"DEAD HE LAY THERE IN THE SUNSET"—Page 153"DEAD HE LAY THERE IN THE SUNSET"—Page 153
On the next day, when the sun was setting, Mondamin came again to wrestle with Hiawatha, and the day after that he came also and they wrestled even longer than before. Then Mondamin smiled at Hiawatha and said to him: "Three times, O Hiawatha, you have bravely wrestled with me. To-morrow I shall wrestle with you once again, and you will overcome me and throw me to the earth and I shall seem to be dead. Then, when I am lying still and limp on the ground, do you take off my gay clothes and bury me where we have wrestled. And you must make the ground above the place where I am buried soft and light, and take good care that weeds do not grow there and that ravens do not come there to disturb me, until at last I rise again from the ground more beautiful than ever."
True to his word, Mondamin came at sunset of the next day, and he and Hiawatha wrestled together for the last time. They wrestled after evening had come upon them, until at last Hiawatha threw Mondamin to the ground, who lay there as if dead.
Then Hiawatha took off all the gay green clothes that Mondamin wore, and he buried Mondamin and made the ground soft and light above the grave, just as he had beentold to do. He kept the weeds from growing in the ground, and kept the ravens from coming to the place, until at last he saw a tiny little green leaf sticking up out of the grave. The little leaf grew into a large plant, taller than Hiawatha himself, and the plant had wonderful green leaves and silky yellow fringes and gay tassels that waved behind it in the wind. "It is Mondamin!" cried out Hiawatha, and he called Nokomis and Iagoo to see the wonderful plant that was to be the food that he had prayed for to the Great Manito.
They waited until autumn had turned the leaves to yellow, and made the tender kernels hard and shiny, and then they stripped the husks and gathered the ears of the wonderful Indian corn. All the Indians for miles around had a great feast and were happy, because they knew that with a little care they would have corn to eat in winter and in summer, in autumn and in spring.
HIAWATHA had two good friends, whom he had chosen from all other Indians to be with him always, and whom he loved more than any living men. They were Chibiabos, the sweetest singer, and Kwasind, the strongest man in the world; and they toldto Hiawatha all their secrets as he told his to them. Best of all Hiawatha loved the brave and beautiful Chibiabos, who was such a wonderful musician that when he sang people flocked from villages far and near to listen to him, and even the animals and birds left their dens and nests to hear.
Chibiabos sang so sweetly that the brook would pause in its course and murmur to him, asking him to teach its waves to sing his songs and to flow as softly as his words flowed when he was singing. The envious bluebird begged Chibiabos to teach it songs as wild and wonderful as his own; the robin tried to learn his notes of gladness, and the lonely bird of night, the whippoorwill, longed to sing as Chibiabos sang when he was sad. He could imitate all the noises of the woodland, and make them sound even sweeter than they really were, and by his singing he could force the Indians to laugh or cry or dance, just as he chose.
The mighty Kwasind was also much beloved by Hiawatha, who believed that next to wonderful songs and love and wisdom great strength was the finest thing in the world and the closest to perfect goodness; and never, in all the years that men have lived upon the earth, has there been another man so strong as Kwasind.
When he was a boy, Kwasind did not fish or play with other children, but seemed very dull and dreamy, and his father and mother thought that they were bringing up afool. "Lazy Kwasind!" his mother said to him, "you never help me with my work. In the summer you roam through the fields and forests, doing nothing; and now that it is winter you sit beside the fire like an old woman, and leave me to break the ice for fishing and to draw the nets alone. Go out and wring them now, where they are freezing with the water that is in them; hang them up to dry in the sunshine, and show that you are worth the food that you eat and the clothes you wear on your back."
Without a word Kwasind rose from the ashes where he was sitting, left the lodge and found the nets dripping and freezing fast. He wrung them like a wisp of straw, but his fingers were so strong that he broke them in a hundred different places, and his strength was so great that he could not help breaking the nets any more than if they were tender cobwebs.
"Lazy Kwasind!" his father said to him, "you never help me in my hunting, as other young men help their fathers. You break every bow you touch, and you snap every arrow that you draw. Yet you shall come with me and bring home from the forest what I kill."
They went down to a deep and narrow valley by the side of a little brook, where the tracks of bison and of deer showed plainly in the mud; and at last they came to a place where the trunks of heavy trees were piled like a stone wall across the valley.
"We must go back," said Kwasind's father; "we can never scale those logs. They are packed so tightly that no woodchuck could get through them, and not even a squirrel could climb over the top," and the old man sat down to smoke and rest and wonder what they were going to do; but before he had finished his pipe the way lay clear, for the strong Kwasind had lifted the logs as if they were light lances, and had hurled them crashing into the depths of the forest.
"Lazy Kwasind!" shouted the young men, as they ran their races and played their games upon the meadows, "why do you stay idle while we strive with one another? Leave the rock that you are leaning on and join us. Come and wrestle with us, and see who can pitch the quoit the farthest."
