The Project Gutenberg eBook, Wigwam and War-path; Or the Royal Chief in Chains, by A. B. (Alfred Benjamin) Meacham

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WIGWAM AND WAR-PATH;
OR THE
ROYAL CHIEF IN CHAINS.

BY
HON. A. B. MEACHAM,
EX-SUPERINTENDENT OF INDIAN AFFAIRS AND CHAIRMAN OF THE LATE MODOC
PEACE COMMISSION.
Illustrated by Portraits of
THE AUTHOR, GEN. CANBY, DR. THOMAS, CAPT. JACK, SCHONCHIN,
SCAR-FACED CHARLEY, BLACK JIM, BOSTON CHARLEY,
TOBEY AND RIDDLE, AND ELEVEN OTHER
SPIRITED AND LIFE-LIKE ENGRAVINGS,
OF ACTUAL SCENES FROM MODOC INDIAN LIFE, AS
WITNESSED BY THE AUTHOR.
SECOND AND REVISED EDITION.

BOSTON:
JOHN P. DALE AND COMPANY,
27 Boylston Street.
1875.

Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1875, by
A. B. MEACHAM,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

Press of
ROCKWELL AND CHURCHILL,
33 Arch Street, Boston.

PREFACE.

The Hon. A. B. Meacham has committed to me the difficult and delicate, yet delightful task of revising the manuscript and arranging the table of contents of the present work.

I have endeavored to review every page as an impartial critic, and have, as far as possible, retained, in all its simplicity and beauty, the singularly eloquent and fascinating style of the gifted author. The changes which I have made have been, for the most part, quite immaterial—no more nor greater than would be required in the manuscript of writers commonly called “learned.” In no case have I attempted (for the attempt would have been vain) to give shape and tone to the writer’s thoughts. His mind was so full, both of the comedy and the tragedy of his thrilling narrative, that it has flowed on like a mighty torrent, bidding defiance to any attempt either to direct or control.

None, it seems to me, can peruse the work without being charmed with the love of justice and the fidelity to truth which pervade its every page, as well as the manly courage with which the writer arraigns Power for the crime of crushing Weakness—holding our Government to an awful accountability for the delays, the ignorance, the fickleness and treachery of its subordinates in dealing with a people whose very religion prompts them to wreak vengeance for wrongs done them, even on the innocent.

For the lover of romance and of thrilling adventure, the work possesses a charm scarcely equalled by the enchanting pages of a Fennimore Cooper; and, to the reader who appreciates truth, justice, and humanity, and delights to trace the outlines of such a career as Providence seems to have marked out for the author, as well as for the unfortunate tribes whose history he has given us, it will be a reliable, entertaining, and instructive companion.

Mr. Meacham’s thirty years’ experience among the Indian tribes of the North-west, and his official career as Superintendent of Indian affairs in Oregon, together with his participation in the tragic events of the Lava Bed, invest his words with an authority which must outweigh that of every flippant politician in the land, who, to secure the huzzas of the mob, will applaud the oppressor and the tyrant one day, and the very next day clamor mercilessly for their blood.

D. L. EMERSON.

Boston, Oct. 1, 1874.

INTRODUCTION.

The chapter in our National history which tells our dealings with the Indian tribes, from Plymouth to San Francisco, will be one of the darkest and most disgraceful in our annals. Fraud and oppression, hypocrisy and violence, open, high-handed robbery and sly cheating, the swindling agent and the brutal soldier turned into a brigand, buying promotion by pandering to the hate and fears of the settlers, avarice and indifference to human life, and lust for territory, all play their parts in the drama. Except the negro, no race will lift up, at the judgment-seat, such accusing hands against this nation as the Indian. We have put him in charge of agents who have systematically cheated him. We have made causeless war on him merely as a pretext to steal his lands. Trampling under foot the rules of modern warfare, we have made war on his women and children. We have cheated him out of one hunting-ground by compelling him to accept another, and have robbed him of the last by driving him to frenzy, and then punishing resistance with confiscation. Meanwhile, neither pulpit nor press, nor political party, would listen to his complaints. Congress has handed him over, gagged and helpless, to the bands of ignorant, drunken and brutal soldiers. Neither on its floor, nor in any city of the Union, could his advocate obtain a hearing. Money has been poured out like water to feed and educate the Indian, of which one dollar in ten may have found its way to supply his needs, or pay the debts we owed him.

To show the folly of our method, examine the south side of the great lakes, and you will find in every thirty miles between Plymouth and Omaha the scene of an Indian massacre. And since 1789 we have spent about one thousand million of dollars in dealing with the Indians. Meanwhile, under British rule, on the north of those same lakes, there has been no Indian outbreak, worth naming, for a hundred years, and hardly one hundred thousand dollars have been spent directly on the Indians of Canada. What is the solution of this astounding riddle? This, and none other. England gathers her Indian tribes, like ordinary citizens, within the girth of her usual laws. If injured, they complain, like other men, to a justice of the peace, not to a camp captain. If offenders, they are arraigned before such a justice, or some superior court. Complaint, indictment, evidence, trial, sentence, are all after the old Saxon pattern. With us martial law, or no law at all, is their portion; no civil rights, no right to property that a white man is bound to respect. Of course quarrel, war, expense, oppression, robbery, resistance, like begetting like, and degradation of the Indian even to the level of the frontiersman

who would plunder him, have been the result of such a method. If such a result were singular, if our case stood alone, we should receive the pitiless curses of mankind. But the same result has almost always followed the contact of the civilized and the savage man.

General Grant’s recommendation of a policy which would acknowledge the Indian as a citizen, is the first step in our Indian history which gives us any claim to be considered a Christian people. The hostility it has met shows the fearful demoralization of our press and political parties. Statesmanship, good sense and justice, even from a chief magistrate can hardly obtain a hearing when they relate to such long-time victims of popular hate and pillage as our Indian tribes. Some few men in times past have tried to stem this hideous current of national indifference and injustice. Some men do now try. Prominent among these is the author of this volume. Thirty years of practical experience in dealing with Indians while he represented the Government in different offices; long and familiar acquaintance with their genius, moods, habits and capabilities, enable and entitle him to testify in this case. That, having suffered, at the hands of Indians, all that man can suffer and still live, he should yet lift up a voice, snatched almost miraculously from the grave, to claim for them, nevertheless, the treatment of men, of citizens, is a marvellous instance of fidelity to conviction against every temptation and injury. Bearing all over his person the scars of nearly fatal wounds received from Indians, he still advocates Grant’s policy. Familiar with the Indian tribes, and personally acquainted with their chiefs, with the old and young, men and women, their sports and faith, their history and aspirations, their education and capacity, their songs, amusements, legends, business, loves and hates, his descriptions lack no element of a faithful portrait; while his lightest illustrations have always beneath the surface a meaning which cannot fail to arrest the attention of the American people, and enable them to understand this national problem. Never before have we had just such a witness on the stand. Brilliant and graphic in description, and exceedingly happy in his choice of topics, he gives us pages startling and interesting as a novel. While his appeals stir the heart like a clarion, he still keeps cautiously to sober fact; and every statement, the most seemingly incredible, is based on more than sufficient evidence. I commend this book to the public—study it not only as accurate and striking in its pictures of Indian life, but as profoundly interesting to every student of human nature,—the picture of a race fast fading away and melting into white men’s ways. His contribution to the solution of one of the most puzzling problems of American statesmanship is invaluable. Destined no doubt to provoke bitter criticism, I feel sure his views and statements will bear the amplest investigation. His volume will contribute largely to vindicate the President’s policy, and to enable, while it disposes, the American people to understand and do justice to our native tribes.

(Signed,) WENDELL PHILLIPS.

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

CONTENTS.

WIGWAM AND WARPATH.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY REMINISCENCES, POW-E-SHIEK’S BAND.

“Oh, that mine enemy would write a book!” With that ominous warning ringing in my ears, I sit down to write out my own observations and experiences, not without full appreciation of the meaning and possible reiteration of the above portentous saying. In so doing I shall endeavor to state plain facts, in such a way, perhaps, that mine enemies will avail themselves of the privilege.

Hoping, however, that I may disarm all malice, and meet with a fair and impartial criticism, based on the principles of justice both to myself and to the peoples of whom I write, I begin this book with the conviction that the truths which I shall state, though told in homely phrase, will nevertheless be well received by the reading public, and will accomplish the purposes for which it is written; the first of which is to furnish reliable information on the subject under consideration, with the hope that when my readers shall have turned the last leaf of this volume they may have a better understanding of the wrongs suffered and crimes committed by the numerous tribes of Indians of the north-west.

Born on the free side of the Ohio river, of parents whose immediate ancestors, though slave-holders, had left the South at the command of conscientious convictions of the great wrong of human bondage, my earliest recollections are of political discussions relating to the crime against God and humanity; of power compelling weakness while groaning under the oppression of wrongs to surrender its rights.

Coupled with the “great wrong” of which I have spoken, occasionally that other wrong, twin to the first, was mentioned in my father’s family; impressed upon my mind by stories I had heard of the treatment of Indians who had in early days been neighbors to my parents, driven mile by mile toward the setting sun, leaving a country billowed by the graves of their victims mingled with bones of their own ancestors. What wonder, then, that, while rambling through the beech woods of my native State, I should speculate on the remnants of ruined homes which these people had left behind them, and walk in awe over the battle-fields where they had resisted the aggressive march of civilization?

While yet in childhood my parents migrated to what was then the “Far West.” Our new home in Iowa was on the outskirts of civilization, our nearest neighbors being a band of Sacs and Foxes,—“Saukees.” This was the beginning of my personal acquaintance with Indians.

The stories that had kindled in my heart feelings of sympathy and commiseration for them were forgotten for a time in the present living history before my eyes.

I was one of a party who in 1844 assisted the Government

in removing Pow-e-shiek’s band from the Iowa river to their new home in the West. The scenes around the Indian village on the morning of their departure were photographed on my mind so plainly that now, after a lapse of thirty years, they are still fresh in my memory, and the impressions made on me, and resolves then made by me, have never been forgotten, notwithstanding the terrible dangers through which I have since passed.

