THE MOUNTAIN OF LITTLE SPIRITS.

At the distance of a woman's walk of a day from the mouth of the river

called by the pale-faces the Whitestone, in the country of the Sioux,

in the middle of a large plain, stands a lofty hill or mound. Its

wonderful roundness, together with the circumstance of its standing

apart from all other hills, like a fir-tree in the midst of a wide

prairie, or a man whose friends and kindred have all descended to the

dust, has made it known to all the tribes of the West. Whether it was

created by the Great Spirit, or piled up by the sons of men, whether

it was done in the morning of the world, or when it had grown fat and

stately, ask not me, for I cannot tell you. Those things are known to

one, and to one only. I know it is called by all the tribes of the

land the Hill of Little People, or the Mountain of Little Spirits. And

the tradition is yet freshly traced out on the green leaf of my

memory, which has made it the terror of all the surrounding nations,

and which fills the Sioux, the Mahas, the Ottoes, and all the

neighbouring tribes, with great fear and trembling, whenever their

incautious feet have approached the sacred spot, or their avocation

compels them to look at the work of spirits. No gift can induce an

Indian to visit it, for why should he incur the anger of the Little

People who dwell within it, and, sacrificed upon the fire of their

wrath, behold his wife and children no more? In all the marches and

countermarches of the Indians; in all their goings and returnings; in

all their wanderings, by day and by night, to and from lands which lie

beyond it; their paths are so ordered that none approach near enough

to disturb the tiny inhabitants of the hill. The memory of the red man

of the forest has preserved but one instance where their privacy was

violated, since it was known through the tribes that they wished for

no intercourse with mortals. Before that time many Indians were

missing every year. No one knew what became of them, but they were

gone, and left no trace nor story behind. Valiant warriors filled

their baskets with dried corn, and their quivers with tough arrow

shafts and sharp points; put new strings to their bows; new shod their

mocassins, and sallied out to acquire glory in combat: but there was

no wailing in the camp of our foes; their arrows were not felt, their

shouts were not heard. Yet they fell not by the hands of their foes;

but perished, we know not where or how. At length, the sun shone on

the mystery, and the parted clouds displayed a clear spot. Listen!

Many seasons ago, there lived within the limits of the great

council-fire of the Mahas, a chief who was renowned for his valour and

victories in the field, his wisdom in the council, his dexterity and

success in the chase. His name was Mahtoree, or the White Crane. He

was celebrated throughout the vast regions of the west, from the

Mississippi to the Hills of the Serpent[A], from the Missouri to the

Plains of Bitter Frost, for all those qualities which render an Indian

warrior famous and feared. He was the terror of his enemies, whom in

the conflict he never spared; the delight as well as refuge of his

friends, whom he never deserted. Yet, brave as he was, and fierce and

reckless when met in the strife of warriors, never did his valour, or

his fierceness, or his recklessness of danger, betray him into those

excesses of wrath and cruelty, which, after great victories purchased

by much blood and loss of dear and valued friends, will often be seen

in the camp of the red man of the forest. Never by his counsels was

the captive tortured--never by his command were weak and defenceless

women and children delivered over to slaughter. He had frequently been

known, at the voice of pity crying at the door of the heart, and at

the suggestions of a great and proud mind, to cut the bonds which

bound the victim to the stake, thereby exposing himself to the wrath

and anger of his stern warriors, and to rage which, but for the

unequalled valour and daring boldness and wisdom of his career, both

as a warrior and a man, would have been attended with death to

himself, and the entailment of infamy upon his name. It has already

been told our brother, that none but a noted and approved warrior dare

take upon himself the liberation of a prisoner, devoted by the spirit

of Indian warfare to tortures and death.

[Footnote A: Hills of the Serpent, the Rocky Mountains. I have before

mentioned the Indian superstition that thunder is the hissing of a

great serpent, which has his residence among those mountains.]

In one of the war expeditions of the Pawnee Mahas against the

Burntwood Tetons, it was the good fortune of the former to overcome,

and to take many prisoners--men, women, and children. One of the

captives, Sakeajah, or the Bird-Girl, a beautiful creature in the

morning of life, after being adopted into one of the Mahas families,

became the favourite wife of the chief warrior of the nation. Great

was the love and affection which the White Crane bore his beautiful

wife, and it grew yet stronger in his soul, when she had brought him

four sons--a gift the more highly prized by the wise and sagacious

chief, because, as my brother can see, for he is not a fool, it was

the pledge of continued power and importance in the tribe, when his

own strength and vigour should have passed away, when the hand of age

should no more find joy in bending the bow, and the trembling knee be

best pleased to rest upon soft skins by the warm fire of the cabin.