Kwasind did not say a word in answer to them, but rose and slowly turned to the huge rock on which he had been leaning. He gripped it with both hands, tore it from the ground and pitched it right into the swift Pauwating River, where you can still see it in the summer months, as it towers high above the current.
Once as Kwasind with his companions was sailing down the foaming rapids of the Pauwating he saw a beaver in the water—Ahmeek, the King of Beavers—who was struggling against the savage current. Without a word, Kwasind leaped into the water and chased the beaver inand out among the whirlpools. He followed the beaver among the islands, dove after him to the bottom of the river and stayed under water so long that his companions believed him dead and cried out: "Alas, we shall see Kwasind no more! He is drowned in the whirlpool!" But Kwasind's head showed at last above the water and he swam ashore, carrying the King of Beavers dead upon his shoulders.
These were the sort of men that Hiawatha chose to be his friends.
ONCE Hiawatha was sitting alone beside the swift and mighty river Taquamenaw, and he longed for a canoe with which he might explore the river from bank to bank, and learn to know all its rapids and its shallows. And Hiawatha set about building himself a canoe such as he needed, and he called upon the forest to give him aid:
"Give me your bark, O Birch Tree!" cried Hiawatha; "I will build me a light canoe for sailing that shall float upon the river like a yellow leaf in autumn. Lay aside your cloak, O Birch Tree, for the summer time is coming." And the birch tree sighed and rustled in the breeze, murmuring sadly: "Take my cloak, O Hiawatha!"
With his knife Hiawatha cut around the trunk of the birch-tree just beneath the branches until the sap came oozing forth; and he also cut the bark around the tree-trunk just above the roots. He slashed the bark from top to bottom, raised it with wooden wedges and stripped it from the trunk of the tree without a crack in all its golden surface.
"Give me your boughs, O Cedar!" cried Hiawatha. "Give me your strong and pliant branches, to make my canoe firmer and tougher beneath me." Through all the branches of the cedar there swept a noise as if somebody were crying with horror, but the tree at last bent downward and whispered: "Take my boughs, O Hiawatha."
He cut down the boughs of the cedar and made them into a framework with the shape of two bows bent together, and he covered this framework with the rich and yellow bark.
"Give me your roots, O Larch Tree!" cried Hiawatha, "to bind the ends of my canoe together, that the water may not enter and the river may not wet me!" The larch-tree shivered in the air and touched Hiawatha's forehead with its tassels, sighing: "Take them, take them!" as he tore the fibres from the earth. With the tough roots he sewed the ends of his canoe together and bound the bark tightly to the framework, and his canoe became light and graceful in shape. He took the balsam and pitch of the fir-tree and smeared the seams so that no water might ooze in, and heasked for the quills of Kagh, the hedgehog, to make a necklace and two stars for his canoe.
Thus did Hiawatha build his birch canoe, and all the life and magic of the forest was held in it; for it had all the lightness of the bark of the birch-tree, all the toughness of the boughs of the cedar, and it danced and floated on the river as lightly as a yellow leaf.
Hiawatha did not have any paddles for his canoe, and he needed none, for he could guide it by merely wishing that it should turn to the right or to the left. The canoe would move in whatever direction he chose, and would glide over the water swiftly or slowly just as he desired. All Hiawatha had to do was to sit still and think where he cared to have it take him. Never was there such a wonderful craft before.
Then Hiawatha called to Kwasind, and asked for help in clearing away all the sunken logs and all the rocks, and sandbars in the river-bed, and he and Kwasind traveled down the whole length of the river. Kwasind swam and dove like a beaver, tugging at sunken logs, scooping out the sandbars with his hands, kicking the boulders out of the stream and digging away all the snags and tangles. They went back and forth and up and down the river, Kwasind working just as hard as he was able, and Hiawatha showing him where he could find new logs and rocks, and sandbars to remove, until together they made the channelsafe and regular all the way from where the river rose among the mountains in little springs to where it emptied a wide and rolling sheet of water into the bay of Taquamenaw.
IN his wonderful canoe, Hiawatha sailed over the shining Big-Sea-Water to go fishing and to catch with his fishing-line made of cedar no other than the very King of Fishes—Nahma, the big sturgeon. All alone Hiawatha sailed over the lake, but on the bow of his canoe sat a squirrel, frisking and chattering at the thought of all the wonderful sport that he was going to see. Through the calm, clear water Hiawatha saw the fishes swimming to and fro. First he saw the yellow perch that shone like a sunbeam; then he saw the crawfish moving along the sandy bottom of the lake, and at last he saw a great blue shape that swept the sand floor with its mighty tail and waved its huge fins lazily backward and forward, and Hiawatha knew that this monster was Nahma, the Sturgeon, King of all the Fishes.
"Take my bait!" shouted Hiawatha, dropping his line of cedar into the calm water. "Come up and take my bait, O Nahma, King of Fishes!" But the great fish did not move,although Hiawatha shouted to him over and over again. At last, however, Nahma began to grow tired of the endless shouting, and he said to Maskenozha, the pike: "Take the bait of this rude fellow, Hiawatha, and break his line."
