Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7
by Charles Herbert Sylvester · English · Gutenberg #23405 · 723,341 chars · public domain (US)
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7
Author: Charles Herbert Sylvester
Release date: November 7, 2007 [eBook #23405]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23405
Credits: Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Julia Miller, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JOURNEYS THROUGH BOOKLAND, VOL. 7 ***
Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Julia Miller, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Transcriber's Note
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. A list of changes is
found at the end of the book. Oe ligatures have been expanded.
[Illustration: THE CANOE RACE]
Journeys
Through Bookland
A NEW AND ORIGINAL
PLAN FOR READING APPLIED TO THE
WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE
FOR CHILDREN
_BY_
CHARLES H. SYLVESTER
_Author of English and American Literature_
VOLUME SEVEN
_New Edition_
[Illustration]
Chicago
BELLOWS-REEVE COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1922
BELLOWS-REEVE COMPANY
CONTENTS
PAGE
THE DAFFODILS _William Wordsworth_ 1
TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN _William Cullen Bryant_ 4
TO A MOUSE _Robert Burns_ 5
TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY _Robert Burns_ 8
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET _Samuel Wordsworth_ 11
BANNOCKBURN _Robert Burns_ 15
BOAT SONG _Sir Walter Scott_ 17
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY _Washington Irving_ 20
THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER _Samuel T. Coleridge_ 29
THE BLACK HAWK TRAGEDY _Edwin D. Coe_ 58
THE PETRIFIED FERN _Mary Bolles Branch_ 77
AN EXCITING CANOE RACE _J. Fenimore Cooper_ 79
THE BUFFALO _Francis Parkman_ 96
THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE _Alfred Tennyson_ 147
FOR A' THAT AND A' THAT _Robert Burns_ 149
BREATHES THERE THE MAN _Sir Walter Scott_ 151
HOW SLEEP THE BRAVE _William Collins_ 151
QUEEN VICTORIA _Anna McCaleb_ 152
THE RECESSIONAL _Rudyard Kipling_ 164
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER _Francis Scott Key_ 167
HOW'S MY BOY? _Sydney Dobell_ 169
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM _Thomas Campbell_ 170
MAKE WAY FOR LIBERTY _James Montgomery_ 172
THE OLD CONTINENTALS _Guy Humphreys McMaster_ 175
THE PICKET-GUARD _Mrs. Ethel Lynn Beers_ 177
MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME _Stephen Collins Foster_ 179
THE FORSAKEN MERMAN _Matthew Arnold_ 180
TOM AND MAGGIE TULLIVER _George Eliot_ 186
A GORILLA HUNT _Paul du Chaillu_ 247
THE CLOUD _Percy Bysshe Shelley_ 257
BRUTE NEIGHBORS _Henry David Thoreau_ 260
ODE TO A SKYLARK _Percy Bysshe Shelley_ 275
THE POND IN WINTER _Henry David Thoreau_ 280
SALMON FISHING _Rudyard Kipling_ 285
WINTER ANIMALS _Henry David Thoreau_ 293
TREES AND ANTS THAT HELP EACH OTHER _Thomas Belt_ 306
THE FAMILY OF MICHAEL AROUT _Emile Souvestre_ 314
ON THE RECEIPT OF MY MOTHER'S PICTURE _William Cowper_ 331
THOSE EVENING BELLS _Thomas Moore_ 340
ANNABEL LEE _Edgar Allan Poe_ 341
THE THREE FISHERS _Charles Kingsley_ 343
THE REAPER'S DREAM _Thomas Buchanan Read_ 345
THE RECOVERY OF THE HISPANIOLA _Robert Louis Stevenson_ 352
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER _Grace E. Sellon_ 381
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT 391
TO A WATERFOWL _William Cullen Bryant_ 395
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES _Grace E. Sellon_ 398
THE CUBES OF TRUTH _Oliver Wendell Holmes_ 406
THE LOST CHILD _James Russell Lowell_ 409
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL _Grace E. Sellon_ 411
A CHILD'S THOUGHT OF GOD _Elizabeth Barrett Browning_ 418
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 419
DON QUIXOTE _Cervantes_ 431
PRONUNCIATION OF PROPER NAMES 487
For Classification of Selections, see General Index, at end of Volume X
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
THE CANOE RACE (Color Plate) _R. F. Babcock_ FRONTISPIECE
A HOST OF GOLDEN DAFFODILS _Albert H. Winkler_ 2
THE FRINGED GENTIAN _G. H. Mitchell_ 4
THOU NEED NA START AWA _Albert H. Winkler_ 6
ROBERT BURNS (Halftone) 8
THOU BONNY GEM _Albert H. Winkler_ 9
INCLINED TO MY LIPS _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 12
THE NOTARY ENTERS THE CARRIAGE _R. F. Babcock_ 26
HE CANNOT CHOOSE BUT HEAR (Heading) _Donn P. Crane_ 29
I SHOT THE ALBATROSS _Donn P. Crane_ 33
AND STRAIGHT THE SUN WAS FLECKED WITH BARS _Donn P. Crane_ 38
I WATCHED THE WATER-SNAKES _Donn P. Crane_ 42
THEY GROANED, THEY STIRRED, THEY ALL UPROSE _Donn P. Crane_ 45
SLOWLY AND SMOOTHLY WENT THE SKIP (Color Plate) _Donn P. Crane_ 48
"O SHRIEVE ME, SHRIEVE ME, HOLY MAN" _Donn P. Crane_ 55
I PASS FROM LAND TO LAND (Ending) _Donn P. Crane_ 57
BLACK HAWK AND THE TWO RUFFIANS _R. F. Babcock_ 63
THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN CROSSED THE RIVER _R. F. Babcock_ 71
HAWKEYE ON THE TRAIL _R. F. Babcock_ 80
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER (Halftone) 82
HAWKEYE _R. F. Babcock_ 85
GRADUALLY I CAME ABREAST OF HIM _R. F. Babcock_ 106
ONE VAST HOST OF BUFFALO _R. F. Babcock_ 125
ON DUNE AND HEADLAND _G. H. Mitchell_ 165
THE LITTLE GRAY CHURCH ON THE WINDY HILL _Walter O. Reese_ 181
"TOM'S COMING HOME!" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 188
"OH, HE IS CRUEL" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 199
"IS IT THE TIPSY CAKE, THEN?" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 206
"HERE, LUCY!" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 224
"AH, YOU'RE FONDEST O' ME, AREN'T YOU?" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 243
GORILLA WITH HER YOUNG _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 251
THE BATTLE OF THE ANTS _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 265
WATCHING FOR THE LOON _R. F. Babcock_ 272
THE SKYLARK _R. F. Babcock_ 276
KNEELING TO DRINK _R. F. Babcock_ 281
SALMON FISHING (Color Plate) _R. F. Babcock_ 286
THE RED SQUIRREL STEALING CORN _R. F. Babcock_ 296
"HOW MUCH DO WE OWE YOU?" _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 320
MICHAEL IS COME BACK _Herbert N. Rudeen_ 326
"MY MOTHER!" _Iris Weddell White_ 336
IN HER SEPULCHRE THERE BY THE SEA _Donn P. Crane_ 342
THE NIGHT RACK CAME ROLLING UP _G. H. Mitchell_ 344
THE CRESCENT MOON WENT BY _G. H. Mitchell_ 347
I LOOKED INTO THE CABIN _R. F. Babcock_ 354
WHITTIER'S BIRTHPLACE (Color Plate) 382
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER (Halftone) 386
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT (Halftone) 392
THY FIGURE FLOATS ALONG _Jerome Rozen_ 396
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES (Halftone) 398
DOWN THE SUNNY GLADE _Walter O. Reese_ 409
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL (Halftone) 412
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING (Halftone) 420
DON QUIXOTE (Heading) _Donn P. Crane_ 431
DON QUIXOTE TILTS WITH THE WINDMILLS _Donn P. Crane_ 439
"DEFEND THYSELF, MISERABLE BEING!" _Donn P. Crane_ 444
THE LION PUT HIS HEAD OUT OF THE CAGE _Donn P. Crane_ 455
SANCHO FELL ON HIS KNEES _Donn P. Crane_ 464
THE HORSE BLEW UP, WITH A PRODIGIOUS NOISE _Donn P. Crane_ 475
THE DAFFODILS
_By_ WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,--
A host of golden daffodils
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I, at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company;
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.
For oft, when on my couch I lie,
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
[Illustration: A HOST OF GOLDEN DAFFODILS]
When we look at this little poem we see at a glance that the
stanzas are all the same length, that the rhyme scheme is _ababcc_
(see "To My Infant Son," Vol. VI), and that the indentation at the
beginning of the lines corresponds with the rhymes. This poem,
then, is perfectly regular in form.
There are other things, however, which go to make up perfect
structure in a poem. First and foremost, the words are so arranged
that the accented syllables in any given line come at regular
intervals. Take, for instance, the first two lines of this poem.
Each line contains eight syllables. If you number these syllables
1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, you will see that it is the second one each
time that bears the accent, thus:
I wan'dered lone'ly as' a cloud'
That floats' on high' o'er vales' and hills'.
Now, if you read the four remaining lines of the stanza you will
see that in each one of these the second syllable bears the
accent, until you come to the last line, where in the word
_fluttering_, which, by the way, you pronounce _flutt'ring_, the
accent is on the first syllable. If the poet did not now and then
change the accent a little it would become tedious and monotonous.
It is a very simple matter, you see, to separate every line of
poetry into groups of syllables, and in every group to place one
accented syllable and one or more syllables that are not accented.
Such a group is called a _foot_. Thus in each of the first two
lines in this poem there are four _feet_. Each _foot_ contains an
accented and an unaccented syllable.
If you examine _To the Fringed Gentian_, _To a Mouse_, and _To a
Mountain Daisy_, the three poems which follow this, you will see
the same structure, except that in _To a Mouse_ and in _To A
Mountain Daisy_ there are some short lines and some double rhymes,
making the last foot a little different in character from the
others.
When a line of poetry is composed of two-syllable feet in which the
second syllable bears the accent we call that meter _iambic_. It is
the prevalent foot in English poetry, and if you examine the
different poems in these volumes you will be surprised to find out
how many of them are written substantially on the plan of _The
Daffodils_.
In naming the meter of a poem two things are considered: First the
_character_ of the feet, and second, the _number_ of feet. In this
poem the feet are iambic and there are four of them, consequently
we name the meter of this poem _iambic tetrameter_. Whenever you
hear those words you think of a poem whose meter is exactly like
that of _The Daffodils_.
These words seem long and hard to remember. It may help you to
remember them if you think that the word _iam'bic_ contains an
iambic foot.
In naming the meter we use the Greek numerals--_mono_ (one), _di_
(two), _tri_ (three), _tetra_ (four), _penta_ (five), _hexa_ (six),
_hepta_ (seven), and _octa_ (eight), and add to them the word
_meter_, thus: _Mo-nom'e-ter_, a line containing one foot,
_dim'e-ter_, _trim'e-ter_, _te-tram'e-ter_, _pen-tam'e-ter_,
_hex-am'e-ter_, _hep-tam'e-ter_, _and oc-tam'e-ter_.
TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN
_By_ WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT
Thou blossom, bright with autumn dew,
And colored with the heaven's own blue,
That openest when the quiet light
Succeeds the keen and frosty night;
[Illustration]
Thou comest not when violets lean
O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen,
Or columbines, in purple dressed,
Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest.
Thou waitest late, and com'st alone,
When woods are bare and birds are flown,
And frosts and shortening days portend
The aged Year is near his end.
Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye
Look through its fringes to the sky,
Blue--blue--as if that sky let fall
A flower from its cerulean wall.
I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draw near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart,
May look to heaven as I depart.
TO A MOUSE
ON TURNING HER UP IN HER NEST WITH THE PLOW, NOVEMBER, 1785
_By_ ROBERT BURNS
Wee, sleekit,[5-1] cow'rin', tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle![5-2]
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murdering pattle![5-3]
I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor earth-born companion,
An' fellow-mortal!
I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen-icker[6-4] in a thrave[6-5]
'S a sma' request:
I'll get a blessin' wi' the lave[6-6]
And never miss't!
[Illustration: THOU NEED NA START AWA]
Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin'!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
O' foggage[7-7] green!
An' bleak December's winds ensuin',
Baith snell[7-8] and keen!
Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste,
And weary winter comin' fast,
And cozie, here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter[7-9] past
Out thro' thy cell.
That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble,
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble,
But house or hald,[7-10]
To thole[7-11] the winter's sleety dribble,
An' cranreuch[7-12] cauld!
But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane,[7-13]
In proving foresight may be vain;
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men,
Gang aft a-gley,[7-14]
An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain,
For promis'd joy.
Still them are blest, compar'd wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But, Och! I backward cast my e'e
On prospects drear;
An' forward, tho' I canna see,[8-15]
I guess an' fear.
FOOTNOTES:
[5-1] _Sleekit_ means _sly_.
[5-2] _Brattle_ means a short race.
[5-3] A _pattle_ is a scraper for cleaning a plow.
[6-4] _Daimen-icker_ means an ear of corn occasionally.
[6-5] A _thrave_ is twenty-four sheaves.
[6-6] _Lave_ is the Scotch word for _remainder_.
[7-7] _Foggage_ is coarse uncut grass.
[7-8] _Snell_ means _sharp_.
[7-9] The coulter is the sharp iron which cuts the sod before the plow.
[7-10] _Hald_ means a resting place. _But_ here means _without_.
[7-11] _Thole_ is the Scotch word for _endure_.
[7-12] _Cranreuch_ is hoar-frost.
[7-13] _No thy lane_ means _not alone_.
[7-14] _Gang aft a-gley_ means _often go wrong_.
[8-15] In this poem and the one _To a Mountain Daisy_, does the allusion
to the poet's own hard fate add to or detract from the beauty of the
composition? Do these allusions give any insight into his character?
What was always uppermost in his mind?
[Illustration: ROBERT BURNS
1759-1796]
TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY
ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH IN APRIL, 1786
_By_ ROBERT BURNS
Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flower,
Thou's met me in an evil hour,
For I maun[8-1] crush amang the stoure[8-2]
Thy slender stem;
To spare thee now is past my power,
Thou bonny gem.
Alas! it's no thy neibor sweet,
The bonny lark, companion meet,
Bending thee' mang the dewy weet,
Wi' spreckled[8-3] breast,
When upward springing, blithe, to greet
The purpling east.
Cauld blew the bitter biting north
Upon thy early, humble birth;
Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth
Amid the storm,
Scarce reared above the parent earth
Thy tender form.
[Illustration: THOU BONNY GEM]
The flaunting flowers our gardens yield,
High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield.
But thou beneath the random bield[9-4]
O' clod or stane,
Adorns the histie[9-5] stibble-field,
Unseen, alane.
There, in thy scanty mantle clad,
Thy snawie bosom sunward spread,
Thou lifts thy unassuming head
In humble guise;
But now the share uptears thy bed,
And low thou lies!
Such is the fate of artless maid,
Sweet floweret of the rural shade!
By love's simplicity betrayed,
And guileless trust,
Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid
Low i' the dust.
Such is the fate of simple bard,
On life's rough ocean luckless starred!
Unskilful he to note the card
Of prudent lore,
Till billows rage, and gales blow hard
And whelm him o'er!
Such fate to suffering worth is given,
Who long with wants and woes has striven,
By human pride or cunning driven
To misery's brink,
Till wrenched of every stay but Heaven,
He, ruined, sink!
Even thou who mourn'st the daisy's fate,
That fate is thine,--no distant date:
Stern Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate,
Full on thy bloom,
Till crushed beneath the furrow's weight,
Shall be thy doom!
FOOTNOTES:
[8-1] _Maun_ is the Scotch word for _must_.
[8-2] _Stoure_ is the Scotch name for dust.
[8-3] _Spreckled_ is the Scotch and provincial English form of
_speckled_.
[9-4] _Bield_ means _shelter_.
[9-5] _Histie_ means _dry_ or _barren_.
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET[11-1]
_By_ SAMUEL WOODWORTH
How dear to my heart are the scenes of my childhood,
When fond[11-2] recollection presents them to view;
The orchard, the meadow, the deep, tangled wild-wood,
And every loved spot that my infancy[11-3] knew.
The wide-spreading pond, and the mill[11-4] that stood by it;
The bridge and the rock where the cataract fell;
The cot of my father, the dairy house[11-5] nigh it,
And e'en the rude bucket which hung in the well--
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well.
That moss-covered bucket I hail as a treasure;
For often at noon, when returned from the field,
I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure,
The purest and sweetest that nature can yield.
How ardent I seized it, with hands that were glowing,
And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell[12-6];
Then soon with the emblem of truth[12-7] overflowing,
And dripping with coolness it rose from the well--
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket arose from the well.
[Illustration: INCLINED TO MY LIPS]
How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive it,
As poised on the curb,[12-8] it inclined to my lips!
Not a full blushing goblet[13-9] could tempt me to leave it,
Though filled with the nectar[13-10] that Jupiter sips.
And now, far removed from the loved situation,[13-11]
The tear of regret will oftentimes swell,
As fancy returns to my father's plantation,
And sighs for the bucket which hangs in the well--
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket which hangs in the well.
If we compare _The Old Oaken Bucket_ with _The Daffodils_ (page 1),
we will see that the lines of the former are longer, and when we
read aloud a few lines from the one and compare the other, we see
that the movement is very different. In _The Old Oaken Bucket_ the
accents are farther apart, and the result is to make the movement
long and smooth, like that of a swing with long ropes.
Let us examine more closely the lines of _The Old Oaken Bucket_ in
a manner similar to that suggested on page 2, for _The Daffodils_.
If we place the accent on the proper syllables in the first four
lines, they will read as follows:
How dear'| to my heart'| are the scenes'| of my child'|hood,
When fond'| rec-ol-lec'|tion pre-sents'| them to view';
The or'|chard, the mead'|ow, the deep'| tan-gled wild'|-wood,
And ev'|'ry loved spot'| that my in'|fan-cy knew.'
The vertical lines above are drawn at the ends of the feet. How
many feet are there in the first line; how many in the second; how
many in the third; how many in the fourth? How many syllables in
the first foot in the first line? How many other feet do you find
containing the same number of syllables? How many syllables are
there in the second foot in the first line? How many other feet are
there containing the same number of syllables? Examine the feet
that contain three syllables. On which syllable is the accent
placed when there are three syllables in the foot? A poetic foot of
three syllables which bears the accent on the third syllable is
called an _anapestic_ foot. The meter of this poem, then is
_anapestic tetrameter_, varied by an added syllable in most of the
odd-numbered lines and by an iambic foot at the beginning of each
line.
Can you find any other poem in this volume in which the meter is
the same? Can you find such poems in other volumes?
FOOTNOTES:
[11-1] Samuel Woodworth, the author of this familiar song, was an
American, the editor of many publications and the writer of a great many
poems; but no one of the latter is now remembered, except _The Old Oaken
Bucket_.
[11-2] This means that the author remembers fondly the scenes of his
childhood, or remembers the things of which he was fond in his
childhood.
[11-3] As the term is used in the law-books, a person is an _infant_
until he is twenty-one years of age; though, probably the word _infancy_
here means the same as _childhood_.
[11-4] Let us picture a large mill-pond with a race running out of one
side of it past the old-fashioned mill, which has a big wooden water
wheel on the outside of it.
[11-5] The dairy house was probably a low, broad building through which
the water from the stream ran. The milkpans were set on low shelves or
in a trough so that the water could run around them and keep the milk
cool.
[12-6] If he could see the white-pebbled bottom of the well, it must
have been a shallow one, or perhaps merely a square box built around a
deep spring.
[12-7] Water is usually spoken of as an emblem of _purity_, not of
_truth_; but sometimes truth is spoken of as hiding at the bottom of a
well.
[12-8] The curb is the square box usually built around the mouth of the
well to a height of a few feet, to protect the water from dirt.
