed, and wished that, `by one strong bound,' they
could spring into the valley; and while they fed their
horses, and took refreshments round the blazing
hunters' fire, Frederic requested some account of
the Indian tradition of the `little white men of the
mountains,' as beings, of whom he had often heard,
but never had received any clear and distinct tracing
of their history. Tutsaugee, or `the Changing Wind,'
was of the company, and withal a little mellow with
the brandy furnished by Julius. Being endowed by
nature with the Scotch gift, and his spirit at this time
moving nimbly and eloquently within him, he arose
from gnawing his venison bone, disengaged his blanket
from his brawny right arm, according to custom,
and with the usual preludes and flourishes of oratory,
began as follows.
`Thou demandest, noble pale face, something of the
red man's medicine faith, touching these beings, of
whom thou hast so often heard, who make their abode
on yonder mountain tops, and choose their altar in the
Manitouna. I can see, by certain movements of thy
face, that thou thinkest cheaply of these powerful
little beings. Pale face—thy people are not so polite,
as ours. We hear Elder Wood declare his medicine
talk; and whatsoever passes within, we preserve grave
countenances, and say nothing. But we well know,
that you are an unbelieving race in all points, but the
worth of beaver; and you have no politeness to conceal
your want of faith. Hearken, pale face, and
thou shalt know the history of the `little white men of
the mountains.' Ten thousand moons have now
elapsed, since the time, when every hollow tree contained
honey; and numberless fountains of these ancient
hills of the Master of Life flowed, some with
`medicine drink,' which I now feel warm at my stomach.
The deer and elk were in those days for number,
as the black snow fleas which you see there. The
buffaloes were for size, as little hills. There were
beasts of prey with tusks sharp, as the fangs of a copperhead,
and long as the horns of the elk. Then were
good times; for there were none but red men on the
earth. Listen, pale face. The words, that I now
speak, are words of sorrow, and my stomach is already
cold.'
At the same time he gave a knowing wink to an
Indian, who carried a canteen of brandy. `Give him
of the drink of joy,' said Areskoui, `to cheer him. For
he hath to relate a tale of sadness.' Tutsaugee held
his mouth to the canteen, until the tears started in his
eyes.
`In truth, pale face,' he continued, smacking his
lips, `thy medicine drink is good drink; and my heart
now reminds me again of these good old medicine
times, when there were none but red men, and the
streams ran milk and strong water. The earth was
then alive with red men, who fished beside waters so
full of choice fishes, that they leapt on shore, in numbers
to yield an ample supply for the wants of the
people. The game was so abundant in the woods,
and the fowls of the sea and the forests were in
such numbers, and so tame, that the people needed
not, as now, practise the unerring closeness of the
winged arrow, or the mimic thunder and invisible
lead for their game. The south wind always blew;
and spring, arrayed in unfading green, and decked in
ever bright flowers, dwelt on the earth. The moon
never waxed, or waned; but always filled her horns.
The women were fairer than the daughters of the
sun; their faces were rounder, than the full moon;
and on yonder hill was a bank of vermilion, from
expense. Little looking glasses, with red frames were
as common as the flakes of talc on yon hill side. The
men, too, were strong, tall, and bold, and never told
the thing, that is not, and were alike without want or
fear. The stout warriors and the fair daughters of the
red men met, and courted, and loved, and were married,
without coquetery or appetite for money. The
deer and elk and buffaloes grew with tanned skins,
and the stout children were clad in them without money
or trouble. When the beasts shed these precious
wrought skins, they were instantly clothed with
others, fresher and more beautifully spotted, than that
of the fawn but two months old. Men's hands were
not then red with each other's blood. Under every
green tree was a table; and stout red warriors, and
beautiful vermilion cheeked girls sat down in love, and
feasted high. Neither the one or the other ever grew
old. Their teeth were always sound and white; and
their breath more fragrant than the flowering acacia,
and their club of black hair always nobly large, and
never whitened with snow. Ah! fathers, life was
then a thing worth possessing. Ah! that Tutsaugee
had lived then, or were to live in the happier days to
come. In those good days were built those mounds,
which now rise on the plains of the Missouri. Those
desolate sepulchres of the desert cause all the wandering
red men, whose hearts are not scorched, to shed
tears, as they behold them rise in their path in the unpeopled
and trackless prairie; and remember, that
they are full of the bones of a gone by world of red
men. Ah! my fathers, our medicine men declare,
that they often see their dusky forms descend on the
slant beams of the setting sun, accompanied by their
women and children. As soon as the moon pours her
silver beams upon the mountains and valleys, they
wander around these mounds, and the places where
days. The ears of the medicine men hear the deep
songs of grief, which they pour over these graves of
their whole race.
`In those days, the mighty buffalo would not trample
on an infant in his way. The tongue of the copper
head, as it vibrated from the fiery jaws, was salutary
to heal wounds, as it voluntarily licked them; and
the long tusked mountain bear employed his terrible
teeth only, in currying the necks of the buffalo cows
in love, as they held out their necks for that bland
office. Pale face—my throat waxes dry, as I come to
sing of grief.'
The canteen was once more handed to Tutsaugee,
to moisten and assuage his sorrow. Tears started to
his eyes, as he took down the canteen from his lips;
the genuine, poetical tears of the joy of grief. He
smacked again, and proceeded.
`Listen, fathers. Those times were too good to
last. Good things waste quick; while bad ones are,
like old age and the winter ices. The red men of
those times were too full, too fat and happy, and their
spirits within them became like those of young warriors,
who have swallowed too much of the white
man's drink of joy. Two old medicine men, in those
days, saw at the side of a sacred fountain, where they
had been quaffing the drink of joy themselves, little
white men floating by them in the air. At first they
only observed faces dimly seen. See! see! said they
to each other. The faces were little, smooth, and of
snow whiteness; and they just showed above a bank
of yellow mist. Soon after, as they looked again, the
hair rose on their heads—long arms were seen behind
the misty curtain, hanging down from half formed
shoulders, and the taper fingers were as yet no more
than the feathery wreathings of vapour, that spring
up from the bosom of the lake, at the rising sun. The
aloud, and said, that their medicine fathers had drunk
too deeply of the strong waters. But some young
and brave warriors, soon after, saw the same little
white men, full formed and distinct. Their shoulders
were decked with the wings of butterflies, and their
bodies with robes of thistle down. Their faces, long
arms, taper fingers and tiny feet seemed as if moulded
of snow, and their eyes, shining, and mischievous,
and deep in their heads, glistened like glow-worms.
Tiny and feeble as they seemed, in their sports they
overturned rocks, tore up trees, and danced, and
caused whirl-winds to rise about them. When they
ceased dancing, they darted away to the summer
clouds, and flashes of lightning and peals of thunder
followed their track along the clouds. The warriors
were stricken with fear, and dared not walk abroad
alone. But, Wakona, the red women of those days
were not like thy mother. There was no end either
to their curiosity, their frolic spirit, or their pernicious
courage. They laughed at the fears of the
warriors; and wished only, that these little white beings
of power might reveal themselves to them.
Their husbands trembled, and besought them, not to
expose themselves in that mad way. But nothing
would satisfy them, short of wandering abroad on the
sides of the mountains, by the light of the moon,
straining their eyes, and sometimes crying out, sacrilegiously,
`come, little white men, come, and see the
fair red faced maidens.' These powerful little spirits
of mist were never far off, when they were invoked
for purposes of mischief. The red girls came
home with satisfied countenances, looking strangely
glad, but saying nothing. We saw, that more had
happened, than they chose to tell. But the wives and
daughters grew thenceforward still more mischievous;
and seemed to have poison and fire in their veins,
to their backs, after the good ancient fashion of
the red men, wrought no reforming effect. Soon
afterwards, children were born to them with pale
faces, of a complexion intermediate between the red
mothers and the little white men. The eyes of the
accursed little babe imps shone like live coals, and
they knew all sorts of medicine tricks almost from
their birth.'