Hiawatha felt the fishing-line tighten with a snap, and as he pulled it in, Maskenozha, the pike, tugged so hard that the canoe stood almost on end, with the squirrel perched on the top; but when Hiawatha saw what fish it was that had taken his bait he was full of scorn and shouted: "Shame upon you! You are not the King of Fishes; you are only the pike, Maskenozha!" and the pike let go of Hiawatha's line and sank back to the bottom, very much ashamed.
Then Nahma said to the sunfish, Ugudwash: "Take Hiawatha's bait, and break his line! I am tired of his shouting and his boasting," and the sunfish rose up through the water like a great white moon. It seized Hiawatha's line and struggled so that the canoe made a whirlpool in the water and rocked until the waves it made splashed upon the beaches at the rim of the lake; but when Hiawatha saw the fish he was very angry and shouted out again: "Oh shame upon you! You are the sunfish, Ugudwash, and you come when I call for Nahma, King of Fishes!" and the sunfish let go of Hiawatha's line and sank to the bottom, where he hid among the lily stems.
Then Nahma, the great sturgeon, heard Hiawatha shouting at him once again, and furious he rose with a swirl to thetop of the water; leaped in the air, scattering the spray on every side, and opening his huge jaws he made a rush at the canoe and swallowed Hiawatha, canoe and all.
Into the dark cave of Nahma's giant maw, Hiawatha in his canoe plunged headlong, as a log rushes down a roaring river in the springtime. At first he was frightened, for it was so inky black that he could not see his hand before his face; but at last he felt a great heart beating in the darkness, and he clenched his fist and struck the giant heart with all his strength. As he struck it, he felt Nahma tremble all over, and he heard the water gurgle as the great fish rushed through it trying to breathe, and Hiawatha struck the mighty heart yet another heavy blow.
Then he dragged his canoe crosswise, so that he might not be thrown from the belly of the great fish and be drowned in the swirling water where Nahma was fighting for life, and the little squirrel helped Hiawatha drag his canoe into safety and tugged and pulled bravely at Hiawatha's side. Hiawatha was grateful to the little squirrel, and told him that for a reward the boys should always call him Adjidaumo, which means "tail-in-the-air," and the little squirrel was much pleased.
At last everything became quiet, and Nahma, the great sturgeon, lay dead and drifted on the surface of the water to the shore, where Hiawatha heard him grate upon the pebbles. There was a great screaming and flapping ofwings outside, and finally a gleam of light shone to the place where Hiawatha was sitting, and he could see the glittering eyes of the sea-gulls, who had crawled into the open mouth of Nahma and were peering down his gullet. Hiawatha called out to them: "O my Brothers, the Sea-Gulls, I have killed the great King of Fishes, Nahma, the sturgeon. Scratch and tear with your beaks and claws until the opening becomes wider and you can set me free from this dark prison! Do this, and men shall always call you Kayoshk, the sea-gulls, the Noble Scratchers."
The sea-gulls set to work with a will, and scratched and tore at Nahma's ribs until there was an opening wide enough for Hiawatha and the squirrel to step through and to drag the canoe out after them. Hiawatha called Nokomis, pointed to the body of the sturgeon and said: "See, Nokomis, I have killed Nahma, the King of Fishes, and the sea-gulls feed upon him. You must not drive them away, for they saved me from great danger; but when they fly back to their nests at sunset, do you bring your pots and kettles and make from Nahma's flesh enough oil to last us through the winter."
Nokomis waited until sunset, when the sea-gulls had flown back to their homes in the marshes, and she set to work with all her pots and kettles to make yellow oil from the flesh of Nahma. She worked all night long until the sun rose again and the sea-gulls came back screechingand screaming for their breakfast; and for three days and three nights the sea-gulls and Nokomis took turns in stripping the greasy flesh of Nahma from his ribs, until nothing was left. Then the sea-gulls flew away for good and all, Nokomis poured her oil into great jars, and on the sand was only the bare skeleton of Nahma, who had once been the biggest and the strongest fish that ever swam.
ONCE Nokomis was standing with Hiawatha beside her upon the shore of the Big-Sea-Water, watching the sunset, and she pointed to the west, and said to Hiawatha: "There is the dwelling of the Pearl-Feather, the great wizard who is guarded by the fiery snakes that coil and play together in the black pitch-water. You can see them now." And Hiawatha beheld the fiery snakes twist and wriggle in the black water and coil and uncoil themselves in play. Nokomis went on: "The great wizard killed my father, who had come down from the moon to find me. He killed him by wicked spells and by sly cunning, and now he sends the rank mist of marshes and the deadly fog that brings sickness and death among our people. Take your bow, Hiawatha," said Nokomis, "and your war-club and your magic mittens. Take the oil of the sturgeon,Nahma, so that your canoe may glide easily through the sticky black pitch-water, and go and kill this great wizard. Save our people from the fever that he breathes at them across the marshes, and punish him for my father's death."