Sometimes three of the sides are carried up to a height of six or eight
feet, and a roof is built over the whole, making a little house of the
curb. The fourth side is left open, except for two or three feet at the
bottom. In these old wells two buckets were often used. They were
attached to a rope which ran over a wheel suspended from the roof of the
well house. When a bucket was drawn up it was often rested on the low
curb in front, while people drank from it.
[13-9] _Blushing goblet_ alludes to wine or some other liquor that has a
reddish color.
[13-10] Nectar was the drink of the old Greek gods, of whom Jupiter was
the chief.
[13-11] _Situation_ and _plantation_ do not rhyme well, and _situation_
is scarcely the right word to use. _Location_ would be better, so far as
the meaning is concerned.
[Illustration]
BANNOCKBURN
ROBERT BRUCE'S ADDRESS TO HIS ARMY
_By_ ROBERT BURNS
Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled;
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;
Welcome to your gory bed,
Or to glorious victorie!
Now's the day and now's the hour--
See the front o' battle lour;
See approach proud Edward's power--
Edward! chains and slaverie!
Wha will be a traitor knave?
Wha can fill a coward's grave?
Wha sae base as be a slave?
Traitor! coward! turn and flee!
Wha for Scotland's king and law
Freedom's sword will strongly draw!
Freeman stand or freeman fa',
Caledonian! on wi' me!
By oppression's woes and pains!
By our sons in servile chains!
We will drain our dearest veins,
But they shall be--shall be free!
Lay the proud usurpers low!
Tyrants fall in every foe!
Liberty's in every blow!
Forward! let us do or die!
On pages 2, and 13, of this volume we talked about the different
meters in which poetry is written. In iambic poetry each foot
contains two syllables, the second of which is accented. There is
another kind of foot composed of two syllables. In this the accent
falls on the first syllable. _Bannockburn_ gives examples of this.
To illustrate, we will rewrite the first stanza, using the words in
their English form, and mark off the feet and the accent:
Scots', who | have' with | Wal'-lace | bled',
Scots', whom | Bruce' has | of'-ten | led';
Wel'-come | to' your | go'-ry | bed',
Or' to | glo'rious | vic'-to | ry'.
Each one of these lines ends with an accented syllable, but that
may be disregarded in studying the feet. This foot is called the
_trochee_, and it will help you to remember it if you will think
that the word _tro'chee_ has two syllables and is accented on the
first. This poem, then, is in _trochaic trimeter_, with added
accented syllables at the ends of the lines. Read the other stanzas
carefully, throwing the accent prominently on the first syllable of
each foot.
When you read to bring out the meter of a poem you are said to be
_scanning_ it. When you are in the habit of scanning poetry you
will find that you can do it very nicely and without spoiling the
sound. At first you will probably accent the syllables too
strongly, and then people will say that you are reading in a
_sing-song_ way, a thing to be avoided. Of course you will
understand that the only way to bring out the meter of a poem is to
read it aloud, but after you have become familiar with the various
meters and have read aloud a great deal, you will be conscious of
the rhythm when you read to yourself. It is this consciousness of
rhythm that gives much of the enjoyment to those who love poetry,
even when they do not read it aloud.
BOAT SONG
_From_ LADY OF THE LAKE
_By_ SIR WALTER SCOTT
Hail to the Chief who in triumph advances!
Honored and blest be the evergreen pine!
Long may the tree, in his banner that glances,
Flourish, the shelter and grace of our line!
Heaven send it happy dew,
Earth lend it sap anew,
Gayly to bourgeon, and broadly to grow,
While every Highland glen
Sends our shout back again,
"Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! ieroe!"
Ours is no sapling, chance sown by the fountain,
Blooming at Beltane, in winter to fade;
When the whirlwind has stripped every leaf on the mountain
The more shall Clan Alpine exult in her shade.
Moored in the rifted rock,
Proof to the tempest's shock,
Firmer he roots him the ruder it blow:
Menteith and Breadalbane, then
Echo his praise again,
"Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! ieroe!"
Proudly our pibroch has thrilled in Glen Fruin,
And Bannochar's groans to our slogan replied;
Glen Luss and Ross-dhu, they are smoking in ruin,
And the best of Loch-Lomond lie dead on her side.
Widow and Saxon maid
Long shall lament our raid,
Think of Clan Alpine with fear and with woe;
Lennox and Leven-glen
Shake when they hear again,
"Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! ieroe!"
Row, vassals, row for the pride of the Highlands!
Stretch to your oars for the evergreen pine!
O that the rosebud that graces yon islands
Were wreathed in a garland around him to twine!
O that some seedling gem,
Worthy such noble stem,
Honored and blessed in their shadow might grow!
Loud should Clan Alpine then
Ring from her deepmost glen,
"Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! ieroe!"
The last of the common feet which we shall have to consider in
reading English poetry is called _dactyl_. This foot consists of
three syllables, the first of which is accented. Scott's _Boat
Song_ is a very fine example of _dactylic tetrameter_, in which the
last foot consists either of a _trochee_ (see page 16) or of a
single accented syllable. In every stanza there are four short
lines of _dactylic dimeter_. Study the four lines which we have
divided for you below:
Hail' to the | chief' who in | tri'umph ad|van'ces!
Hon'ored and | blest' be the | ev'er green | pine!'
Long' may the | tree', in his | ban'ner that | glan'ces,
Flou'rish, the | shel'ter and | grace' of our | line.'
This is one of the finest meters in which poetry may be written,
and one which you will learn to recognize and like whenever you see
it.
To assist you in remembering what we have said on this subject in
the four poems we have studied, we will give this brief outline:
Poetic feet
1. Consisting of two syllables:
_Iambic_, when the second syllable is accented.
Example: I wan'|dered lone|ly as'| a cloud'.
_Trochaic_, when the first syllable is accented.
Example: Scots', who | have' with | Wal'lace | bled'.
2. Consisting of three syllables:
_Anapestic_, when the third syllable is accented.
Example: How dear' | to my heart' | are the scenes' | of my
child'|hood.
_Dactylic_, when the first syllable is accented.
Example: Hail' to the | chief' who in | tri'umph ad|van'ces.
There are two other feet which are found occasionally in English
poetry, namely the _spondee_, which has two accented syllables, and
the _amphilbrach_, which consists of three syllables with the
accent on the middle one.
Of course it is not necessary for you to know the names of these
different feet in order to enjoy poetry, but it is interesting
information. What you must do is to notice whenever you read poetry
the kind of feet that compose the lines and how many there are in
the line. After a while this becomes second nature to you, and
while you may not really pause to think about it at any time, yet
you are always conscious of the rhythm and remember that it is
produced by a fixed arrangement of the accented syllables. If you
would look over the poems in these volumes, beginning even with the
nursery rhymes, it would not take you long to become familiar with
all the different forms.
While study of this kind may seem tiresome at first, you will soon
find that you are making progress and will really enjoy it, and you
will never be sorry that you took the time when you were young to
learn to understand the structure of poetry.
THE GOVERNOR AND THE NOTARY
_By_ WASHINGTON IRVING
In former times there ruled, as governor of the Alhambra[20-1], a
doughty old cavalier, who, from having lost one arm in the wars, was
commonly known by the name of El Gobernador Manco, or the one-armed
governor. He in fact prided himself upon being an old soldier, wore his
mustachios curled up to his eyes, a pair of campaigning boots, and a
toledo[20-2] as long as a spit, with his pocket handkerchief in the
basket-hilt.
He was, moreover, exceedingly proud and punctilious, and tenacious of
all his privileges and dignities. Under his sway, the immunities of the
Alhambra, as a royal residence and domain, were rigidly exacted. No one
was permitted to enter the fortress with firearms, or even with a sword
or staff, unless he were of a certain rank, and every horseman was
obliged to dismount at the gate and lead his horse by the bridle. Now,
as the hill of the Alhambra rises from the very midst of the city of
Granada, being, as it were, an excrescence of the capital, it must at
all times be somewhat irksome to the captain-general, who commands the
province, to have thus an _imperium in imperio_,[21-3] a petty,
independent post in the very core of his domains. It was rendered the
more galling in the present instance, from the irritable jealousy of the
old governor, that took fire on the least question of authority and
jurisdiction, and from the loose, vagrant character of the people that
had gradually nestled themselves within the fortress as in a sanctuary,
and from thence carried on a system of roguery and depredation at the
expense of the honest inhabitants of the city. Thus there was a
perpetual feud and heart-burning between the captain-general and the
governor; the more virulent on the part of the latter, inasmuch as the
smallest of two neighboring potentates is always the most captious about
his dignity. The stately palace of the captain-general stood in the
Plaza Nueva, immediately at the foot of the hill of the Alhambra, and
here was always a bustle and parade of guards, and domestics, and city
functionaries. A beetling bastion of the fortress overlooked the palace
and the public square in front of it; and on this bastion the old
governor would occasionally strut backward and forward, with his toledo
girded by his side, keeping a wary eye down upon his rival, like a hawk
reconnoitering his quarry from his nest in a dry tree.
Whenever he descended into the city it was in grand parade, on
horseback, surrounded by his guards, or in his state coach, an ancient
and unwieldy Spanish edifice of carved timber and gilt leather, drawn
by eight mules, with running footmen, outriders, and lackeys, on which
occasions he flattered himself he impressed every beholder with awe and
admiration as vicegerent of the king, though the wits of Granada were
apt to sneer at his petty parade, and, in allusion to the vagrant
character of his subjects, to greet him with the appellation of "the
king of the beggars."
One of the most fruitful sources of dispute between these two doughty
rivals was the right claimed by the governor to have all things passed
free of duty through the city, that were intended for the use of himself
or his garrison. By degrees, this privilege had given rise to extensive
smuggling. A nest of contrabandistas[22-4] took up their abode in the
hovels of the fortress and the numerous caves in its vicinity, and drove
a thriving business under the connivance of the soldiers of the
garrison.
The vigilance of the captain-general was aroused. He consulted his legal
adviser and factotum, a shrewd, meddlesome Escribano or notary, who
rejoiced in an opportunity of perplexing the old potentate of the
Alhambra, and involving him in a maze of legal subtilities. He advised
the captain-general to insist upon the right of examining every convoy
passing through the gates of his city, and he penned a long letter for
him, in vindication of the right. Governor Manco was a straightforward,
cut-and-thrust old soldier, who hated an Escribano worse than the devil,
and this one in particular, worse than all other Escribanoes.
"What!" said he, curling up his mustachios fiercely, "does the
captain-general set this man of the pen to practice confusions upon me?
I'll let him see that an old soldier is not to be baffled by
schoolcraft."
He seized his pen, and scrawled a short letter in a crabbed hand, in
which he insisted on the right of transit free of search, and denounced
vengeance on any custom-house officer who should lay his unhallowed hand
on any convoy protected by the flag of the Alhambra.
While this question was agitated between the two pragmatical potentates,
it so happened that a mule laden with supplies for the fortress arrived
one day at the gate of Xenil, by which it was to traverse a suburb of
the city on its way to the Alhambra. The convoy was headed by a testy
old corporal, who had long served under the governor, and was a man
after his own heart--as trusty and stanch as an old Toledo blade. As
they approached the gate of the city, the corporal placed the banner of
the Alhambra on the pack saddle of the mule, and drawing himself up to a
perfect perpendicular, advanced with his head dressed to the front, but
with the wary side glance of a cur passing through hostile grounds, and
ready for a snap and a snarl.
"Who goes there?" said the sentinel at the gate.
"Soldier of the Alhambra," said the corporal, without turning his head.
"What have you in charge?"
"Provisions for the garrison."
"Proceed."
The corporal marched straight forward, followed by the convoy, but had
not advanced many paces before a posse of custom-house officers rushed
out of a small toll-house.
"Halloo there!" cried the leader. "Muleteer, halt and open those
packages."
The corporal wheeled round, and drew himself up in battle array.
"Respect the flag of the Alhambra," said he; "these things are for the
governor."
"A fig for the governor, and a fig for his flag. Muleteer, halt, I say."
"Stop the convoy at your peril!" cried the corporal, cocking his musket.
"Muleteer, proceed."
The muleteer gave his beast a hearty thwack, the custom-house officer
sprang forward and seized the halter; whereupon the corporal leveled his
piece and shot him dead.
The street was immediately in an uproar. The old corporal was seized,
and after undergoing sundry kicks and cuffs, and cudgelings, which are
generally given impromptu by the mob in Spain, as a foretaste of the
after penalties of the law, he was loaded with irons, and conducted to
the city prison; while his comrades were permitted to proceed with the
convoy, after it had been well rummaged, to the Alhambra.
The old governor was in a towering passion, when he heard of this insult
to his flag and capture of his corporal. For a time he stormed about the
Moorish halls, and vapored about the bastions, and looked down fire and
sword upon the palace of the captain-general. Having vented the first
ebullition of his wrath, he dispatched a message demanding the surrender
of the corporal, as to him alone belonged the right of sitting in
judgment on the offenses of those under his command. The
captain-general, aided by the pen of the delighted Escribano, replied at
great length, arguing that as the offense had been committed within the
walls of his city, and against one of his civil officers, it was clearly
within his proper jurisdiction. The governor rejoined by a repetition of
his demand; the captain-general gave a surrejoinder of still greater
length, and legal acumen; the governor became hotter and more peremptory
in his demands, and the captain-general cooler and more copious in his
replies; until the old lion-hearted soldier absolutely roared with fury
at being thus entangled in the meshes of legal controversy.
While the subtle Escribano was thus amusing himself at the expense of
the governor, he was conducting the trial of the corporal; who, mewed up
in a narrow dungeon of the prison, had merely a small grated window at
which to show his iron-bound visage, and receive the consolations of his
friends; a mountain of written testimony was diligently heaped up,
according to Spanish form, by the indefatigable Escribano; the corporal
was completely overwhelmed by it. He was convicted of murder, and
sentenced to be hanged.
It was in vain the governor sent down remonstrance and menace from the
Alhambra. The fatal day was at hand, and the corporal was put _in
capilla_, that is to say, in the chapel of the prison; as is always done
with culprits the day before execution, that they may meditate on their
approaching end and repent them of their sins.
Seeing things drawing to an extremity, the old governor determined to
attend to the affair in person. He ordered out his carriage of state
and, surrounded by his guards, rumbled down the avenue of the Alhambra
into the city. Driving to the house of the Escribano, he summoned him to
the portal.
The eye of the old governor gleamed like a coal at beholding the
smirking man of the law advancing with an air of exultation.
[Illustration: THE NOTARY ENTERS THE CARRIAGE]
"What is this I hear," cried he, "that you are about to put to death one
of my soldiers?"
"All according to law--all in strict form of justice," said the
self-sufficient Escribano, chuckling and rubbing his hands. "I can show
your excellency the written testimony in the case."
"Fetch it hither," said the governor.
The Escribano bustled into his office, delighted with having another
opportunity of displaying his ingenuity at the expense of the
hard-headed veteran. He returned with a satchel full of papers, and
began to read a long deposition with professional volubility. By this
time a crowd had collected, listening with outstretched necks and gaping
mouths.
"Prithee man, get into the carriage out of this pestilent throng, that I
may the better hear thee," said the governor. The Escribano entered the
carriage, when in a twinkling the door was closed, the coachman smacked
his whip, mules, carriage, guards, and all dashed off at a thundering
rate, leaving the crowd in gaping wonderment, nor did the governor pause
until he had lodged his prey in one of the strongest dungeons of the
Alhambra.
He then sent down a flag of truce in military style, proposing a cartel
or exchange of prisoners, the corporal for the notary. The pride of the
captain-general was piqued, he returned a contemptuous refusal, and
forthwith caused a gallows, tall and strong, to be erected in the center
of the Plaza Nueva, for the execution of the corporal.
"Oho! is that the game?" said Governor Manco; he gave orders, and
immediately a gibbet was reared on the verge of the great beetling
bastion that overlooked the Plaza. "Now," said he, in a message to the
captain-general, "hang my soldier when you please; but at the same time
that he is swung off in the square, look up to see your Escribano
dangling against the sky."
The captain-general was inflexible; troops were paraded in the square;
the drums beat; the bell tolled; an immense multitude of amateurs had
collected to behold the execution; on the other hand, the governor
paraded his garrison on the bastion, and tolled the funeral dirge of the
notary from the Torre de la Campana, or tower of the bell.
The notary's wife pressed through the crowd with a whole progeny of
little embryo Escribanoes at her heels, and throwing herself at the feet
of the captain-general implored him not to sacrifice the life of her
husband and the welfare of herself and her numerous little ones to a
point of pride.
The captain-general was overpowered by her tears and lamentations, and
the clamors of her callow brood. The corporal was sent up to the
Alhambra under a guard, in his gallows garb, like a hooded friar; but
with head erect and a face of iron. The Escribano was demanded in
exchange, according to the cartel. The once bustling and self-sufficient
man of the law was drawn forth from his dungeon, more dead than alive.
All his flippancy and conceit had evaporated; his hair, it is said, had
nearly turned gray with fright, and he had a downcast, dogged look, as
if he still felt the halter round his neck.
The old governor stuck his one arm akimbo, and for a moment surveyed him
with an iron smile. "Henceforth, my friend," said he, "moderate your
zeal in hurrying others to the gallows; be not too certain of your own
safety, even though you should have the law on your side; and, above
all, take care how you play off your schoolcraft another time upon an
old soldier."
FOOTNOTES:
[20-1] The Alhambra was the fortified palace, or citadel, of the Moorish
kings when they reigned over Granada, in Spain. It was built in the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and is one of the most beautiful
examples of Moorish architecture.
[20-2] A toledo is a sword having a blade made at Toledo, in Spain, a
place famous for blades of remarkably fine temper and great elasticity.
[21-3] _Imperium in imperio_ is a Latin phrase meaning a _government
within a government_.
[22-4] _Contrabandista_ is a Spanish name for a smuggler.
[Illustration]
THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER[29-*]
_By_ SAMUEL T. COLERIDGE
PART I
It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.
"By thy long gray beard and glittering eye,
Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?
"The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide,
And I am next of kin;
The guests are met, the feast is set:
May'st hear the merry din."
He holds him with a skinny hand.
"There was a ship," quoth he.
"Hold off! unhand me, gray-beard loon!"
Eftsoons[30-1] his hand dropt he.
He holds him with his glittering eye--
The Wedding-guest stood still,
And listens like a three years' child:
The Mariner hath his will.
The Wedding-guest sat on a stone:
He cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner:[30-2]--
"The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,
Merrily did we drop
Below the kirk, below the hill,
Below the lighthouse top.
"The sun came up upon the left,[30-3]
Out of the sea came he!
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the sea.
"Higher and higher every day,
Till over the mast at noon--"[30-4]
The Wedding-guest here beat his breast,
For he heard the loud bassoon.
The bride hath paced into the hall,
Red as a rose is she;
Nodding their heads before her goes
The merry minstrelsy.
The Wedding-guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner:--
"And now the storm-blast came, and he
Was tyrannous and strong;
He struck with his o'ertaking wings,
And chased us south along.
"With sloping masts and dipping prow,
As who[31-5] pursued with yell and blow
Still treads the shadow of his foe[31-6],
And forward bends his head,
The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast,
And southward aye we fled.
"And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold:
And ice, mast-high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.[32-7]
"And through the drifts, the snowy clifts[32-8]
Did send a dismal sheen:
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken--
The ice was all between.
"The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around:
It cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
Like noises in a swound![32-9]
"At length did cross an Albatross,
Thorough[32-10] the fog it came;
As if it had been a Christian soul,
We hailed it in God's name.[32-11]
"It ate the food it ne'er had eat,
And round and round it flew.
The ice did split with a thunder-fit;
The helmsman steered us through.
[Illustration: I SHOT THE ALBATROSS]
"And a good south wind sprung up behind;[34-12]
The Albatross did follow,
And every day, for food or play,
Came to the mariner's hollo!
"In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,
It perched for vespers nine;
Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,
Glimmered the white moonshine."