`Oh! hand the canteen. Grief and thirst make
my throat, like the roasted kettle.' After an energetic
draught, the orator resumed.
`From that time, every thing on the earth began to
turn upside down. The mountain bears fought with
the mammoth, and the buffaloes and elks with the
deer. Wolves came forth in troops. The dams of
the great waters burst. A roar of terrible sounds
was heard, as though the Master of Life had put forth
all the sleeping thunders in his magazine in the sky.
The waters came rolling on from the rising sun, in
one mighty wave, which had a front higher than the
tops of the trees. The sun came north about, looking
from a throne of bloody mist, surrounded by a
thousand rainbows, whose ground color was as of
blood. The old council men, the young warriors,
the fair red girls, the old mothers, the mammoths, and
all the big beasts, wild and tame, the birds in the air,
falling with spent and exhausted wing—all—all were
whelmed in the wave. The great beasts sunk, where
their bones are now dug up by the pale faces, and
sold for a show. Masses of floating earth settled over
the funeral piles, that reverently covered the innumerable
bodies of the red men, and formed the sepulchres
of the desert. The few wise and good medicine
men took their wives and children, and fled to
these mountains, as they heard and understood the
sounds of the coming waters. On the top of yonder
black with rocks and glittering with ices, that never
melt, they rested, and saw the ruins of a drowned
world below. Then they drank tears instead of water,
and fed on dark thoughts, without a drop of warming
medicine drink to cheer their spirits.'
Here Tutsaugee wistfully eyed the canteen; but
Areskoui motioned him that he had had enough, and
that it was time to come to a finish.
`The face of the sky was terrible to behold. The
sun continued to come north about, walking through
piles of bloody mist. Black clouds hung motionless
in the sky. The little white men were often seen
capering in masses from cloud to cloud; and their little
deep eyes were bright as the fleaky lightning.
A malicious joy shone in their faces, as they looked
down upon the drowned world, and the wave of a
lake without a shore. Their faces were whiter than
the petals of the Pannocco, or the mountain snow.
Their huge heads were out of proportion with their
bodies; and their arms hung down below their knees,
as they strode along the clouds. Soon afterwards,
they were seen descending from their clouds to the
summit of yonder Manitou mountain, where the remnant
of the people of the submerged world was congregated.
Fathers, I blush for our ancient mothers.
Though often warned, sometimes with good words,
sometimes with a sharp and harsh talk, often with
tears, and sometimes with the hazle rod of good counsel,
nothing would answer them, nothing cure them
of their propensity to be walking on the mountain top
by moon light. They had no fear of these little mischievous
men of power; not they. They saw the fair
red women, and they sailed down from their clouds;
and a sound of joy arose, like that of the medicine
corn dance. The husbands and fathers fled in terror;
and left their wives and daughters fearless and alone.
and natural and peaceful clouds sailed once more
over the mild blue. The waters fell by degrees. The
trees budded. The earth sent up an odor of waters
that had sunk away, and of fresh starting grass, of
half formed leaves, of the fragrant acacia, catalpas,
magnolias, the wild apple, and a thousand mingled
smells of starting flowers. The steaming cloud of
aroma went up, a grateful fragrance to the Master
of Life. The red men bowed towards the Master of
Life, and went down in joy from the mountain top, to
walk once more upon the green, level earth. But,
behold, the babes, that were born to the mothers,
were no longer true sons of the red men. They
showed, that their mothers had looked too intently
upon the little white men of the mountains. They
were cunning and mischievous from their birth; and
ran away from their mothers to deeds of mischief, as
the young duckling to the water, or the partridge with
the egg-shell still on its head. The red fathers cared
little for these gratuitous offerings of the little white
men, and would have put them all to death. The
fathers of these babes were warned of this purpose,
and took them up into their clouds; and sailed with
them over the great salt lake towards the rising sun.
There this mixed race had sons and daughters. The
red men were appeased, and once more dwelt with
their wives, and spread over all these forests and prairies
towards the rising sun. There was, it is true,
but one to a thousand, that had lived, before the
world was deluged. They were a musing and sad
race, the fathers of the present races of red men,
and they lived by fishing and the chase. A few hundred
moons, only, have passed, since the mixed race
over the great salt lake, taught by their cursed little
white fathers, came swimming, in white winged canoes,
over the great salt lake. They tricked the red
covenants, and broke them, and cried still—
land—land!—sell us land! red men. They taught us
in return to use the thunder of the Master of Life,
and the black seeds of fire. They taught us treachery
and cheating. They sold us the poison medicine,
mischievous, but good.'
Tutsaugee looked wistfully at the canteen, and
hemmed—but his significant looks were disregarded.
`The pale faces have been steadily driving us before
them towards the point, where the sun sinks in the
salt lake of the west. The Wahcondah had compassion
on his red children, and was angry with the mischievous
little dwellers in the clouds. He raised a
mighty wind, and blew millions of them into the great
salt lake, as the flies fall in the summer pool. Other
millions he pegged fast to the rocks with sharp thorns,
where they have ever since been fluttering, and struggling
to escape. Most of them were killed, or thus
fastened. But too many still remain. Their last
habitation was on yonder mountain. They often go
down to dance in the Manitouna, and Maniteewah
could tell you much more, than you have yet heard
about them, if she would. Our women are still perniciously
disposed to run after them, and fear them not.
They are oftentimes seen in the summer, before night
thunder showers, chasing fire flies; and sometimes,
by the clear sun light, walking, like little snow wreaths,
up the sides of the mountain; busy, full of frolic motion,
and their little burning eyes as deep in the head,
and the expression as mischievous as ever. Sometimes
they chase butterflies about the spring fountains;
and sometimes they are seen seated, and shining
on the summit of a rock inaccessible to mortal foot.
Their heads are still monstrous, and disproportioned
to their tiny bodies. Their arms still hang down below
their knees; and their faces are still white, as the
turkies gobble; the wolves howl; the dogs whine, and
retreat into their cabins; and the game all hides in
the deep woods. We often see circles on the sides
of the mountains, where they have run round the
trees, and where the green grass became red, withered,
and sear under their foot prints. The corn, that they
fly over, withers; and the hair of the red men rises
on their flesh, as they behold. But to this time, our
daughters fear them not. We much fear, that in a
few hundred moons, all our children will resemble the
pale face. Tutsaugee has said.'
Frederic clapped, and thundered applause of bravo!
bravissimo! `Tutsaugee has spoken, like a medicine
man,' said Areskoui. `If I have spoken well,' said
Tutsaugee, `give me more of the medicine drink, to
allay thirst and grief. I shall not be comforted from
my sorrowful remembrances, till I see yonder peaks
spinning round.'
Elder Wood heard the sly orator at first with a
sneering countenance. But, as he proceeded, the attention
of the minister, became first fixed, and then
profound. When the Indian had done, and was receiving
his fee from the canteen, Elder Wood arose,
clapped his hands, and cried, `I have found! I have
found! I call on you, Frederic, and you, Jessy, to observe,
and bear witness, that here, in the wild and visionary
traditions of this poor, fuddling heathen, (this
he spoke in his own speech) you have a clear and
wonderfully distinct shadowing forth of the fall of
man, and the history of the deluge. Wonderful coincidence!