The impression was, that power and might were compelling these people to leave their homes against their wishes, and in violation of justice and right. The resolution was, that, whenever and wherever I could, I would do them justice, and contribute whatever of talent and influence I might have to better their condition.

These impressions and resolutions have been my constant companions through a stormy life of many years on the frontier of Iowa, California, and Oregon.

The bloody tragedy in the Lava Beds, April, 1873, through which the lamented Christian soldier, Gen. Canby, and the no less lamented eminent preacher, Dr. Thomas, lost their lives, and by which I had passed so close to the portals of eternity, has not changed my conviction of right, or my determination to do justice to even those who so earnestly sought my life. Narrow-minded, short-sighted men have said to me, more than once, “I reckon you have suffered enough to cure all your fanatical notions of humanity for these people!”

I pity the heart and intelligence of any man who measures principles of justice and right by the gauge

of personal suffering or personal interest. It is unworthy of enlightened Christian manhood.

“By their works ye shall know them.” So may these people of whom I write be adjudged in the lights of 1874; so shall this nation be adjudged; so judge ye the author of this book.

The spring of 1845, Pow-e-shiek’s band of Sacs and Foxes were removed from their home on Iowa river, twenty-five miles above Iowa City, Iowa, to Skunk river, one hundred miles west. Eighteen or twenty teams were hired by the Government to convey the household goods and supplies.

Among the number who furnished teams, my father was one, and I went as captain of the ox-team. The Indians were assembled at the “Trading Post” preparatory to starting. While the wagons were being loaded, some of them were gathering up their horses and packing their goods, ready for shipment; others were making the air vocal with wails of grief over the graves of their friends, or from sadness, consequent on leaving the scenes of a life-time.

I wonder not that they should reluctantly yield to inexorable fate, which compelled them to leave their beautiful valley of the Iowa. “The white man wanted it,” and they must retreat before the onward march of empire, notwithstanding their nationality and their ownership of the country had been acknowledged by the Government, when it went into treaty-council with them for the lands they held. This was not on the plea of “eminent domain,” but on account of the clamor for more room for the expanding energies of a growing population.

“The white man wanted it,” tells the story, as it

has been repeated, time after time, since the founding of the Colonies in America.

I do not know that, in this instance, any advantage was taken of these Indians, except that advantage which the powerful always have over the weak. But I do know that if they had been allowed a choice, they never would have consented to leave the graves of their fathers. ’Twas easy to say, “It was a fair transaction of selling and buying.”

So is it a business transaction when a man buys the lots adjoining your own, and builds high walls on three sides, erects powder magazines and glycerine manufactories, corrupts city councils, and, by means of extra privileges and excessive taxation, compels you to sell your valuable property for a mere song, by saying, “Take my price for your property, or run the risk of being blown up.”

Is it a fair “business transaction,” after he has thus forced the trade?

What though he does faithfully pay the contract-price? Does it atone for the first moral wrong, in legally forcing the sale? And how much more aggravated the injury becomes, when, through his agents, or his sons, he “legitimately,” under various pretences, permits the unfortunate seller to be robbed, by paying him off in “chips and whetstones,” that he does not desire nor need, so that in the end he is practically defrauded out of his property, and finds himself at the last payment, homeless and penniless.

All done, however, under the sanction of law, and in the shade of church-steeples, and with sanctimonious semblance of honesty and justice.

The picture is not overdrawn. The illustration is

fair, or, if deficient at all, it has bean in excess of advantage to the principal, not the victim. The latter has accepted the situation and suffered the consequences.

To return to Pow-e-shiek’s band leaving their home. Who shall ever recount the sorrows and anguish of those people, while they formed in line of march, and turned their eyes for the last time upon the scenes that had been all the world to them? What mattered it though they realized all the pangs their natures were capable of, in those parting hours, with the uncomfortable promises that the ploughshare of civilization would level down the graves of their fathers, before their retreating footprints had been obliterated from the trail which led them sadly away? They were “Injins;” and they ought to have been in better luck than being “Injins.”

Such was the speech of a white man in whose hearing I had said some word of sympathy on the occasion. I did not like the unfeeling wretch then, and have not much respect for him, or for the class he represents. Now I may have charity and pity, too, for all such. Charity for the poverty of a soul so devoid of the finer sensibilities of “common humanity that make mankind akin;” pity for a heart overflowing with selfishness, made manifest in thoughtless or spiteful speech.

The trying hour in the lives of these Indian people had come, and the long cavalcade moved out along the line of westward march, wagons loaded with corn and other supplies. The old men of the tribe, with darkened brows and silent tongue, sat on their horses;

the younger ones, with seeming indifference, in red blankets, feathers, and gaudy paints, moving off on prancing ponies, in little squads, to join the funeral pageant; for so it was. They were leaving the cherished scenes of childhood to hunt for sepulchres in the farther West.

The women, young and old, the drudges of the Indian household, as well as homes, where the sunlight of civilization should warm the hearts of men, and move them to truer justice, were gathered up, and preparing their goods for transportation, while bitter tears were flowing and loud lamentations gave evidence of the grief that would not be repressed, and each in turn, as preparations were complete, would lift the pappoose-basket with its young soul to altitudes of mother’s back or horse’s saddle, and then, with trembling limbs, climb to their seats and join the sad procession, adding what of woful wailing seemed necessary to make the whole complete with sights and sound that would bid defiance to painter’s skill or poet’s words, though, in the memory of those who beheld it, it may live as long as the throbs of sympathy which it kindled shall repeat themselves in hearts that feel for human sorrow.

The first day’s journey measured but four miles; the next, six; and at most never exceeded ten or twelve. I did not understand, then, why we went so slow. It may have been necessary to “kill time,” in order to use up the appropriation for the removal. When “camp” was reached, each day the wagons were “corralled;” that is to say, were drawn together in a circle, one behind another, and so close that when the teams were detached, the “pole” laid upon the

hind wheel of the next forward wagon would close up the gap, and thus complete the “corral,” which was to answer the double purpose of “penning the oxen when being yoked up,” and also as an extempore fort in case of attack by the Sioux Indians.

The wick-e-ups—Indian tents—were scattered promiscuously around, as each family might elect. After dinner was over the remainder of Uncle Sam’s time was spent in various ways: horse-racing, foot-racing, card-playing, shooting-matches by the men, white and red, while the women were doing camp-work, cooking, getting wood, building lodges, etc.; for be it understood, an old-style Indian never does such work any more than his white brother would rock the cradle, or operate a laundry for his wife. The old men would take turns standing guard, or rather sitting guard. At all events they generally went out to the higher hills, and, taking a commanding position, would sit down all solitary and alone, and with blanket drawn around their shoulders and over their heads, leaving only enough room for vision and the escape of smoke from their pipes.

In solemn silence, scanning the surroundings, hour after hour thus wore away. There was something in this scene suggesting serious contemplation to a looker-on, and I doubt not the reveries of the lone watchman savored strongly of sadness and sorrow, may be revenge.

The Lone Indian Sentinel.

Approaching one old fellow I sought to penetrate his mind, and was rewarded by a pantomimic exhibition, more tangible than “Black Crook” ever witnessed from behind the curtains, while recuperating

his wasted energies that he might the more seemingly “play the devil.”

Rising to his feet and releasing one naked arm from his blanket, he pointed toward the east, and with extended fingers and uprising, coming gesture quickly brought his hand to his heart, dropping his head, as if some messenger of despair had made a sudden call. He paused a moment, and then from his heart his hand went out in circling, gathering motion, until he had made the silent speech so vivid that I could see the coming throng of white settlers and the assembling of his tribe; and then, turning his face away with a majestic wave of his hand, I saw his sorrow-stricken people driven out to an unknown home; while he, sitting down again and drawing his blanket around him, refused me further audience. Perhaps he realized that he had told the whole story, and therefore need say no more.

Often at evening we would gather around some grassy knoll, or, it may be, some wagon-tongue, and white and red men mingled together. We would sit down and smoke, and tell stories and recount traditions of the past. Oftenest from Indian lips came the history of wars and dances, of scalps taken and prisoners tortured.

At the time of which I write the “Saukies” were at variance with the “hated Sioux,” and, indeed, the latter had been successful in a raid among the herds of the former, and had likewise carried away captives. Hence the sentinels on the outpost at evening.

Just at dusk one night, when the theme had been the “Sioux,” and our thoughts were in that channel, suddenly the whole camp was in a blaze of flashing

muskets. We beat a hasty retreat to our wagons—which were our only fortifications—with mingled feelings of fear and hope; fear of the much-dreaded Sioux, and hope that we might witness a fight.

My recollection now is that fear had more to do with our gymnastic exercises round about the wagon-wheels than hope had to do with getting a position for observation. But both were short-lived, for soon our red-skinned friends were laughing loud at our fright, and we, the victims, joined in to make believe we were not scared by the unceremonious flight of a flock of belated wild geese, inviting fire from the warriors of our camp; for so it was and nothing more. Still it was enough to make peace-loving, weak nerves shake, and heated brain to dream for weeks after of Sioux and of Indians generally. I speak for myself, but tell the truth of all our camp, I think.

The destination of our chief, Pow-e-shiek, and his band was temporarily with “Kisk-ke-kosh,” of the same tribe, whose bands were on Desmoines river. There is among all Indians, of whom I have any knowledge, a custom in vogue of going out to meet friends, or important personages, to assure welcome, and, perhaps, gratify curiosity.

When we were within a day or two of the end of our journey, a delegation from Kisk-ke-kosh’s camp came out to meet our party, and, while the greeting we received was not demonstrative in words, the younger people of both bands had adorned themselves with paint, beads, and feathers, and were each of them doing their utmost to fascinate the other. The scene presented was not only fantastic, but as

civilized, people would exclaim, “most gay and gorgeous,” and exhilarating even to a looker-on.

At night they gathered in groups, and made Cupid glad with the battles lost and won by his disciples. Then they danced, or, to ears polite, “hopped,” or tripped the light fantastic moccasin trimmed with beads, to music, primitive, ’tis true, but music made with Indian drums and rattling gourds. They went not in waltz, but circling round and round, and always round, as genteel people do, but round and round in single row, the circling ends of which would meet at any particular point, or all points, whenever the ring was complete, without reference to sets or partners, and joining in the hi-yi-yi-eia-ye-o-hi-ye-yi; and when tired sit down on the ground until rested, and then, without coaxing or renewed invitation, joining in, wherever fancy or convenience suited; for these round dances never break up at the unwelcome sound of the violin,—not, indeed, until the dancers are all satisfied.