"God save thee, ancient Mariner,
From the fiends that plague thee thus!--
Why look'st thou so?"--"With my cross-bow
I shot the Albatross."
PART II
"The Sun now rose upon the right:[34-13]
Out of the sea came he,
Still hid in mist, and on the left
Went down into the sea.
"And the good south wind still blew behind,
But no sweet bird did follow,
Nor any day for food or play
Came to the mariner's hollo!
"And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would work 'em woe:
For all averred I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow,--
Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay,
That made the breeze to blow.
"Nor dim, nor red, like God's own head,
The glorious Sun uprist:[35-14]
Then all averred I had killed the bird
That brought the fog and mist.
'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay,
That bring the fog and mist.[35-15]
"The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free;[35-16]
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.
"Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
'Twas sad as sad could be;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea!
"All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,[35-17]
No bigger than the Moon.[35-18]
"Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
"Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.
"The very deep did rot: O Christ!
That ever this should be!
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.
"About, about, in reel and rout[36-19]
The death-fires[36-20] danced at night;
The water, like a witch's oils,
Burnt green, and blue, and white.
"And some in dreams assured were
Of the Spirit that plagued us so;
Nine fathom deep he had followed us
From the land of mist and snow.
"And every tongue, through utter drought,
Was withered at the root;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.
"Ah! well a day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.[36-21]
PART III
"There passed a weary time. Each throat
Was parched, and glazed each eye.
A weary time! a weary time!
How glazed each weary eye!
When looking westward, I beheld
A something in the sky.
"At first it seemed a little speck,
And then it seemed a mist:
It moved and moved, and took at last
A certain shape, I wist.[37-22]
"A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!
And still it neared and neared:
As if it dodged a water-sprite,
It plunged, and tacked, and veered.
"With throats unslaked, with black lips baked
We could not laugh nor wail;
Through utter drought all dumb we stood!
I bit my arm, I sucked the blood,
And cried, A sail! a sail!
"With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,
Agape they heard me call:
Gramercy![37-23] they for joy did grin,[37-24]
And all at once their breath drew in,
As they were drinking all.
[Illustration: AND STRAIGHT THE SUN WAS FLECKED WITH BARS]
"See! see! (I cried) she tacks no more!
Hither to work us weal;
Without a breeze, without a tide,
She steadies with upright keel!
"The western wave was all a-flame,
The day was well-nigh done!
Almost upon the western wave
Rested the broad, bright Sun;
When that strange shape drove suddenly
Betwixt us and the Sun.
"And straight the Sun was flecked with bars,
(Heaven's Mother send us grace!)
As if through a dungeon grate he peered
With broad and burning face.
"Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)
How fast she nears and nears!
Are those her sails that glance in the Sun,
Like restless gossameres?[39-25]
"Are those her ribs through which the Sun
Did peer, as through a grate?
And is that Woman all her crew?
Is that a Death? and are there two?
Is Death that Woman's mate?
"Her lips were red, her looks were free,
Her locks were yellow as gold:
Her skin was as white as leprosy,
The Night-mare Life-in-Death was she,
Who thicks man's blood with cold.
"The naked hulk alongside came,
And the twain were casting dice;
'The game is done! I've won, I've won!'[39-26]
Quoth she, and whistles thrice.
"The Sun's rim dips: the stars rush out:
At one stride comes the dark;[40-27]
With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea,
Off shot the spectre-bark.
"We listened and looked sideways up!
Fear at my heart, as at a cup,
My life-blood seemed to sip!
The stars were dim, and thick the night,
The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white;
From the sails the dew did drip--
Till clomb[40-28] above the eastern bar
The horned Moon,[40-29] with one bright star
Within the nether tip.
"One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.
"Four times fifty living men,
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan)
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropped down one by one.
"The souls did from their bodies fly,--
They fled to bliss or woe!
And every soul, it passed me by,
Like the whiz of my cross-bow!"
PART IV
"I fear thee, ancient Mariner!
I fear thy skinny hand!
And thou art long, and lank and brown.
As is the ribbed sea-sand.[41-30]
"I fear thee and thy glittering eye,
And thy skinny hand so brown."
"Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-guest!
This body dropt not down.
"Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide, wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
"The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand, thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I.
"I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.
"I looked to heaven, and tried to pray
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.
"I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky,[42-31]
Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.
"The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.
[Illustration: I WATCHED THE WATER-SNAKES]
"An orphan's curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high;
But oh! more horrible than that
Is the curse in a dead man's eye!
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.
"The moving Moon went up the sky,
And nowhere did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside--
"Her beams bemock'd the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;
But where the ship's huge shadow lay,
The charmed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.
"Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.
"Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
"O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.[43-32]
"The selfsame moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea."
PART V
"O sleep! it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!
To Mary Queen the praise be given!
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven,
That slid into my soul.
"The silly[44-33] buckets on the deck,
That had so long remained,
I dreamt that they were filled with dew;
And when I awoke, it rained.
"My lips were wet, my throat was cold,
My garments all were dank;
Sure I had drunken in my dreams,
And still my body drank.
"I moved, and could not feel my limbs:
I was so light--almost
I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed ghost.
"And soon I heard a roaring wind:
It did not come anear;
But with its sound it shook the sails,
That were so thin and sere.
"The upper air burst into life!
And a hundred fire-flags sheen,[44-34]
To and fro they were hurried about!
And to and fro, and in and out,
The wan stars danced between.
"And the coming wind did roar more loud,
And the sails did sigh like sedge:[45-35]
And the rain poured down from one black cloud:
The Moon was at its edge.
[Illustration: THEY GROANED, THEY STIRRED, THEY ALL UPROSE]
"The thick black cloud was cleft, and still
The Moon was at its side:
Like waters shot from some high crag,
The lightning fell with never a jag,
A river steep and wide.
"The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on!
Beneath the lightning and the Moon
The dead men gave a groan.
"They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;
It had been strange, even in a dream,
To have seen those dead men rise.
"The helmsman steered; the ship moved on;
Yet never a breeze up blew;
The mariners all 'gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do;
They raised their limbs like lifeless tools--
We were a ghastly crew.
"The body of my brother's son
Stood by me, knee to knee:
The body and I pulled at one rope,
But he said naught to me."
"I fear thee, ancient Mariner!"
"Be calm, thou Wedding-guest!
'Twas not those souls that fled in pain,
Which to their corses came again,
But a troop of spirits blest:
"For when it dawned--they dropped their arms,
And clustered round the mast;
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,
And from their bodies passed.
"Around, around, flew each sweet sound,
Then darted to the Sun;
Slowly the sounds came back again,
Now mixed, now one by one.
"Sometimes a-drooping from the sky
I heard the sky-lark sing;
Sometimes all little birds that are,
How they seemed to fill the sea and air
With their sweet jargoning!
"And now 'twas like all instruments,
Now like a lonely flute;
And now it is an angel's song,
That makes the heavens be mute.
"It ceased; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.
"Till noon we quietly sailed on,
Yet never a breeze did breathe:
Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
Moved onward from beneath.
"Under the keel nine fathom deep,
From the land of mist and snow,
The spirit slid: and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.
"The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixed her to the ocean:
But in a minute she 'gan stir,
With a short, uneasy motion--
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short, uneasy motion.
"Then like a pawing horse let go,
She made a sudden bound:
It flung the blood into my head,
And I fell down in a swound.
"How long in that same fit I lay,
I have not to declare;
But ere my living life returned,
I heard, and in my soul discerned,
Two voices in the air.
"'Is it he?' quoth one, 'Is this the man?
By him who died on cross,
With his cruel bow he laid full low
The harmless Albatross.
"'The spirit who bideth by himself
In the land of mist and snow,
He loved the bird that loved the man
Who shot him with his bow.'
"The other was a softer voice,
As soft as honey-dew:
Quoth he, 'The man hath penance done,
And penance more will do.'"
[Illustration: SLOWLY AND SMOOTHLY WENT THE SHIP]
PART VI
_First Voice_
"'But tell me, tell me! speak again,
Thy soft response renewing--
What makes that ship drive on so fast?
What is the ocean doing?'
_Second Voice_
"'Still as a slave before his lord,
The ocean hath no blast;
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the Moon is cast--
"'If he may know which way to go;
For she guides him smooth or grim.
See, brother, see! how graciously
She looketh down on him.'
_First Voice_
"'But why drives on that ship so fast,
Without or wave or wind?'[49-36]
_Second Voice_
"'The air is cut away before,
And closes from behind.
"'Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high!
Or we shall be belated:
For slow and slow that ship will go,
When the mariner's trance is abated.'
"I woke, and we were sailing on
As in a gentle weather:
'Twas night, calm night, the Moon was high;
The dead men stood together.
"All stood together on the deck,
For a charnel-dungeon[50-37] fitter:
All fixed on me their stony eyes,
That in the Moon did glitter.
"The pang, the curse, with which they died,
Had never passed away:
I could not draw my eyes from theirs,
Nor turn them up to pray.
"And now this spell was snapt:[50-38] once more
I viewed the ocean green,
And looked far forth, yet little saw
Of what had else been seen--
"Like one, that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.
"But soon there breathed a wind on me,
Nor sound nor motion made:
Its path was not upon the sea,
In ripple or in shade.
"It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek
Like a meadow-gale of spring--
It mingled strangely with my fears,
Yet it felt like a welcoming.
"Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship,
Yet she sailed softly too:
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze--
On me alone it blew.
"Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed
The lighthouse top I see?
Is this the hill? is this the kirk?
Is this mine own countree?
"We drifted o'er the harbour-bar,
And I with sobs did pray--
O let me be awake, my God!
Or let me sleep alway.
"The harbour-bay was clear as glass,
So smoothly it was strewn!
And on the bay the moonlight lay,
And the shadow of the Moon.
"The rock shone bright, the kirk no less,
That stands above the rock:
The moonlight steeped in silentness
The steady weathercock.
"And the bay was white with silent light,
Till, rising from the same,
Full many shapes, that shadows were,
In crimson colours came.
"A little distance from the prow
Those crimson shadows were:
I turned my eyes upon the deck--
O Christ! what saw I there!
"Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat,
And, by the holy rood![52-39]
A man all light, a seraph-man,
On every corse there stood.
"This seraph-band, each waved his hand:
It was a heavenly sight!
They stood as signals to the land.
Each one a lovely light;
"This seraph-band, each waved his hand:
No voice did they impart--
No voice; but oh! the silence sank
Like music on my heart.[52-40]
"But soon I heard the dash of oars,
I heard the Pilot's cheer;
My head was turned perforce away,
And I saw a boat appear.
"The Pilot and the Pilot's boy,
I heard them coming fast:
Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy
The dead men could not blast.
"I saw a third--I heard his voice:
It is the Hermit good!
He singeth loud his godly hymns
That he makes in the wood.
He'll shrieve my soul, he'll wash away
The Albatross's blood."
PART VII
"This Hermit good lives in that wood
Which slopes down to the sea.
How loudly his sweet voice he rears!
He loves to talk with marineres
That come from a far countree.
"He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve--
He hath a cushion plump:
It is the moss that wholly hides
The rotted old oak-stump.
"The skiff-boat neared: I heard them talk,
'Why, this is strange, I trow!
Where are those lights so many and fair,
That signal made but now?'
"'Strange, by my faith!' the Hermit said--
'And they answered not our cheer.
The planks look warped! and see those sails,
How thin they are and sere!
I never saw aught like to them,
Unless perchance it were
"'Brown skeletons of leaves that lag
My forest-brook along;
When the ivy-tod[53-41] is heavy with snow,
And the owlet whoops to the wolf below,
That eats the she-wolf's young.'
"'Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look!'
(The Pilot made reply)
'I am a-feared'--'Push on, push on!'
Said the Hermit cheerily.
"The boat came closer to the ship,
But I nor spake nor stirred;
The boat came close beneath the ship,
And straight a sound was heard.
"Under the water it rumbled on,
Still louder and more dread:
It reached the ship, it split the bay;
The ship went down like lead.
"Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound,
Which sky and ocean smote,
Like one that hath been seven days drowned
My body lay afloat;
But swift as dreams, myself I found
Within the Pilot's boat.
"Upon the whirl where sank the ship,
The boat spun round and round;
And all was still, save that the hill
Was telling of the sound.
"I moved my lips--the Pilot shrieked
And fell down in a fit;
The holy Hermit raised his eyes,
And prayed where he did sit.
"I took the oars: the Pilot's boy,
Who now doth crazy go,
Laughed loud and long, and all the while
His eyes went to and fro.
'Ha! ha!' quoth he, 'full plain I see,
The Devil knows how to row.'
"And now, all in my own countree,
I stood on the firm land!
The Hermit stepped forth from the boat,
And scarcely he could stand.
[Illustration: 'O SHRIEVE ME, SHRIEVE ME, HOLY MAN']
"'O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man!'
The Hermit crossed his brow.
'Say quick,' quoth he, 'I bid thee say--
What manner of man art thou?'
"Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched
With a woeful agony,
Which forced me to begin my tale;
And then it left me free.
"Since then, at an uncertain hour,
That agony returns:
And till my ghastly tale is told,
This heart within me burns.
"I pass, like night, from land to land;
I have strange power of speech;
The moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me:
To him my tale I teach.
"What loud uproar bursts from that door!
The wedding-guests are there:
But in the garden-bower the bride
And bridesmaids singing are:
And hark the little vesper bell,
Which biddeth me to prayer!
"O Wedding-guest! This soul hath been
Alone on a wide, wide sea:
So lonely 'twas, that God himself
Scarce seemed there to be.
"O sweeter than the marriage feast,
'Tis sweeter far to me,
To walk together to the kirk
With a goodly company!
"To walk together to the kirk,
And all together pray,
While each to his great Father bends,
Old men, and babes, and loving friends,
And youths and maidens gay!
"Farewell, farewell! but this I tell
To thee, thou Wedding-guest!
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.
"He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all."[57-42]
The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
Whose beard with age is hoar,
Is gone: and now the Wedding-guest
Turned from the bridegroom's door.
He went like one that hath been stunned,
And is of sense forlorn:
A sadder and a wiser man,
He rose the morrow morn.
FOOTNOTES:
[29-*] NOTE.--In 1798 there was published in England a little volume of
poems known as _Lyrical Ballads_. This collection brought to its two
young authors, Wordsworth and Coleridge, little immediate fame, but not
long afterward people began to realize that much that was contained in
the little book was real poetry, and great poetry. The chief
contribution of Coleridge to this venture was _The Ancient Mariner_.
The poem as originally printed had a series of quaintly explanatory
notes in the margin, and an introductory argument which read as follows:
"How a ship having passed the Line, was driven by storms to the cold
Country towards the South Pole; and how from thence she made her course
to the tropical latitudes of the great Pacific Ocean, and of the strange
things that befell; and in what manner the Ancient Mariner came back to
his own country."
[30-1] _Eftsoons_ means _quickly_. The poem is written in ballad form,
and many quaint old words are introduced.
[30-2] Such rhymes as this--_Mariner_ with _hear_,--were common in the
old ballads which Coleridge so perfectly imitates.
[30-3] Does this line tell you anything about the direction in which
they were sailing?
[30-4] Where was the ship when the sun stood "over the mast at noon"?
[31-5] Two words are to be understood in this line--"As _one_ who _is_
pursued."
[31-6] Is not this an effective line? Can you think of any way in which
the closeness of the foe could be more effectively suggested?
[32-7] Coleridge's wonderful power of painting word-pictures is shown in
this and the succeeding stanzas. With the simplest language he makes us
realize the absolute lonesomeness and desolateness of the scene: he
produces in us something of the same feeling of awe and horror that we
should have were we actually in the situation he describes.
[32-8] _Clifts_ means _cleft rocks_.
[32-9] "Like noises _one hears_ in a swound."
[32-10] _Thorough_ is used here instead of _through_, as it often is in
poetry, for the sake of the meter.
[32-11] Besides the joy the sailors felt at seeing a living creature
after the days in which they had seen "nor shapes of men nor beasts,"
they had a special pleasure in welcoming the albatross because it was
regarded as a bird of good omen.
[34-12] Coleridge does not state that it was the albatross that brought
the "good south wind:" he lets us infer it.
[34-13] In what direction were they sailing now?
[35-14] _Uprist_ is an old form for _uprose_.
[35-15] It was this attitude of the sailors toward the mariner's brutal
act of killing the bird that brought punishment upon them; they cared
nothing for the death of the harmless bird, but only for its effect upon
them.
[35-16] Note the striking alliteration in these two lines. Read this
stanza and the succeeding one aloud, and see how much easier it is to
read these alliterative lines rapidly than it is any of the other six
lines. Such relation of movement to meaning is one of the artistic
things about the poem.
[35-17] How far northward had the ship returned?
[35-18] When such a definite picture is presented, close your eyes and
try to see it. Did you ever see the sun when it seemed to have no
radiance--when it was just a red circle?
[36-19] A rout is a confused and whirling dance.
[36-20] The death-fires are a sort of phosphorescent light, or
will-o'-the-wisp, supposed to portend death.
[36-21] The shipmates try in this manner to fasten all the guilt on the
ancient mariner and mark him alone for punishment.
[37-22] _Wist_ means _knew_.
[37-23] _Gramercy_ is an exclamation derived from the French _grand
merci_, which means _great thanks_.
[37-24] In a comment on _The Ancient Mariner_ Coleridge says: "I took
the thought of 'grinning for joy' from my companion's remark to me, when
we had climbed to the top of Plinlimmon, and were nearly dead with
thirst. We could not speak from the constriction, till we found a little
puddle under a stone. He said to me: 'You grinned like an idiot.' He had
done the same."
[39-25] Gossameres are the cobweb-like films seen floating in the air in
summer.
[39-26] Death and Life-in-Death have been casting dice for the crew, as
to whether they shall die, or live and suffer. Life-in-Death has won the
ancient mariner.
[40-27] This is Coleridge's beautiful way of telling us that in the
tropics there is little or no twilight.
[40-28] _Clomb_ is an old form of _climbed_.
[40-29] That is, the waning moon. Did you ever see the moon "with one
bright star within the nether tip"?
[41-30] In his notes on the poem, Coleridge stated that the last two
lines of this stanza were composed by Wordsworth.
[42-31] Can you see any reason for the repetition in this line, and for
the unusual length? Does it suggest the _load_ and the _weariness_ in
the next line?
[43-32] This is the turning point of the poem. As soon as the mariner
felt in his heart love for the "happy living things," the spell which
had been laid on him for the wanton slaying of the albatross began to
break. In the third stanza from the end of the poem, this point is
clearly brought out.
[44-33] _Silly_ here means _helpless, useless_.
[44-34] _Sheen_ means bright, _glittering_.
[45-35] Note this fine alliterative line.
[49-36] The mariner has been thrown into a trance, for the ship is being
driven northward faster than a human being could endure.
[50-37] A charnel-dungeon is a vault or chamber underneath or near a
church, where the bones of the dead are laid.
[50-38] The sin is finally expiated.
[52-39] The holy rood is the holy cross.
[52-40] "The silence sank like music on my heart," is among the
beautiful lines that you will often hear quoted.
[53-41] An ivy-tod is a thick clump of ivy.
[57-42] A friend of Coleridge's once told him that she admired _The
Ancient Mariner_, but had a serious fault to find with it--it had no
moral. Do you think, as you read this stanza, that her objection was a
valid one?