Wonderful coincidence! This will tell in
a book to a charm;' and he smoked his pipe with a
nervous velocity, in self complacent cogitations upon
his erudite invention.
Their dinner was over, their horses refreshed, and
they set forth anew to descend the mountains, with
full in view, as the pole star of his returning daughter.
But the night overtook them, still on the slope of the
table summit of the mountains. They kindled their
evening fires, under the shelter of a rock, made their
cheerful supper, sang their evening hymn, and listened
to the prayers and thanksgivings of Elder Wood.
Jessy, inveloped in buffalo robes, laid down on a
couch of leaves, and fatigue procured her a dreamless
sleep.
They took their breakfast, before the dawn, and
resumed their journey. Their first advances were
painful, from the sharp influences of the frost. But,
when at last the sun began to show his red and warm
forehead above the summit cliffs of the opposite mountain,
as the chaos of the deep and misty valley, and the
dark glens, of the thousand caves, crags and declivities
of the mountains were defined into distinct visibility,
from the pervading brightness, what a spectacle!
It was the first time Jessy had ever seen such
a sunrise. The mists curled in a thousand graceful
forms. The beasts and birds poured forth their varied
demonstrations, that they admired the fresh and
radiant scene, and felt the joy of renovated being in
common with man. With what fervor the heart of
Jessy rose to the Eternal Author of this sublime scene,
as she reached forth her arms towards the natal spot,
now more distinctly in view, and even the pines becoming
visible. The morning smoke arose. It bore
testimony, that the dear inmates still lived, and had
awakened with the rest of creation. `Thou art my
God,' she said, `as Thou art my father's God; and
Thou shalt be my guide even unto death.'
The sun mounted high and bright in the heavens;
and the snows were melting, as they descended towards
the valley. They paused, from time to time,
to listen to the grand sounds of the new formed streams
or leapt down the sides of the mountains. The splendid
red bird, warmed into melody by the influence of this
transitory spring, came forth from its tangled covert
of brambles, and chaunted its long drawn and mellow
song.
At length their feet pressed the level of the vale.
The precincts of the town opened to view. Groups
of Indians received them on the banks of the Sewasserna,
with reiterated embraces and acclamations.
The rejoicing song was caught, and perpetuated from
mouth to mouth, and preceded them to the dwelling
of William Weldon. Even Hatch, who could have
given, had he chosen it, ample intelligence of the origin
of this expedition, and by a word could have prevented
all that had happened, was among the rest offering
his congratulations. He was one of those
thrifty personages, who have always a hearty welcome
for the prosperous, be they whom they may. A moment
afterwards, and she was in the arms of her parents,
and the burst of nature and unutterable joy had
its course. The Indians, meanwhile, were singing
and dancing; and the cry was heard from assembled
thousands, `Wakona hath come! The young chief
hath come!' Nor were there wanting not loud, but
deep imprecations of vengeance upon the refractory
and treacherous Shienne, of whom a few were present,
to witness this joyful scene. The daughter received
alternately the embrace of father and mother.
`Oh Tien, Universal Jehovah, God of Israel, God of
my fathers, I thank thee from my full heart,' cried the
mother. `Now, Lord, lettest Thou thy servant depart
in peace,' cried the father. `It is enough; my
hands feel; and my eyes see; and thou hast returned
safe and in honor.' Long and repeated were these
embraces of parental and filial affection. Again and
again was the dear daughter strained anew to the
spasm passed away. Hundreds of Shoshonee looked
on with a glad participation in this scene, which showed
that the human heart every where has the same sympathy
with real and deep feeling. Nor was it the
least impressive part of the daughter's return, that the
wretch who had given occasion for all this grief and
joy, shortly after arrived, bound strongly with cords,
a fiendish witness of the horror and detestation inspired
by her abduction, as measured by the joy of
her return. There he lay, a detested and despised
thing, occasionally pointed at by the Indians, whose
dialect he now sufficiently understood, to know, that
they were saying, `the vile pale face must burn.
We must offer him a sacrifice to the Wahcondah of
the red men.'
The returned daughter once more tenanted her
natal habitation. Father and mother, and Elder
Wood, and Frederic and Areskoui, and his parents,
sat round her, and the minister repeated the eventful
story of the rescue. Areskoui was clearly the hero
of it; and as Elder Wood painted, in his own energetic
phrase, the noble intrepidity of the chief, when,
seeing Jessy in the vale of Manitouna, he determined
to throw himself down the icy precipices a thousand
feet, and excited the rest by his example, to dare the
same self devotion, William Weldon could not restrain
a new burst of parental affection; but rose from
his seat, strained the noble young chief in his arms,
and declared that to him he owed the life and honor
of his daughter. `Son,' cried his parents, `thou art
worthy of us and Wakona.' Elder Wood resumed
his eulogy, and forgot not to descant on the power of
his invention, when arrived at length, almost within
comparative reach of their object, they saw themselves
tantalized by inability to descend, or ascend;
and at their `wit's end,' in search of devices, to reach
of life. When the expedient of the nature
formed ladder of grape-vines occurred to the invention
of the young chief, Ellswatta refrained not the
native ugh! of Indian gratulation. He arose erect
on his toes, flourished his arm, and exclaimed `who
will say that the red men have less medicine thoughts,
than the pale face?' As in the bulletin of a battle,
each one of the expedition came in for his due share
of praise, and received his meed of intrepidity and
self exposure. Jessy related her proportion of suffering,
and those points of incident, which she alone was
qualified to narrate. Her bland tresses floated, as
formerly, on her fair neck. Joy had restored to her
the wonted brilliance of her beauty; and the languor
of fatigue and suffering that still remained, only softened
the glow and the suffusion of joy on her cheek.
`How passed you the time of my absence?' she asked,
at length, in her turn. `I will not believe, that it
was not the source of grief and suffering. Relate, dear
parents, to your returned daughter, how you sustained
it.' They could give no more, than the general
tale of the actings of human nature in the endurance
of exquisite suffering. They took no food, and knew
no sleep. They had seated themselves in the mute
silence of despair, at one time raising their eyes to
heaven, and at another time to the place selected for
the family sepulchre; in this intolerable anguish, longing
for the repose of the grave. The father sometimes
read aloud the penitential psalms of David, or
the deep strains of the afflicted man of Uz. `Why
was this dear one given us, thus to be taken away?
Why died we not from the cradle? Why was life
given to them, that are in bitterness of spirit, and light
to them, that are in darkness?' Then they said, `the
Lord gave. He hath taken away. Blessed be his
name. The comfort, we had in her, is sufficient,—
treasured remembrance. Very pleasant hast thou
been to us, dear lost one. Thou wert more gentle
than the dove. Would God we had died for thee, our
daughter.' `Then we strove to restrain the sinful
expression of our grief. We said, `the way of the
Eternal is pathless in the great deep. He hath his
purpose in all this; and we ought to enquire, wherefore
our souls are so disquieted? and yet to trust in
Him for the rescue and return of our daughter.'
Towards the close of the first day of her abduction,
they walked to her bower, and there found relief for
their suffocating spirits in tears. There were her
drawings. There were her footsteps. Every spot,
where she had walked, was consecrated. Every one, to
whom they knew her in any way attached, was bound
to them by a tie, stronger than death. Then their
fluctuating views and feelings suggested to them the
courage, affection, noble disinterestedness and enterprize
of those, who joined for her rescue; and they
said, `God will strengthen and enlighten them; and
the teeth of the oppressor will be broken; and she
will return to us with songs of joy.' Then again they
framed dark, but natural imaginings of her struggles,
her cries, her sufferings in the hands of her brutal oppressor.