The toilets were somewhat expensive, at least the “outfit” of each maiden cost her tribe several acres of land,—sometimes, if of fine figure, several hundred acres,—and not because of the long trails or expensive laces, for they do not need extensive skirts in which to dance, or laces, either, to enhance their charms; for the young gentlemen for whom they dressed were not envious of dry goods or fine enamel, but rather of the quality of paint on the cheeks of laughing girls; for girls will paint, you know, and those of whom I write put it on so thick that their beaux never have cause to say, “That’s too thin.”

The boys themselves paint in real genuine paint,

not moustaches alone, but eye-brows, checks, and hair. They wore feathers, too, because they thought that feathers were good things to have at a round dance; and they followed nature, and relieved the dusky maidens of seeming violation of nature’s plain intention.

As I shall treat under the head of amusement the dances of Indians more at length, I only remark, in this connection, that the dance on this occasion, while it was a real “round dance,” differed somewhat from round dances of more high-toned people in several ways, and I am not sure it was not without advantage in point of accommodation to the finer feelings of discreet mammas, or envious “wall-flowers.” At all events, as I have said on former pages, the whole set formed in one circle, with close rank, facing always to the front, and enlarged as the number of the dancers grew, or contracted as they retired; but each one going forward and keeping time with feet and hands to the music, which was low and slow at first, with short step, increasing the music and the motion as they became excited, until the air grew tremulous with the sounds, rising higher and wilder, more and more exciting, until the lookers-on would catch the inspiration and join the festive ring; even old men, who at first had felt they could not spare dignity or muscle either, would lay aside their blankets until they had lived over again the fiery scenes of younger days, by rushing into the magnetic cordon, and, with recalled youth, forget all else, save the soul-storming fury of the hour, sweetened with the charm of exultant joy, over age and passing years.

And thus the dance went on, until at last by degrees

the dancers had reached an altitude of happiness which burst forth in simultaneous shout of music’s eloquence, complete by higher notes of human voice drawn out to fullest length.

The dance was over, and the people went away in groups of twos and threes. The maidens, skipping home to the paternal lodge without lingering over swinging gates, or waiting for answering maids to ringing bells, crept softly in, not waking their mammas up to take off for them their lengthened trails, but perhaps with wildly beating hearts from the dance to dream-land.

The young braves gathered their scarlet blankets around them, and in couples or threes, laughing as boys will do at silly jest of awkward maid or swain, went where “tired Nature’s sweet restorer” would keep promise and let them live over again the enchanting scenes of the evening, and thus with negative and photograph would feel the picture of youth their own.

The older men, whose folly had led them to display contempt for age, went boldly home to lodge where the tired squaws had long since yielded to exhausted nature, and were oblivious to the frolics of their liege lords.

Mrs. Squaw had no rights that a brave was bound to respect. It was her business to carry wood, build lodges, saddle his horse, and lash the pappoose in the basket, and do all other drudgery. It was his to wear the gayest blanket, the vermilion paint, and eagle-feathers, and ride the best horses, have a good time generally, and whip his squaws when drunk

or angry; and it was nobody’s business to question him. He was a man.

Now, if my reader has failed to see the picture I have drawn of Indian dances, I promise you that, before our journey is ended, I will try again a similar scene, where the music of tall pine-trees and tumbling torrents from hoary mountains will give my pencil brighter hues and my hand a steadier, finer touch.

The arrival of our train at the camp of Kisk-ke-kosh called out whatever of finery had not been on exhibition with the welcoming party who had come out to meet us. And when the sun had gone down behind the Iowa prairies the dances were repeated on a larger scale.

The following day we were paid off and signed the vouchers. Don’t know that it was intended; don’t know that it was not; but I do remember that we were allowed the same number of days in which to return that we had occupied in going out, although on our homeward journey we passed each day two or three camps made on the outward journey. I ventured to make some remark on the subject, suggesting the injustice of taking pay for more time than was required for us to reach home, and a nice kind of a churchman, one who could drive oxen without swearing, said in reply, “Boys should be seen and not heard, you little fool!”

He snubbed me then, but I never forgot the deep, earnest resolve I made to thrash him for this insult when “I got to be a man.” But, poor fellow, he went years ago where boys may be heard as well as seen, and I forgive him.

We met the rushing crowds who were going to the

“New Purchase”; so eager, indeed, that, like greedy vultures which circle round a dying charger and then alight upon some eminence near, or poise themselves in mid air, impatient for his death, sometimes swoop down upon him before his heart has ceased to beat.

So had these emigrants encamped along the frontier-line, impatient for the hour when the red man should pull down his wigwam, put out his council-fires, collect his squaws, his pappooses, and his ponies, and turn his back upon the civilization they were bringing to take the place of these untamed and savage ceremonies. While the council-fire was dying out, another was being kindled whose ruddy light was to illuminate the faces, and warm the hands of those who, following the westward star of empire, had come to inherit the land, and build altars wherefrom should go up thanks to Him who smiled when he created the “beautiful valley” of the Iowa.

How changed the scene! Then the gray smoke from Indian lodge rose slowly up and floated leisurely away. Nov from furnace-blast it bursts out in volume black, and settles down over foundry and farm, city and town, unless, indeed, the Great Spirit sends fierce tempests, as an omen of his wrath, at the sacrilege done to the red man’s home.

Then the forest stood entire, like harp-strings whereon the Great Spirit might utter tones to soothe their stormy souls, or rouse them to deeds in vindication of rights he had bequeathed.

Now they live only in part, the other part decaying, while groaning under the pressure of the iron heel of power.

Bearing no part in sweet sounds, unless indeed it be sweet to hear the iron horse, with curling breath, proclaiming the advance of legions that worship daily at Mammon’s shrine, or bearing forward still further westward the enterprising men and women who are to work for other lands a transformation great as they have wrought for this.

Then on the bosom of the river the red man’s children might play in light canoe, or sportive dive, to catch the mimic stars that seemed to live beneath its flow, to light the homes of finny tribes who peopled then its crystal chambers.

Now, it is turgid and slow, and pent with obstructions to make it flow in channels where its power is wanted to complete the wreck of forests that once had made it cool, fit beverage for nature’s children, or is muddied with the noisy wheels of commerce, struggling to rob the once happy home of Pow-e-shiek, of the charms and richness of soil that nature’s God had given.

The prairies, too, at that time, were like a shoreless sea when, half in anger, the winds resist the ebb or flow of its tides; or they may be likened to the clouds, which seem to be mirrored on their waving surface, sporting in the summer air, or, at the command of the Great Spirit, hurry to join some gathering tempest, where He speaks in tones of thunder, as if to rebuke the people for their crimes.

Where once the wild deer roamed at will is enlivened now by the welcome call of lowing herds of tamer kind.

The waving grass, and fragrant flowers, too, gave way to blooming maize of finer mould.

The old trails have been buried like the feet that made them, beneath the upturned sod.

And now, while I am writing, this lovely valley rings out a chant of praise to God, for his beneficence, instead of the weird wild song of Pow-e-shiek and his people at their return from crusades against their enemies.

Who shall say the change that time and civilization have wrought, have not brought nearer the hour, “When man, no more an abject thing, shall from the sleep of ages spring,” and be what God designed him, “pure and free?”

No one, however deeply he may have drank from the fount of justice and right, can fail to see, in the transformation wrought on this fair land, the hand of Him whose finger points out the destiny of his peculiar people, and yearly gives token of his approbation, by the return of seasons, bringing rich reward to the hands of those whom he has called to perform the wonders of which I write, in compensation for the hardships they endured, while the transit was being made from the perfection of untamed life to the higher state of civilization.

While we praise Him who overrules all, we cannot fail to honor His instrumentalities.

The brave pioneers, leaving old homes in other lands to find new ones in this, have made sacrifices of kindred, family ties, and early associations, at the behest of some stern necessity (it may be growing out of bankruptcy of business, though not of pride and honor, or manly character), or ambition to be peers among their fellows.

Or, mayhap, the change was made by promptings

of parental love for children whose prospects in life might be made better thereby, and the family unity still preserved by locating lands in close proximity, where from his home the father might by some well-known signal call his children all around him. Where the faithful watch-dog’s warning was echoed in every yard, and thus gave information of passing events worthy of his attention enacting in the neighborhood. Where the smoke from cabin chimneys high arose, mingled in mid air, and died away in peaceful brotherhood. Where the blended prayer of parent and child might go up in joint procession from the school-house-churches through the shining trees that answered well for steeples then, or passing through clouds to Him who had made so many little groves, where homes might be made and prepared the most beautiful spots on earth for final resting-place, where each, as the journey of life should be over, might be laid away by kindred hands, far from the hurrying, noisy crowds, who rush madly along, or stop only to envy the dead the ground they occupy, and speculate how much filthy lucre each sepulchre is worth.

Others went to the new country with downy cheeks of youth, and others still with full-grown beards, who were fired with high ambition to make name, fame, home, and fortune, carrying underneath their sombre hats bright ideas and wonderful possibilities, with hearts full of manly purposes, beating quickly at the mention of mother’s name or father’s pride, sister’s prayer or brother’s love.

And with all these to buoy them up, would build homes on gentle slope, or in shady grove, and thus become by slow degrees “one among us.”

I was with the first who went to this new country, and I know whereof I write. I know more than I have told, or will tell, lest by accident I betray the petty jealousies that cropped out; when Yankee-boys, forgetting the girls they left behind them, would pay more attention to our western girls than was agreeable to “us boys.”

Others there were who had followed the retreating footsteps of the Indians. These were connecting links between two kinds of life, savage and civilized. Good enough people in their way, but they could not bear the hum of machinery, or the glitter of church-spires, because the first drove back the wild game, and the devotees who worshipped beneath the second, forbade the exercise of careless and wicked noises mingling with songs of praise.