[Illustration]
THE BLACK HAWK TRAGEDY[58-1]
_By_ EDWIN D. COE
I do not pose as an Indian lover. In fact the instincts and impressions
of my early life bent me in the opposite direction. My father's log
house, in which I was born, stood within a few rods of Rock River, about
forty-five miles west of this city. The stream was the boundary line, in
a half-recognized way, between two tribes of Indians, and a common
highway for both. I well remember their frequent and unheralded entries
into our house, and their ready assumption of its privileges. I can see
them yet--yes, and smell them, too. In some unventilated chamber of my
rather capacious nostrils an abiding breath of that intense,
all-conquering odor of fish, smoke and muskrat, which they brought with
them, still survives. I well remember their impudent and sometimes
bullying demeanor; and the horror of one occasion I shall never forget,
when a stalwart Winnebago, armed with a knife, tomahawk and gun, seized
my mother by the shoulder as she stood by her ironing table, and shook
her because she said she had no bread for him. I wrapped myself in her
skirts and howled in terror. Having been transplanted from the city to
the wilderness, she had a mortal fear of Indians, but never revealed it
to them. She had nerve, and resolution as well; and this particular
fellow she threatened with her hot flat-iron and drove him out of the
house. So you see I have no occasion for morbid or unnatural sympathy
with any of the Indian kind.
Black Hawk was born in 1767 at Saukenuk. His father was the war chief of
the nation and a very successful leader. Young Black Hawk inherited his
martial spirit and conducted himself so valorously in battle that he was
recognized as a brave when only fifteen years old. He was enthusiastic
and venturesome, and before the close of his twentieth year had led
several expeditions against the Osages and Sioux. It was his boast that
he had been in a hundred Indian battles and had never suffered defeat.
Life passed pleasantly with Black Hawk and his tribe at Saukenuk for
many years. The location combined all the advantages possible for their
mode of existence. When Black Hawk was taken to Washington after his
capture in 1832, he made an eloquent and most pathetic speech at one of
the many interviews which he held with the high officials of the
government. He said: "Our home was very beautiful. My house always had
plenty. I never had to turn friend or stranger away for lack of food.
The island was our garden. There the young people gathered plums,
apples, grapes, berries and nuts. The rapids furnished us fish. On the
bottom lands our women raised corn, beans and squashes. The young men
hunted game on the prairie and in the woods. It was good for us. When I
see the great fields and big villages of the white people, I wonder why
they wish to take our little territory from us."
We are apt to regard the agriculture of the Indians as of small moment,
but the Sauks and Foxes cultivated three thousand acres on the peninsula
between the Rock and the Mississippi. Black Hawk said it was eight
hundred acres, but the measurement of the cornfields shows that the area
was nearly four times that. Of this the Foxes, who were much the smaller
and weaker tribe, farmed five hundred acres; they also occupied
considerable land on the opposite side of the Mississippi, where the
city of Davenport now stands. These lands were all fenced with posts and
rails, the latter being held in place by bark withes. The barrier was
sufficient to keep the ponies out of the corn, but their lately acquired
razor-back hogs gave them more trouble. The work of preparing a field
for their planting involved much labor. The women heaped the ground into
hills nearly three feet high, and the corn was planted in the top for
many successive years without renewing the hills. Accordingly a field
was much more easily prepared on the mellow bottom lands than on the
tough prairie sod. They raised three kinds of corn: a sweet corn for
roasting ears, a hard variety for hominy and a softer for meal. They
also cultivated beans, squashes, pumpkins, artichokes and some tobacco.
The Sauks at one time sold three thousand bushels of corn to the
government officials at Fort Crawford for their horses. The Winnebagoes
at Lake Koshkonong sold four thousand bushels of corn to General
Atkinson when he was pursuing Black Hawk in 1832. The hundreds of acres
of corn hills still visible about the latter lake show how extensively
that region was inhabited and farmed by the Indians.
Aside from the devastating wars which the tribe carried on with their
new enemies west of the great river, whereby their numbers were steadily
reduced, no serious shadow fell upon their life at and about Rock Island
till the year 1804. A French trader had established himself a few miles
below on the Mississippi. The young braves and squaws delighted in
visiting his place and were always sure of a dance in the evening. One
night in that year an Indian killed one of the habitues of the place,
the provocation being unbearable. A few weeks after demand was made that
he be given up, and he was at once surrendered and taken to Saint Louis.
Soon after, his relative, Quashquamme, one of the sub-chiefs of the
tribe, and four or five other Sauks went to Saint Louis to work for his
release. A bargain was made to the effect that a tract of land including
parts of Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin and Illinois, comprising fifty
million acres, be ceded to the government, the consideration being the
cancellation of a debt of $2,400, which the Indians owed trader Choteau,
of Saint Louis, and a perpetual annuity of $1,000 thereafter. It was
also tacitly agreed that the imprisoned Indian should be released. This
part of the program was carried out, but the poor fellow had not gone
three hundred feet before he was shot dead. We are sorry to say that
General William Henry Harrison was the chief representative of the
government in this one-sided treaty, though, of course, he knew nothing
of the predetermined killing of the Indian prisoner. This treaty, made
without due authority on the part of Quashquamme, was not accepted by
the Sauks till 1816, when its ratification was made a side issue in an
agreement which the government negotiated between the Sauks and the
Osages or Sioux.
Black Hawk always claimed that he had never consented to the sale of
Saukenuk; and it is but fair to Quashquamme to say that he always
insisted that his cession of land went only to the Rock--and therefore
did not include Saukenuk--and not to the Wisconsin, as the whites
asserted. I have been thus explicit, as the disagreement about this
treaty led to the final conflict between the Sauks and the whites.
One proposition of the original paper was that the Indians should be
allowed to occupy all the territory as aforetime until it was surveyed
and sold to settlers. Along in the '20's the frontier line rapidly
approached the great river; and about 1823, when still fifty miles
distant, squatters began to settle on the Indian lands at Saukenuk.
Protest was made against this to the commander of Fort Armstrong (which
was built on Rock Island in 1816) and to the government, but without
avail.
The squatters, relying for protection on the troops near by, perpetrated
outrages of the most exasperating character. They turned their horses
into the Indian cornfields, threw down fences, whipped one young woman
who had pulled a few corn suckers from one of their fields to eat, while
on her way to work, and finally two ruffians met Black Hawk himself one
day as he was hunting on the river bottom and accused him of shooting
their hogs. He indignantly denied it, but they snatched his rifle from
his hand, wrenched the flint out, and then beat the old man with a
hickory stick till the blood ran down his back, and he could not leave
his house for days. Doubtless this indignity surpassed all other
outrages in the proud old chief's estimation, and we can imagine him
sitting in his cabin on the highest ground in the village, looking over
the magnificent landscape, brooding upon the blight which had fallen
upon the beautiful home of his tribe, and harboring thoughts of revenge.
Still he refrained from open resistance till the spring of 1831.
[Illustration: BLACKHAWK AND THE TWO RUFFIANS]
It was the custom of the tribe to spend the winter months hunting and
trapping in northeastern Missouri, returning in the spring to Saukenuk.
This time they found the whites more aggressive than ever. They had
fenced in the most of the cultivated land, plowed over the burying
ground, and destroyed a number of houses. They received the Indians with
hostile looks, but Black Hawk at last did what he ought to have done at
first, ordered the squatters all off the peninsula. He then went to an
island where a squatter sold liquor and had paid no heed to his
entreaties not to sell to the Indians, and with a party of his braves
knocked in the heads of the whisky barrels and poured their contents on
the ground. The liquor vendor immediately hurried to Governor Reynolds,
of Illinois, with his tale of woe and represented that Black Hawk was
devastating the country with torch and tomahawk.
Governor Reynolds at once issued a flamboyant proclamation calling for
volunteers, and asked the United States authorities at Saint Louis for
aid. A considerable body of regulars was dispatched up the river and
reached Saukenuk before the volunteers. Black Hawk told his people to
remain in their houses, and not to obey any orders to leave Saukenuk,
for they had not sold their home and had done no wrong. But when he saw
the undisciplined, lawless and wildly excited volunteers, who came a few
days later, he told the people that their lives were in danger and they
must go. Accordingly the next morning at an early hour all embarked in
their canoes and crossed the Mississippi. They were visited there by the
officials, and Black Hawk entered into an agreement to remain west of
the river.
Black Hawk's band spent the fall and winter, after their expulsion from
Saukenuk, in great unhappiness and want. It was too late to plant corn,
and they suffered from hunger. Their winter's hunt was unsuccessful, as
they lacked ammunition, and many of their guns and traps had gone to pay
for the whisky they had drunk before Black Hawk broke up the traffic. In
the meantime Black Hawk was planning to recover Saukenuk by force. He
visited Canada, but received little encouragement there, except sympathy
and the assurance that his cause was just.
Black Hawk's worst adviser was Neapope, his second in command, and a
terrible liar. He also visited Canada and claimed that the British whom
he had seen stood ready to help Black Hawk with men, arms and
ammunition, and that a steamboat would bring them to Milwaukee in the
spring. This was good news to the credulous old chief; and quite as
acceptable as this was Neapope's story that the Winnebagoes and
Pottawatomi would join in the campaign to secure his rights. Added to
these encouragements were the entreaties of the homesick hungry women,
who longed for their houses and cornfields at Saukenuk.
Keokuk did his utmost to dissuade Black Hawk but in vain, and then he
gave warning to the whites of Black Hawk's purpose. He feared that the
whole nation might be drawn into the war if it was once started. Black
Hawk's first move with his band in the spring of 1832 was to visit
Keokuk's village, set up his war post and call for recruits. He wore a
British uniform and displayed a British flag. This foolishness and
gratification of vanity cost him dearly in the end. He made an
impassioned speech and wrought the Indians up to such enthusiasm that
they demanded that Keokuk join with Black Hawk. It was a critical moment
for the young chief--even his life was in danger; but he was a more
skillful master of oratory than even the eloquent Black Hawk, and,
seeming at first to fall in with his plan, he gradually showed up its
danger and its impracticable character, until at last he saved all his
own party and even won a considerable number away from Black Hawk.
On the 26th of April the Black Hawk band crossed the Mississippi several
miles below Rock River. They numbered twelve hundred in all, less than
four hundred being warriors, and these only partly armed. Their
destination was Prophetstown, as Black Hawk's plan was to raise a crop
there and go on the war path in the fall. The braves struck across the
country, while the women, weak with famine, slowly paddled the canoes up
against the swift current of the river. They reached Prophetstown late
in April, the heavy rains which had swollen the rivers greatly impeding
their progress. A marvelous feature of this journey across the territory
which the whites claimed had been ceded to them, is the fact that not
the slightest depredation was committed at any farm or house on the
march. The inhabitants fled, but the hungry Indians touched none of the
abundant food which they left behind. Not a gun was fired. Black Hawk
had ordered that no offense be given, and he was strictly obeyed.
Black Hawk was disappointed to find that the Winnebagoes were lukewarm
as to his enterprise, and also reluctant to let him plant a crop,
fearing to get into trouble with the government. He then pushed on to
confer with the Pottawatomi, who had a village at Sycamore Creek about
forty miles farther on. Here he found similar conditions; also he
learned the falsity of the story that he could get aid from the British.
He says that he then determined to return to Iowa and make the best of
it there. But he was too late--Governor Reynolds had issued another
proclamation, and two thousand volunteers besides a considerable body of
regulars were on his trail. He had made a farewell dog feast for his
Pottawatomi friends, when a scout brought news that about three hundred
whites were going into camp five miles distant. This was a sort of
independent command under Major Stillman, who had pushed ahead of the
main body. It was composed of lawless, undisciplined material, and at
that moment was suffering under the effects of drinking two barrels of
whisky which the troops had poured down their throats rather than leave
it on a wagon that was hopelessly stuck in the mud.
Black Hawk directed three young braves to take a white flag, go to the
camp, ask what the purpose of the command was, and to say that he
desired a conference with them. He then sent five others on horseback to
report the reception which the flag bearers met with. Three of them an
hour later came at full speed into camp, reporting that the whites had
surrounded the flag bearers and killed them and then chased the five who
had followed, killing two of them, and were coming on in full force. All
the devil in the old warrior's heart was roused by this brutal
treachery, and calling on the forty warriors who were with him at the
conference, the rest being in camp some miles away, he hastened to meet
the enemy. Forming an ambush in the brush, the Indians fired their guns
as the whites approached, just at nightfall, and rose up and charged
with a wild yell. The drunken volunteers at once turned and fled, the
panic gathering force as they went. The fugitives rushed through the
camp pell-mell, and all who were left there joined in the stampede. In
their desperate fear, every soldier thought every other an Indian and
fired hither and yon. Eleven were killed, probably only one by the
redskins. The survivors for the most part continued their flight,
spreading the most exaggerated stories of the numbers and ferocity of
the Indians, until they reached their several homes. As it proved, the
three Indian flag bearers were not harmed till the stampede began, when
one of them was shot by a soldier just mounting his horse to run. One of
the surviving Indians immediately killed him with his tomahawk.
This easy triumph changed Black Hawk's purpose. He regarded it as an
omen of victory and determined to go on. But his strenuous efforts to
enlist the Pottawatomi in the cause were unavailing. Old Chief Shaubenee
had absolute control over them and steadily said "no." Even Chief Big
Foot at the head of Lake Geneva refused. He was a drunken, sullen,
brutal savage, but had given his word to keep the peace and did so,
though he bitterly hated the whites and would have been glad to see the
war go on. About one hundred reckless, lawless individuals of the
Winnebago and Pottawatomi tribes joined Black Hawk, but gradually
deserted him as his fortunes waned.
Black Hawk was now anxious to take his women, children and old men to a
place of safety, and, following the guidance of two Winnebagoes, they
made their way up the Rock to Hustisford Rapids and there went into
camp. Fish, game, clams, roots and the bark of trees constituted their
food while there, but Black Hawk in his biography says they found it
difficult to keep from starving. And, adding to their present misery,
the thrifty, provident squaws saw another harvestless summer passing and
a winter of famine before them. With his warriors he then returned to
continue the contest. A few skirmishes and collisions took place along
the line that now separates Wisconsin and Illinois, and predatory
parties of Winnebagoes and Pottawatomi worked out their grudges and
revenges on whites who had incurred their enmity. These outrages were
numerous and were attributed to the Sauks, as their perpetrators
expected would be the case. It is now believed that not a single case of
the murder of an unarmed man or of a woman or child was justly
chargeable to the Sauks.
Governor Reynolds had called for a second levy of two thousand
volunteers, and General Atkinson, with a considerable force of regulars,
was in the field. All were under his command, and he followed Black
Hawk, as the latter retired northward, with an army of four thousand,
all mounted, fully twelve times as great in number as the starving band
which he was pursuing. They camped near Beloit, camped at Milton, near
the south end of Storr's Lake, and followed on cautiously to Lake
Koshkonong, for Atkinson had a most wholesome regard for Black Hawk's
prowess. At the lake they found an old blind Sauk who had been left
behind. They gave him food, but a straggler coming along later shot him
as he was crawling to a spring for water. His bones lay on the ground
unburied for years after the country was settled, the skull having been
hung on a bush. At the junction of the Bark and Rock rivers Atkinson
went into utter bewilderment and uncertainty as to Black Hawk's
whereabouts, and he finally built the stockade at the point which bears
his name. He dispatched a considerable force under Colonels Alexander,
Dodge and Henry to Portage for supplies. There they learned where Black
Hawk's camp was; Henry and Dodge set out to attack it, while Alexander
returned to Atkinson. The latter had heard that Black Hawk was in full
force at Burnt Village on the Whitewater River, about four miles north
of the location now occupied by the city bearing that name. He sent off
messengers for the remainder of the army to join him for an attack.
But in going and coming, the trail of Black Hawk and his entire band was
discovered leading to the west. Henry and Dodge started in rapid
pursuit, sending word to Atkinson that the game had been flushed. That
doughty warrior had in the meantime learned that the Burnt Village story
was a myth; and those of his men whose time had expired, broke ranks and
returned to their homes, all believing that Black Hawk had finally
escaped. The fugitive's trail crossed the site of the present city of
Madison and also the University grounds, bearing thence northwest to the
Wisconsin River. Singularly enough, Black Hawk struck this stream
directly opposite the site of his people's ancient village of Prairie
du Sac. Soon after leaving Fourth Lake the Indians discovered their
pursuers and hastened their painful flight. All along the trail had been
marked by evidences of their extremity: in the skeletons of ponies
robbed of their flesh, in the trees stripped of bark for food, and the
ground dug over for roots. To these proofs were now added kettles and
blankets which the enfeebled women could no longer carry, and the dead
bodies of famished papooses and old people.
[Illustration: THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN CROSSED THE RIVER]
About four o'clock in the afternoon, the rear guard of the Sauks was
overtaken a few miles from the river. This was on the 21st day of July,
and the troops had made a forced march of eighty miles in three days
from the Rock to the Wisconsin, much of the way through swamps and dense
forests. Until dark a series of skirmishes was maintained, the Indians
skilfully forming new lines and holding the enemy back while the women
and children were crossing the river. Black Hawk directed the fight
while sitting on his pony, his stentorian voice reaching every part of
the field. He always counted this battle as most creditable to his
military genius, and there is reason for the claim, for he delayed the
whites till the passage of the river was secured. Jefferson Davis, who
was present, says that the squaws tore the bark off the trees and made
little canoes in which to float their papooses and utensils across the
river; and that half the braves swam the river holding their rifles in
the air, while the rest kept the whites back, and then, having landed,
fired on the whites from the other side, while the remaining braves
crossed. Davis pronounced it the most brilliant defensive battle he ever
witnessed.
The next morning the Indians had disappeared, but during the night they
had constructed a raft upon which a large number of the women and
children and old men were placed and set adrift, hoping that they would
be allowed to go down the river unmolested, and reach their late village
in Iowa. But Colonel Dodge sent word ahead, and the soldiers at Fort
Crawford lay in wait for them; and when the raft approached they fired
upon the helpless creatures, killing a large number. A few were taken
prisoners, but the rest were drowned or swam ashore and afterwards
perished of hunger in the woods.
Late in the night after the fight at Wisconsin Heights, a loud, shrill
voice was heard from the eminence which Black Hawk had occupied during
the conflict. It caused consternation at first among the whites, as it
was thought to signify a night attack. But the voice continued in
strong, impassioned harangue for more than an hour, eliciting, however,
only jeers and an occasional rifle shot. It was afterwards learned that
the orator was Neapope, speaking in the Winnebago tongue. He had seen a
few Winnebagoes with the whites in the afternoon but did not know that
they had gone away at nightfall. He told how they saw their great
mistake in leaving Iowa, that they had their wives and children with
them, that all were dying for want of food, and that they only asked to
be allowed to go in peace; and they pledged themselves to return to
Iowa, and never again come east of the river. Neapope was an orator of
great power, and he presented his plea with all the eloquence of which
he was master. But it fell on ears that understood not its purport. I
know of no more pathetic incident in all the long chapter of human woe
and despair than this pitiful prayer of a perishing people for mercy and
forgiveness, spoken in a tongue that carried no meaning to those who
heard. Let us hope that if the petition had been understood it would
have been granted.
The loss in the battle on the 21st had not been large on either side,
and the Black Hawk band pursued their journey to the Mississippi
without guides, through a rugged, trackless wilderness, sorrowing,
suffering and despairing. The whites continued down the Wisconsin to
Helena, where General Atkinson took command. Helena was a deserted
village which had been built to carry on shot-making. The soldiers tore
down the log houses and made rafts of the logs to cross the river. Five
days in all were consumed before the Black Hawk trail was discovered,
and then the pursuers were guided to it by crows and buzzards gathering
in the air over the bodies of dead refugees left by the wayside.
On the first of August the Indians reached the Mississippi and began
crossing in two canoes. In the afternoon the steamer Warrior, which had
been sent up from Fort Crawford to notify the Sioux Chief, Wabasha, one
hundred and twenty miles above to look out for his enemy, Black Hawk,
who was headed that way, stopped opposite the spot where the Indians had
gathered. Black Hawk raised a white flag and tried to parley; but the
captain assumed that it was an attempt to trap him and, without warning,
fired into the Indians at short range with a cannon loaded with
cannister. Thus a second time was the usage of all nations violated in
this war by refusing to recognize the flag of truce. Twenty-three were
killed by this discharge. There were twenty riflemen on the boat who
then began firing, and the Sauks responded. The Warrior soon after
steamed away to Fort Crawford, twenty miles below, and the Indians
continued their efforts to cross the river, here three hundred rods wide
and running a strong current. Some were drowned and others were carried
down the stream on improvised rafts. A few of these were rescued at
Prairie du Chien.