Swiftly Hiawatha took his war-club and his arrows and his magic mittens, launched his birch canoe upon the water and cried: "O Birch Canoe, leap forward where you see the snakes that play in the black pitch-water. Leap forward swiftly, O my Birch Canoe, while I sing my war-song," and the canoe darted forward like a live thing until it reached the spot where the fiery serpents were sporting in the water.
"Out of my way, O serpents!" cried Hiawatha, "out of my way and let me go to fight with Pearl-Feather, the awful wizard!" But the serpents only hissed and answered: "Go back, Coward; go back to old Nokomis, Faint-heart!"
Then Hiawatha took his bow and sent his arrows singing among the serpents, and at every shot one of them was killed, until they all lay dead upon the water.
"Onward, my Birch Canoe!" cried Hiawatha; "onward to the home of the great wizard!" and the canoe darted forward once again.
It was a strange, strange place that Hiawatha had entered with his birch canoe! The water was as black as ink, and on the shores of the lake dead men lit fires that twinkled in the darkness like the eyes of a wicked oldwitch. Awful shrieks and whistling echoed over the water, and the heron flapped about the marshes to tell all the evil beings who lived there that Hiawatha was coming to fight with the great wizard.
Hiawatha sailed over this dismal lake all night long, and at last, when the sun rose, he saw on the shore in front of him the wigwam of the great magician, Pearl-Feather. The canoe darted ahead faster and faster until it grated on the beach, and Hiawatha fitted an arrow to his bowstring and sent it hissing into the open doorway of the wigwam.
"Come out and fight me, Pearl-Feather!" cried Hiawatha; "come out and fight me if you dare!"
Then Pearl-Feather stepped out of his wigwam and stood in the open before Hiawatha. He was painted red and yellow and blue and was terrible to see. In his hand was a heavy war-club, and he wore a shirt of shining wampum that would keep out an arrow and break the force of any blow.
"Well do I know you, Hiawatha!" shouted Pearl-Feather in a deep and awful voice. "Go back to Nokomis, coward that you are; for if you stay here, I will kill you as I killed her father."
"Words are not as sharp as arrows," answered Hiawatha, bending his bow.
Then began a battle even more terrible than the one among the mountains when Hiawatha fought with Mudjekeewis,and it lasted all one summer's day. For Hiawatha's arrows could not pierce Pearl-Feather's shirt of wampum, and he could not break it with the blows of his magic mittens.
At sunset Hiawatha was so weary that he leaned on his bow to rest. His heavy war-club was broken, his magic mittens were torn to pieces, and he had only three arrows left. "Alas," sighed Hiawatha, "the great magician is too strong for me!"
Suddenly, from the branches of the tree nearest him, he heard the woodpecker calling to him: "Hiawatha, Hiawatha," said the woodpecker, "aim your arrows at the tuft of hair on Pearl-Feather's head. Aim them at the roots of his long black hair, for there alone can you do him any harm." Just then Pearl-Feather stooped to pick up a big stone to throw at Hiawatha, who bent his bow and struck Pearl-Feather with an arrow right on the top of the head. Pearl-Feather staggered forward like a wounded buffalo. "Twang!" went the bowstring again, and the wizard's knees trembled beneath him, for the second arrow had struck in the same spot as the first and had made the wound much deeper. A third arrow followed swiftly, and Pearl-Feather saw the eyes of Death glare at him from the darkness, and he fell forward on his face right at the feet of Hiawatha and lay there dead.
Then Hiawatha called the woodpecker to him, and asa mark of gratitude he stained the tuft of feathers on the woodpecker's head with the blood of the dead Pearl-Feather, and the woodpecker wears his tuft of blood-red feathers to this day.
Hiawatha took the shirt of wampum from the dead wizard as a sign of victory, and from Pearl-Feather's wigwam he carried all the skins and furs and arrows that he could find, and they were many. He loaded his canoe with them and sped homeward over the pitch-water, past the dead bodies of the fiery serpents until he saw Chibiabos and Kwasind and Nokomis waiting for him on the shore. All the Indians assembled and gave a feast in Hiawatha's honor, and they sang and danced for joy because the great wizard would never again send sickness and death among them. And Hiawatha took the red crest of the woodpecker to decorate his pipe, for he knew that to the woodpecker his victory was due.
"WOMAN is to man as the cord is to the bow," thought Hiawatha. "She bends him, yet obeys him; she draws him, yet she follows. Each is useless without the other." Hiawatha was dreaming of the lovely maiden, Minnehaha, whom he had seen in the country of the Dacotahs.
"Do not wed a stranger, Hiawatha," warned the old Nokomis; "do not search in the east or in the west to win a bride. Take a maid of your own people, for the homely daughter of a neighbor is like the pleasant fire on the hearth-stone, while the stranger is cold and distant, like the starlight or the light of the pale moon."
But Hiawatha only smiled and answered: "Dear Nokomis, the fire on the hearth-stone is indeed pleasant and warm, but I love the starlight and the moonlight better."