A few, perhaps, had fled from other States to avoid the consequences of technical legal constructions which would sadly interfere with their unpuritanical ways. But these were not numerous. The early settlers, taken all in all, possessed many virtues and qualifications that entitled them to the honor which worthy actions and noble deeds guarantee to those who do them. They had come from widely different birth-lands, and brought with them habits that had made up their lives; and though each may have felt sure their own was the better way, they soon learned that honest people may differ and still be honest. And to govern themselves accordingly, each yielded, without sacrifice of principle, their hereditary whims

and peculiar ways, and left the weightier matters of orthodoxy or heterodoxy to be argued by those who had nothing better with which to occupy their time than to muddle their own and other people’s brains with abstruse themes.

The “early settlers” were eminently practical, and withal successful in moulding out of the heterogeneous mass of whims and prejudices a common public sentiment, acceptable to all, or nearly so. And thus, they grew, not only in numbers but in wealth, power, intelligence, and patriotism, until to-day there may be found on the once happy home of Pow-e-shiek a people rivalling those of any other State, surpassing many of them in that greatest and noblest of all virtues, “love for your neighbor.”

No people in all this grand republic furnished truer or braver men for the holocaust of blood required to reconsecrate the soil of America to freedom and justice, than those whose homes are built on the ruins of Pow-e-shiek’s early hunting-grounds. Proud as the record may be, it shall yet glow with names written by an almost supernal fire, that warms into life the immortal thought of poets, and the burning eloquence of orators.

We are proud of the record of the past, and cherish bright hopes of the future. But with all our patriotic exultations, memory of Pow-e-shiek’s sacrifices comes up to mingle sadness with our joy. Sadness, not the offspring of reproach of conscience for unfair treatment to him or his people by those who came after he had gone at the invitation of the Government, but sadness because he and his people could not enjoy what other races always have, the privilege

of a higher civilization; sadness, because, while our gates are thrown wide open and over them is written in almost every tongue known among nations, “Come share our country and our government with us,” it was closed behind him and his race, and over those words painted, in characters which he understood, “Begone!”

CHAPTER II.

OVERLAND: BLOOD FOR BLOOD.

In 1846 Pow-e-shiek came with his band to visit his old home. We were “early settlers” then, and had built our cabins on the sloping sides of a bluff overlooking the valley below. From this outpost we descried the bands of piebald ponies and then the curling smoke, and next the poles of his wick-e-ups (houses); and soon we saw Pow-e-shiek coming to make known his wish that he might be permitted to pasture his stock on the fields which we had already robbed of corn. The recognition in me of one who had assisted in removing his people seemed to surprise and please him, and for a moment his eye lit up as if some fond reality of the past had revived the friendship that had grown out of my sympathy for him in his dark hour of departure from his home. And when I said, “This is my father, and my mother, these my sisters and my brothers, and this place is our home,” he gave to the welcoming hands a friendly grasp in evidence of his good intentions, and then assured us that no trouble on his part should grow out of his coming, and that, if his young men should do any dishonest acts, he would punish them; that he had come back to spend the winter once again near his haunts of olden times, perhaps to kill the deer that he thought white men did not care about since they had so many cattle and swine. We accepted his

assurance, and believed him to be just what he pretended,—a quiet, honest old chief, who would do as he agreed, nor seek excuse for not doing so.

The dinner hour had passed, but such as we had my mother set before him, and he did not fail to do full justice to everything upon the table. He made sure that his pappooses should complete what he began by making a clean sweep into one corner of his blanket to bear it to his lodge. After dinner he drew out his pipe, and filling it with Kin-ni-ki-nick (tobacco), and lighting it with a coal of fire, he first sought to propitiate the Great Spirit by offering up to him the first puff of smoke; next the devil, by blowing the smoke downward, and saved the third for himself; and after that he offered to the fourth person in his calendar, my father, the privilege of expressing his approval. But, as he was not a smoker himself, he passed the pipe to his oldest son, intimating his desire that he should be represented by proxy. I, willing to do his bidding, in friendship for our guest, it may be, or perhaps from other personal motives, soon reduced the Kin-ni-ki-nick to ashes and handed back the empty pipe to Pow-e-shiek. I knew not that I had transgressed the rules of politeness until afterwards, when I offered a pipe to our strange-mannered guest, he, with dignity, drew a puff or two and then passed it back, with an expression of countenance which declared unmistakably that it was meant for reproof.

If I felt resentment for a moment that a savage should presume to teach me manners, I do not feel that I was the only one who might be greatly benefited by taking lessons of unsophisticated men and

women of other than white blood; not alone in simple politeness, but also in regard to right and justice, whose flags of truce are never raised ostensibly to insure protection, but really to intimidate the weak and defenceless, who dared to stand up for the God-given rights to home and country.

Pow-e-shiek made preparations to return to his lodge, and we, boy-like, followed him out of the cabin door, and while he was saying good-by he espied a fine large dog that we had, named Van, though the name did not indicate our politics. Pow-e-shiek proposed to trade a pony for “old Van,” and we were pleased at first, because we thought the pony would do to ride after the “breaking team” of dewy mornings in the spring. But when we learned that “Van” was wanted by the chief to furnish the most substantial part of a feast for his people, we demurred. “Old Van,” too, seemed to understand the base use to which he was to be put, and reproached us with sullen side-looks; and the trade was abandoned, and would have been forgotten only that Van was ever afterward maddened at the sight of Pow-e-shiek or any of his race.

The winter passed, and our red neighbors had kept their promise, for although neither the granary nor any other building was ever locked, nothing had been missed, and our mutual regard seemed stronger than when the acquaintance was renewed. When spring had fully come, Pow-e-shiek, punctual to his promise, broke up his camp and went away.

Bull-Dog Trade.

Occasionally, for years afterwards, his people came back to visit; but he no more.

Years have passed, and he has joined the great throng in the happy hunting-grounds.

When the gold fever was at its height, in 1850, in company with others I journeyed overland to the new Eldorado. While en route, we heard much of Indians, of their butcheries and cruelties; I think there was good foundation for the stories. Indeed, we saw so many evidences of their handiwork, in new-made graves and abandoned wagons demolished, that there could be no reasonable doubt of their savage treatment of those who came within their power.

While I do not now, never have, and never will attempt to justify their butcheries, yet it is but fair that both sides of the story be told.

When our party was at “Independence Rock,” in 1850, and no Indians had disturbed the passing travellers, near where we were then, we “laid over” a day, and within the time a man came into camp and boasted that he had “knocked over a buck at a distance of a hundred yards,” and when the query was made as to the whereabouts of his game he produced a bloody scalp. He gave as an excuse that the Indians had frightened an antelope he was trying to kill, and that he shot the Indian while the latter was endeavoring to get away. Is it unreasonable to suppose that the friends of the murdered Indian, when he came not to the lodge at nightfall, would hunt him up, and that, when his brother or friend saw his scalpless head, he should avow to avenge his death?

Doubtless he did avenge both himself and his tribe, and he may have slain many innocent persons in retaliation for this foul deed.

As to the cause of the Indian troubles on the

Humbolt river, during the summer of 1850, I know nothing. Probably they originated in some lawless act similar to the one above described. In September following I loaned a rifle to a miner who was going out on a prospecting tour. On his return he proposed to buy it, saying that “it was a good one, he knew, because he tried it on an Indian, shooting from one bluff to another; and,” said this civilized white man, “I dropped him into the river, and he went where all good Injuns go.”

Later in the season two friendly Indians came into the town of “Bidwell’s Bar,” and, although no evidence was produced against them, they were arrested on “general principles,” it was said; and while threats were made of hanging them on “general principles” too, better counsels prevailed, and they were placed in charge of a guard, who were to convey them to “Long’s Bar,” and turn them over to the sheriff to be held for trial.

The guard returned in a short time, and reported that the prisoners had “slipped down a bank and were drowned.” It was, however, understood that they were killed by the guard “to save expense.” Following this accident several white men were murdered by Indians, it was said, although the murdered men, it was evident, had met death through other instrumentality than bows and arrows.

A company was raised to go out and punish the offenders. On their return they reported grand success in finding Indian rancheros, and in the wholesale butchery they had committed. Do you wonder that twenty or thirty white men were riddled with arrows within a short time, after such manly conduct, by the brave butchers of Indian women and children?

I have not at hand the data from which to mention in detail the various Indian wars that harassed the miners of California. Suffice it that they were of frequent occurrence, and, indeed, continued until the mountain bands of Indians were broken up. If the truth could be heard from the lips of both the living and the dead, we should hear many things unpleasant to the ears of white men as well as Indians, and, perhaps, discreditable to both. I doubt not such revelation would support the declaration I here make,—that bad white men have always been the instigators of the bloody deeds through which so many innocent persons have passed on to the other life.

The proofs are not wanting in almost every instance in support of this statement. That the Indian is vindictive, is true; that he is brave, cunning, and inhuman to his enemies is also true; but that he is faithful to his compacts, whenever fairly dealt with, is not less true.

CHAPTER III.

INDIANS AND MINERS.

Walla-walla, Washington Territory,
February 4th, 1863.

Dear Brother (Suisun City, Cal.):—

I have found a good country and more business than I can manage alone; come and help me. Better leave your family until you can see for yourself. You may not like it, though I do. Money is plenty, everything new, and prices keyed up to old “forty-nine” times.

Your brother,
H. J. MEACHAM.

Lee’s Encampment, fifty miles south of Walla-Walla,
on top of Blue Mountain, March 6, 1863.

My dear Wife (Suisun, Cal.):—

“Eureka.” Come; I am camping in four feet of snow, and cooking meals in a frying-pan, and charging a dollar; selling “slap jacks” two bits each; oats and barley at twelve cents, and hay at ten cents per pound, and other things at same kind of prices; can’t supply the demand. Go to William Booth, San Francisco, and tell him to ship you and the children with the goods, to Walla-Walla, Washington Territory, via Portland, Oregon, care Wells, Fargo & Co.’s Express.

A. B. MEACHAM.

These two letters are copied here, to carry the reader and the writer over a period of twelve years, leaving behind whatever may have transpired of interest to the work now in hand, to be taken up on some other page, in proper connection with kindred subjects of later date.