The next day Atkinson appeared on the ground. Black Hawk seems to have
been utterly demoralized and had told those who had not crossed that he
was going to the Chippewa country, and that they had better follow. Only
a few did so, and after going a few miles he turned back on August 2nd,
just in time to see the closing scene of the massacre called the battle
of Bad Axe.
As Atkinson approached he was skilfully decoyed beyond the Indian camp
some distance, but its location was finally discovered and a fierce
onslaught was made. The poor wretches at first begged for quarter, but
as the soldiers shot them down without discrimination, they fought for a
time with desperation, and then men, women and children plunged into the
river, the most of them to drown before reaching the other side. The
steamer Warrior reappeared, and the sharpshooters fired at the swimmers,
some of them women with babies on their backs. The incidents of the
merciless slaughter are too harrowing for recital, and would be
incredible if not thoroughly authenticated. It is difficult to
understand the ferocity with which Black Hawk's band was pursued and
destroyed. Probably the belief that he was still in the British service
had much to do with it; also his first success at Stillman's Run, and
the murder of the whites in Northern Illinois by marauders from other
tribes, which were unjustly charged to him, may account for it in large
part. About three hundred Indians succeeded in crossing the river, but
their ill fate still pursued them. Their fierce enemy, Wabasha, was on
their track, and before reaching the Iowa river half of the three
hundred had been relentlessly slain. Of the twelve hundred who crossed
the Mississippi in April, only one hundred and fifty, and they barely
living skeletons, returned in August.
Black Hawk gave himself up soon after the Bad Axe massacre to the
Winnebagoes, and was surrendered to our officers at Prairie du Chien.
Thence he was taken to Saint Louis, Washington, through the east, and
back to Fort Armstrong, where he was delivered over to Keokuk, who
became surety for his good behavior. Although always kindly treated by
the latter, the old chief never ceased to be mindful of his
subordination. For five years he brooded over his misfortunes and
humiliation, and then died in his seventy-second year. Even his body was
not allowed to rest in peace; it was stolen, and when the Indians
discovered the theft and demanded the return of the bones, the building
in which the skeleton was stored burned before it was delivered up, and
only indistinguishable ashes remained.
A word further is due the stalwart old chief, whose good qualities
certainly surpassed his evil ones. He was honorable, brave, generous and
magnanimous. He never permitted a captive to be tortured, and early gave
up the practice of scalping the enemies he had slain. As a leader in
Indian warfare he ranks high, and his final campaign had in its purpose
the same comprehensive idea which actuated Tecumseh and Pontiac, that of
a union of all Indian tribes; and he had the further intent of drawing
in the British to enforce the treaty of 1815, which he claimed had been
violated in his own case--the guarantee of immunity to all Indian allies
of the British having been disregarded. Absolute honesty and
truthfulness in business matters were among his characteristics. These
he shared with his people generally. Colonel Davenport, who had a
trading establishment on the island for many, many years, used often to
go to dinner leaving his store full of Indians, and he said they never
took so much as a clay pipe in his absence.
Black Hawk was impulsive, hopeful and credulous, and so was easily
imposed upon; he had an ardent love for the beauties of nature; he was
deeply religious, and said that he never took a drink of water from a
brook without sincere gratitude to the Great Spirit who cared for him.
He was a tender husband and father, and, contrary to the usage of his
tribe, married only one wife. When his father was killed he mourned and
fasted five years. He did the same for two years, when a son and
daughter died, eating only a little corn each evening, "hoping that the
Great Spirit would take pity on him." We wish for the honor of our race
that this poor savage whose only offense was that of loving his home too
well to give it up without a struggle, had not gone out of life leaving
such a red, indelible page on the book of history against us.
FOOTNOTES:
[58-1] The following account is taken from a paper read before the Loyal
Legion at Milwaukee, May 6, 1896, by Mr. Coe.
THE PETRIFIED FERN
_By_ MARY BOLLES BRANCH
In a valley, centuries ago,
Grew a little fern-leaf, green and slender,
Veining delicate and fibres tender;
Waving when the wind crept down so low.
Rushes tall, and moss, and grass grew round it,
Playful sunbeams darted in and found it,
Drops of dew stole in by night, and crowned it,
But no foot of man e'er trod that way;
Earth was young, and keeping holiday.
Monster fishes swam the silent main,
Stately forests waved their giant branches,
Mountains hurled their snowy avalanches,
Mammoth creatures stalked across the plain;
Nature revelled in grand mysteries,
But the little fern was not of these,
Did not number with the hills and trees;
Only grew and waved its wild sweet way,
None ever came to note it day by day.
Earth one time put on a frolic mood,
Heaved the rocks and changed the mighty motion
Of the deep, strong currents of the ocean;
Moved the plain and shook the haughty wood,
Crushed the little fern in soft moist clay,--
Covered it, and hid it safe away.
O the long, long centuries since that day!
O the agony! O life's bitter cost,
Since that useless little fern was lost!
Useless? Lost? There came a thoughtful man
Searching Nature's secrets, far and deep;
From a fissure in a rocky steep
He withdrew a stone, o'er which there ran
Fairy pencilings, a quaint design,
Veinings, leafage, fibres clear and fine,
And the fern's life lay in every line!
So, I think, God hides some souls away,
Sweetly to surprise us, the last day.
AN EXCITING CANOE RACE
_By_ J. FENIMORE COOPER
The heavens were still studded with stars when Hawkeye[79-1] came to
arouse the sleepers. Casting aside their cloaks, Munro[79-2] and
Heyward[79-3] were on their feet while the woodsman was still making his
low calls at the entrance of the rude shelter where they had passed the
night. When they issued from beneath its concealment, they found the
scout awaiting their appearance nigh by, and the only salutation between
them was the significant gesture for silence made by their sagacious
leader.
"Think over your prayers," he whispered, as they approached him; "for He
to whom you make them knows all tongues; that of the heart, as well as
those of the mouth. But speak not a syllable; it is rare for a white
voice to pitch itself properly in the woods. Come," he continued,
turning toward a curtain of the works; "let us get into the ditch on
this side, and be regardful to step on the stones and fragments of wood
as you go."
[Illustration: HAWKEYE ON THE TRAIL]
His companions complied, though to two of them the reasons of this
extraordinary precaution were yet a mystery. When they were in the low
cavity that surrounded the earthen fort on three of its sides, they
found the passage nearly choked by the ruins. With care and patience,
however, they succeeded in clambering after the scout until they reached
the sandy shore of the Horicon.
"That's a trail that nothing but a nose can follow," said the satisfied
scout, looking back along their difficult way; "grass is a treacherous
carpet for a flying party to tread on, but wood and stone take no print
from a moccasin. Had you worn your armed boots, there might indeed have
been something to fear; but with the deerskin suitably prepared, a man
may trust himself, generally, on rocks with safety. Shove in the canoe
nigher to the land, Uncas;[81-4] this sand will take a stamp as easily
as the butter of the Jarmans on the Mohawk. Softly, lad, softly; it must
not touch the beach, or the knaves will know by what road we have left
the place."
The young man observed the precaution; and the scout laying a board from
the ruins to the canoe, made a sign for the two officers to enter. When
this was done, everything was studiously restored to its former
disorder; and then Hawkeye succeeded in reaching his little birchen
vessel without leaving behind him any of those marks which he appeared
so much to dread.
"Now," continued the scout, looking back at the dim shore of William
Henry, which was now fast receding, and laughing in his own silent but
heartfelt manner; "I have put a trail of water atween us; and unless the
imps can make friends with the fishes, and hear who has paddled across
their basin this fine morning, we shall throw the length of the Horicon
behind us before they have made up their minds which path to take."
"With foes in front and foes in our rear, our journey is like to be one
of danger."
"Danger," repeated Hawkeye, calmly; "no, not absolutely of danger, for,
with vigilant ears and quick eyes, we can manage to keep a few hours
ahead of the knaves; or, if we must try the rifle, there are three of us
who understand its gifts as well as any you can name on the borders. No,
not of danger; but that we shall have what you may call a brisk push of
it is probable; and it may happen a brush, a scrimmage, or some such
divarsion, but always where covers are good and ammunition abundant."
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER
1789-1851]
It is possible that Heyward's estimate of danger differed in some degree
from that of the scout, for, instead of replying, he now sat in silence,
while the canoe glided over several miles of water. Just as the day
dawned, they entered the narrows of the lake[82-5], and stole swiftly
and cautiously among their numberless little islands. It was by this
road that Montcalm had retired with his army, and the adventurers knew
not but he had left some of his Indians in ambush, to protect the rear
of his forces and collect the stragglers. They therefore approached
the passage with the customary silence of their guarded habits.
Chingachgook[83-6] laid aside his paddle, while Uncas and the scout
urged the light vessel through crooked and intricate channels, where
every foot that they advanced exposed them to the danger of some sudden
rising on their progress. The eyes of the sagamore moved warily from
islet to islet and copse to copse as the canoe proceeded; and when a
clearer sheet of water permitted, his keen vision was bent along the
bald rocks and impending forests that frowned upon the narrow strait.
Heyward, who was a doubly interested spectator as well from the beauties
of the place as from the apprehension natural to his situation, was just
believing that he had permitted the latter to be excited without
sufficient reason, when the paddle ceased moving, in obedience to a
signal from Chingachgook.
"Ugh!" exclaimed Uncas, nearly at the moment that the light tap his
father had made on the side of the canoe notified them of the vicinity
of danger.
"What now?" asked the scout; "the lake is as smooth as if the winds had
never blown, and I can see along its sheets for miles; there is not so
much as the black head of a loon dotting the water."
The Indian gravely raised his paddle, and pointed in the direction in
which his own steady look was riveted. Duncan's eyes followed the
motion. A few rods in their front lay another of the low-wooded islets,
but it appeared as calm and peaceful as if its solitude had never been
disturbed by the foot of man.
"I see nothing," he said, "but land and water; and a lovely scene it
is."
"Hist!" interrupted the scout. "Ay, sagamore, there is always a reason
for what you do. 'Tis but a shade, and yet it is not natural. You see
the mist, major, that is rising above the island; you can't call it a
fog, for it is more like a streak of thin cloud----"
"It is a vapor from the water."
"That a child could tell. But what is the edging of blacker smoke that
hangs along its lower side, and which you may trace down into the
thicket of hazel? 'Tis from a fire; but one that, in my judgment, has
been suffered to burn low."
"Let us then push for the place, and relieve our doubts," said the
impatient Duncan; "the party must be small that can lie on such a bit of
land."
"If you judge of Indian cunning by the rules you find in books or by
white sagacity, they will lead you astray, if not to your death,"
returned Hawkeye, examining the signs of the place with that acuteness
which distinguished him. "If I may be permitted to speak in this matter,
it will be to say that we have but two things to choose between: the one
is, to return and give up all thought of following the Hurons----"
"Never!" exclaimed Heyward in a voice far too loud for their
circumstances.
"Well, well," continued Hawkeye, making a hasty sign to repress his
impatience, "I am much of your mind myself; though I thought it becoming
my experience to tell the whole. We must then make a push, and, if the
Indians or Frenchers are in the narrows, run the gantlet through these
toppling mountains. Is there reason in my words, sagamore?"
[Illustration: HAWKEYE]
The Indian made no further answer than by dropping his paddle into the
water and urging forward the canoe. As he held the office of directing
its course, his resolution was sufficiently indicated by the movement.
The whole party now plied their paddles vigorously, and in a very few
moments they had reached a point whence they might command an entire
view of the northern shore of the island.
"There they are, by all the truth of signs," whispered the scout; "two
canoes and a smoke. The knaves haven't yet got their eyes out of the
mist, or we should hear the accursed whoop. Together, friends--we are
leaving them, and are already nearly out of whistle of a bullet."
The well-known crack of a rifle, whose ball came skipping along the
placid surface of the strait, and a shrill yell from the island
interrupted his speech and announced that their passage was discovered.
In another instant several savages were seen rushing into the canoes,
which were soon dancing over the water in pursuit. These fearful
precursors of a coming struggle produced no change in the countenances
and movements of his three guides, so far as Duncan could discover,
except that the strokes of their paddles were longer and more in unison,
and caused the little bark to spring forward like a creature possessing
life and volition.
"Hold them there, sagamore," said Hawkeye, looking coolly backward over
his left shoulder, while he still plied his paddle; "keep them just
there. Them Hurons have never a piece in their nation that will execute
at this distance; but 'Kill Deer'[86-7] has a barrel on which a man may
calculate."
The scout, having ascertained that the Mohicans were sufficient of
themselves to maintain the requisite distance, deliberately laid aside
his paddle and raised the fatal rifle. Then several times he brought the
piece to his shoulder, and when his companions were expecting its report
he as often lowered it to request the Indians would permit their enemies
to approach a little nigher. At length his accurate and fastidious eye
seemed satisfied, and throwing out his left arm on the barrel, he was
slowly elevating the muzzle, when an exclamation from Uncas, who sat in
the bow, once more caused him to suspend the shot.
"How now, lad?" demanded Hawkeye; "you saved a Huron[87-8] from the
death-shriek by that word; have you reason for what you do?"
Uncas pointed toward the rocky shore a little in their front, whence
another war canoe was darting directly across their course. It was too
obvious now that their situation was imminently perilous to need the aid
of language to confirm it. The scout laid aside his rifle, and resumed
the paddle, while Chingachgook inclined the bows of the canoe a little
toward the western shore, in order to increase the distance between them
and this new enemy. In the meantime they were reminded of the presence
of those who pressed on their rear, by wild and exulting shouts. The
stirring scene awakened even Munro from his apathy.
"Let us make for the rocks on the main," he said, with the mien of a
tried soldier, "and give battle to the savages. God forbid that I or
those attached to me or mine should ever trust again to the faith of any
servant of the Louises."
"He who wishes to prosper in Indian warfare," returned the scout, "must
not be too proud to learn from the wit of a native. Lay her more along
the land, sagamore; we are doubling on the varlets, and perhaps they may
try to strike our trail on the long calculation."
Hawkeye was not mistaken; for, when the Hurons found that their course
was likely to throw them behind their chase, they rendered it less
direct, until, by gradually bearing more and more obliquely, the two
canoes were, ere long, gliding on parallel lines, within two hundred
yards of each other. It now became entirely a trial of speed. So rapid
was the progress of the light vessels that the lake curled in their
front in miniature waves, and their motion became undulating by its own
velocity. It was, perhaps, owing to this circumstance, in addition to
the necessity of keeping every hand employed at the paddles, that the
Hurons had not immediate recourse to their firearms. The exertions of
the fugitives were too severe to continue long, and the pursuers had the
advantage of numbers. Duncan observed, with uneasiness, that the scout
began to look anxiously about him, as if searching for some further
means of assisting their flight.
"Edge her a little more from the sun, Sagamore," said the stubborn
woodsman; "I see the knaves are sparing a man to the rifle. A single
broken bone might lose us our scalps. Edge more from the sun, and we
will put the island between us."
The expedient was not without its use. A long, low island lay a little
distance before them, and, as they closed with it, the chasing canoe was
compelled to take a side opposite to that on which the pursued passed.
The scout and his companions did not neglect this advantage, but, the
instant they were hid from observation by the bushes, they redoubled
efforts that before had seemed prodigious. The two canoes came round the
last low point, like two coursers at the top of their speed, the
fugitives taking the lead. This change had brought them nigher to each
other, however, while it altered their relative positions.
"You showed knowledge in the shaping of birchen bark, Uncas, when you
chose this from among the Huron canoes," said the scout, smiling,
apparently more in satisfaction at their superiority in the race, than
from that prospect of final escape which now began to open a little upon
them. "The imps have put all their strength again at the paddles, and we
are to struggle for our scalps with bits of flattened wood, instead of
clouded barrels and true eyes. A long stroke, and together, friends!"
"They are preparing for a shot," said Heyward; "and as we are in a line
with them, it can scarcely fail."
"Get you then into the bottom of the canoe," returned the scout; "you
and the colonel; it will be so much taken from the size of the mark."
Heyward smiled, as he answered:
"It would be but an ill example for the highest in rank to dodge, while
the warriors were under fire!"
"Lord! Lord! that is now a white man's courage!" exclaimed the scout,
"and, like too many of his notions, not to be maintained by reason. Do
you think the sagamore, or Uncas, or even I, who am a man without a
cross, would deliberate about finding a cover in a scrimmage when an
open body would do no good? For what have the Frenchers reared up their
Quebec, if fighting is always to be done in the clearings?"
"All that you say is very true, my friend," replied Heyward; "still, our
custom must prevent us from doing as you wish."
A volley from the Hurons interrupted the discourse; and, as the bullets
whistled about them, Duncan saw the head of Uncas turned, looking back
at himself and Munro. Notwithstanding the nearness of the enemy, and his
own great personal danger, the countenance of the young warrior
expressed no other emotion, as the former was compelled to think, than
amazement at finding men willing to encounter so useless an exposure.
Chingachgook was probably better acquainted with the notions of white
men, for he did not even cast a glance aside from the riveted look his
eye maintained on the object by which he governed their course. A ball
soon struck the light and polished paddle from the hands of the chief,
and drove it through the air far in advance. A shout rose from the
Hurons, who seized the opportunity to fire another volley. Uncas
described an arc in the water with his own blade, and, as the canoe
passed swiftly on, Chingachgook recovered his paddle, and, flourishing
it on high, he gave the war-whoop of the Mohicans, and then lent his
strength and skill again to the important task.
The clamorous sounds of "Le Gros Serpent!"[91-9] "La Longue
Carabine!"[91-10] "Le Cerf Agile!"[91-11] burst at once from the canoes
behind, and seemed to give new zeal to the pursuers. The scout seized
"Kill Deer" in his left hand, and, elevating it above his head, he shook
it in triumph at his enemies. The savages answered the insult with a
yell, and immediately another volley succeeded. The bullets pattered
along the lake, and one even pierced the bark of their little vessel. No
perceptible emotion could be discovered in the Mohicans during this
critical moment, their rigid features expressing neither hope nor alarm;
but the scout again turned his head, and, laughing in his own silent
manner, he said to Heyward:
"The knaves love to hear the sounds of their pieces, but the eye is not
to be found among the Mingoes that can calculate a true range in a
dancing canoe! You see the dumb devils have taken off a man to charge,
and by the smallest measurement that can be allowed we move three feet
to their two."
Duncan, who was not altogether as easy under this nice estimate of
distances as his companions, was glad to find, however, that, owing to
their superior dexterity, and the diversion among their enemies they
were very sensibly obtaining the advantage. The Hurons soon fired again,
and a bullet struck the blade of Hawkeye's paddle without injury.
"That will do," said the scout, examining the slight indentation with a
curious eye; "it would not have cut the skin of an infant, much less of
men who, like us, have been blown upon by the heavens in their anger.
Now, major, if you will try to use this piece of flattened wood, I'll
let 'Kill Deer' take a part in the conversation."
Heyward seized the paddle and applied himself to the work with an
eagerness that supplied the place of skill, while Hawkeye was engaged in
inspecting the priming of his rifle. The latter then took a swift aim
and fired. The Huron in the bows of the leading canoe had risen with a
similar object, and he now fell backward, suffering the gun to escape
from his hands into the water. In an instant, however, he recovered his
feet, though his gestures were wild and bewildered. At the same moment
his companions suspended their efforts, and the chasing canoes clustered
together and became stationary. Chingachgook and Uncas profited by the
interval to regain their wind, though Duncan continued to work with the
most persevering industry. The father and son now cast calm but
inquiring glances at each other, to learn if either had sustained any
injury by the fire; for both well knew that no cry or exclamation would,
in such a moment of necessity, have been permitted to betray the
accident. A few large drops of blood were trickling down the shoulders
of the sagamore, who, when he perceived that the eyes of Uncas dwelt
too long on the sight, raised some water in the hollow of his hand, and,
washing off the stain, was content to manifest, in this simple manner,
the slightness of the injury.