"Do not bring home an idle woman," said old Nokomis, "bring not home a maiden who is unskilled with the needle and will neither cook nor sew!" And Hiawatha answered: "Good Nokomis, in the land of the Dacotahs lives the daughter of an Arrow-maker, and she is the most beautiful of all the women in the world. Her name is Minnehaha, and I will bring her home to do your bidding and to be your firelight, your moonlight, and your starlight, all in one."
"Ah, Hiawatha," warned Nokomis, "bring not home a maid of the Dacotahs! The Dacotahs are fierce and cruel and there is often war between our tribe and theirs." Hiawatha laughed and answered: "I will wed a maid of the Dacotahs, and old wars shall be forgotten in a new and lasting peace that shall make the two tribes friends forevermore. For this alone would I wed the lovely Laughing Water if there were no other reason."
Hiawatha left his wigwam for the home of the old Arrow-maker, and he ran through the forest as lightly as the wind, until he heard the clear voice of the Falls of Minnehaha.
At the sunny edges of the forest a herd of deer were feeding, and they did not see the swift-footed runner until he sent a hissing arrow among them that killed a roebuck. Without pausing, Hiawatha caught up the deer and swung it to his shoulder, running forward until he came to the home of the aged Arrow-maker.
The old man was sitting in the doorway of his wigwam, and at his side were all his tools and all the arrows he was making. At his side, also, was the lovely Minnehaha, weaving mats of reeds and water-rushes, and the old man and the young maiden sat together in the pleasant contrast of age and youth, the one thinking of the past, the other dreaming of the future.
The old man was thinking of the days when with such arrows as he now was making he had killed deer and bison, and had shot the wild goose on the wing. He remembered the great war-parties that came to buy his arrows, and how they could not fight unless he had arrow-*heads to sell. Alas, such days were over, he thought sadly, and no such splendid warriors were left on earth.
The maiden was dreaming of a tall, handsome hunter, who had come one morning when the year was young topurchase arrows of her father. He had rested in their wigwam, lingered and looked back as he was leaving, and her father had praised his courage and his wisdom. Would the hunter ever come again in search of arrows, thought the lovely Minnehaha, and the rushes she was weaving lay unfingered in her lap.
Just then they heard a rustle and swift footsteps in the thicket, and Hiawatha with the deer upon his shoulders and a glow upon his cheek and forehead stood before them in the sunlight.
"Welcome, Hiawatha," said the old Arrow-maker in a grave but friendly tone, and Minnehaha's light voice echoed the deep one of her father, saying: "Welcome, Hiawatha."
Together the old Arrow-maker and Hiawatha entered the wigwam, and Minnehaha laid aside her mat of rushes and brought them food and drink in vessels of earth and bowls of basswood. Yet she did not say a word while she was serving them, but listened as if in a dream to what Hiawatha told her father about Nokomis and Chibiabos and the strong man, Kwasind, and the happiness and peace of his own people, the Ojibways. Hiawatha finished his words by saying very slowly: "That this peace may always be among us and our tribes become as brothers to each other, give me the hand of your daughter, Minnehaha, the loveliest of women."
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The aged Arrow-maker paused before he answered, looked proudly at Hiawatha and lovingly at his daughter, and then said:
"You may have her if she wishes it. Speak, Minnehaha, and let us know your will."
The lovely Minnehaha seemed more beautiful than ever as she looked first at Hiawatha and then at her old father. Softly she took the seat beside Hiawatha, blushing as she answered: "I will follow you, my husband."
Thus did Hiawatha win the daughter of the ancient Arrow-maker. Together he and his bride left the wigwam hand in hand and went away over the meadows, while the old Arrow-maker with shaded eyes gazed after them and called out sadly: "Good-bye, Minnehaha! Good-bye my lovely daughter!"
They walked together through the sunlit forest, and all the birds and animals gazed at them from among the leaves and branches.
When they came to swift rivers, Hiawatha lifted Minnehaha and carried her across, and in his strong arms she seemed lighter than a willow-leaf or the plume upon his headgear. At night he cleared away the thicket and built a lodge of branches; he made a bed of hemlock boughs and kindled a fire of pine-cones before the doorway, and Adjidaumo, the squirrel, climbed down from his nest andkept watch, while the two lovers slept in their lodge beneath the stars.
A GREAT feast was prepared by Hiawatha to celebrate his wedding. That the feast might be one of joy and gladness, the sweet singer Chibiabos sang his love-songs; that it might be merry, the handsome Pau-Puk-Keewis danced his liveliest dances; and to make the wedding guests even more content, Iagoo, the great boaster, told them a wonderful story. Oh, but it was a splendid feast that Nokomis prepared at the bidding of Hiawatha! She sent messengers with willow-wands through all the village as a sign that all Ojibways were invited, and the wedding guests wore their very brightest garments—rich fur robes and wampum-belts, beads of many colors, paint and feathers and gay tassels. All the bowls at the feast were made of white and shining basswood; all the spoons were made of bison horn, as black as ink and polished until the black was as bright as silver, and the Indians feasted on the flesh of the sturgeon and the pike, on buffalo marrow and the hump of the bison and the haunch of the red deer. They ate poundedmeat called pemican and the wild rice that grew by the river-bank and golden-yellow cakes of Indian corn. It was a feast indeed!