The object, the purpose, the views of the
wretch and his Indians, and the alternate destination
of the daughter, all these, when the darkness of night
again overshadowed them, and the autumnal wind
moaned in the pines, and the wolves howled from afar,
were left to the undefined and perpetually varying
grouping of the imagination. `But why talk of sorrow,'
they said, `which has all vanished in joy? Let
us bless God, and forget the day of his visitation for
all purposes, except to swell our present thankfulness
and our unlimited trust in Him for all the future.'
`See, said Elder Wood, `what a world is this, is
which our lot is cast! How nearly the sounds of
thanksgiving rise to the wailings of grief and agony!
Let us remember, that the joy, too, will again pass, and
be replaced by days of darkness. Oh! that this might
persuade you, and that I could convince you to build
on another foundation, than such a changing scene of
things. At the moment, while we are rejoicing over
the return of a lost daughter to her parents, how many
thousands are mourning over their dead, and conveying
the remains of those, most dear to them, to their
long home!'
`Thou sayest right, Elder Wood,' said Jessy. `Thou
art right, while our hearts are still tender, and our
joy overflowing, to temper it with these views, as
painful, as they are true. Let us devote ourselves to
thy God. Let us feel, that we are pilgrims, and indulge
our joys with a chastened and moderated spirit.
Let our chief thoughts be on eternal re-union in the
Father's house, in the everlasting mansions in which
there are neither tears, accident nor death.'
Upon the word Elder Wood took up the bible and
psalm book. He read various affecting passages, appropriate
to the occasion. When the hymn was given
out, with the sweet voice of Jessy, and with that of
hundreds of sympathising Indians without—and the
sounds borne along through the mouths of the red men,
though harsh and discordant, produced the solemn
impression that never fails to result from many human
voices joined. The party then all fell on their knees,
and accompanied with full hearts the loud and earnest
thanksgivings of Elder Wood.
When the prayers and praises were concluded,
`allow me,' said Jessy, `before we separate, to return
to each one of my deliverers thanks, since there is nothing,
but words to repay.' To each one of the Indians,
she gave her hand, and made some appropriate and
grateful acknowledgement, after their own phrase
and figure. `To you, Areskoui,' she said, `my brother,
and the soul of honor, I owe more than life. I
will engrave on my memory thy descent from the
mountain to my relief. I can never forget all, that
preceded, and followed.' The young chief pressed
the offered hand to his lips, and Josepha, in her energetic
Spanish dialect, claimed permission to embrace
her. `And you, Frederic, will not turn away from
the grateful thanks of the rescued object of your
generous daring.' He approached with glowing
cheek, and received her acknowledgements, paid
with an averted face and moistened eye, which, he
might have seen, were the offspring neither of unkindness
nor indifference.
What a night was that to Julius, which followed
the return of Jessy! Had he not suffered from a guilty
conscience and a coward fear of death, no doubt, he
would that night have terminated his wretched life
with his own hands. He shrunk from a self-inflicted
death, to which his fellow captives urged him. His
deep acquaintance with human nature, in revolving
his chances, led him to see a vista of light and hope in
the future. Conscience and his fears whispered,
`wretch, they will burn thee on the morrow.' Then
revenge cried from the secret chambers of his
thoughts, and he was not without his secret hopes,
that he should yet turn the tables on his victors, and
still achieve his guilty purposes. Terrible perverseness
and pertinacity of human guilt! Never had he
seen his escaped victim so lovely, and taking such a
place in his unhallowed thoughts, as when emotions,
more than mortal, gave a celestial radiance to her
eye, and expression to her countenance, on her return
to her parents. `Fool, that I was,' said he to himself.
I not allowed this simple girl to outwit me. It is her
time now. It will be mine next. They will not burn
me.' But still there was enough of terror in his position,
to cause, that no sleep visited his eyes, for that
night.
A morning followed, corresponding to the expected
business of the day—dark, misty, chill; one of the
gloomy days of the last of November. The announced
trial was of a character to assemble the whole
population of both the tribes. The drums beat. The
medicine men took their places in the council house,
in silent and solemn gravity. The chiefs arranged
themselves with unwonted regard to ceremonial. A
number of stakes and piles of faggots, on the level
space between the council house and the river, manifested
to the prisoners, that the work of preparation
had been going on through the night. The Shienne,
ranged round their chief, Nelesho, were painted black
and green, as indicating undecided purposes. The
Shoshonee more generally wore black, the color of
anger, war, and stern resolve. Ellswatta, too, it was
observed, was in black. After a brief consultation
together, among the chiefs, the common and subordinate
Shienne, who had been concerned in the abduction,
were beaten with rods, and dismissed. Though
the infliction was severe, and unsparingly laid on, not
a groan, not a writhe of pain escaped them; notwithstanding
their lacerated backs showed that there was
ample cause of pain. The same punishment was
awarded Baptiste. But although inflicted with a
much more tender hand, the Canadian danced and
yelled in no gentle measures, and in cries as various
and voluble as his customary speech. As he danced,
and cried, `mon Dieu,' and `ayez pitie,' the Indian character
and temperament broke forth, in the most unanimous
shouts of laughter. Even the girls, who had
his wife, laughed as heartily as the rest. This inverted
sympathy could not have been in the slightest degree
an emollient for his scathed back. Finding, too,
that the enjoyment of the joke of his cries, would tend
to prolong, and redouble the endurance, he made the
first great effort of his life, and shrugged not exactly
in the style of that, which graced his common parlance.
He ground his teeth at every stripe, cried
`sacre! dem! never mind! sacre crapeau! my turn by
and by.' He was complimented, as they released
him, that a few more whippings would discipline him
to become a real red man, and no woman.
The two chief Shienne in the concern of the abduction
were next brought forward, and placed, strongly
pinioned, in the centre of the council house. The
council fire burned near them. The chiefs smoked
long, and silently, before a word was said. Ellswatta
then arose. His manner was calm, but stern. `My
red children,' he said, `hearken. He, who would
stain the totem of our nation, by attempting the violation
of female honor, deserves to be burned. Our
name, for sacredness in this kind of honor, has spread
from the rising to the setting sun. Here is a pale
face, who came amongst us and received adoption into
our tribe. He experienced from us ample hospitality
and protection, as one of our own children.—
The parents of Wakona admitted him with the confidence
which allows no doubt, into their family. He
requited it by seducing base and wicked Shienne to
aid him, in stealing away from this family their only
child. I will not name the crime, which, we believe,
he meditated to commit. It is too base, for a red
man to permit on his tongue, or even to stain his
thoughts. He carried her to the medicine prison of
the little white men of the mountains. Your young
chief, and these pale faces pursued him, with these
They descended the medicine mountain, by the aid
of the Wahcondah. Wakona was brought back by
the bravery and good conduct of our red children and
our white brothers, in peace. What shall be done to
the base Shienne, and the recreant pale face? Pale
faces, she is of your race. Declare your thoughts.'