The lake now began to expand, and their route lay along a reacher, that
was lined, as before, by high and rugged mountains. But the islands were
few and easily avoided. The strokes of the paddles grew more measured
and regular; while they who plied them continued their labor, after the
close and deadly chase from which they had just relieved themselves,
with as much coolness as though their speed had been tried in sport,
rather than under such pressing, nay, almost desperate circumstances.
Instead of following the western shore, whither their errand led them,
the wary Mohican inclined his course more toward those hills behind
which Montcalm was known to have led his army into the formidable
fortress of Ticonderoga. As the Hurons, to every appearance, had
abandoned the pursuit, there was no apparent reason for this excess of
caution. It was, however, maintained for hours until they had reached a
bay nigh the northern termination of the lake. Here the canoe was driven
upon the beach, and the whole party landed. Hawkeye and Heyward ascended
an adjacent bluff, where the former, after considering the expanse of
water beneath him, pointed out to the latter a small black object,
hovering under a headland, at a distance of several miles.
"Do you see it?" demanded the scout. "Now, what would you account that
spot, were you left alone to white experience to find your way through
this wilderness?"
"But for its distance and its magnitude, I should suppose it a bird. Can
it be a living object?"
"'Tis a canoe of good birchen bark, and paddled by fierce and crafty
Mingoes. Though Providence has lent to those who inhabit the woods eyes
that would be needless to men in the settlements where there are
inventions to assist the sight, yet no human organs can see all the
dangers which at this moment circumvent us. These varlets pretend to be
bent chiefly on their sundown meal, but the moment it is dark they will
be on our trail as true as hounds on the scent. We must throw them off.
These lakes are useful at times, especially when the game takes the
water," continued the scout, gazing about him with a countenance of
concern; "but they give no cover, except it be to fishes. God knows what
the country would be, if the settlement should ever spread far from the
two rivers. Both hunting and war would lose their beauty."
"Let us not delay a moment without some good and obvious cause."
"I little like that smoke which you may see worming up along the rock
above the canoe," interrupted the abstracted scout. "My life on it,
other eyes than ours see it, and know its meaning. Well, words will not
mend the matter, and it is time we were doing."
Hawkeye moved away from the lookout, and descended, musing profoundly,
to the shore. He communicated the result of his observations to his
companions, in Delaware, and a short and earnest consultation succeeded.
When it terminated, the three instantly set about executing their new
resolutions.
The canoe was lifted from the water, and borne on the shoulders of the
party. They proceeded into the wood, making as broad and obvious a trail
as possible. They soon reached a water course, which they crossed, and
continued onward until they came to an extensive and naked rock. At this
point, where their footsteps might be expected to be no longer visible,
they retraced their route to the brook, walking backward with the utmost
care. They now followed the bed of the little stream to the lake, into
which they immediately launched their canoe again. A low point concealed
them from the headland, and the margin of the lake was fringed for some
distance with dense and overhanging bushes. Under the cover of these
natural advantages, they toiled their way, with patient industry, until
the scout pronounced that he believed it would be safe once more to
land.
The halt continued until evening rendered objects indistinct and
uncertain to the eye. Then they resumed their route, and, favored by the
darkness, pushed silently and vigorously toward the western shore.
Although the rugged outline of mountain, to which they were steering,
presented no distinctive marks to the eyes of Duncan, the Mohican
entered the little haven he had selected with the confidence and
accuracy of an experienced pilot.
The boat was again lifted and borne into the woods, where it was
carefully concealed under a pile of brush. The adventurers assumed their
arms and packs, and the scout announced to Munro and Heyward that he and
the Indians were at last in readiness to proceed.
FOOTNOTES:
[79-1] Hawkeye is an American scout working with the English army. He is
one of the most important characters in this book, and under different
names figures in the other volumes of _The Leather-Stocking Tales_. In
one he is known as the Deerslayer, in others as Leather-Stocking and the
Pathfinder. His real name is Natty Bumppo. The five stories which Cooper
includes among _The Leather-Stocking Tales_ are in their natural order:
_Deerslayer_, _The Last of the Mohicans_, _The Pathfinder_, _The
Pioneers_ and _The Prairie_. This selection is taken from _The Last of
the Mohicans_.
[79-2] Munro is the father of two young ladies who have been captured
and carried away by the Indians. With his companions he is now following
the trail of the captors, and this canoe race is but one of many
adventures through which they pass before they finally rescue the women.
[79-3] Duncan Heyward is a British officer who was with the young ladies
when they were captured.
[81-4] Uncas is the son of the last chief of the Mohicans, a fine Indian
who sides with the Americans, and is, as his tribe has always been, a
bitter enemy of the Huron Indians.
[82-5] The beauties of Lake George are well known to every American
tourist. In the height of the mountains which surround it, and in
artificial accessories, it is inferior to the finest of the Swiss and
Italian lakes, while in outline and purity of water it is fully their
equal, and in the number and disposition of its isles and islets much
superior to them altogether. There are said to be some hundreds of
islands in a sheet of water less than thirty miles long. The narrows,
which connect what may be called, in truth two lakes, are crowded with
islands, to such a degree as to leave passages between them frequently
of only a few feet in width. The lake itself varies in breadth from one
to three miles.
[83-6] Chingachgook, the father of Uncas, is the chief of the Delaware
or Mohican Indians.
[86-7] _Kill Deer_, his favorite rifle, has a particularly long barrel,
much longer than the rifle used by the soldiers. Hawkeye's appearance is
described in another place as follows: "The frame of the white man,
judging by such parts as were not concealed by his clothes, was like
that of one who had known hardships and exertion from his earliest
youth. His person, though muscular, was rather attenuated than full; but
every nerve and muscle appeared strung and indurated by unremitted
exposure and toil. He wore a hunting-shirt of forest green, fringed with
faded yellow, and a summer cap of skins which had been shorn of their
fur. He also bore a knife in a girdle of wampum, like that which
confined the scanty garments of the Indian, but no tomahawk. His
moccasins were ornamented after the gay fashion of the natives, while
the only part of his under-dress which appeared below the hunting-frock,
was a pair of buckskin leggings that laced at the sides, and which were
gartered above the knees with the sinews of a deer. A pouch and horn
completed his personal accoutrements, though a rifle of great length,
which the theory of the more ingenious whites had taught them was the
most dangerous of all fire-arms, leaned against a neighboring sapling.
The eye of the hunter, or scout, whichever he might be, was small,
quick, keen, and restless, roving while he spoke, on every side of him,
as if in quest of game, or distrusting the sudden approach of some
lurking enemy. Notwithstanding these symptoms of habitual suspicion, his
countenance was not only without guile, but, at the moment at which he
is introduced, it was charged with an expression of sturdy honesty."
[87-8] The Huron tribe sided with the French, and as they were powerful
Indians, wise in woodcraft and fierce in battle, they were among the
most deadly foes whom the English colonists had to meet.
[91-9] _Le Gros Serpent_ is a French phrase meaning _The Great Serpent_,
or _The Big Snake_, a name which the Hurons gave to Chingachgook.
[91-10] _La Longue Carabine_ means _The Long Rifle_, and is the French
name which the Hurons gave to Hawkeye.
[91-11] _Le Cerf Agile_ is a French phrase which means _The Nimble
Deer_. It is the name given to Uncas by the Hurons.
THE BUFFALO
NOTE.--The following selections are taken from _The Oregon Trail_,
a narrative written by Francis Parkman describing the journey which
he undertook in order to study the manners, customs and character
of the Indians in their native state. Parkman planned this
investigation to prepare himself more fully for writing his
splendid _Histories of the French and Indians in America_, a series
of books which are not only the best accounts we have of the
period, but are also written in most charming style. His
_Conspiracy of Pontiac_ and _La Salle_ are among the most readable
of these works. The selections which we have made are peculiarly
interesting. His journey was begun in the spring of 1846, and in
the brief time that has elapsed the wilderness he describes has
given way to populous states and thriving cities. The red man is
seen there no longer, and the vast herds of buffalo whose numbers
seem to us incredible have become wholly extinct. In the United
States there remain almost no wild bison, and to study the animal
at all a person must now examine those half domesticated groups
that are confined in public parks.
The extravagant slaughter which he chronicles bears little
comparison to the hunts in which others engaged. The cruel and
wanton destruction of the bison takes its place in history with the
more fierce and relentless persecution which the Indians have
suffered. When we read of the innumerable herds of bison which
Parkman saw, we are inclined, however, not to wonder that he
expressed the belief that the extinction of the animal was
impossible. His description of his hunts are fascinating, and will
rouse the wild blood in any boy's nature.
Four days on the Platte, and yet no buffalo! Last year's signs of them
were provokingly abundant; and wood being extremely scarce, we found an
admirable substitute in the _bois de vache_, which burns exactly like
peat, producing no unpleasant effects. The wagons one morning had left
the camp; Shaw and I were already on horseback, but Henry Chatillon
still sat cross-legged by the dead embers of the fire, playing pensively
with the lock of his rifle, while his sturdy Wyandotte pony stood
quietly behind him, looking over his head. At last he got up, patted the
neck of the pony (whom, from an exaggerated appreciation of his merits,
he had christened "Five Hundred Dollar"), and then mounted with a
melancholy air.
"What is it, Henry?"
"Ah, I feel lonesome; I never been here before; but I see away yonder
over the buttes, and down there on the prairie, black--all black with
buffalo!"
In the afternoon he and I left the party in search of an antelope; until
at the distance of a mile or two on the right, the tall white wagons and
the little black specks of horsemen were just visible, so slowly
advancing that they seemed motionless; and far on the left rose the
broken line of scorched, desolate sand-hills. The vast plain waved with
tall rank grass that swept our horses' bellies; it swayed to and fro in
billows with the light breeze, and far and near antelope and wolves were
moving through it, the hairy backs of the latter alternately appearing
and disappearing as they bounded awkwardly along: while the antelope,
with the simple curiosity peculiar to them, would often approach us
closely, their little horns and white throats just visible above the
grass tops, as they gazed eagerly at us with their round black eyes.
I dismounted, and amused myself with firing at the wolves. Henry
attentively scrutinized the surrounding landscape; at length he gave a
shout, and called on me to mount again, pointing in the direction of the
sand-hills. A mile and a half from us, two minute black specks slowly
traversed the face of one of the bare glaring declivities, and
disappeared behind the summit. "Let us go!" cried Henry, belaboring the
sides of Five Hundred Dollar; and I following in his wake, we galloped
rapidly through the rank grass toward the base of the hills.
From one of their openings descended a deep ravine, widening as it
issued on the prairie. We entered it, and galloping up, in a moment were
surrounded by the bleak sand-hills. Half of their steep sides were bare;
the rest were scantily clothed with clumps of grass, and various uncouth
plants, conspicuous among which appeared the reptile-like prickly pear.
They were gashed with numberless ravines; and as the sky had suddenly
darkened, and a cold gusty wind arisen, the strange shrubs and the
dreary hills looked doubly wild and desolate. But Henry's face was all
eagerness. He tore off a little hair from the piece of buffalo robe
under his saddle, and threw it up to show the course of the wind. It
blew directly before us. The game were therefore to windward, and it was
necessary to make our best speed to get around them.
We scrambled from this ravine, and galloping away through the hollows,
soon found another, winding like a snake among the hills, and so deep
that it completely concealed us. We rode up the bottom of it, glancing
through the shrubbery at its edge, till Henry abruptly jerked his rein,
and slid out of his saddle. Full a quarter of a mile distant, on the
outline of the farthest hill, a long procession of buffalo were walking
in Indian file, with the utmost gravity and deliberation; then more
appeared, clambering from a hollow not far off, and ascending, one
behind the other, the grassy slope of another hill; then a shaggy head
and a pair of short broken horns appeared issuing out of a ravine close
at hand, and with a slow, stately step, one by one, the enormous brutes
came into view, taking their way across the valley, wholly unconscious
of an enemy. In a moment Henry was worming his way, lying flat on the
ground, through grass and prickly pears, toward his unsuspecting
victims. He had with him both my rifle and his own. He was soon out of
sight, and still the buffalo kept issuing into the valley. For a long
time all was silent; I sat holding his horse, and wondering what he was
about, when suddenly, in rapid succession, came the sharp reports of the
two rifles, and the whole line of buffalo, quickening their pace into a
clumsy trot, gradually disappeared over the ridge of the hill. Henry
rose to his feet, and stood looking after them.
"You have missed them," said I.
"Yes," said Henry; "let us go." He descended into the ravine, loaded the
rifles, and mounted his horse. We rode up the hill after the buffalo.
The herd was out of sight when we reached the top, but lying on the
grass not far off was one quite lifeless, and another violently
struggling in the death agony.
"You see I miss him!" remarked Henry. He had fired from a distance of
more than a hundred and fifty yards, and both balls had passed through
the lungs--the true mark in shooting buffalo.
The darkness increased, and a driving storm came on. Tying our horses to
the horns of the victims, Henry began the bloody work of dissection,
slashing away with the science of a connoisseur, while I vainly
endeavored to imitate him. Old Hendrick recoiled with horror and
indignation when I endeavored to tie the meat to the strings of rawhide,
always carried for this purpose, dangling at the back of the saddle.
After some difficulty we overcame his scruples; and heavily burdened
with the more eligible portions of the buffalo, we set out on our
return. Scarcely had we emerged from the labyrinth of gorges and
ravines, and issued upon the open prairie, when the pricking sleet came
driving, gust upon gust, directly in our faces. It was strangely dark,
though wanting still an hour of sunset. The freezing storm soon
penetrated to the skin, but the uneasy trot of our heavy-gaited horses
kept us warm enough, as we forced them unwillingly in the teeth of the
sleet and rain, by the powerful suasion of our Indian whips.
The prairie in this place was hard and level. A flourishing colony of
prairie dogs had burrowed into it in every direction, and the little
mounds of fresh earth around their holes were about as numerous as the
hills in a cornfield; but not a yelp was to be heard; not a nose of a
single citizen was visible; all had retired to the depths of their
burrows, and we envied them their dry and comfortable habitations.
An hour's hard riding showed us our tent dimly looming through the
storm, one side puffed out by the force of the wind, and the other
collapsed in proportion, while the disconsolate horses stood shivering
close around, and the wind kept up a dismal whistling in the boughs of
three old half-dead trees above. Shaw, like a patriarch, sat on his
saddle in the entrance, with a pipe in his mouth, and his arms folded,
contemplating, with cool satisfaction, the piles of meat that we flung
on the ground before him. A dark and dreary night succeeded; but the sun
rose with a heat so sultry and languid that the captain excused himself
on that account from waylaying an old buffalo bull, who with stupid
gravity was walking over the prairie to drink at the river. So much for
the climate of the Platte!
We encamped that night upon the bank of the river. Among the emigrants
there was an overgrown boy, some eighteen years old, with a head as
round and about as large as a pumpkin, and fever-and-ague fits had dyed
his face of a corresponding color. He wore an old white hat, tied under
his chin with a handkerchief; his body was short and stout, but his legs
of disproportioned and appalling length. I observed him at sunset,
breasting the hill with gigantic strides, and standing against the sky
on the summit, like a colossal pair of tongs. In a moment after we heard
him screaming frantically behind the ridge, and nothing doubting that he
was in the clutches of Indians or grizzly bears, some of the party
caught up their rifles and ran to the rescue. His outcries, however,
proved but an ebullition of joyous excitement; he had chased two little
wolf pups to their burrow, and he was on his knees, grubbing away like a
dog at the mouth of the hole, to get at them.
Before morning he caused more serious disquiet in the camp. It was his
turn to hold the middle guard; but no sooner was he called up, than he
coolly arranged a pair of saddle-bags under a wagon, laid his head upon
them, closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and fell asleep. The guard on
our side of the camp, thinking it no part of his duty to look after the
cattle of the emigrants, contented himself with watching our own horses
and mules; the wolves, he said, were unusually noisy; but still no
mischief was anticipated until the sun rose, and not a hoof or horn was
in sight! The cattle were gone! While Tom was quietly slumbering, the
wolves had driven them away.
Then we reaped the fruits of R.'s precious plan of traveling in company
with emigrants. To leave them in their distress was not to be thought
of, and we felt bound to wait until the cattle could be searched for,
and, if possible, recovered. But the reader may be curious to know what
punishment awaited the faithless Tom. By the wholesome law of the
prairie, he who falls asleep on guard is condemned to walk all day,
leading his horse by the bridle, and we found much fault with our
companions for not enforcing such a sentence on the offender.
Nevertheless, had he been of our own party, I have no doubt he would in
like manner have escaped scot-free. But the emigrants went farther than
mere forbearance: they decreed that since Tom couldn't stand guard
without falling asleep, he shouldn't stand guard at all, and
henceforward his slumbers were unbroken.
"Buffalo! buffalo!" It was but a grim old bull, roaming the prairie by
himself in misanthropic seclusion; but there might be more behind the
hills. Dreading the monotony and languor of the camp, Shaw and I saddled
our horses, buckled our holsters in their places, and set out with Henry
Chatillon in search of the game. Henry, not intending to take part in
the chase, but merely conducting us, carried his rifle with him, while
we left ours behind as incumbrances. We rode for some five or six miles,
and saw no living thing but wolves, snakes, and prairie dogs.
"This won't do at all," said Shaw.
"What won't do?"
"There's no wood about here to make a litter for the wounded man; I have
an idea that one of us will need something of the sort before the day is
over."
There was some foundation for such an apprehension, for the ground was
none of the best for a race, and grew worse continually as we proceeded;
indeed it soon became desperately bad, consisting of abrupt hills and
deep hollows, cut by frequent ravines not easy to pass. At length, a
mile in advance, we saw a band of bulls. Some were scattered grazing
over a green declivity, while the rest were crowded more densely
together in the wide hollow below. Making a circuit to keep out of
sight, we rode toward them until we ascended a hill within a furlong of
them, beyond which nothing intervened that could possibly screen us from
their view. We dismounted behind the ridge just out of sight, drew our
saddle-girths, examined our pistols, and mounting again rode over the
hill, and descended at a canter toward them, bending close to our
horses' necks. Instantly they took the alarm; those on the hill
descended; those below gathered into a mass, and the whole got in
motion, shouldering each other along at a clumsy gallop. We followed,
spurring our horses to full speed; and as the herd rushed, crowding and
trampling in terror through an opening in the hills, we were close at
their heels, half suffocated by the clouds of dust.
But as we drew near, their alarm and speed increased; our horses showed
signs of the utmost fear, bounding violently aside as we approached, and
refusing to enter among the herd.
The buffalo now broke into several small bodies, scampering over the
hills in different directions, and I lost sight of Shaw; neither of us
knew where the other had gone. Old Pontiac ran like a frantic elephant
up hill and down hill, his ponderous hoofs striking the prairie like
sledge-hammers. He showed a curious mixture of eagerness and terror,
straining to overtake the panic-stricken herd, but constantly recoiling
in dismay as we drew near. The fugitives offered no very attractive
spectacle, with their enormous size and weight, their shaggy manes and
the tattered remnants of their last winter's hair covering their backs
in irregular shreds and patches, and flying off in the wind as they ran.
At length I urged my horse close behind a bull, and after trying in
vain, by blows and spurring, to bring him alongside, I shot a bullet
into the buffalo from this disadvantageous position. At the report,
Pontiac swerved so much that I was again thrown a little behind the
game. The bullet, entering too much in the rear, failed to disable the
bull, for a buffalo requires to be shot at particular points, or he will
certainly escape. The herd ran up a hill, and I followed in pursuit. As
Pontiac rushed headlong down on the other side, I saw Shaw and Henry
descending the hollow on the right, at a leisurely gallop; and in front,
the buffalo were just disappearing behind the crest of the next hill,
their short tails erect, and their hoofs twinkling through a cloud of
dust.