Among the children of the forest he is most valued who has provided

most plentifully the means to maintain the honour, and secure the

safety, of his people; and hence he who can reckon the most brave and

warlike sons is esteemed the greatest of benefactors. Among all the

red men of the land, that wife acquires the strongest hold on the

affections of her husband who has given him the largest family, as

that husband acquires the greatest consequence in the eyes of his

nation, who sees the most birds in his nest, and is able to carry most

vultures to prey upon the corpses of his enemies. Is the barren woman

beloved by her husband? Ask me if the male bird watches by the nest of

her who sits on addled eggs. I shall tell you "No," nor does the

husband love or value the wife who lives alone in his cabin with none

to call her mother.

The beautiful Sakeajah gave her husband but one daughter, and upon her

did her parents lavish all those affections which had not their origin

in war and bloodshed. The sons were loved for the promise they gave of

bending their father's bow, and raising his massy club in battle, and

shouting his terrible war-cry with the ability to make good the

threats it contained--with the daughter were linked the few pacific

remembrances which find entrance into that stony thing--an Indian's

heart. And well was Tatoka, or the Antelope, for that was the name of

the daughter of Mahtoree and Sakeajah, worthy to be loved. She was

beautiful, as young Indian maidens generally are, before the hard

duties of the field and the cabin have bowed their limbs, and

servitude has chilled the fire of their hearts. Her skin was but

little darker than that of the chief from the far land who is

listening to my story. Her eyes were large and bright as those of the

bison-ox, and her hair black and braided with beads, brushed, as she

walked, the dew from the flowers upon the prairies. Her temper was

soft and placable, and her voice--what is so sweet as the voice of an

Indian maiden when tuned to gladness! what so moves the hearer to

grief and melancholy by its tones of sorrow and anguish! Our brother

has heard them--let him say if the birds of his own forests, the dove

of his nest, have sweeter notes than those he hears warbled in the

cabin of the red man. His eyes say no. It is well.

It may not be doubted that the beautiful Tatoka had many lovers; there

was not a youth in the nation, whose character authorised the

application, that did not become a suitor to the fair daughter of the

White Crane. But the heart of the maiden was touched by none of them;

she bade them all depart as they came; she rejected them all. The

father who loved his daughter too well to sell her as he would a

beaver-trap or a moose-skin, or to compel her to become a wife, would

have been glad to see her choose a protector from among the many

Braves who solicited her affections. But, with the perverseness which

is often seen among women, who are but fools at best, though made to

be loved, she had placed her affections upon a youth, who had

distinguished himself by no valiant deeds in war, nor even by industry

or dexterity in the chase. His name had never reached the surrounding

nations; his own nation knew him not, unless it was as a weak and

imbecile man: he was poor in every thing that constitutes the riches

of Indian life, and poorer still in spirit and acquirements. Who had

heard the twanging of Karkapaha's bow in the retreats of the bear? or

who beheld the war-paint on his cheek or brow?--Where were the scalps

or the prisoners that betokened his valour or daring? No song of

valiant exploits had been heard from his lips, for he had none to

boast of--if he had done aught becoming a man, he had done it when

none were by. The beautiful Tatoka, who knew and lamented the

deficiencies of her lover, strove long to conquer her passion; but,

finding the undertaking beyond her strength, surrendered herself to

the sweets of unrepressed affection, and urged her heart no more to

the unequal task of subduing her love. Their stolen interviews were

managed with much care, and for a long time no one suspected them; but

at length the secret of their love and the story of their shame became

so apparent as to do away the possibility of further concealment. The

lovers were in an agony of fear and terror. Though beloved by her

father, she had no reason to hope that he would so far forget his

dignity and the honour of his family, and so far sacrifice his views

of aggrandizement, as to admit into his family a man who was neither

hunter nor warrior, and whose want of qualifications would have

ensured his rejection by families of ordinary note--how much more from

that of a proud and haughty chief! Love conquers the strongest; and,

rather than be separated, those who love each other well will dare

every danger. Rather than be torn apart, the fond pair, whose

affections were strengthened by the pledge of love which Tatoka bore

about her, determined to fly the anger of the father. The preparations

for flight were made, the night fixed upon came, and they left the

village of the Mahas and the lodge of Mahtoree for the wilderness.