Every one knew, that Hatch had been privy to the
plot of abduction, though proof might be wanting, and
was a partizan of Nelesho. The brass in his countenance
was exchanged for a blush, when asked his
opinion. A consciousness of the predicament, in
which he stood before them, was equally manifest in
every other countenance, as in his own. He had imagined,
this affair would have terminated in another
way. He stammered, as he gave his opinion. `The
person in trial,' he said, `was young, handsome, rich,
and had been rather favored, as he had heard, by
Jessy. He loved, and had eloped with her, intending
marriage. If it had taken place, she would, probably,
have been a loving and happy wife. At any rate,
no crime had been committed; and the most that
could be said of it, was, that it was the freak of a wild
young man, dictated by love. He rejoiced in the
return of Wakona. He was for acquitting the prisoner.'
Ellswatta gravely notched a mark on a long
white rod. `What sayest thou, young pale face, who
camest here, as his companion? Thou hast proved
thyself brave, honest and true in this business. We
wait thy sentence.' The pale face of the prisoner
was now raised, marked with a conflict of various and
terrible emotions. Frederic hastened to give his
voice. `I am a child in counsel,' he said, `compared
with these wise and aged fathers. I once called him
friend, and I cannot give my voice against him, although
I think him worthy to die.' `In so saying,
replied Ellswatta, `according to our usages, thou hast
black rod. `And thou,' medicine man of
the pale face, he continued, turning to Elder Wood.
`Thou knowest the will of thy Master of Life; and
art wise, to discern the thing, that is true and right.
Thou canst make, what is in darkness, bright as the
morning; what sayest thou of yonder pale face?' The
countenance of the Kentucky minister betrayed irresolution.
He made a speech of some length. He
said, `that, by the laws of the whites, such crimes,
when committed, were punished by death; but, that
they made a distinction between the manifest intention,
and the overt act. The end of the young man,
no doubt, was too horrible to name. The means were
cruel and detestable, beyond all words to describe
them. He hoped, it would not be thought, in giving
his opinion, that he did not detest, and abhor the act,
as much, as any one. He hoped that none would be
found, to go beyond him, in sympathy for the sufferings
of the parents, or indignation for the outrage
practised; to say nothing of what was intended. No
punishment, he thought, could be sufficiently severe;
or meet the horrible aggravation of the offence; or
make adequate atonement to the injured party. But
then, he could not forget, that death would cut him
off from repentance. He could not forget, that he
had parents beyond the seas; that it was the crime of
youth, and of the guilty appetite, miscalled love.
The beauty and innocence of the party, however,
they might have been temptations, he admitted, were
no extenuation of the guilt. He gave his opinion,
that he should be forthwith transported out of the
valley, and punished with death, if ever found visiting
it again. He deemed, that, when there was any
doubt in the case, it was right to incline to the side of
mercy.' His opinion was notched on the white rod.
`And, what sayest thou, father of Wakona,' asked
my heart is too full of joy and affection, to allow my
thoughts sufficient calmness and impartiality, to decide
upon a case, which touches life.' His opinion
was notched on the white rod.
`We will now take the voice of our own people,'
said the chief. `What is thy decision, Nelesho?'
Every countenance was turned towards him, to see
how he would deport himself in this emergency. He
had labored for self command; and he had obtained
it. The prisoner arose from his recumbent position,
and looked wistfully upon him, as feeling, that life or
death hung on his word, and opinion. Nelesho arose,
threw his buffaloe robe from his shoulder, squared
himself, and showed a form, that seemed of more than
carthly power. He had taken counsel of disdain, and
as it seemed, contempt of life. `Thou askest Nelesho,
Shoshonee chief, how he would dispose of yonder
pale face? They are both pale faces. They are
both beautiful. Do not the birds, and the deer, and
all the dwellers of the air and the streams and the
woods, wed under such circumstances? How camest
thou, Ellswatta, by the mother of Areskoui? Yonder
pale face is said to be a very great man among
his own people. The Master of Life marked in the
most signal manner, that Wakona ought to have been to
Nelesho. He offered her his love, and she rejected
it with disdain. Why should she render so many
wretched with her scorn? Did the Master of Life
give her the beautiful face and the medicine charm,
merely to create torment? The young pale face
loved her, did he? So does the other pale face, and
Areskoui, and I know not how many more. She has
received, I fear, charms of potency from the little
white men of the mountains; else she could not so
melt away the strong hearts of the red warriors, and
the young pale faces. Our fathers were wont to put
white men of the mountains. It would seem
strange counsel, if Nelesho were to propose, to burn
Wakona, who medicines all, that come in her way,
as though in communication with the mischievous
spirits, and let the pale face whom she has medicined,
escape. It is right, that the young and beautiful
should love the young and beautiful. My mind is,
therefore, that we release the prisoner, and compel
Wakona to receive him for a husband. Let us have
a marriage between them, and let us all rejoice together.
If they become weary of each other, as is
likely, Nelesho will still take her, as his squaw.' The
reckless and undaunted insolence of Nelesho was received
with a distinct grunt of approbation from a few
of his Shienne; and with a loud, general and long
drawn groan of indignation from the Shoshonee, and
most of all, from Areskoui. He arose, pale with
wrath, and with a countenance of more uncontrolled
fierceness, than he was ever seen to have worn before.
Every eye was upon him. Ellswatta saw, that his son
would commit himself, and lose his reputation for
calmness and self control. `Areskoui,' he said, `a
more opportune time will come, for what thou wouldst
say. No one is answerable for the folly of his heart, unless
it escape from his lips.' The young chief stood
rebuked, swallowed his words, cast a withering look
upon Nelesho, which was met by a corresponding expression
of defiance and disdain, and sat down.
The sub-chiefs and warriors were now called upon
in turn, to give their declaration of opinion in the
case. Burn! Burn! was the general voice of the
Shoshonee. `Burn the pale face and the base Shienne,
who have stained our totem.' A few of the
Shienne, too, who wavered between allegiance to
Ellswatta, and subservience to Nelesho, gave their
voices in the same way. The greater portion of the
gave their suffrage for releasing all the prisoners. On
counting the notches on the sticks of mercy and vengeance,
it was found that the far greater number was
on the latter.
It was an impressive specimen of the actings of the
fierce democracy of nature, where the unwritten laws,
though founded only in opinion, operate with terrible,
prompt and certain efficacy. On this occasion, deep
feelings of mutual jealousy and hate had been developed
between the Shienne and Shoshonee, and between
rival and hating chiefs and partizans, in fierce
and defying speeches, and in that menacing and proud
independence, which constitutes such a prominent
feature in Indian deliberations. The partizans of a
particular speaker cheered him, as he proceeded, by
the deep grunt of Indian approbation; and the low
murmur was like the gently mustering winds, that
precede a tempest. The tumultuous adoption and
renunciation of opinion was like the swelling and sinking
of the tempest, when acting in its fury.
After all the opinions had been declared, and collected,
the counsel chiefs again smoked awhile, and
were silent, looking on the ground. They then raised
their calumets, and flourished them first to the rising,
and then to the setting sun—then to the south, and
the north. Ellswatta threw his buffalo robe from his
right shoulder, and gave the decision of the council
with equal calmness and firmness. `My red children,
warriors of the Shoshonee and Shienne, listen. The
Master of Life hath taught us, to mingle calmness
with determination, and justice with mercy. The
red people, from the salt lake at the rising to that at
the setting sun, have received it from their forefathers
and the Master of Life, that the honor of women
is a bright line in their totem—a medicine—a
thing of inviolate sanctity. The pale faces babble all
they allow us this honor. It is our right. Sooner
than stain it, we will all sacrifice our lives. I say nothing
of the outrage of carrying off Wakona, and of
the groans of her parents, while she was gone. I will
not expound what, we all believe, was intended; for
to speak it would wither the honor and scorch the
tongue of a red man. He hath, moreover, seduced
the allegiance of the Shienne, and sown the seeds of
insubordination and rebellion. I say nothing of the
show and effect of this, which you have all heard in
the speech of the insolent Shienne chief. He caused,
also, that the lives of all the party of rescue were put
at hazard, in their throwing themselves down the
medicine mountain, when, it would seem, that no
power, but the Master of Life, could have saved them.
