KIENUKA, the peace-home, was desolate. The fire of pine knots that for
many generations had burned upon its fire-place was dead and sodden. No
voice of welcome was heard within its doors. Its hangings of skins and
robes were torn and loosened by the winds of all seasons. The broad paths
leading from the sun-rising, the sun-setting, the guide star and the
summer land, which for many hundred moons by night and by day had been
pressed by the feet of the red children of the forest when in trouble,
in danger, in need of counsel, or in want, were now choked with briars
and thistles. The wolf whelped her young in the couch of the Peacemaker.
Birds without song and of black plumage built their nests and muttered
hoarse croakings to their nestlings in the roof of the peace-home.
Blood had been shed in Kienuka and the Great Spirit had made the
peace-home desolate.
When Hiawatha, the wise man, was speaking the last words to his children,
he told them to choose from their tribes a maiden possessing wisdom,
who should be their peacemaker. So the red men built a home wherein the
peacemaker should dwell, and doors were made at each side so that it
mattered not whence came the wayfarer he would find a welcome. Then the
maidens of the tribes were brought together at the council-place and
to them were submitted the questions in dispute among their brothers.
The wise men decided that she who would decide the greatest number most
justly should be the Peacemaker Queen and dwell within the fortress they
had built. Thus the Queen was chosen, and when the Great Spirit called
her to the long home she was mourned by the people of all the tribes, and
none entered the peace-home until her successor had been selected.
In this manner came to the peace-home Genetaska, the Seneca maiden, whose
wisdom and kindness were known to all, and whose beauty was like that of
the full summer. She was the most famous of all the Peacemaker Queens,
and the red men said that Minnehaha, the daughter of Hiawatha, came often
from the sky on the back of the celestial bird and gave her advice and
guidance. Whoever went to the doors of the peace-home disputing came
from them again, when they had eaten and rested, with no anger in their
hearts, for Genetaska soothed them by her gentle voice. To the sick
and wounded she ministered with the greatest medicine herbs; to those
heated by passion she told tales of the Great Spirit that taught them
moderation. Disputes among the tribes were so adjusted that the hunters
or warriors who would come to Kienuka with anger and war in their hearts
left its doors as brothers.
One day there came to the peace-home two young chiefs--one from the
Oneidas and the other from the Onondagas. Each claimed that his arrow
had given the death stroke to a mighty buck they had been trailing in
the forest. When they had tried their skill with weapons, agreeing that
the most skillful should possess the slain animal, neither could gain
advantage over the other. Then said the Onondaga: "I will fight thee,
Oneida, and he who lives may carry to his village the mighty buck and the
scalp-lock of his enemy."
But the Oneida said: "Thou, Onondaga, must remember the words that have
been spoken in thine ears by the old men who listened to the teachings
of Hiawatha, that when two hunters of the Five Nations dispute in the
paths of the forest they shall not fight, but tell their dispute to the
Peacemaker. The Oneida will go with thee to Kienuka."
When they had eaten and rested at the peace-home, the hunters were told
that each should take half of the buck back to his village. "For," said
the Peacemaker, "the animal is large, and with half each hath enough for
his wife and little ones."
"The Oneida is alone in his home," said the chief. "I carry the meat to
the old men and to the women who have no sons. The Oneida has seen no
maiden he would take to his wigwam till he beheld Genetaska, the Peace
Queen."
Then said the Onondaga: "The home of the Onondaga is desolate since the
plague robbed it of the loved ones. He is a great chief and has power in
his tribe, for he was never defeated on the chase or in the contest. But
the Peacemaker has made his heart weak, and he can never be strong again
unless she will come to his wigwam."
Then said Genetaska: "Go, thou, my brothers, and think no more of the
Peace Queen, who is chosen by the tribes and may not be the wife of any.
Seek thou other maidens, who will gladly become wives to you."
But when they were gone there was no longer peace in the heart of
Genetaska, for the form of the Oneida was before her eyes.
When the autumn came--when its first tints had touched the forests and
merely tinged the dark green with a hazy brown--the Oneida chief came at
sun-setting to the peace-home and stood boldly before the Peacemaker. He
said:
"The Oneida hath built a wigwam in the summer land where the Five Tribes
do not care to go. He hath filled it with robes and supplied it with food
and it awaits the coming of Genetaska, the Seneca maiden, who loves the
Oneida. The tribes will choose another Peace Queen when thou art gone,
and thy heart will no longer be heavy with the burdens of all the red
children who come to thee with their troubles. Will not Genetaska go?"
The maiden looked boldly into the face of her lover and answered:
"Genetaska will go."
Toward the summer land they left Kienuka, and when they came to the river
they glided rapidly along in the Oneida's canoe and were lost to their
people forever.
* * * * *
But the peace-home was desolate, and to its doors in the darkness came
running two men whose anger toward each other had long been fed with
jealousy and hatred. When no Peacemaker was found their rage could no
longer be controlled, and they fell upon each other with their hunting
clubs and fought till they sank from exhaustion and died before each
other's eyes.
The peace-home had been desecrated by the shedding of blood. Henceforth
it was a place shunned by all men.