Lee’s Encampment is located near the summit of the Blue Mountains in Oregon, on the great highway leading from the Columbia river to the rich gold fields of Idaho and Eastern Oregon. It is fifty miles south of Walla-Walla, and is also one of the out-boundaries of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, occupied by the Walla-Walla, Cayuse and Umatilla Indians.

The roads leading out from the several starting-points on the Columbia river, to the mines above-mentioned, converge on the Reservation, and, climbing the mountain’s brow, on the old “Emigrant trail,” cross over to Grand Round valley.

During the spring of 1863, the great tide of miners that flowed inland, to reach the new gold fields, necessarily passed through the Reservation, and thence via Lee’s Encampment. This circumstance of location gave abundant opportunity for observation by the writer. Of those who sought fortunes in the mines, I might write many chapters descriptive of the motley crowds of every shade of color and of character, forming episodes and thrilling adventures. But my purpose in this work would not be subserved by doing so, except such as have bearing on the subject-matter under consideration.

Of the thousands who landed at Umatilla City and Walla-Walla, en route to the “upper country,” few

brought means of transportation overland. There were no stages, no railroads; and what though Haley & Ish, Stephen Taylor, and many others, advertised “saddle trains to leave for the mines every day of the week, at reasonable rates,” which were, say, sixty dollars, on ponies that cost perhaps forty dollars; yet there were hundreds that could not get tickets even at those rates. The few who engaged reserved seats were started off on saddle-horses of various grades, under the charge of a “conductor,” whose principal duty was, not to collect fares, but to herd the kitchen mules,—every train had with it one or more animals on whose back the supplies and blankets were carried,—and indicate the camping places by pulling the ropes that loosed the aforesaid kitchens and blankets, when, like other trains, at the pull of the rope, the whole would stop, and not be startled into unnecessary haste by “twenty minutes for dinner” sounded in their ears. One or more nights the camp would be on the Reservation, thus bringing travellers and Indians in contact.

I have said that many could not get places, even on the backs of mules, or Cayuse ponies. Such were compelled to take “Walkers’ line,” go on foot and carry blankets and “grub” on their backs. The second night out would find them also on the Reservation, and those who had the wherewith, purchased horses of the Indians; some, perhaps, without consulting the owners. Not stealing them! No. A white man would not do so mean a thing; but ropes are suspicious things when found in the pack of one of “Walker’s” passengers, and if a pony was fool enough to run his head into a noose, the handiest way to get

clear of him was to exchange with some other man of similar misfortune, and then it was not stealing in the eyes of honest white men.

If the Indian missed his property, and, hunting along the line, found him under a white man, you might suppose he could recover his horse. Not so, my lord! Not so. The white man had proof that he had bought him of some other man, may be an Indian. Such was sometimes the case, for I do not believe that all men are honest, white or red; and these red men were not behind the white in sharp practice; and it is safe to say, that those of whom I am writing now were peers of those who sought to outwit, them.

The horses of saddle trains would sometimes “stray away,”—often those of freighters,—and, since time was money, and strangers might not understand the “range,” the Indians were employed to hunt for the straying animals, and paid liberally if they succeeded; and thus it made the stock of other trains restless, and often they would run away—and so the business increased, and the Indians grew wealthier, notwithstanding their own sometimes followed off a rope in the hands of white men.

The road, along which this stream of miners poured, left the valley of Umatilla on the Reservation, leading up the mountains. Near the foot of the hill, but with a deep ravine or gulch intervening, and on another hill,—part really of the valley, though sloping toward the former,—was The “Trading Post,”—Indian’s sutler store. ’Twas here that saddle trains and “Walker’s line,” halted for the night, or “to noon” and rest, after travelling a fourteen-mile “stretch.”

The “Walker” passengers were already worn out,

with heavy packs of picks and pans, bottles and blankets. The situation of the post, with reference to the mountain, was to an observer like standing on the sloping roof of one house and measuring the “pitch” of the one adjoining, making it seem much steeper than it really is. So with this mountain. True, it required a broad upward sweep of vision to take in the height. On the first bench, one mile above, the trains and men seemed to be transformed into dogs and boys. On the second bench, two miles up, they looked still smaller. On the third, three miles up, they very closely resembled Punch and Judy driving a team of poodles. The Indians found here a market for their horses, and sometimes did a livery business, in Indian style.

A stalwart son of Erin, standing against the wall of the store to “rest his pack,” after looking at the trail leading up the mountain, said to the merchant doing business there, “I say, misther, is it up that hill we go?” Hearing an affirmative answer, he looked again at each bench, his brow growing darker the higher his eye went; at length he gave vent to his estimate of the undertaking by saying, “By the howly St. Patrick, if me own mother was here in the shape of a mule, I’d ride her up that hill, sure! I say, Misther Injun, wouldn’t you sell us a bit of a pony for to carry our blankets an’ things over the mountain with?”

The Indian had been in business long enough to understand that, and replied, “Now-wit-ka mi-ka pot-luetch. Chic-a, mon, ni-ka is-cum, cu-i-tan!”—“Och! Mister Injun, don’t be makin’ fun of a fellow, now, will ye? It’s very sore me feet is, a-carrying me pick and pan and cooking-traps. Why don’t you talk like a

dacent American gentleman?”—“Wake-ic-ta-cum-tux,” said Tip-tip-a-noor, the Indian. “Don’t be playin’ your dirty tongue on me now, or I’ll spoil your beautiful face so I will.”

Drawing his arms out of the straps that had kept the pack in position on his shoulders, and lowering it “aisy,” to save the bottle, he began to make demonstrations of hostile character, when Mr. Flippin, the post-trader, explained that Tip-tip-a-noos had replied to his first request, “Yes, you show the money, and I will furnish the horse;” and he had replied to the second, “I don’t understand you.”—“And is that all he says? Shure, he is a nice man, so he is. Shan’t I swaten his mouth wid a dhrop from me bottle?”—“No,” says Flip., “that won’t do.”—“Away wid yees; shure, this is a free counthry, and can’t a man do as he plases with his own?”—“Not much,” replied Flip. “I say now, Mike, will you join me in the byin’ of a bit of a pony for to carry our blankets and things?”

The man addressed as Mike assented to the proposal, and soon Tip-tip-a-noos brought a small pinto calico-colored horse; and after some dickering the trade was completed by Pat, through pantomimic signs, giving Tip to understand, that if he would follow down into the gulch, out of sight of Flip., he would give him a bottle of whiskey, in addition to the twenty dollars.

The pony was turned over to Pat and Mike. The next move was to adjust the packs on the Cayuse. This was not easily done. First, because the pony did not understand Pat’s jargon; second, they had not reckoned on the absence of a pack-saddle. Flip., always ready to accommodate the travelling public, for

a consideration, brought an old cross-tree pack-saddle, and then the lash-ropes,—ropes to bind the load to the saddle. Pat approached the pony with outstretched hands, saying pretty things in Irish brogue; while Mike, to make sure that the horse should not escape, had made it fast to his waist with a rope holding back, while Pat went forward, so that at the precise moment the latter had reached the pony’s nose, he reared up, and, striking forward, gave Pat a blow with his fore-foot, knocking him down. Seeming to anticipate the Irishman’s coming wrath, he whirled so quick that Mike lost his balance and went down, shouting, “Sthop us, sthop us; we are running away!” Pat recovered his feet in time to jump on the prostrate form of Mike, going along horizontally, at a furious gait, close to the pony’s heels. The Cayuse slackened his speed and finally stopped, but not until Mike had lost more or less of clothing, and the “pelt” from his rosy face.

When the two Irishmen were once more on foot, and both holding to the rope, now detached from Mike’s waist at one end, and buried into the wheezing neck of the Cayuse at the other, a scene occurred that Bierstadt should have had for a subject. I don’t believe I can do it justice, and yet I desire my readers to see it, since the renowned painter above-mentioned, was not present to represent it on canvas.

Think of two bloody-nosed Irish lads holding the pony, while he was pulling back until his haunches almost touched the ground, wheezing for breath, occasionally jumping forward to slacken the rope around his neck, and each time letting Pat and Mike fall suddenly to the ground, swearing in good Irish style at

the “spalpeen of a brute” that had no better manners, while Mr. Indian was laughing as he would have done his crying,—away down in his heart. Flip., and others looking on, were doing as near justice to the occasion as possible, by laughing old-fashioned horse-laughs, increasing with each speech from Pat or Mike.

Occasionally, when the Cayuse would suddenly turn his heels, and fight in pony style, Pat would roar out Irish, while the horse would compel them to follow him, each with body and limbs at an angle of forty-five degrees, until his horseship would turn again, and then they were on a horizontal awhile. Securing him to a post, Pat said, “Now, be jabers, we’ve got him.” After slipping a shirt partly over his head, to “blind” him, they proceed to sinche—fasten—the pack-saddle on him, and then the two packs. When all was lashed fast, and a hak-i-more—rope halter—was on his nose, they untied him from the post, and proposed to travel, but Cayuse did not budge. Mike pulled and tugged at the halter, while Pat called him pretty names, and, with outspread hands, as though he was herding geese, stamping his foot, coaxed pony to start. No use. Flip. suggested a sharp stick. Pat went for his cane, like a man who had been suddenly endowed with a bright idea. After whittling the end to a point, he applied it to the pony.

The next speech that Irishman made was while in half-bent position. With one hand on the side of his head, he anxiously addressed Tip. “Meester Injun, is me ear gone—Meester Injun, what time of night is it now? I say, Meester Injun, where now is the spalpeen of a pony?”

Mike had let go of the rope soon after Pat applied the sharp stick, and was following the retreating blankets and bottles, ejaculating, “The beautiful whiskey! The beautiful whiskey!”

When Pat’s eyes were clear enough, Meester Injun, without a smile, pointed to the valley below, where frying pans and miners tools were performing a small circus, much to the amusement of a band of Cayuse horses, who were following Pat’s pony with considerable interest.

I don’t think the goods, or the whiskey either, were ever recovered by Pat and Mike, but I have an idea that “Tip-tip-a-noor” had a big dance, and slept warm under the blankets, and possibly a big drunk.

Of course, reader, you do not blame Irishmen for their opposition to “The Humane Policy of the Government.”