For these crimes the red men determine, that yonder
pale face shall burn, or fall on his knees before Wakona,
in view of all the nation, and demand her forgiveness;
which, if he receive not, he still burns.—
But if he receive it, he suffers wis-ton-gah, or running
the gauntlet; and is then to be carried out of the tribe,
cursed, and forbidden ever to enter it again, on pain
of death.
`Touching our two recreant red children we also
pass, that they draw lots, who of the two, shall burn,
or undergo the same humiliation of asking forgiveness
of Wakona on bended knees, and then endure the
wis-ton-gah, and be banished from the town of the Shienne,
to dwell at the remote point of the north pass of
the mountains. It is said. Let it be done.'
A general grunt of approbation ran through the vast
assembly. Nelesho and his few factious partizans
cast a knowing eye over the crowd, and saw, that in
this case, there were none to sustain them in opposition,
and that purposes of treason and revolt were as
yet premature. Judgment and justice and wisdom
seemed a general feeling of pride and respect, in regard
to the aged and wise chief, as though a second
Daniel had come to judgment.
Immediately four young warriors, executioners of
the nation, with pistols and hatchets in their girdles,
arose, and advanced towards the prisoners. The two
Shienne were blindfolded. Prepared lots were placed
before them, and drawn. The fortunate drawer
was immediately liberated; and, disgraced, and shunned
by every eye, he moodily withdrew from the assembly.
A message was despatched to Jessy; and
she came in her beauty, in a case as trying to one of
her character, as could be imagined. Life hung upon
her act, and she could not hesitate. But the whole
transaction, and every thing that preceded it, was of
a character to harrow her feelings. She was pale—
but every one could have seen, that mercy had the
ascendency on her countenance. A general murmur
of delight ran over the crowd, as the lovely girl, alternately
pale, and rosy red, sat down between her
parents.
The four warriors seized Julius. All conceivable
human passions were marked on his fair face. `Lead
me to Wakona,' he said; but in a voice almost inarticulate.
They led him to her. Pride struggled for
a moment in his bosom, and its influence was as of
spasm. Love of life prevailed. He fell on his
knees, amidst a low murmuring hiss, which rose spontaneously
from the whole multitude. `Pardon, Jessy,
and let me live. Thou wast lovely; and I fell. Pardon.
I depart in guilt and shame to expiate my
crimes in repentance, and in remembrance of thee
and of this humiliation, which will gnaw upon my bosom,
like the never dying worm.' Such were his
words, while on his knees before her. To see a youth,
so fair and noble in appearance, in such extreme humiliation,
hers. `Julius,' she replied, in words distinctly audible,
go; repent, and may God forgive thee, as I do.
Let me never see thee more.'
The act was followed by a general groan, the last
expression of Indian contempt. Nelesho threw off
his robe, as if from excessive warmth, put his fingers
to his mouth, giving the true Indian yell, ugh! ugh!
it arose even from many a woman present; while the
Shienne cried, `thy countenance is fair, pale face, but
thy soul is that of an old woman. Release the despised
pale face for the Wistongah,' was the general
cry. In a moment there was formed, all the way
from the council house to the river, a compact mass
of warriors and women intermixed, each armed with
a beechen switch, of which hundreds had been prepared
for the alternative. Children and aged, male
and female, all pressed to the ranks, to have a share
in this high frolic; and the very struggle to get forward
and administer the switch, was the cause that
he suffered little in the application. They let him
loose, amidst shouts of laughter, and so many switches
were brandished at him, that one fell upon the other.
The ranks were disordered, in eagerness each to whip
him. He stumbled and fell; and the interval was
filled with those who were pressed down in eagerness
to get at him. The fallen all caught the switches together,
and the shout of merriment rent the sky.
He was soon raised, the path cleared, and he ran on,
staggering on this side and on that, getting quite as
many stripes from the women as the men. The discipline,
on the whole, was rather severe, and when he
arrived at the river, he was was thoroughly scored from
head to foot, and was carried away, to receive at the
house of Hatch such unction and consoling words, as
might prepare him to be transported out of the nation,
which was to take place on the following morning.
have him forthcoming for transportation in the
morning.
The drums beat, and the chiefs assembled in the
council house, surrounded by the nation, as before, to
witness the termination of the council in the alternative
of the remaining Shienne prisoner. Once more
Jessy was seated to receive his humiliation, if he chose
to make it. It was so signified to him. He indignantly
spurned the offer. `What! a Shienne warrior
get on his knees to a woman! No. No. You
can burn a Shienne, but you cannot quail his spirit.'
The terrible sentence was uttered, that he must burn,
and so implicit was the deep deference to modes sanctioned
by immemorial usage, that not a groan, not a
sign of disapprobation arose from all that mingled
crowd, in which the unhappy prisoner had parents, a
wife, and children, and a whole train of intimates and
friends. The chief arose, and waved his hand towards
the West. `The sun has gone,' he said, to
bathe his forehead in the great salt lake. Let the
Master of Life look upon our doings. Let him see
us cleanse the stained totem of our nation, when he
looks upon his red children in the brightness of the
morning. The council was dissolved, and the prisoner
placed under a guard for the terrible ceremony of
the morning. But during the night the guard was
beset, and the prisoner liberated; and the information
in the morning was, that he had fled to the Black-feet,
who had long opened an asylum for fugitives from
the Shoshonee.
During this winter every second warrior of the two
tribes was detached on different trapping expeditions;
and the annals of the nation resumed their customary
aspect. The influence of Elder Wood, as a
missionary, had become a very considerable element
of influence in the nation. The heart of the good
gather much fruit from among these interesting heathens
for the Redeemer, and be known in the annals of
the church, as the Apostle of the Shoshonee. Two
Indian girls received baptism, and were added to his
little church. Various other demonstrations of his
growing success filled his heart with joy. Winter
howled through the leafless forest, and swept along
the most sunny vallies; holding undivided empire upon
the icy summits of the mountains. When the mountain
breeze descended to the valley, it was as if the
concentered essence of frost had descended with it.
Even the hardy and much enduring warriors came in
from their traps. But the warm abodes under the
over arching wall were plentifully stored with venison,
prairie potatoes, and dried salmon; and Indian festivity,
holiday and song sojourned in those nature wrought
abodes of comfort.
Jessy, warned by the dreadful disaster that had recently
befallen her, went little abroad; and never,
except when accompanied by numbers, who were able
to protect her. The guilty Julius had, indeed, been
deported, and left with a periogue and a curse at the
Great Falls of the Oregon, to make his way to Astoria
alone, as he might. But a thousand circumstances,
which could be summed up only by intimate acquaintance
with the manners of the people, indicated,
that though the master spirit was gone, the influence
of his money and his counsels remained. There was
too much reason to fear, that through Baptiste, Hatch
and Nelesho, he still held the threads of disaffection
and revolt in his hands at Astoria, where, it was understood
he arrived safely, after his deportation from
the valley. Ellswatta well understood all this. But
the usages of that patriarchal government gave no
countenance to punishment, except upon the clearest
and most palpable conviction; and the grand maxim
tribes, to forbear towards the Shienne, as long as forbearance
was possible.