But the kind host Hiawatha did not take a mouthful of all this tempting food. Neither did Minnehaha nor Nokomis, but all three waited on their guests and served them carefully until their wants were generously satisfied. When all had finished, old Nokomis filled from an ample otter pouch the red stone pipes with fragrant tobacco of the south, and when the blue smoke was rising freely she said: "O Pau-Puk-Keewis, dance your merry Beggar's Dance to please us, so the time may pass more pleasantly and our guests may be more gay."
Pau-Puk-Keewis rose and stood amid the guests. He wore a white shirt of doeskin, fringed with ermine and covered with beads of wampum. He wore deerskin leggings, also fringed with ermine and with quills of Kagh, the hedgehog. On his feet were buck-skin moccasins, richly embroidered, and red foxes' tails to flourish while he danced were fastened to the heels. A snowy plume of swan's down floated over his head, and he carried a gay fan in one hand and a pipe with tassels in the other.
All the warriors disliked Pau-Puk-Keewis, and called him coward and idler; but he cared not at all, because he was so handsome that all the women and the maidensloved him. To the sound of drums and flutes and singing voices Pau-Puk-Keewis now began the Dance of Beggars.
First he danced with slow steps and stately motion in and out of the shadows and the sunshine, gliding like a panther among the pine-trees; but his steps became faster and faster and wilder and wilder, until the wind and dust swept around him as he danced. Time after time he leaped over the heads of the assembled guests and rushed around the wigwam, and at last he sped along the shore of the Big-Sea-Water, stamping on the sand and tossing it furiously in the air, until the wind had become a whirlwind and the sand was blown in great drifts like snowdrifts all over the shore.
There they have stayed until this day, the great Sand Hills of the Nagow Wudjoo.
When the Beggar's Dance was over, Pau-Puk-Keewis returned and sat down laughing among the guests and fanned himself as calmly as if he had not stirred from his seat, while all the guests cried out: "Sing to us, Chibiabos, sing your love songs!" and Hiawatha and Nokomis said: "Yes, sing, Chibiabos, that our guests may enjoy themselves all the more, and our feast may pass more gayly!"
Chibiabos rose, and his wonderful voice swelled all the echoes of the forest, until the streams paused in their courses, and the listening beavers came to the surface ofthe water so that they might hear. He sang so sweetly that his voice caused the pine-trees to quiver as if a wind were passing through them, and strange sounds seemed to run along the earth. All the Indians were spellbound by his singing, and sat as if they had been turned to stone. Even the smoke ceased to rise from their pipes while Chibiabos sang, but when he had ended they shouted with joy and praised him in loud voices.
Iagoo, the mighty boaster, alone did not join in the roar of praise, for he was jealous of Chibiabos, and longed to tell one of his great stories to the Indians. When Iagoo heard of any adventure he always told of a greater one that had happened to himself, and to listen to him, you would think that nobody was such a mighty hunter and nobody was such a valiant fighter as he. If you would only believe him, you would learn nobody had ever shot an arrow half so far as he had, that nobody could run so fast, or dive so deep, or leap so high, and that nobody in the wide world had ever seen so many wonders as the brave, great, and wonderful Iagoo.
This was the reason that his name had become a byword among the Indians; and whenever a hunter spoke too highly of his own deeds, or a warrior talked too much of what he had done in battle, his hearers shouted: "See, Iagoo is among us!"
But it was Iagoo who had carved the cradle of Hiawathalong ago, and who had taught him how to make his bow and arrows. And as he sat at the feast, old and ugly but very eager to tell of his adventures, Nokomis said to him: "Good Iagoo, tell us some wonderful story, so that our feast may be more merry," and Iagoo answered like a flash: "You shall hear the most wonderful story that has ever been heard since men have lived upon the earth. You shall hear the strange and marvelous tale of Osseo and his father, King of the Evening Star."
"SEE the Star of Evening!" cried Iagoo; "see how it shines like a bead of wampum on the robes of the Great Spirit! Gaze on it, and listen to the story of Osseo!
"Long ago, in the days when the heavens were nearer to the earth than they are now, and when the spirits and gods were better known to all men, there lived a hunter in the Northland who had ten daughters, young and beautiful, and as tall as willow-wands. Oweenee, the youngest of these, was proud and wayward, but even fairer than her sisters. When the brave and wealthy warriors came as suitors, each of the ten sisters had many offers, and all except Oweenee were quickly married; but Oweeneelaughed at her handsome lovers and sent them all away. Then she married poor, ugly old Osseo, who was bowed down with age, weak with coughing, and twisted and wrinkled like the roots of an oak-tree. For she saw that the spirit of Osseo was far more beautiful than were the painted figures of her handsome lovers.
"All the suitors whom she had refused to marry, and they were many, came and pointed at her with jeers and laughter, and made fun of her and of her husband; but she said to them: 'I care not for your feathers and your wampum; I am happy with Osseo.'