With all their precautions, and supposed exemption from suspicion,

their flight was not unmarked: their intimacy had been for some time

suspected; but it was only the day preceding their elopement that the

mother had discovered undoubted proofs of their guilty intimacy. When

the justly indignant father was made acquainted with the disgrace

which had befallen his house, he called his young men around him, and

bade them pursue the fugitives, promising his daughter to whomsoever

should slay the ravisher. Immediate pursuit was made, and soon a

hundred eager youths were on the track of the hapless pair. With that

unerring skill and sagacity in discovering foot-prints which mark our

race, their steps were tracked, and themselves soon discovered

retreating. But what was the surprise and consternation of the

pursuers, when they found that the path taken by the hapless pair

would carry them to the Mountain of Little Spirits, and that they were

sufficiently in advance to reach it before the pursuers could come up

with them! None durst venture within the supposed limits, and they

halted till the White Crane should be informed of their having put

themselves under the protection of the spirits.

In the mean time the lovers pursued their journey towards the fearful

residence of the little people of the hill. Despair lent them courage

to do an act to which the stoutest Indian resolution had hitherto been

inadequate. They determined, as a last resource, to tell their story

to the spirits, and demand their protection. They were within a few

feet of the hill, when, in a breath, its brow, upon which no object

till now had been visible, became covered with little people, the

tallest of whom was not higher than the knee of the maiden, and many

of them, but these children, were of lower stature than the squirrel.

Their voice was sharp and quick, like the barking of the prairie dog;

a little wing came out at each shoulder; each had a single eye, which

eye was a right in the men, and in the women a left; and their feet

stood out at each side. They were armed as Indians are armed, with

tomahawks, spears, and bows and arrows. He who appeared to be the head

chief, for he wore the air of command and the eagle feather of a

leader, came up to them, and spoke as follows:--

"Why have you invaded the village of a race whose wrath has been so

fatal to your people? How dare you venture within the sacred limits of

our residence? Know you not that your lives are forfeited?"

The trembling pair fell on their knees before the little people, and

Tatoka, for her lover had less than the heart of a doe, and was

speechless, related her story. She told them how long she had loved

Karkapaha, and holding down her head confessed her fatal indiscretion.

Then she pictured the wrath of her father, the pursuit which was

making, doubtless with a view to the punishment by death of her lover,

and concluded her tale of sorrow with a burst of tears, which came

from her eyes like the rain from a summer cloud, and sighs which might

be compared to summer winds breathing from a bed of flowers. The

little man who wore the eagle's feather appeared very much moved with

the sorrows of the pair, and calling around him a large number of men,

who were doubtless the chiefs and counsellors of the nation, a long

consultation took place. The result was a determination to favour and

protect the lovers. They had but just talked themselves into a

resolution to inflict vengeance on all who should approach the hill

with the intent to injure the pair who had thrown themselves upon

their protection, when Shongotongo, or the Big Horse, one of the

Braves whom Mahtoree had dispatched in quest of his daughter, appeared

in view in pursuit of the fugitives. It was not till Mahtoree had

taxed his courage that the Big Horse had ventured on the perilous and

fearful quest. He approached with the strength of heart and singleness

of purpose which accompany an Indian warrior who deems the eyes of his

nation upon him. When first the Brave was discovered thus wantonly,

and with no other purpose but the shedding of blood, intruding on the

dominions of the spirits, no words can tell the rage which appeared to

possess their bosoms, manifesting itself in a thousand wild and

singular freaks of passion and coarseness of language. Secure in the

knowledge of their power to repel the attacks of every living thing,

the intrepid Maha was permitted to advance within a few steps of

Karkapaha. He had just raised his spear to strike the unmanly lover,

when, all at once, he found himself riveted to the ground: his feet

refused to move; his hands, which he attempted to raise, hung

powerless at his side; his tongue, when he attempted to speak, refused

to utter a word. The bow and arrow fell from his hand, and his spear

lay powerless. A little child, not so high as the fourth leaf of the

thistle, came and spat upon him, and a company of young maidens,

whose feet were not longer than the blue feather upon the wing of the

teal, danced a mirthsome dance around him, singing a taunting song of

which he was the burthen. All and each of the tiny spirits did their

part towards inflicting pain and ignominy on the hapless Maha. When

they had finished their task of punishing by preparatory torture, a

thousand little Spirits drew their bows, and a thousand winged arrows

pierced his heart. In a moment, a thousand mattocks, of the size of an

Indian's thumb-nail, were employed in preparing him a grave. And he

was hidden from the eyes of the living, ere Tatoka could have thrice

counted over the fingers of her hand.