The Indian, however, if detected in unlawful acts, was sure of punishment under the law, no matter though he may have been incited to the deed by whiskey he had bought of white men, who vended it in violation of law. This commerce in whiskey was carried on extensively, notwithstanding the efforts of a very efficient agent to prevent it.

Men have started out on “Walker’s line,” carrying their blankets, and in a day or two they would be well mounted, without resorting to a “rope” or money to purchase with, and obtain the horses honestly too; that is to say, when they practised self-denial, and did not empty the bottles they had concealed in their packs. One bottle of whiskey would persuade an Indian to dismount, and allow the sore-footed, honest miner, who carried the bottle, to ride, no matter though the

horse may have belonged to other parties. I have heard men boast that they were “riding a bottle,” meaning the horse that bore them along had cost that sum.

Such things were common, and could not be prevented. Young “Black Hawk” learned how to speak English, and make brick, and various other arts, through the kindness of the Superintendent of the State’s Prison. These things he might never have known, but for the foresight of some fellow who disliked the fare on “Walker’s” line.

The question is asked, “What was the agent doing?” He was doing his duty as well as he could, with the limited powers he possessed. But when he sought to arrest the white men who were violators of the laws of the United States, he was always met with the common prejudices against Indian testimony, and found himself defeated. But, when he was appealed to for protection against Indian depredations, he found sympathy and support, and few instances occurred where guilty Indians escaped just punishment.

I knew the agent well, and doubted not his sense of justice in his efforts to maintain peace.—If he did not mete out even-handed justice in all matters of dispute between white men and Indians, the fault was not his, but rather that of public sentiment. When colored men were “niggers,” the Indian “had no rights that white men were bound to respect.”

He who proclaimed against the unjust administration of law so unfavorable to the Indians, in courts where white men and Indians were parties, was denounced as a fanatical sentimentalist, and placed in the

same category with “Wendell Phillips” and “Old John Brown,” whose names, in former times, were used to deride and frighten honest-thinking people from the expression of sentiments of justice and right.

I wish here to record that, although we did a large amount of business with white men and Indians, we never had occasion to complain of the latter for stealing, running off stock, or failing to perform, according to agreement, to the letter, even in matters left to their own sense of honor.

On one occasion, “Cascas,” a Reservation Indian, who was under contract to deliver, once in ten days, at Lee’s Encampment, ten head of yearlings, of specified size and quality, as per sample, at the time of making the bargain, brought nine of the kind agreed upon and one inferior animal. Before driving them into the corral, he rode up to the house, and calling me, pointed to the small yearling, saying that was “no good;” that he could not find “good ones” enough that morning to fill the contract, but if I would let the “Ten-as-moose-moose”—small steer—go in, next time, he would drive up a “Hi-as-moose-moose”—big steer—in place of an ordinary yearling. If I was unwilling to take the small one, he would drive him back, and bring one that would be up to the standard.

I assented to the first proposition. Faithful to the promise, he made up the deficiency with a larger animal next time, and even then made it good.

Another circumstance occurred which asserted the honesty of these Indians. After we had corralled a small lot of cows purchased from them, one escaped and returned to the Indian band of cattle, from which

she had been driven. Three or four years after, we were notified by the owner of the band that we had four head of cattle with his herd. True, it was but simple honesty, and no more than any honest man would have done; but there are so many who would have marked and branded the calves of that little herd, in their own interest, that I felt it worthy of mention here to the credit of a people who have few friends to speak in their behalf. Notwithstanding their lives furnish many evidences of high and honorable character, yet they, very much like white men, exhibit many varieties.

In pressing need for a supply of beef for hotel use, I called on “Tin-tin-mit-si,” once chief of the Walla-Wallas (a man of extraordinary shrewdness, and possessed of great wealth, probably thirty thousand dollars in stock and money), to make a purchase. He, silently, half in pantomime, ordered his horse, that he might accompany me to the herds. Taking with us his son-in-law, John McBerne, as interpreter, we soon found one animal that would answer our purpose. The keen-eyed old chief, with his blanket drawn over his head, faced about, and said, “How much that cow weigh?”—“About four hundred and fifty pounds,” I answered. “How much you charge for a dinner?”—“One dollar,” I responded. “How much a white man eat?” said “Tin-tin-mit-si.” I read his mind, and knew that he was thinking how to take advantage of my necessity, and, also, that he was not accustomed to the white man’s dinner. I replied, “Sometimes one pound.”—“All right,” quoth Indian; “you pay me four hundred dollars, then what is over will pay you for cooking.”—“But who will pay me

for the coffee, sugar, butter, potatoes, eggs, cheese, and other things?” I replied.

While Johnny was repeating this speech the old chief moved up closer, and let his blanket slip off his ears, and demanded a repetition of the varieties composing a Christian dinner; and, while this was being done, he looked first at the interpreter, then at me, and said, in a surly, dry tone, “No wonder a white man is a fool, if he eat all those things at once; an Indian would be satisfied with beef alone.”

After some mathematical calculations had been explained, he agreed to accept forty-five dollars, a good, round price for the cow. And I drove away the beast, while “Tin-tin-mit-si” returned to his lodge to bury the money I had paid him along with several thousand dollars he had saved for his sons-in-law to quarrel over; for the old chief soon after sent for his favorite horse to be tied near the door of his lodge, ready to accompany him to the happy hunting-grounds, where, according to Indian theology, he has been telling his father of the strange people he had seen.

CHAPTER IV.

DIAMOND-CUT-DIAMOND.

It was understood, in the treaty stipulation with the Government and these people, that they were to have the privilege of hunting and grazing stock in common with citizens on the public domain. In the exercise of this right, they made annual journeys to Grand Round and other valleys, east of the Blue mountains, driving before them, on these journeys, their horses. They were often thus brought in contact with white settlers, and sometimes difficulties occurred, growing, generally, out of the sale of intoxicating liquors to them by unprincipled white men.

Indians are not better than white men, and, when drunk, they exhibit the meaner and baser qualities of their nature as completely as a white man. Deliver us from either, but of the two, an intoxicated white man has the advantage; he is not held responsible to law. The Indian has one privilege the civilized white brother is not supposed to enjoy. He can abuse his family, and as long as he is sober enough can whip his squaw; but woe be to him when he gets past fighting, for then the squaw embraces the opportunity of beating him in turn, and calls on other squaws to assist in punishing her lord for past as well as present offences.

The chiefs generally watch over their men, to prevent the purchase of liquor by them. “Homli,”

chief of the Walla-Wallas, sometimes punished his braves in a summary manner for getting drunk, using a horsewhip in the public streets. However worthy the example, I believe that it was not often followed by others of either race.

The annual visits of which I have spoken occurred in the latter part of June, when the mountain sides of Grand Round valley were offering tempting inducements in fields of huckleberries. The valley, too,—where not enclosed and turned to better use,—was blooming with Indian “muck-a-muck,” a sweet, nutritious root called ca-mas, with which the Indian women filled baskets and sacks, in which to carry it to their homes for winter use.

The beautiful river of Grand Round was inviting the red men to war against the shining trout and salmon, that made yearly pilgrimage to greater altitudes and cooler shades, there to woo and mate, and thus to people the upper waters with finny children, who would, in time of autumn leaves, go to the great river below, and come again when mountain snows, now changed to foaming torrents, hastened to the river’s mouth, and tempting salmon flies had come from their hiding places, and swarmed on bush and bank, to lure the fish onward and upward, or beguile them to the fisher’s net, or hidden spear, if, perchance, they were warned away from angler’s line, or escaped the lightning arrow of Indian boys.

Then, too, this beautiful garden of the mountains wore its brightest hues on plain and sloping hills and cultured field. The farmers were idle then, and often went to join the red men in racing horses, and chasing each other in mimic wars. Sometimes the two would

engage in trades of wild Cayuses (Indian horses), teaching each other how to tame these fiery steeds. Great circus shows were these, in which the red man might for once laugh at the white man’s clumsy imitations of red men’s daily recreations.

Again, the red man had sweet revenge for sharper practice which he had felt at the hands of his white brother. Selecting some ill-natured beast, whose tricks he well knew, he would offer him at a price so low, that some white man who was tired of going to his neighbors for a ride, or had a hopeful son anxious to imitate little Indian boys in feats of horsemanship, would purchase him. Then fun began, to witness which the town sometimes turned out. The colt, unused to civilized bit or spur, would, like his former owner, show contempt for burdens he was not made to bear without “bucking.” When, with bridle and saddle, and rider, all new, surrounded by scenes unlike his coltship’s haunts, he was called upon to forward move, he would stand as if turned to marble, until by persuasion of whip and spur he’d change his mind. Then, with a snort, a bound, or upward motion of his back, his nostrils buried in the dust, he’d whirl and whirl until the rider dizzy grew, of which circumstance he seemed aware, when, with all his power brought into quick use, he sent the rider in mid-air or overhead, and straightway bent each bound toward his former home, followed by loud shouts of laughter, made up of voices joined of every kind and age, except perhaps that of the disgusted father—who had sundry dollars invested in furniture on the runaway’s back—and the crying boy in the dust.

The chances against the new owner’s boy ever

“putting on much style” on that pony were not very numerous. Fearing as much, the next proposition was to sell the pony back to “Mr. Injun” at a heavy discount; which was done much against the wishes of the dethroned boy, whose aspirations for western honor were thereby “nipped in the bud.”

A lawyer of “La Grande,” celebrated for his shrewdness in business generally, and who was the father of several enterprising sons, made an investment in Cayuse stock, for the benefit of the aforesaid boys, and fearing that he, too, might go in mourning over the money thus spent, in fatherly tenderness determined that he himself would ride the pony first.

The horse was saddled, and led by a long rope to the office door. The lawyer said, “Now, Charley, I’ll fool that pony, sure. I’m little, you know, and he’ll think I’m a boy.” The rope was made fast to an awning-post, and then, in presence of a hopeful audience, he mounted slowly, though in full lawyer’s dress, a bell-crowned “plug” (hat) included. When softly springing in the stirrups, to assure himself all was right, and confident that his “nag” was there, subject to his will, he essayed to display his horsemanship. But pony was not ready then. The lawyer called for whip and spurs, and without dismounting they were furnished, and while holding out his foot to have the spur put on, remarked that “he did not half like the white of the pony’s eye. But, boys, I’ll stick while the saddle does.” With sober face and eye fixed on the ears in front, he coaxed again, and with soft speech sought to change the pony’s mind. But he was not ready now, until he felt the rowel stick into

his sides, and then away went horse and rider together, to the end of the rope, where the pony stopped, though the lawyer did not, until his head had struck the crown of his hat; and not then even, but, going at a furious rate, the lawyer, hat, and torn trowsers had landed all in a heap on the other side of the street; the awning-post gave way, and the lawyer’s Cayuse went off, with a small part of the town following him.