A strange sympathy had grown up, in place of the
former estrangement, that existed for awhile between
Frederic and Areskoui. The former became a constant
inmate in the dwelling of the latter. In walking, in
hunting, in their visits at William Weldon's, they were
inseparable companions. It was understood, that the
young chief had resumed the relinquished studies of
his early youth, and under the instruction of Frederic,
was making patient and rapid advances in learning;
and that he was indefatigable in his efforts to understand,
and copy the observances, common courtesies,
and modes of the white people. The fruit of these
instructions was marked by every one. Sometimes
it created painful respect, and sometimes it inspired
smiles in Jessy, to remark the stately and somewhat
stiff ceremonial of the young chief, in that intermediate
stage, where his manners had lost the listless independent
ease of his native deportment, without acquiring
the graceful finish of civilized manners.
The compact between the two inmates was similar
in character, though based more deeply in truth and
honor, than that, which had originally existed between
Frederic and Julius, when they first came to
the valley. Their covenant ran, that they would be
friends, faithful and totem friends, in the language of
Areskoui; that no jealousy, distrust or concealment
should belong to their intercourse; that the chief
should deport himself invariably to his friend, as his
father had to William Weldon; that they would
spend their days together; and that if Wakona, unsolicited,
should show favor to either, the other should
relinquish any thought of attempting hindrance. `But,'
said Areskoui, `it were better, that we continue to
live, as we now live; sustaining to her the relation of
wring the heart of the other by the cruel triumph of
possession.' In a moment of privacy, which occurred
soon afterwards, Areskoui, in very guarded, but sufficiently
intelligible language, announced the terms of
this treaty to Jessy. `Wakona,' he said, `I hope, that
thou wilt henceforward gladden my heart by that
same smiling and unconstrained confidence, which
thou wert wont to bestow upon me in the thrice happy,
and never to be forgotten days of our infancy.—
Wakona, thy smiles clear the sky, and bring good fortune.
Flower of the valleys, thou seest, that I love
the pale face, who dwelleth with me, and who giveth,
and receiveth all my confidence. I implore thee,
therefore, never again to look upon me with the averted
eye of distrust, or fear, that I shall vex thee more
with talk of my love.'
A thousand reasons rendered such an intercourse
the first wish of her heart, and peace of mind was again
restored to her. The intercourse was cheerful, unrestrained
and delightful; more than compensating for
the want of the unconscious communion of their young
days, by possessing more of character and heart, and
the guarded feelings of higher interest from the relations
of sex, age, and more self respect, and matured
thoughts. When the storm poured without, and all nature
was invested with its covering of snow, and imprisoned
in chains of ice, the nation, sheltered in their
warm cabins under the great arch of nature, told their
tales, and prosecuted their loves, and laid down their
schemes for the occupations of the spring; or shivered
with horror at superstitious legends of the Maniteewah,
and of the little white men of the mountains.—
Elder Wood, the while, sat in one corner of William
Weldon's spacious parlor, with his table, lamp and religious
books before him. Ellswatta and Josepha,
half reclined on their buffaloe robes, in earnest converse
touched his flute with the inspiration of love. The
fingers of Jessy wandered over her harp. The evening
tea and coffee smoked, and diffused their fragrance.
A cheerful fire blazed; and lamps at the remote point
of the apartment threw an impressive brilliance upon
the dark red cave of the glorious and lofty arch of living
stone above.
`There is gladness,' said Areskoui, as on such an
evening, a northern storm poured columns of snow and
sleet down the valley, `there is gladness in this scene
of comfort and peace.' `It contrasts delightfully,'
said Frederic, `with the howling of the storm, and the
keenness of the frost; and the consciousness, how soon
the poor, unsheltered traveller without, would perish
under the wrath of winter. How sweet are the security,
abundance and comfort within. How doubly
dear the faces of those, to whom we are united by
domestic and friendly ties. We look round, and
here is our paradise, our home, our world.'—
`My daughter,' said William, aroused by the enthusiasm
of Frederic, `sing to us the touching air,
you gave us the other evening.' Without waiting
for the painful repetition of entreaty, she sang, to
a tender and plaintive air,
The sweet notes and the touching words drew tears
from the small audience, and aroused the attention of
even Elder Wood from his holier meditations. `Jessy,
my daughter,' said the good man, `in society they
would tell you, you sing like an angel. I say to you
in truth, that the beautiful ballad on your lips has
drawn tears even from these eyes, which are not used
to weeping. Jessy, you have made me think painfully
of Kentucky.'
Sometimes the conversation was playful, and intermingled
with stories by Ellswatta, of conflicts with
and gambols in the brine of the western sea, as
he pursued sea lions and seals to their retreats beneath
the billows. He recounted, and it made no
mean romance, the story, how he won Josepha with
his sword and his bow. The Spanish woman laughed
heartily at his version, and occasionally commented,
and showed fine eyes and teeth, and informed him,
that Yensi would, perhaps, hear from her an entirely
different account of the whole matter. Sometimes
it turned on higher and holier themes, friendship, the
comfort and security and peace of the lowly tenants
of the vale. Sometimes it dwelt on comparisons of
their position and enjoyments, with those of the dwellers
in the great world; and sometimes Elder Wood
gave the key note to the theme of religion, and then
it turned upon the enduring character of religious
satisfaction, the power of that faith, that triumphs over
death, and the eternal hopes of the life to come.—
Each member of this small social circle was inexpressibly
dear to the other. The conversation, thus colored
by friendship, thus concentered by affection, thus
diversified by guests from such remote quarters, and
minds of such opposite training, and naturally partaking
much of Indian simplicity, and picture painting
power, called their thoughts into full and delightful
exercise; and their remembrances and affections
from their deepest cells.
During the day, if the weather was not inclement,
the two friends hunted, by tracing the foot prints of
their game in the snow, or angled in the ponds under
the ice; or found the covert of the wild turkeys and
bustards, or the open places in the Sewasserna, where
the geese and swans remained through the winter;
and loaded with game, they entered with the departure
of light the abode of William Weldon, to feast,
and spend the long winter evenings in the renewal of
preceding evening. Jessy, too, had for the ear of her
mother and Elder Wood, relations still more interesting,
than the hunting chronicle of the preceding day,
as detailed by the two friends. There are sickness
and sorrow every where; and she had been, through
the day, a ministering angel beside the sick and the
sorrowful and the destitute in the humble Indian
abodes of the nation. Her mother, without professing
the religion of Elder Wood, felt these obligations, and
encouraged these exertions on the part of her daughter.
Their stock of medicines and comforts for the
sick and destitute was comparatively great; for the
Indians are naturally thoughtless, and reckless of the
future. It was by such acts, long practised among
the humblest of the nation, that Jessy had won the
love and veneration of the people. But it was not
for blessings, or humble applause, or to have the tale
told, that Jessy went to the squalid abode, administered
food and medicine, wiped the sweat of pain and
agony from the face of the sick, and imparted counsel,
consolation and hope to the dying. Her record
was on high. She felt, that she owed these painful
duties to God and to her kind; and when she could
reflect, that she had faithfully performed them through
the day, a calm serenity came over her evening
thoughts, a perennial and healthful satisfaction, of a
far higher order than even the spirit-stirring recollections
of the active young hunters, as they narrated
the adventures and pleasures of the chase of the past
day.