"It happened that the sisters were all invited to a great feast, and they were walking together through the forest, followed by old Osseo and the fair Oweenee; but while all the others chatted gayly, these two walked in silence. Osseo often stopped to gaze at the Star of Evening, and at last the others heard him murmur: 'Oh, pity me, pity me, my Father!' 'He is praying to his father,' said the eldest sister. 'What a shame that the old man does not stumble in the path and break his neck!' and the others all laughed so heartily at the wicked joke that the forest rang with merriment.
"On their way through the thicket, lay a hollow oak that had been uprooted by a storm, and when Osseo saw it he gave a cry of anguish, and leaped into the mighty tree. He went in an old man, ugly and bent and hideous withwrinkles. He came out a splendid youth, straight as an arrow, handsome and very strong. But Osseo was not happy in the change that had come over him. Indeed, he was more sorrowful than ever before, because at the same instant that he recovered his lost youth, Oweenee was changed into a tottering old woman, wasted and worn and ugly as a witch. And her nine hard-hearted sisters and their husbands laughed long and loud, until the forest echoed once again with their wicked merriment.
"Osseo, however, did not turn from Oweenee in her trouble, but took her brown and withered hand, called her sweetheart and soothed her with kind words, until they came to the lodge in the forest where the feast was being given. They sat down to the feast, and all were joyous except Osseo, who would taste neither food nor drink, but sat as if in a dream, looking first at the changed Oweenee, then upward at the sky. All at once he heard a voice come out of the empty air and say to him: 'Osseo, my son, the spells that bound you are now broken, and the evil charms that made you old and withered before your time have all been wished away. Taste the food before you, for it is blessed and will change you to a spirit. Your bowls and your kettles shall be changed to silver and to wampum, and shine like scarlet shells and gleam like the firelight; and all the men and women but Oweenee shall be changed to birds.'
"The voice Osseo heard was taken by the others for the voice of the whippoorwill, singing far off in the lonely forest, and they did not hear a word of what was said. But a sudden tremor ran through the lodge where they sat feasting, and they felt it rise in the air high up above the tree-tops into the starlight. The wooden dishes were changed into scarlet shells, the earthen kettles were changed into silver bowls, and the bark of the roof glittered like the backs of gorgeous beetles.
"Then Osseo saw that the nine beautiful sisters of Oweenee and their husbands, were changed into all sorts of different birds. There were jays and thrushes and magpies and blackbirds, and they flew about the lodge and sang and twittered in many different keys. Only Oweenee was not changed, but remained as wrinkled and old and ugly as before; and Osseo, in his disappointment, gave a cry of anguish such as he had uttered by the oak tree when lo and behold! all Oweenee's former youth and loveliness returned to her. The old woman's staff on which she had been leaning became a glittering silver feather, and her tattered dress was changed into a snowy robe of softest ermine.
"The wigwam trembled once again and floated through the sky until at last it alighted on the Evening Star as gently as thistledown drops to the water, and the ruler ofthe Evening Star, the father of Osseo, came forward to greet his son.
"'My son,' he said, 'hang the cage of birds that you bring with you at the doorway of my wigwam, and then do you and Oweenee enter,' and Osseo and Oweenee did as they were told, entered the wigwam and listened to the words of Osseo's father.
"'I have had pity on you, my Osseo,' he began. 'I have given back to you your youth and beauty; and I have changed into birds the sisters of Oweenee and their husbands, because they laughed at you and could not see that your spirit was beautiful. When you were an ugly old man, only Oweenee knew your heart. But you must take heed, for in the little star that you see yonder lives an evil spirit, the Wabeno; and it is he who has brought all this sorrow upon you. Take care that you never stand in the light of that evil star. Its gleams are used by the Wabeno as his arrows, and he sits there hating all the world and darting forth his poisonous beams of baleful light to injure all who stray within his reach.'
"For many years Osseo and his father and Oweenee lived happily together upon the Evening Star. Oweenee bore a son to Osseo, and the boy had beauty and courage. Osseo, to please his son, made little bows and arrows for him, and when the boy had learned to shoot, Osseo openedthe door of the silver bird-cage and let out all the birds. They darted through the air, singing for joy at their freedom, until the boy bent his bow and struck one of them with a fatal arrow, so that the bird fell wounded at his feet. But when it touched the ground the bird underwent a great change; and there lay at the boy's feet a beautiful young woman with the arrow in her breast.
"As soon as her blood dripped upon the sacred Evening Star, all the magical charms that Osseo's father had used to keep his son and Oweenee with him in the happy dwelling far above the earth were broken, and the boy hunter with his bow and arrow felt himself held by unseen hands, but sinking downward through the blue sky and the empty air until he rested on a green and grassy island in the Big-Sea-Water. Falling and fluttering after him came all the bright birds; and the lodge, with Osseo and Oweenee in it, sailed lightly downward and landed on the island.
"When the bright birds touched the earth, another change came over them, and they became men and women once again as they were before; only they remained so small in size—so tiny, that they were called the Little People, the Puk-Wudjies. And on summer nights, when the stars shone brightly above them, they would dance hand in hand about the island, and sometimes in the starlight they dance there even now."