The language used by him on this occasion consisted not of quotations from Blackstone, or the Bible either, unless in detached words put strangely in shape to answer immediate use. It is not safe to say anything about fooling ponies, in court or elsewhere, in the town of La Grande, unless the speaker wants war. That lawyer, although a stanch Republican, and liable to be a candidate for Congress, is strongly opposed to President Grant’s peace policy with Indians,—the Umatilla Indians in particular.

To say that Chief Homli and his tribe enjoyed little episodes, growing out of horse-trading with the citizens of La Grande, is too gentle and soft a way of telling the truth, and have it well understood, unless we add the westernism “hugely.”

These visits had other beneficial results than those growing out of trade, since they extended over the Fourth of July, when all the people of the valley came together to celebrate the “nation’s birthday,” when, with fife and drum, the country-folks would join with those in town, who “marched up a street and then marched down again,” to the willow-covered stand, where readers and orators would rehearse, one, the history of the “Declaration,” the other, repeat some great man’s speech.

The tables groaned beneath the loads of viands, spread by gentle women’s hands. The reader and the orator of the day would take positions at either end, and the meek chaplain in between, while the bashful country boys would lead up their girls, until the table had been filled. Homli and his people, dressed in Fourth-of-July regalias, would look on from respectful distance, and wonder what the reader meant, when he said, “All men are born free and equal,” and wondered more to hear a wicked orator protest that the “flag above was no longer a flaunting lie.” The Indians were then serving in the house of a foolish old man, named Esau. When fair lips refused longer to taste, and manly breast was filled too full for utterance, Homli and his people were invited to partake. Some of his people accepted the gift of the remnants; but he, Homli, never.

In the absence of better pastime, the crowd would come again to the grand stand, to give opportunity for disappointed spouters to ventilate pent-up patriotism. Homli, too, made a speech, and with keen rebuke referred to days gone by, when white men had come to his lodge, and craved his hospitality; how his women had culled their berry-baskets to find something worthy of the white man’s taste, and how the finest trout had been offered in proof of friendship for the stranger guest, and boasted that he had given the finest horses of his band to help the stranger on, and sent an escort of trusty braves to direct him over all doubtful trails. He boasted, too, that no white man’s blood had ever stained his hand, even when he was strong, and they were weak; then, with well-made gesture, pointed to the valley, once all his own, and

covered with antelope and feathery tribes. No houses, fields, or barns marred then the beautiful valley of the mountain. Turning half around, he gazed at people and town, and sadly motioned to the mountain-sides, robbed of fir and pine, and seemed to drink in, what, to him, was desolation made complete. With eye half closed, he mused a moment, and then broke forth like some brave soul that had mastered self, and was reconciled to the inexorable destiny that his mind had seen in store, declared that he would be a man himself, with white man’s heart, and that his people would yet join with pride in the coming celebrations.

The triumph of civil hopes over savage mind was complete, and when the change was realized by the lookers-on, they gathered round the chieftain, and gave him welcome to a brotherhood born of a nation’s struggles to redeem mankind, when the white men were few and Homli’s people numerous as the stars that looked down on the rivers of this beautiful land. Who shall remember the mild reproof of Homli, when he, under the humane and enlightened policy of the Government, shall have made good this declaration to be a white man in heart and practice?

Little things sometimes move in harmony until they unite, and make up an aggregate of causes, whose combined power becomes irresistible for good or ill to peoples, tribes, and nations.

The chieftain of whom I write had, at various times, felt the thongs that bound him to his savage habits loosening, little by little, until at last, under the influence of the patriotic joy of freemen, he himself had stepped from under a shadow that was once

a benison, but had now, because of his enlightenment, become a barrier to his happiness.

The change was real, and the heart that had come laden with reproach to his neighbor, and felt the sting of slighted manhood, now exulted in the recognition he had found in the sunshine of American Independence, and the warm hands of freedom’s sons, who bade him welcome to a better life.

No human brain can correctly measure the influence of such events. Homli, as I have said, was a chief of the Walla-Wallas, who, in conjunction with the Umatillas and Cayuses, occupied the reservation spoken of as “Umatilla” (horse-heaven), it being the original home of the tribe bearing that name. In 1856, the three tribes above named united in treaty council with the Government, represented by the lamented J. I. Stevens and General Joel Palmer.

This treaty was conducted with firmness and on principles of justice, the Indians having, in this instance at least, half “the say.” By the terms agreed upon, a portion of country was reserved by the three tribes for a permanent home, to be held jointly by them. It is located on one of the tributaries of the Columbia, known as the Umatilla river. The out-boundaries measured one hundred and three miles, covering a country possessing many natural advantages, conducive to Indian life, and of great value in the transfer of these people from a barbarous to a civilized condition.

Its surface is diversified with rich prairie lands, producing an excellent quality of bunch grass,—so called because of its growing in tussocks,—covering not more than half the surface of the round, the

remainder being entirely devoid of vegetation, very nutritious and well adapted to grazing.

The mountains are partly covered with forests of pine and fir, valuable for commercial and building purposes. The streams are rapid, with bold shores, abounding in latent power, waiting for the time when labor and capital shall harness its cataracts to machinery, whose music will denote the transformation process going on in the forest of the mountain; the fleeces from the plain, and in the cereals they contain, in embryo, for better use than shading herds of cattle and Indian horses, or its fleeces made traffic for traders and shippers, who enrich themselves by taking them in bulk and returning in manufactured exchanges; or for its fields to lie dormant and idle, while commerce invites and starving people clamor for bread they might be made to yield.

True, its almost unbroken wilderness, echoing the call of cougar or cayote (ki-o-te); its tall grass plains, tangled and trembling with the tread of twenty thousand horses; its valleys decked with carpets of gorgeous flowers,—fit patterns for the costumes of those who dance thereon,—or speckled with baby farms, belonging to red-skinned ploughmen, or shaded by the smoke of council wigwams; its waters sometimes shouting, as if in pain, while hurrying headlong against the rock, or, laughing beneath the balm-wood trees at the gambols of its own people, or, divided into an hundred streams, go rushing on, still playing mirror for the smiling faces of the youths, whose hearts and actions take pattern after its own freedom; true, indeed, that this lovely spot of earth seems to have been the special handiwork of the Almighty,

who had withheld from other labors the choicest gems of beauty, that he might make a paradise, where youth could keep pace with passing years, until the change of happy hunting-grounds should be noted only by the wail of weeping widows, or sighs of sorrowing orphans.

’Twas to this Indian paradise that Homli returned from his summer visit, his heart laden with new feelings of pride; for he had been recognized as a man. If he did not then begin to enjoy the realization of his hopes, there were reasons why he did not that few have understood.

Born to a wild, free life, possessed of a country such as few over enjoy, with a channel of commerce traversing his home; brought in constant contact with white men, some of whom, at least, he found to be soulless adventurers, ever ready to take advantage of his ignorance of trade; confused and bewildered by the diversity of opinions on political and religious subjects; witnessing the living falsehood of much of civilized life; but half understanding the ambitions of his “new heart,” or the privilege he was entitled to; with the romance of his native education in matters of religion, its practical utility to satisfy his longings that reached into the future, or to meet the demands of conscience, where duty led him, or anger at insult drove him; the performance of its ceremonies, connecting social with religious rites,—added to these the power that his red brethren who were yet untouched by the finger of destiny, and were luxuriating in idle, careless life, enhanced by the sight of the hardened hands and sweating brows of those who sought to find admission to circles where labor insures

reward; confused when witnessing the enforcement of laws “that are supposed to be uniform in operation,” by the outrageous partiality shown; treated with coldness and distrust, because of his color; envied of his possessions, to which he had an inalienable right, by deed from God, and confirmed by the government of the United States; compelled to hear the constant coveting of others for it, and to hear government denounced because it did not rob him of his home; to see distrust in every action toward him; his manhood ignored, or crushed by cruel power; his faith shaken; treated as an alien, even in his birthplace; taunted with the threat that when he planted his feet on higher plains, he should be crowded off, or forced to stand tottering on the brink; his fears aroused by the threats he overheard of being finally driven away; of speculations on the future towns that should spring up over the graves of his fathers, when he was not there to defend them,—added to all these discouragements the oppressions of his would-be teachers, in moral ethics and religion; demanding his attendance on ceremonies that were intangible, incomprehensible, to his mind, made more unbearable by the tyranny of his red brethren, growing out of their recognition of church-membership, and the consequent arrogance, even contempt, with which they spoke of his religious habits and ceremonies; unable to reconcile the practices of these people with the precepts of their priest; ostracised from those, who, while untouched by the hand of Christianity, had mingled voice and prayer with him in wilder worship; finding friends among white men, whose hearts were true, but who, instead of soothing his troubled feelings by patiently

teaching him charity and liberal-minded views touching matters of religious practice of his Catholic friends and their ministers, would pile the fagots on the burning altar ’twixt him and them, increasing distrust, making the breach wider, thus becoming alienated from the other chiefs, How-lish-wam-po, of Cayuse, and We-nap-snoot, of the Umatillas, and those of their tribes who had been led, by ministrations of priest and chief, to the solemn masses of the church: if then Homli failed to be a “white man” in heart, on whom does the responsibility rest?

I have not dealt in fiction, but have stated the circumstance plainly, the truth of which will not be questioned by those whose personal knowledge qualifies them for passing judgment, unless, indeed, it be those whose minds have been trained to run in narrow, bigoted grooves, whose hearts have never felt the warming influences of the high and pure love for truth that characterizes a noble Christian manhood, and whose measure of right is made by the petty and selfish interest of himself, who, with the judgment of a truckling demagogue, barks for pay in popular applause or political reward.

