The Indian houses were long huts covered with strips of birch bark.
Four or five families lived in each of these houses.
John was given to an Indian woman who had lost her own boy the year
before.
John's Indian mother was good to him, and treated him as if he were her
own son.
One time the Indian boys thought they would test John's courage, so they
formed in two lines, while each boy held a stout stick.
Then they ordered John to run down between the two long lines.
They had their sticks all ready to beat him.
They thought John would be afraid and so would do as they told him.
But John was a strong lad, and jumping upon the first Indian boy, he
took his stick away from him.
[Illustration]
Armed with this stick, John struck right and left at the heads of the
boys until they were all glad to run away.
The Indian men liked to see John's courage, and laughed long and loud
when the Indian boys ran away.
After this the boys were glad to have John play with them.
With their bows and arrows they shot at a mark.
They swam in the river and played games of tag, hide and seek, and ball.
In the spring the Indian women planted the yellow corn.
When the corn was up, the squaws went into the fields to hoe out the
weeds. For a hoe they used a flat piece of stone tied to a wooden
handle.
As John was a white boy the squaws tried to make him help hoe the corn.
When John took the hoe, he hoed up the corn and left the weeds.
The angry squaws made signs to him that he must not do so.
Then John threw the hoe far from him.
"Hoeing is fit for squaws, not for warriors," he shouted. He had learned
this from the Indian boys.
The old men were pleased. They thought John would make a fine warrior.