When the story was finished, Iagoo looked about him atthe assembled guests, and added very solemnly: "There are many great men at whom their own people often scoff and jeer. Let these people take warning from the story of Osseo, so that they too may not be changed to birds for laughing at their betters;" and the wedding guests all whispered to each other, "I wonder if he means himself and us." Then Chibiabos sang another sweet and tender love-song, and the guests all went away, leaving Hiawatha alone and happy with Minnehaha.
MANY were the pleasant days that followed the wedding of Minnehaha and Hiawatha. All the tribes were at peace with one another, and the hunters roved wherever they chose, built their birch canoes, hunted and fished and trapped the beaver without once hearing the war-cry or the hiss of a hostile arrow. The women made sugar from the sap of the maple-trees, gathered the wild rice and dressed the skins of the deer and beaver, while all around the peaceful village waved green and sunny fields of corn.
Once, when the corn was being planted by the women, the wise and thoughtful Hiawatha said to Minnehaha: "To-night you shall bless the cornfields, and draw aroundthem a magic circle to keep out the mildew and the insects. In the night, when everybody is asleep and none can hear you or see you, rise from your bed, lay aside your clothes and walk in the darkness around the fields of corn that you have planted. Do this and the fields shall be more fruitful and the magic circle of your footsteps cannot be crossed by either worm or insect; for the dragon-fly and the spider, and the grasshopper and the caterpillar all will know that you have walked around the cornfields, and they will not dare to enter."
While Hiawatha spoke, Kahgahgee, King of the Ravens, sat with his band of black robbers in the tree-tops near at hand, and they laughed so loud at the words of Hiawatha that the tree-tops shook and rattled. "Kaw!" shouted the ravens. "Listen to the wise man! Hear the plots of Hiawatha! We will fly over the magic circle and eat just as much corn as we can hold."
When night had fallen dark and black over the fields and woodlands, and when all the Indians were sleeping fast, Minnehaha rose from her bed of branches, laid aside her garments and walked safely among the cornfields, drawing the magic circle of her light footsteps closely around them. No one but the midnight saw her, and no one but the whippoorwill heard the panting of her bosom, for the darkness wrapped its cloak closely about her as she walked. And the dragon-fly and the grasshopper, thespider and the caterpillar, all knew that they could not cross the magic circle of Minnehaha's footsteps.
When the morning came, however, Kahgahgee gathered about him all his black and rascally crew of ravens and jays and crows and blackbirds, shrieking with laughter, and with harsh cries and raucous clamor they all left the tree-tops and flapped eagerly down upon the cornfields. "Kaw! Kaw!" they shrieked, "we will dig up the corn from the soft earth, and we will eat all we can hold, in spite of Minnehaha and her foolish circle!"
But Hiawatha had overheard the ravens as they laughed at him from among the tree-tops. He had risen before day-*break and had covered the cornfields with snares, and at that moment he was hiding in the woods until all the evil birds should alight on the fields and begin their wicked feast.
They came with a rush of wings and hungry cries, settled down upon the cornfields and began to dig and delve and scratch in the earth for the corn that had been planted there, and with all their skill and cunning, they did not see that anything was amiss until their claws were caught in Hiawatha's snares and they were helpless.
Then Hiawatha left his hiding-place among the bushes and strode toward the captive ravens, and his appearance was so awful that the bravest of them hopped and shrieked and flapped their wings in terror. He walked amongthem, and killed them to the right and left in tens and twenties without mercy; and he hung their dead bodies on poles, to serve as scarecrows and to frighten away all other thieves and robbers from the sacred fields of corn. Only one of the ravens was spared by Hiawatha and that was Kahgahgee, the ruler of them all. Hiawatha tied him with a string and fastened him to the ridge-pole of his wigwam, saying: "Kahgahgee, you are the cause of all this mischief, and I am going to hold you as a warning to all the ravens left alive. If they light upon the cornfields and begin again their wicked thieving, I will kill you and hang your body on a pole as an example." And Hiawatha left Kahgahgee tied fast to the ridge-pole of the wigwam, hopping and tugging angrily at his string and croaking in vain for his friends to come and set him free.
The summer passed, and all the air became warm and soft with the haze of early autumn. The corn had grown tall and yellow, and the ears were almost bursting from their sheaths, when old Nokomis said to Minnehaha: "Let us gather the harvest and strip the ripe ears of all their husks and tassels," and Minnehaha and Nokomis went through the village, calling on the women and the maidens and the young men to come forth and help them with the husking of the corn. All together they went to the cornfields, and the old men and the warriors sat in the shade at the edges of the forest and smoked and looked on in approval,while the young men and maidens stripped the ears of corn and laughed and sang merrily over their labor. Whenever a youth or a maiden found a crooked ear, they all laughed even louder, and crept about the cornfields like weak old men bent almost double with age. But when some lucky maiden found a blood-red ear in the husking, they all cried out: "Ah, Nushka! You shall have a sweetheart!" And the old men nodded in approval as they smoked beneath the pine-trees.