At that moment, I heard Shaw and Henry shouting to me; but the muscles
of a stronger arm than mine could not have checked at once the furious
course of Pontiac, whose mouth was as insensible as leather. Added to
this, I rode him that morning with a common snaffle, having the day
before, for the benefit of my other horse, unbuckled from my bridle the
curb which I ordinarily used. A stronger and hardier brute never trod
the prairie; but the novel sight of the buffalo filled him with terror,
and when at full speed he was almost uncontrollable. Gaining the top of
the ridge, I saw nothing of the buffalo; they had all vanished amid the
intricacies of the hills and hollows. Reloading my pistols, in the best
way I could, I galloped on until I saw them again scuttling along at the
base of the hill, their panic somewhat abated. Down went old Pontiac
among them, scattering them to the right and left, and then we had
another long chase.
About a dozen bulls were before us, scouring over the hills, rushing
down the declivities with tremendous weight and impetuosity, and then
laboring with a weary gallop upward. Still Pontiac, in spite of spurring
and beating, would not close with them. One bull at length fell a little
behind the rest, and by dint of much effort I urged my horse within six
or eight yards of his side. His back was darkened with sweat; he was
panting heavily, while his tongue lolled out a foot from his jaws.
Gradually I came up abreast of him, urging Pontiac with leg and rein
nearer to his side, when suddenly he did what buffalo in such
circumstances will always do; he slackened his gallop, and turning
toward us, with an aspect of mingled rage and distress, lowered his
huge shaggy head for a charge. Pontiac, with a snort, leaped aside in
terror, nearly throwing me to the ground, as I was wholly unprepared for
such an evolution. I raised my pistol in a passion to strike him on the
head, but thinking better of it, fired the bullet after the bull, who
had resumed his flight; then drew rein, and determined to rejoin my
companions. It was high time. The breath blew hard from Pontiac's
nostrils, and the sweat rolled in big drops down his sides; I myself
felt as if drenched in warm water.
[Illustration: GRADUALLY I CAME ABREAST OF HIM]
Pledging myself (and I redeemed the pledge) to take my revenge at a
future opportunity, I looked round for some indications to show me where
I was, and what course I ought to pursue; I might as well have looked
for landmarks in the midst of the ocean. How many miles I had run or in
what direction, I had no idea; and around me the prairie was rolling in
steep swells and pitches, without a single distinctive feature to guide
me. I had a little compass hung at my neck; and ignorant that the Platte
at this point diverged considerably from its easterly course, I thought
that by keeping to the northward I should certainly reach it. So I
turned and rode about two hours in that direction. The prairie changed
as I advanced, softening away into easier undulations, but nothing like
the Platte appeared, nor any sign of a human being; the same wild
endless expanse lay around me still; and to all appearance I was as far
from my object as ever. I began now to consider myself in danger of
being lost; and therefore, reining in my horse, summoned the scanty
share of woodcraft that I possessed (if that term be applicable upon the
prairie) to extricate me. Looking round, it occurred to me that the
buffalo might prove my best guides. I soon found one of the paths made
by them in their passage to the river; it ran nearly at right angles to
my course; but turning my horse's head in the direction it indicated,
his freer gait and erected ears assured me that I was right.
But in the meantime my ride had been by no means a solitary one. The
whole face of the country was dotted far and wide with countless
hundreds of buffalo. They trooped along in files and columns, bulls,
cows, and calves, on the green faces of the declivities in front. They
scrambled away over the hills to the right and left; and far off, the
pale blue swells in the extreme distance were dotted with innumerable
specks. Sometimes I surprised shaggy old bulls grazing alone, or
sleeping behind the ridges I ascended. They would leap up at my
approach, stare stupidly at me through their tangled manes, and then
gallop heavily away. The antelope were very numerous; and as they are
always bold when in the neighborhood of buffalo, they would approach
quite near to look at me, gazing intently with their great round eyes,
then suddenly leap aside, and stretch lightly away over the prairie, as
swiftly as a racehorse. Squalid, ruffianlike wolves sneaked through the
hollows and sandy ravines. Several times I passed through villages of
prairie dogs, who sat, each at the mouth of his burrow, holding his paws
before him in a supplicating attitude, and yelping away most vehemently,
energetically whisking his little tail with every squeaking cry he
uttered. Prairie dogs are not fastidious in their choice of companions;
various long, checkered snakes were sunning themselves in the midst of
the village, and demure little gray owls, with a large white ring around
each eye, were perched side by side with the rightful inhabitants. The
prairie teemed with life. Again and again I looked toward the crowded
hillsides, and was sure I saw horsemen; and riding near, with a mixture
of hope and dread, for Indians were abroad, I found them transformed
into a group of buffalo. There was nothing in human shape amid all this
vast congregation of brute forms.
When I turned down the buffalo path, the prairie seemed changed; only a
wolf or two glided past at intervals, like conscious felons, never
looking to the right or left. Being now free from anxiety, I was at
leisure to observe minutely the objects around me; and here, for the
first time, I noticed insects wholly different from any of the varieties
found farther to the eastward. Gaudy butterflies fluttered about my
horse's head; strangely formed beetles, glittering with metallic luster,
were crawling upon plants that I had never seen before; multitudes of
lizards, too, were darting like lightning over the sand.
I had run to a great distance from the river. It cost me a long ride on
the buffalo path before I saw from the ridge of a sand-hill the pale
surface of the Platte glistening in the midst of its desert valleys and
the faint outline of the hills beyond waving along the sky. From where I
stood, not a tree nor a bush nor a living thing was visible throughout
the whole extent of the sun-scorched landscape. In half an hour I came
upon the trail, not far from the river; and seeing that the party had
not yet passed, I turned eastward to meet them, old Pontiac's long
swinging trot again assuring me that I was right in doing so. Having
been slightly ill on leaving camp in the morning, six or seven hours of
rough riding had fatigued me extremely. I soon stopped, therefore; flung
my saddle on the ground, and with my head resting on it, and my horse's
trail-rope tied loosely to my arm, lay waiting the arrival of the party,
speculating meanwhile on the extent of the injuries Pontiac had
received. At length the white wagon coverings rose from the verge of the
plain. By a singular coincidence, almost at the same moment two horsemen
appeared coming down from the hills. They were Shaw and Henry, who had
searched for me awhile in the morning, but well knowing the futility of
the attempt in such a broken country, had placed themselves on the top
of the highest hill they could find, and picketing their horses near
them, as a signal to me, had lain down and fallen asleep. The stray
cattle had been recovered, as the emigrants told us, about noon. Before
sunset, we pushed forward eight miles farther.
TETE ROUGE
The next morning, having directed Delorier to repair with his cart to
the place of meeting, we came again to the fort to make some
arrangements for the journey. After completing these we sat down under a
sort of perch, to smoke with some Cheyenne Indians whom we found there.
In a few minutes we saw an extraordinary little figure approach us in a
military dress. He had a small, round countenance, garnished about the
eyes with the kind of wrinkles commonly known as crow's feet and
surrounded by an abundant crop of red curls, with a little cap resting
on the top of them. Altogether, he had the look of a man more conversant
with mint juleps and oyster suppers than with the hardships of prairie
service. He came up to us and entreated that we would take him home to
the settlements, saying that unless he went with us he should have to
stay all winter at the fort. We liked our petitioner's appearance so
little that we excused ourselves from complying with his request. At
this he begged us so hard to take pity on him, that at last we
consented, though not without many misgivings.
The rugged Anglo-Saxon of our new recruit's real name proved utterly
unmanageable on the lips of our French attendants, and Henry Chatillon,
after various abortive attempts to pronounce it, one day coolly
christened him Tete Rouge, in honor of his red curls. He had at
different times been clerk of a Mississippi steamboat, and agent in a
trading establishment at Nauvoo, besides filling various other
capacities, in all of which he had seen much more of "life" than was
good for him. In the spring, thinking that a summer's campaign would be
an agreeable recreation, he had joined a company of Saint Louis
volunteers.
"There were three of us," said Tete Rouge, "me and Bill Stevens and John
Hopkins. We thought we would just go out with the army, and when we had
conquered the country, we would get discharged and take our pay, you
know, and go down to Mexico. They say there is plenty of fun going on
there. Then we could go back to New Orleans by way of Vera Cruz."
But Tete Rouge, like many a stouter volunteer, had reckoned without his
host. Fighting Mexicans was a less amusing occupation than he had
supposed, and his pleasure trip was disagreeably interrupted by brain
fever, which attacked him when about halfway to Bent's Fort. He jolted
along through the rest of the journey in a baggage wagon. When they came
to the fort he was taken out and left there, together with the rest of
the sick. Bent's Fort does not supply the best accommodations for an
invalid. Tete Rouge's sick chamber was a little mud room, where he and a
companion attacked by the same disease were laid together, with nothing
but a buffalo robe between them and the ground. The assistant surgeon's
deputy visited them once a day and brought them each a huge dose of
calomel, the only medicine, according to his surviving victim, which he
was acquainted with.
Tete Rouge woke one morning, and turning to his companion, saw his eyes
fixed upon the beams above with the glassy stare of a dead man. At this
the unfortunate volunteer lost his senses outright. In spite of the
doctor, however, he eventually recovered; though between the brain fever
and the calomel, his mind, originally none of the strongest, was so much
shaken that it had not quite recovered its balance when we came to the
fort. In spite of the poor fellow's tragic story, there was something so
ludicrous in his appearance, and the whimsical contrast between his
military dress and his most unmilitary demeanor, that we could not help
smiling at them.
We asked him if he had a gun. He said they had taken it from him during
his illness, and he had not seen it since; "but perhaps," he observed,
looking at me with a beseeching air, "you will lend me one of your big
pistols if we should meet with any Indians." I next inquired if he had a
horse; he declared he had a magnificent one, and at Shaw's request a
Mexican led him in for inspection. He exhibited the outline of a good
horse, but his eyes were sunk in the sockets, and every one of his ribs
could be counted. There were certain marks too about his shoulders,
which could be accounted for by the circumstance, that during Tete
Rouge's illness, his companions had seized upon the insulted charger,
and harnessed him to a cannon along with the draft horses. To Tete
Rouge's astonishment we recommended him by all means to exchange the
horse, if he could, for a mule. Fortunately the people at the fort were
so anxious to get rid of him that they were willing to make some
sacrifice to effect the object, and he succeeded in getting a tolerable
mule in exchange for the broken-down steed.
A man soon appeared at the gate, leading in the mule by a cord which he
placed in the hands of Tete Rouge, who, being somewhat afraid of his new
acquisition, tried various flatteries and blandishments to induce her to
come forward. The mule, knowing that she was expected to advance,
stopped short in consequence, and stood fast as a rock, looking straight
forward with immovable composure. Being stimulated by a blow from behind
she consented to move, and walked nearly to the other side of the fort
before she stopped again. Hearing the bystanders laugh, Tete Rouge
plucked up spirit and tugged hard at the rope. The mule jerked backward,
spun herself round, and made a dash for the gate. Tete Rouge, who clung
manfully to the rope, went whisking through the air for a few rods, when
he let go and stood with his mouth open, staring after the mule, who
galloped away over the prairie. She was soon caught and brought back by
a Mexican, who mounted a horse and went in pursuit of her with his
lasso.
Having thus displayed his capacities for prairie traveling, Tete
proceeded to supply himself with provisions for the journey, and with
this view he applied to a quartermaster's assistant who was in the fort.
This official had a face as sour as vinegar, being in a state of chronic
indignation because he had been left behind the army. He was as anxious
as the rest to get rid of Tete Rouge. So, producing a rusty key, he
opened a low door which led to a half-subterranean apartment, into which
the two disappeared together. After some time they came out again, Tete
Rouge greatly embarrassed by a multiplicity of paper parcels containing
the different articles of his forty days' rations. They were consigned
to the care of Delorier, who about that time passed by with the cart on
his way to the appointed place of meeting with Munroe and his
companions.
We next urged Tete Rouge to provide himself, if he could, with a gun. He
accordingly made earnest appeals to the charity of various persons in
the fort, but totally without success, a circumstance which did not
greatly disturb us, since in the event of a skirmish he would be much
more apt to do mischief to himself or his friends than to the enemy.
When all these arrangements were completed we saddled our horses and
were preparing to leave the fort, when looking round we discovered that
our new associate was in fresh trouble. A man was holding the mule for
him in the middle of the fort, while he tried to put the saddle on her
back, but she kept stepping sideways and moving round and round in a
circle until he was almost in despair. It required some assistance
before all his difficulties could be overcome. At length he clambered
into the black war saddle on which he was to have carried terror into
the ranks of the Mexicans.
"Get up," said Tete Rouge. "Come now, go along, will you."
The mule walked deliberately forward out of the gate. Her recent conduct
had inspired him with so much awe that he never dared to touch her with
his whip. We trotted forward toward the place of meeting, but before he
had gone far we saw that Tete Rouge's mule, who perfectly understood her
rider, had stopped and was quietly grazing, in spite of his
protestations, at some distance behind. So getting behind him, we drove
him and the contumacious mule before us, until we could see through the
twilight the gleaming of a distant fire.
We began our journey for the frontier settlements on the 27th of August,
and certainly a more ragamuffin cavalcade never was seen on the upper
Arkansas. Of the large and fine horses with which we had left the
frontier in the spring, not one remained; we had supplied their place
with the rough breed of the prairie, as hardy as mules and almost as
ugly; we had also with us a number of the latter detestable animals. In
spite of their strength and hardihood, several of the band were already
worn down by hard service and hard fare, and as none of them were shod,
they were fast becoming foot-sore. Every horse and mule had a cord of
twisted bull-hide coiled around his neck, which by no means added to the
beauty of his appearance. Our saddles and all our equipments were by
this time lamentably worn and battered, and our weapons had become dull
and rusty. The dress of the riders fully corresponded with the
dilapidated furniture of our horses, and of the whole party none made a
more disreputable appearance than my friend and I. Shaw had for an upper
garment an old red flannel shirt, flying open in front and belted around
him like a frock; while I, in absence of other clothing, was attired in
a time-worn suit of leather.
Thus happy and careless as so many beggars, we crept slowly from day to
day along the monotonous banks of the Arkansas. Tete Rouge gave constant
trouble, for he could never catch his mule, saddle her, or indeed do
anything else without assistance. Every day he had some new ailment,
real or imaginary, to complain of. At one moment he would be woebegone
and disconsolate, and the next he would be visited with a violent flow
of spirits, to which he could only give vent by incessant laughing,
whistling, and telling stories. When other resources failed, we used to
amuse ourselves by tormenting him; a fair compensation for the trouble
he cost us. Tete Rouge rather enjoyed being laughed at, for he was an
odd compound of weakness, eccentricity, and good-nature. He made a
figure worthy of a painter as he paced along before us, perched on the
back of his mule, and enveloped in a huge buffalo-robe coat, which some
charitable person had given him at the fort. This extraordinary garment,
which would have contained two men of his size, he chose, for some
reason best known to himself, to wear inside out, and he never took it
off, even in the hottest weather. It was fluttering all over with seams
and tatters, and the hide was so old and rotten that it broke out every
day in a new place. Just at the top of it a large pile of red curls was
visible, with his little cap set jauntily upon one side, to give him a
military air. His seat in the saddle was no less remarkable than his
person and equipment. He pressed one leg close against his mule's side,
and thrust the other out at an angle of 45 deg.. His pantaloons were
decorated with a military red stripe, of which he was extremely vain;
but being much too short, the whole length of his boots was usually
visible below them. His blanket, loosely rolled up into a large bundle,
dangled at the back of his saddle, where he carried it tied with a
string. Four or five times a day it would fall to the ground. Every few
minutes he would drop his pipe, his knife, his flint and steel, or a
piece of tobacco, and have to scramble down to pick them up. In doing
this he would contrive to get in everybody's way; and as the most of the
party were by no means remarkable for a fastidious choice of language, a
storm of anathemas would be showered upon him, half in earnest and half
in jest, until Tete Rouge would declare that there was no comfort in
life, and that he never saw such fellows before.
On the next afternoon, as we moved along the bank of the river, we saw
the white tops of wagons on the horizon. It was some hours before we met
them, when they proved to be a train of clumsy ox-wagons, quite
different from the rakish vehicles of the Santa Fe traders, and loaded
with government stores for the troops. They all stopped, and the
drivers gathered around us in a crowd. I thought that the whole frontier
might have been ransacked in vain to furnish men worse fitted to meet
the dangers of the prairie. Many of them were mere boys, fresh from the
plow, and devoid of knowledge and experience.
Just after leaving the government wagons, as Shaw and I were riding
along a narrow passage between the river bank and a rough hill that
passed close upon it, we heard Tete Rouge's voice behind us. "Hallo!" he
called out; "I say, stop the cart just for a minute, will you?"
"What's the matter, Tete?" asked Shaw, as he came riding up to us with a
grin of exultation. He had a bottle of molasses in one hand, and a large
bundle of hides on the saddle before him, containing, as he triumphantly
informed us, sugar, biscuits, coffee, and rice. These supplies he had
obtained by a stratagem on which he greatly plumed himself, and he was
extremely vexed and astonished that we did not fall in with his views of
the matter. He had told Coates, the master-wagoner, that the commissary
at the fort had given him an order for sick-rations, directed to the
master of any government train which he might meet upon the road. This
order he had unfortunately lost, but he hoped that the rations would not
be refused on that account, as he was suffering from coarse fare and
needed them very much. As soon as he came to camp that night Tete Rouge
repaired to the box at the back of the cart, where Delorier used to keep
his culinary apparatus, took possession of a saucepan, and after
building a little fire of his own, set to work preparing a meal out of
his ill-gotten booty. This done, he seized on a tin plate and spoon, and
sat down under the cart to regale himself. His preliminary repast did
not at all prejudice his subsequent exertions at supper; where, in spite
of his miniature dimensions, he made a better figure than any of us.
Indeed, about this time his appetite grew quite voracious. He began to
thrive wonderfully. His small body visibly expanded, and his cheeks,
which when we first took him were rather yellow and cadaverous, now
dilated in a wonderful manner, and became ruddy in proportion. Tete
Rouge, in short, began to appear like another man.
THE CHASE
The country before us was now thronged with buffalo, and a sketch of the
manner of hunting them will not be out of place. There are two methods
commonly practiced, "running" and "approaching." The chase on horseback,
which goes by the name of "running," is the more violent and dashing
mode of the two. Indeed, of all American wild sports, this is the
wildest. Once among the buffalo, the hunter, unless long use has made
him familiar with the situation, dashes forward in utter recklessness
and self-abandonment. He thinks of nothing, cares for nothing, but the
game; his mind is stimulated to the highest pitch, yet intensely
concentrated on one object. In the midst of the flying herd, where the
uproar and the dust are thickest, it never wavers for a moment; he drops
the rein and abandons his horse to his furious career; he levels his
gun, the report sounds faint amid the thunder of the buffalo; and when
his wounded enemy leaps in vain fury upon him, his heart thrills with a
feeling like the fierce delight of the battlefield. A practiced and
skilful hunter, well mounted, will sometimes kill five or six cows in a
single chase, loading his gun again and again as his horse rushes
through the tumult. An exploit like this is quite beyond the capacities
of a novice.
In attacking a small band of buffalo, or in separating a single animal
from the herd and assailing it apart from the rest, there is less
excitement and less danger. With a bold and well-trained horse the
hunter may ride so close to the buffalo that as they gallop side by side
he may reach over and touch him with his hand; nor is there much danger
in this as long as the buffalo's strength and breath continue unabated;
but when he becomes tired and can no longer run at ease, when his tongue
lolls out and foam flies from his jaws, then the hunter had better keep
at a respectful distance; the distressed brute may turn upon him at any
instant; and especially at the moment when he fires his gun. The wounded
buffalo springs at his enemy; the horse leaps violently aside; and then
the hunter has need of a tenacious seat in the saddle, for if he is
thrown to the ground there is no hope for him. When he sees his attack
defeated the buffalo resumes his flight, but if the shot be well
directed he soon stops; for a few minutes he stands still, then totters
and falls heavily upon the prairie.