The hopes of Elder Wood, too, were elevated with
indefinite anticipations of success. The popularity
of Areskoui was manifestly advancing; and the star
of Nelesho was waxing pale in proportion. There
was every reason to believe, when Ellswatta
should be gathered to his fathers, that Areskoui would
the united nation, than even his father had been.—
This young chief, Elder Wood had sanguine hopes,
would profess the Christian religion. He had written
this on the tablet of his heart; and his ardent imagination
had gone on, rioting in the glorious vision, that
the nation would follow their chief; and that he would
be finally written Apostle of the converted nation of
the Shoshonee. His creative mind ran on to the
civilization consequent upon the Christianization of
the people. He saw fields and fences and houses and
roads and canals and orchards, and the church with
its spire. He heard the sound of the church-going
bell. He saw himself invested with the united consideration
and sanctity of prophet, priest and king.
He went further. His serious and imaginative spirit
transcended the bounds of time and space, and the
limits of the grave. He saw the books opened, his
red converts ascending the holy hill of Zion, and recognizing
him in the everlasting mansions, as the instrument
of their being brought home to God. Kings,
and those, whose names are written on marble, have
no illusions so benevolent and glorious, as this picture
of the present and final results of a Christian community,
thus portrayed in the imagination of Elder
Wood.
Alas! for the frailty of human nature. It was unquestionably
love, which led the young chief to think
seriously and to converse earnestly upon the subject
with Elder Wood. He had said to Jessy, to Frederic
and himself, that he would be contented with the
sisterly regard, the disinterested and common kindness
of his sister, such as she could share in equal
proportions between him and Frederic. But, in saying
this, he had deceived himself. He was of a nature,
in which all affections and passions take strong
and deep root. This sentiment had been incorporated
Every year and every scene, and every
visit and every conversation, had strengthened the
sentiment. It had rooted deeply, and thrown out
wide branches, and unconsciously pervaded all his
thoughts and associations; and mingled with every
plan and colored every future prospect, until it had
become a tyrannic and master feeling, not to be reasoned
with, or controlled; but, like disease and constitutional
madness and the influence and acting of
the brute powers of nature, endured, as he might sustain
them.
Though Elder Wood had the warmest regard for
Frederic, there were more points of union between
him and the young chief, than between him and his
own countryman. Areskoui was, in the way, to which
allusion has just been made, identified with all his
bright visions of the future, on earth and in heaven.
Elder Wood knew not himself, that he wished Jessy
might become the wife of the chief. But he was unconsciously
swayed to that wish. His representations
of Areskoui to her were always, more or less, colored
by that wish. Unhappily, this purpose, latent to him,
was clear to her; and deeming it matter of design, it
tended in a degree to counteract its own purpose, and
induced her to regard his animated statements and
his warm eulogy rather with distrust, than confidence.
Long and confidential were the communications,
which the young chief held with him, touching the
evidences, the doctrines and the immortal hopes of
the Christian religion. The system, as a whole, met
his respect and his cordial acceptation; though he very
frankly demurred to the narrow and exclusive views
of the minister. But however the conversation began,
whatever turn it took, it always ended upon two
points, whether there were unions in heaven, like
those on earth; and whether he thought, there was
sentiments beyond simple regard? `Father,' he would
say, `you affirm, that all is disappointment and sorrow
here below. My heart is sad, and fondly seeks to rest
in some hope, that its earnest longings may somewhere
be satisfied. Ah! if it may be in heaven! I will strive
to go to heaven; for Wakona will never love me on
earth; and you affirm, that in that country, all the adventitious
advantages of complexion, speech, form, deportment,
and cultivation, will be done away, and every
thing will be settled on the test of superior worth
and goodness. There I will show Wakona, what she
has thrown from her on such considerations. There
she shall read the mind and the heart of the young
chief.' Then, he would earnestly and anxiously ask,
`father, if all these circumstances, by which we know
each other on earth, shall be changed, how shall
minds know each other in heaven?'
All these conflicts and solicitudes in the heart of
Areskoui became matter of unconscious relation to
Jessy in the conversations of Elder Wood. To
present his catechumen in the attitude of hopeless
self-conflict, despairing love, and seeking only the
good of the object of his affections even in rejection;
such, in all simplicity of heart, was the plan of the
minister; and many an unconscious and unwitnessed
tear, in her silent meditations, had she bestowed upon
the sorrows of Areskoui, as thus painted to her
imagination by the man of God.
On the other hand, she had her own peculiar bitterness
of heart, from another source. In Frederic
she saw dignity, nobleness and strength of character,
as in the other. He had not grown up with her from
infancy, raising between them associations, that had
been formed gradually and imperceptibly. He was
descended from her own race, educated, capable of
eliciting her thoughts, and divining her undeclared
always in earnest. This one could glide in a moment,
by a transition natural and decorous, from gay
to grave. He was playful and sprightly, when the
occasion called. He had wit or wisdom, eloquence
or profoundness, according to the exigency of conversation.
All these views had developed in a short
time; and had been seen in the light of a discriminating
judgment. The one in that world, where, although
she knew it only by books, or the accounts of
her friends, the standard of her estimation was fixed,
would be called savage! Savage! that word of horrid
import, a word, to which, from all her mother's
prejudices, she had learned to attach the most repulsive
meaning—a savage, and then her imagination
ran out to paint all the subsequent consequences of
an union with a savage. The other was high minded,
but docile and gentle, showing her in every word,
movement and look, the appropriate attractions and
influences of society. But the one had loved her almost
from a child; had performed for her parents and
herself a thousand kindnesses, had recently displayed
the most noble intrepidity, and had rescued her from
a condition, worse than death. Would not the other
have preceded in the same daring, and the same purpose?
But, what if he would? He was silent, reserved,
seemingly proud, had never made professions
except by looks; and had since more than retracted
them, by a manner, which he could not have sustained,
had he continued to love. There were times,
when such views piqued her pride. `Is it true, then,'
she said, `that all, that has been said about my personal
attractions, is mere flattery and illusion?' From this
view, native self respect roused her indignantly to
reflect, `I am sufficient, with the love of my parents,
for myself. The whole view is an illusion. It is good
to be alone. All these struggles are worthy only of
cannot be gratified. I will think of neither, and will
calculate to remain for the future, as I have been
for the past.'
In such alternations of thought and feeling in the
inmates at William Weldon's habitation, the winter
passed away. It had been of uncommon length and
severity. The keen north wind, charged with sleet
and snow, had swept down the valley, almost without
intermission. Avalanches had, more than once, slidden
from the mountains, and filled different points of
the vale. The bursting of the ice in the blue lake,
and in the still places of the Sewasserna, had sounded
like frequent thunder-bolts. The trees all bent their
branches in curves towards the ground with their
weight of snow. The grouse, bustards and wild turkeys
had crowded round the abodes of the nation for
food, more strongly drawn by hunger, than repelled
by their dread of man. Often, too, had Jessy marked
the sustaining wisdom of a wonder-working providence,
as she saw, in the most cutting rigor of the
snows and frosts, little sparrows of the brightest plumage,
and with bodies scarcely larger than an acorn,
hopping on the shrubs in front of her dwelling, chirping
and active and alert, under a temperature which
seemed by its bitterness to threaten all animal existence.
Though not inclined to superstition, she had
often felt the thrill of painful and dark thoughts come
over her bosom, as she retired to her apartment, and
heard the fierce storm pour, and the snows drive, and
the wind whistle, and ran over in thought the incessant
predictions of the medicine men, that the unusually
severe winter was a precursor of a bloody and
fatal summer.
| CHAPTER VIII. The Shoshonee Valley | |