For the present, I leave my readers to chide Homli for his failure, if, indeed, they can, with the facts before them. As to the responsibility, I shall discuss the subject fully and fearlessly on some future page of this work, where the argument for and against the several “policies” may be made and applied in a general way in the consideration of the subject of “Indian civilization.”

CHAPTER V.

POLICIES ON TRIAL—“ONEATTA.”

In the fall of 1866, the “Oregon Delegation,” in Washington, proposed the name of the author of this book for appointment as Superintendent of Indian Affairs in Oregon.

President Johnson, on inquiry, learned that he was not a “Johnson man,” and, of course, refused to make the nomination.

The recommendation of the author’s name was made without his solicitation or knowledge. On the accession of President Grant, the recommendation was renewed, the nomination was made and confirmed by the Senate of the United States; bonds filed, oaths of office administered, and notice given to my predecessor; and on the 1st of May, 1869, I assumed the duties of the office indicated.

The new administration had the Indian question in transit, between three policies: The old way, “Civil Service,” “The War Department Policy,” and General Grant’s “Quaker Policy.”

With good intention, doubtless, the several policies were put on trial.

Oregon superintendency and all its agencies were assigned to the tender care of the War Department policy, and I was ordered to turn over my office to an officer of the army, even before I had performed

an important official duty. Remonstrance was made by the people of Oregon against the change.

A compromise was effected. I was retained as Superintendent, and Hon. Ben. Simpson, Agent at Siletz, and Capt. Charles Lafollette, Agent at Grand Round also of the civil service policy. The remainder of the agencies were assigned to officers of the army. This mixing up of elements was somewhat embarrassing for a time.

I began again my official duties. From the records in the Superintendent’s Office, Salem, Oregon, I learned the location and something of the condition of the several agencies under my charge.

“The Coast Reservation,” covering three hundred miles of the Pacific coast, embraced several stations, or agencies, comprising not more than one-third the territory within its boundaries. It had never been ceded to the Government, neither acquired by conquest, but was set apart by an act of Congress for the benefit of the several tribes of the Willamette valley. It is partly timbered and generally mountainous. It abounds in resources suitable to Indian savage life.

Once this wild region had been peopled with deer and elk, whose plaintive call had led the cougar to his feast, or quickened the steps of the huntsman, whose steady nerves enabled him to glide through the tanglewood, bearing with him images of his children (who, dependent upon his archery, awaited his return); and of faithful clutchmen (squaws), whose eyes would kindle at sight of hunter, laden with fruits of the chase, that were to be food and clothing for her little ones. These forest trees had stood

sentinels, guarding its people, from the gaze of tamer huntsmen, and from the rough ocean winds that sweep the coast; or, uttering hoarser sounds, or sighing songs, warning of coming storms, that sometimes beat the white-winged ship, laden with merchandise, from foreign lands, against the rocky shore (whose caverns were the refuge of sea-lions), or, echoing back Pacific’s roar, were waiting for the debris from wrecks of stately crafts, or coming of sea-washed mariners.

Then, at such perilous times, the peoples of this wild western verge of continent would, in pure charity, build warning-fires on higher bluffs, at nightfall, and thus give signals of danger; or, mayhap, they sometimes built them to decoy, in order to avenge insult (or wrong, real, or imaginary) of some former seaman, who had repaid them for good will by treacherous act of larceny of some dusky maiden, or black-eyed boy, or stalwart warrior, carried away to other lands.

Tradition’s living tongue has furnished foundation for the pictures I have made. And many times to listening ears the story has been told, changed only in the name of maiden, or boy, or braves, as date or location gave truth to the sorrowing tale.

Living still, on a home set apart by the State, are two chieftains of a western tribe, whose people tell, in story and in song, how, at a certain sign of danger to a ship, they went out over the breakers in a hollow-tree canoe, to meet the white “tyee” of the “great canoe,” and in pity for the poverty of his knowledge of sea line had proffered him shelter in a quiet nook of land-locked ocean, until such time as

the Great Spirit might give evidence of anger past, by smiling on the boisterous waves that had made sport of man’s puny efforts to control his own going.

These chieftains, in dainty craft, had won the captain’s confidence, and, by consent of favoring winds and rolling seas, with trust he follows past lone rocks that stand above the sunken reef, and through the foamy passage, guarded by “headlands” on either side; past bars, unseen, that break huge rollers into waves of shorter measure; past, still past, the homes of fishermen on shore, until at last his sails flapped approval on the mast, the keel complains of unaccustomed touch, and anchors dropped in fathoms short to the bed of a bay that gives evidence of welcome, by sending its sands to surface, speckled with mica or sparkling with grains of gold.

Thus the white man’s big canoe found rest, and sailors crowded the rail to give signs of gratitude to the strange, strong-armed pilots.

The captain let down his stairs, that they might come on deck and exchange mutual feelings of each heart. On the one hand, that of thankfulness, that misfortunes make mankind akin, and used such occasions to teach the lion that the mouse may be his master when circumstances bring his ability into demand.

The white man felt gratitude, and made proof of it by loading the red man’s “hollow tree” with rich stores of choice sugars from the islands, blankets made in colder zones; with clothing that illy fitted the red man’s limbs; with lines, and nets, and hooks, and spears of foreign make, and with weapons of

fiery breath and noisy mouth, that poorly mated the bow and arrow, though mating good by force of execution the loss in warning talk.

The chieftains, too, gave back, with answering hand and smiling face, the gladness of their hearts that they had found opportunity to serve the white man.

When they departed, the “tyee” bade them come again. This was a great day for the chieftain’s household, when they landed beneath the willow trees near their e-li-he (home). The women, with great, wondering eyes at the sight of so many ic-tas (goods), began to unload the “hollow-tree canoe,” and, as each article new to them came in sight, they would wonder and chatter and try them on, until at last they stood clothed in sailor’s garb, of jacket, pants and shoes. To their camps they came, loaded with the precious freights, and, coming to their own, the little ones would cry and run, shouting, “Hal-lu-me, til-li-cum” (strangers); nor would they trust to their mothers’ voices until they had put aside their costumes.

These chiefs still laugh at the surprise they felt at sight of what they supposed to be the new-found friends, until the merry cluchmen (women) shouted, “Cla-hoy-em-six, tyee?” (How do you do, chief?) They quickly rose from their cougar skin and panther’s pelt, caught the bogus sailors, and quickly robbed them of their borrowed clothes.

That night, while the sun was going to rest in his bed of flaming billows, on the ship’s deck and on the sand of the red man’s floor, happy hearts bade each “Good-night.” The white man was happy now that his home was gently rocked by flowing tides. The

red men, happy with their til-li-cums, retailing in guttural notes their great adventures, and dancing the pot-lach dance (giving dance), would stop, and with their hands divide the prizes won, without thought of shells, or Indian coin, or white man’s chick-a-mon (money). When “to-morrow’s sun” had climbed over the craggy ledges of the coast mountain, and sent out his fiery messengers to announce his coming, they came to the vessel’s deck, and found no watchman there. They peeped into the forecastle and cabin, and waked the slumberers up to welcome the new morn begun on the bosom of Ya-quina Bay.

At the Indian lodge, the soft voice of cluchman, mingling with the murmur of rippling rills, that from snow-banks high on the mountain side came hurrying down to quench the thirst of sailor or of savage; maybe, the briny lips of the sea-monster or salmon fish, that come in to rest from surging waters and bask awhile in the smooth currents of the bay.

The chiefs arose and made breakfast on foreign teas and island sugars, and when in new attire, with cluchman in beads and fine tattoo (an adornment of savage tribes), with noses pierced by long polished shells, that made an uncouth imitation of a dandy’s moustache, with pappoose in basket hung with bells, or lashed to boards with wild-deer thongs, and slung on mother’s back, secured with sealskin belts worn on the brow. To make the whole a complete picture of Indian life, the dogs were taken in, and then sitting in the prow to give command, the “hollow-tree canoe” was pointed toward the ship. The loud hurrah of sailors, that was intended to give welcome, was at

first construed to be a warning, and quick the “hollow-tree canoe” was turned about, each paddle playing in concert to carry the frightened visitors away, while cluchmen and maidens, with woman’s privilege, screamed in terror of expected harm.

The chief soothing them, and looking back descried the tyee captain, with beckoning hand and signs recalling him to fulfil his purpose, and make the visit. He bade the oarsman cease, and, while his canoe moved on from acquired motion, though slower going, while he backward gazed, he, with noiseless paddle, again brought the prow towards the sides of the “big canoe.”

Slowly and cautiously he, with his precious cargo, floated nearer and nearer still, with eyes wide open, to detect any sign of treachery, sometimes half stopping at suggestions of frightened mothers or timid maidens, and then anon would forward move; still, however, with great caution, until at last the two canoes were rocking on the gentle tide in closest friendship.

The seamen who made this welcome port came on deck, with a sailor’s pride of dress, wide-legged trowsers, and wider collars to their shirts over their shoulders falling, and with wide-topped, brimless caps. When the new-comers had passed their fright, and the old chief had climbed on deck to be sure that all was safe, he called his family, and, though the jolly tars went down to assist them, they remained waiting for some further proof of friendship.

While their eyes were upward turned, and Jack’s were downward bent, two pairs (at least) met midway, and told the old, old tale over again.

On deck, and leaning over the rail, stood a youthful

sailor, with deep, earnest eyes. These had met the gaze of another, the daughter of the pilot chief. Silently the arrows flew; and, without honeyed word, or war-whoop, the battle went on, until, by special invitation of looks, Oneatta came aboard, and stood beside the smiling pale-face; and soon the older women followed with the baby baskets until all were there except the dogs, who cried at the partiality shown to the master and his family.

The scene on deck was novel. The tyee captain and the chief were teaching each other the words with which to give token of hospitality and gratitude; half-sign, half-word language ’twas, though, in which exchanges of friendly sentiments were told.

The sailors, with the women and maidens, had organized a school, on a small scale. Merry laughter often broke at the clumsy efforts of white man’s tongue to imitate Indian wa-wa (talk). The little ones received the touch of rough fingers on dimpled chin, and turned like frightened fawns away to listen to the tinkling of the little bells above their heads.