The chief difficulty in running buffalo, as it seems to me, is that of
loading the gun or pistol at full gallop. Many hunters for convenience'
sake carry three or four bullets in the mouth; the powder is poured
down the muzzle of the piece, the bullet dropped in after it, the stock
struck hard upon the pommel of the saddle, and the work is done. The
danger of this method is obvious. Should the blow on the pommel fail to
send the bullet home, or should the latter, in the act of aiming, start
from its place and roll toward the muzzle, the gun would probably burst
in discharging. Many a shattered hand and worse casualties besides have
been the result of such an accident. To obviate it, some hunters make
use of a ramrod, usually hung by a string from the neck, but this
materially increases the difficulty of loading. The bows and arrows
which the Indians use in running buffalo have many advantages over
firearms, and even white men occasionally employ them.
The danger of the chase arises not so much from the onset of the wounded
animal as from the nature of the ground which the hunter must ride over.
The prairie does not always present a smooth, level, and uniform
surface; very often it is broken with hills and hollows, intersected by
ravines, and in the remoter parts studded by the stiff wild-sage bushes.
The most formidable obstructions, however, are the burrows of wild
animals, wolves, badgers, and particularly prairie dogs, with whose
holes the ground for a very great extent is frequently honeycombed. In
the blindness of the chase the hunter rushes over it unconscious of
danger; his horse, at full career, thrusts his leg deep into one of the
burrows; the bone snaps, the rider is hurled forward to the ground and
probably killed. Yet accidents in buffalo running happen less frequently
than one would suppose; in the recklessness of the chase, the hunter
enjoys all the impunity of a drunken man, and may ride in safety over
the gullies and declivities where, should he attempt to pass in his
sober senses, he would infallibly break his neck.
The method of "approaching," being practiced on foot, has many
advantages over that of "running"; in the former, one neither breaks
down his horse nor endangers his own life; instead of yielding to
excitement he must be cool, collected, and watchful; he must understand
the buffalo, observe the features of the country and the course of the
wind, and be well skilled, moreover, in using the rifle. The buffalo are
strange animals; sometimes they are so stupid and infatuated that a man
may walk up to them in full sight on the open prairie and even shoot
several of their number before the rest will think it necessary to
retreat. Again at another moment they will be so shy and wary, that in
order to approach them the utmost skill, experience, and judgment are
necessary. Kit Carson, I believe, stands pre-eminent in running buffalo;
in approaching, no man living can bear away the palm from Henry
Chatillon.
The next day was one of activity and excitement, for about ten o'clock
the men in advance shouted the gladdening cry of "Buffalo, buffalo!" and
in the hollow of the prairie just below us, a band of bulls were
grazing. The temptation was irresistible, and Shaw and I rode down upon
them. We were badly mounted on our traveling horses, but by hard lashing
we overtook them, and Shaw, running alongside of a bull, shot into him
both balls of his double-barreled gun. Looking around as I galloped
past, I saw the bull in his mortal fury rushing again and again upon
his antagonist, whose horse constantly leaped aside, and avoided the
onset. My chase was more protracted, but at length I ran close to the
bull and killed him with my pistols. Cutting off the tails of our
victims by way of trophy, we rejoined the party in about a quarter of an
hour after we left it.
Again and again that morning rang out the same welcome cry of "Buffalo,
buffalo!" Every few minutes in the broad meadows along the river, we
would see bands of bulls, who, raising their shaggy heads, would gaze in
stupid amazement at the approaching horsemen, and then breaking into a
clumsy gallop, would file off in a long line across the trail in front,
toward the rising prairie on the left. At noon, the whole plain before
us was alive with thousands of buffalo--bulls, cows, and calves--all
moving rapidly as we drew near; and far off beyond the river the
swelling prairie was darkened with them to the very horizon. The party
was in gayer spirits than ever. We stopped for a nooning near a grove of
trees by the river-side.
"Tongues and hump ribs to-morrow," said Shaw, looking with contempt at
the venison steaks which Delorier placed before us. Our meal finished,
we lay down under a temporary awning to sleep. A shout from Henry
Chatillon aroused us, and we saw him standing on the cart-wheel,
stretching his tall figure to its full height while he looked toward the
prairie beyond the river. Following the direction of his eyes we could
clearly distinguish a large dark object, like the black shadow of a
cloud, passing rapidly over swell after swell of the distant plain;
behind it followed another of similar appearance though smaller. Its
motion was more rapid, and it drew closer and closer to the first. It
was Arapahoe hunters pursuing a band of buffalo. Shaw and I hastily
sought and saddled our best horses, and went plunging through sand and
water to the farther bank. We were too late. The hunters had already
mingled with the herd, and the work of slaughter was nearly over. When
we reached the ground we found it strewn far and near with numberless
black carcasses, while the remnants of the herd, scattered in all
directions, were flying away in terror, and the Indians still rushing in
pursuit. Many of the hunters, however, remained upon the spot, and among
the rest was our yesterday's acquaintance, the chief of the village. He
had alighted by the side of a cow, into which he had shot five or six
arrows, and his squaw, who had followed him on horseback to the hunt,
was giving him a draught of water out of a canteen, purchased or
plundered from some volunteer soldier. Recrossing the river we overtook
the party, who were already on their way.
We had scarcely gone a mile when an imposing spectacle presented itself.
From the river bank on the right, away over the swelling prairie on the
left, and in front as far as we could see, extended one vast host of
buffalo. The outskirts of the herd were within a quarter of a mile. In
many parts they were crowded so densely together that in the distance
their rounded backs presented a surface of uniform blackness; but
elsewhere they were more scattered, and from amid the multitude rose
little columns of dust where the buffalo were rolling on the ground.
Here and there a great confusion was perceptible, where a battle was
going forward among the bulls. We could distinctly see them rushing
against each other, and hear the clattering of their horns and their
hoarse bellowing. Shaw was riding at some distance in advance, with
Henry Chatillon; I saw him stop and draw the leather covering from his
gun. Indeed, with such a sight before us, but one thing could be thought
of. That morning I had used pistols in the chase. I had now a mind to
try the virtue of a gun. Delorier had one, and I rode up to the side of
the cart; there he sat under the white covering, biting his pipe between
his teeth and grinning with excitement.
[Illustration: ONE VAST HOST OF BUFFALO]
"Lend me your gun, Delorier," said I.
"_Oui, monsieur, oui_,"[126-1] said Delorier, tugging with might and
main to stop the mule, which seemed obstinately bent on going forward.
Then everything but his moccasins disappeared as he crawled into the
cart and pulled at the gun to extricate it.
"_Oui, bien charge_;[126-2] you'll kill, _mon bourgeois_;[126-3] yes,
you'll kill--_c'est un bon fusil_."[126-4]
I handed him my rifle and rode forward to Shaw.
"Are you ready?" he asked.
"Come on," said I.
"Keep down that hollow," said Henry, "and then they won't see you till
you get close to them."
The hollow was a kind of ravine very wide and shallow; it ran obliquely
toward the buffalo, and we rode at a canter along the bottom until it
became too shallow, when we bent close to our horses' necks, and then
finding that it could no longer conceal us, came out of it and rode
directly toward the herd. It was within gunshot; before its outskirts,
numerous grizzly old bulls were scattered, holding guard over their
females. They glared at us in anger and astonishment, walked toward us a
few yards, and then turning slowly round retreated at a trot which
afterward broke into a clumsy gallop. In an instant the main body caught
the alarm. The buffalo began to crowd away from the point toward which
we were approaching, and a gap was opened in the side of the herd. We
entered it, still restraining our excited horses. Every instant the
tumult was thickening. The buffalo, pressing together in large bodies,
crowded away from us on every hand. In front and on either side we could
see dark columns and masses, half hidden by clouds of dust, rushing
along in terror and confusion, and hear the tramp and clattering of ten
thousand hoofs. That countless multitude of powerful brutes, ignorant of
their own strength, were flying in a panic from the approach of two
feeble horsemen. To remain quiet longer was impossible.
"Take that band on the left," said Shaw; "I'll take these in front."
He sprang off, and I saw no more of him. A heavy Indian whip was
fastened by a band to my wrist; I swung it into the air and lashed my
horse's flank with all the strength of my arm. Away she darted,
stretching close to the ground. I could see nothing but a cloud of dust
before me, but I knew that it concealed a band of many hundreds of
buffalo. In a moment I was in the midst of the cloud, half suffocated by
the dust and stunned by the trampling of the flying herd; but I was
drunk with the chase and cared for nothing but the buffalo. Very soon a
long dark mass became visible, looming through the dust; then I could
distinguish each bulky carcass, the hoofs flying out beneath, the short
tails held rigidly erect. In a moment I was so close that I could have
touched them with my gun.
Suddenly, to my utter amazement, the hoofs were jerked upward, the tails
flourished in the air, and amid a cloud of dust the buffalo seemed to
sink into the earth before me. One vivid impression of that instant upon
my mind. I remember looking down upon the backs of several buffalo dimly
visible through the dust. We had run unawares upon a ravine. At that
moment I was not the most accurate judge of depth and width, but when I
passed it on my return, I found it about twelve feet deep and not quite
twice as wide at the bottom. It was impossible to stop; I would have
done so gladly if I could; so, half sliding, half plunging, down went
the little mare. I believe she came down on her knees in the loose sand
at the bottom; I was pitched forward violently against her neck and
nearly thrown over her head among the buffalo, who amid dust and
confusion came tumbling in all around. The mare was on her feet in an
instant and scrambling like a cat up the opposite side. I thought for a
moment that she would have fallen back and crushed me, but with a
violent effort she clambered out and gained the hard prairie above.
Glancing back I saw the huge head of a bull clinging as it were by the
forefeet at the edge of the dusty gulf. At length I was fairly among the
buffalo. They were less densely crowded than before, and I could see
nothing but bulls, who always run at the rear of the herd. As I passed
amid them they would lower their heads, and turning as they ran, attempt
to gore my horse; but as they were already at full speed there was no
force in their onset, and as Pauline ran faster than they, they were
always thrown behind her in the effort.
I soon began to distinguish cows amid the throng. One just in front of
me seemed to my liking, and I pushed close to her side. Dropping the
reins I fired, holding the muzzle of the gun within a foot of her
shoulder. Quick as lightning she sprang at Pauline; the little mare
dodged the attack, and I lost sight of the wounded animal amid the
tumultuous crowd. Immediately after I selected another, and urging
forward Pauline, shot into her both pistols in succession. For a while I
kept her in view, but in attempting to load my gun, lost sight of her
also in the confusion. Believing her to be mortally wounded and unable
to keep up with the herd, I checked my horse. The crowd rushed onward.
The dust and tumult passed away, and on the prairie, far behind the
rest, I saw a solitary buffalo galloping heavily. In a moment I and my
victim were running side by side. My firearms were all empty, and I had
in my pouch nothing but rifle bullets, too large for the pistols and too
small for the gun. I loaded the latter, however, but as often as I
leveled it to fire, the little bullets would roll out of the muzzle and
the gun returned only a faint report like a squib, as the powder
harmlessly exploded. I galloped in front of the buffalo, and attempted
to turn her back; but her eyes glared, her mane bristled, and lowering
her head, she rushed at me with astonishing fierceness and activity.
Again and again I rode before her, and again and again she repeated her
furious charge. But little Pauline was in her element. She dodged her
enemy at every rush, until at length the buffalo stood still, exhausted
with her own efforts; she panted, and her tongue hung lolling from her
jaws.
Riding to a little distance I alighted, thinking to gather a handful of
dry grass to serve the purpose of wadding, and load the gun at my
leisure. No sooner were my feet on the ground than the buffalo came
bounding in such a rage toward me that I jumped back again into the
saddle with all possible dispatch. After waiting a few minutes more, I
made an attempt to ride up and stab her with my knife; but the
experiment proved such as no wise man would repeat. At length,
bethinking me of the fringes at the seams of my buckskin pantaloons, I
jerked off a few of them, and reloading the gun, forced them down the
barrel to keep the bullet in its place; then approaching, I shot the
wounded buffalo through the heart. Sinking to her knees, she rolled over
lifeless on the prairie. To my astonishment, I found that instead of a
fat cow I had been slaughtering a stout yearling bull. No longer
wondering at the fierceness he had shown, I opened his throat, and
cutting out his tongue, tied it at the back of my saddle. My mistake was
one which a more experienced eye than mine might easily make in the dust
and confusion of such a chase.
Then for the first time I had leisure to look at the scene around me.
The prairie in front was darkened with the retreating multitude, and on
the other hand the buffalo came filing up in endless unbroken columns
from the low plains upon the river. The Arkansas was three or four miles
distant. I turned and moved slowly toward it. A long time passed,
before, far down in the distance, I distinguished the white covering of
the cart and the little black specks of horsemen before and behind it.
Drawing near, I recognized Shaw's elegant tunic, the red flannel shirt,
conspicuous far off. I overtook the party, and asked him what success
he had met with. He had assailed a fat cow, shot her with two bullets,
and mortally wounded her. But neither of us were prepared for the chase
that afternoon, and Shaw, like myself, had no spare bullets in his
pouch; so he abandoned the disabled animal to Henry Chatillon, who
followed, dispatched her with his rifle, and loaded his horse with her
meat.
We encamped close to the river. The night was dark, and as we lay down
we could hear mingled with the howling of the wolves the hoarse
bellowing of the buffalo, like the ocean beating upon a distant coast.
THE BUFFALO CAMP
The morning was a bright and gay one, and the air so clear that on the
farthest horizon the outline of the pale blue prairie was sharply drawn
against the sky. Shaw felt in the mood for hunting; he rode in advance
of the party, and before long we saw a file of bulls galloping at full
speed upon a vast green swell of the prairie at some distance in front.
Shaw came scouring along behind them, arrayed in his red shirt, which
looked very well in the distance; he gained fast on the fugitives, and
as the foremost bull was disappearing behind the summit of the swell, we
saw him in the act of assailing the hindmost; a smoke sprang from the
muzzle of his gun, and floated away like a little white cloud; the bull
turned upon him, and just then the rising ground concealed them both
from view.
We were moving forward until about noon, when we stopped by the side of
the Arkansas. At that moment Shaw appeared riding slowly down the side
of a distant hill; his horse was tired and jaded; and when he threw his
saddle upon the ground, I observed that the tails of two bulls were
dangling behind it. No sooner were the horses turned loose to feed than
Henry, asking Munroe to go with him, took his rifle and walked quietly
away. Shaw, Tete Rouge and I sat down by the side of the cart to discuss
the dinner which Delorier placed before us; we had scarcely finished
when we saw Munroe walking toward us along the river bank. Henry, he
said, had killed four fat cows, and had sent him back for horses to
bring in the meat. Shaw took a horse for himself and another for Henry,
and he and Munroe left the camp together.
After a short absence all three of them came back, their horses loaded
with the choicest parts of the meat; we kept two of the cows for
ourselves and gave the others to Munroe and his companions. Delorier
seated himself on the grass before the pile of meat, and worked
industriously for some time to cut it into thin broad sheets for drying.
This is no easy matter, but Delorier had all the skill of an Indian
squaw. Long before night cords of rawhide were stretched around the
camp, and the meat was hung upon them to dry in the sunshine and pure
air of the prairie. Our California companions were less successful at
the work; but they accomplished it after their own fashion, and their
side of the camp was soon garnished in the same manner as our own.
We meant to remain at this place long enough to prepare provisions for
our journey to the frontier, which as we supposed might occupy about a
month. Had the distance been twice as great and the party ten times as
large, the unerring rifle of Henry Chatillon would have supplied meat
enough for the whole within two days; we were obliged to remain,
however, until it should be dry enough for transportation; so we erected
our tent and made the other arrangements for a permanent camp.
In the meantime we had nothing to do but amuse ourselves. Our tent was
within a rod of the river, if the broad sand-beds, with a scanty stream
of water coursing here and there along their surface, deserve to be
dignified with the name of river. The vast plains on either side were
almost level with the sand-beds, and they were bounded in the distance
by low, monotonous hills, parallel to the course of the Arkansas. All
was one expanse of grass; there was no wood in view, except some trees
and stunted bushes upon two islands which rose from amid the wet sands
of the river. Yet far from being dull and tame, this boundless scene was
often a wild and animated one; for twice a day, at sunrise and at noon,
the buffalo came issuing from the hills, slowly advancing in their grave
processions to drink at the river. All our amusements were at their
expense. Except an elephant, I have seen no animal that can surpass a
buffalo bull in size and strength, and the world may be searched in vain
to find anything of a more ugly and ferocious aspect. At first sight of
him every feeling of sympathy vanishes; no man who has not experienced
it can understand with what keen relish one inflicts his death wound,
with what profound contentment of mind he beholds him fall.
The cows are much smaller and of a gentler appearance, as becomes their
sex. While in this camp we forebore to attack them, leaving to Henry
Chatillon, who could better judge their fatness and good quality, the
task of killing such as we wanted for use; but against the bulls we
waged an unrelenting war. Thousands of them might be slaughtered without
causing any detriment to the species, for their numbers greatly exceed
those of the cows; it is the hides of the latter alone which are used
for the purpose of commerce and for making the lodges of the Indians;
and the destruction among them is therefore altogether disproportioned.
Our horses were tired, and we now usually hunted on foot. The wide, flat
sand-beds of the Arkansas, as the reader will remember, lay close by the
side of our camp. While we were lying on the grass after dinner,
smoking, conversing, or laughing at Tete Rouge, one of us would look up
and observe, far out on the plains beyond the river, certain black
objects slowly approaching. He would inhale a parting whiff from the
pipe, then rising lazily, take his rifle, which leaned against the cart,
throw over his shoulder the strap of his pouch and powder-horn, and with
his moccasins in his hand walk quietly across the sand toward the
opposite side of the river.
This was very easy; for though the sands were about a quarter of a mile
wide, the water was nowhere more than two feet deep. The farther bank
was about four or five feet high, and quite perpendicular, being cut
away by the water in spring. Tall grass grew along its edge. Putting it
aside with his hand, and cautiously looking through it, the hunter can
discern the huge shaggy back of the buffalo slowly swaying to and fro,
as with his clumsy swinging gait he advances toward the water. The
buffalo have regular paths by which they come down to drink. Seeing at
a glance along which of these his intended victim is moving, the hunter
crouches under the bank within fifteen or twenty yards, it may be, of
the point where the path enters the river. Here he sits down quietly on
the sand. Listening intently, he hears the heavy, monotonous tread of
the approaching bull. The moment after he sees a motion among the long
weeds and grass just at the spot where the path is channeled through the
bank. An enormous black head is thrust out, the horns just visible amid
the mass of tangled mane. Half sliding, half plunging, down comes the
buffalo upon the river-bed below. He steps out in full sight upon the
sands. Just before him a runnel of water is gliding, and he bends his
head to drink. You may hear the water as it gurgles down his capacious
throat. He raises his head, and the drops trickle from his wet beard. He
stands with an air of stupid abstraction, unconscious of the lurking
danger. Noiselessly the hunter cocks his rifle. As he sits upon the
sand, his knee is raised, and his elbow rests upon it, that he may level
his heavy weapon with a steadier aim. The stock is at his shoulder; his
eye ranges along the barrel. Still he is in no haste to fire. The bull,
with slow deliberation, begins his march over the sands to the other
side. He advances his fore-leg, and exposes to view a small spot denuded
of hair, just behind the point of his shoulder; upon this the hunter
brings the sight of his rifle to bear; lightly and delicately his finger
presses upon the hair-trigger. Quick as thought the spiteful crack of
the rifle responds to his slight touch, and instantly in the middle of
the bare spot appears a small red dot. The buffalo shivers; death has
overtaken him, he cannot tell from whence; still he does not fall, but
walks heavily forward, as if nothing had happened. Yet before he has
advanced far out upon the sand, you see him stop; he totters; his knees
bend under him, and his head sinks forward to the ground. Then his whole
vast bulk sways to one side; he rolls over on the sand, and dies with a
scarcely perceptible
Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/23405