When this was done, the chief of the Little Spirits called Karkapaha

to his seat, and spoke to him thus:--"Maha, you have the heart of a

doe; you would fly from a roused wren. Cowards find no favour in the

eyes of the spirits of the air, who do not know what fear is, save

when they see it painted on the cheeks of a mortal. We have not spared

you because you deserved to be spared, but because the maiden loves

you, and we would pleasure her. It is for this purpose that we will

give you the heart of a man, that you may return to the village of the

Mahas, and find favour in the eyes of Mahtoree and the Braves of the

nation. We will take away your cowardly spirit, and will give you the

spirit of the warrior whom we slew, whose heart was firm as a rock,

and whose knees would have trembled when mountains caught the touch of

fear, and not before. Sleep, man of little soul, and wake to be better

worthy the love of the beauteous Antelope."

Then a deep sleep came over the Maha lover. How long he slept he knew

not, but when he woke he felt at once that a change had taken place in

his feelings and temper. The first thought that came to his mind was a

bow and arrow; the second the beautiful Indian girl who lay sleeping

at his side. The Little Spirits had disappeared--not a solitary being,

of the many thousands, who, but a few minutes before, peopled the hill

and filled the air with their discordant cries, was now to be seen or

heard. At the feet of Karkapaha lay a tremendous bow, larger than any

bowman ever yet used, and a sheaf of arrows of proportionate size, and

a spear of a weight which no Maha could wield. Wonder of wonders! the

weak and slender Karkapaha could draw that bow, as an Indian boy bends

a willow twig, and the spear seemed in his hand but a reed, or a

feather. The shrill war-whoop burst unconsciously from his lips, and

his nostrils seemed dilated with the fire and impatience of a

newly-awakened courage. The heart of the fond Indian girl dissolved

in tears, when she saw these proofs of strength and those evidences of

spirit, which, she knew, if they were coupled with valour--and how

could she doubt the completeness of the gift to effect the purposes of

the giver!--would thaw the iced feelings of her father, and tune his

heart to the song of forgiveness. Yet, it was not without many fears,

and tears, and misgivings, on the part of the maiden, that they began

their march for the Maha village. The lover, now a stranger to fear,

used his endeavours to quiet the beautiful Tatoka, and in some measure

succeeded.

Upon finding that his daughter and her lover had gone to the Hill of

the Spirits, and that Shongotongo did not return from his perilous

adventure, the chief of the Mahas had recalled his Braves from the

pursuit, and was listening to the history of the pair, as far as the

returned warriors were acquainted with it, when his daughter and her

lover made their appearance. With a bold and fearless step the once

faint-hearted Karkapaha walked up to the offended father, and, folding

his arms on his breast, stood erect as a pine, and motionless as that

tree when the winds of the earth are chained above the clouds. It was

the first time that Karkapaha had ever looked on angry men without

trembling, and a demeanour so unusual in him excited universal

surprise.

"Karkapaha is a thief," said the White Crane.

"It is the father of my beautiful and beloved Tatoka that says it,"

answered the lover; "else would Karkapaha say it was the song of a

bird that has flown over."

"My warriors say it."

"Your warriors are singing-birds; they are wrens; Karkapaha says they

do not speak the truth.--Karkapaha has the heart of a tiger, and the

strength of a bear; let the Braves try him. He has thrown away the

woman's heart; he has become a man."

"Karkapaha _is_ changed," said the chief thoughtfully, "but when,

and how?"

"The Little Spirits of the Mountain have given him a new soul. Bid

your Braves draw this bow; bid them poise this spear. Their eyes say

they can do neither. Then is Karkapaha the strong man of his tribe;"

and as he said this he flourished the ponderous spear over his head as

a man would poise a reed, and drew the bow as a child would bend a

willow twig.

"Karkapaha is the husband of Tatoka," said Mahtoree, springing to his

feet, and he gave the beautiful maiden to her lover. The traditionary

lore of the Mahas is full of the exploits, both in war and the chase,

of Karkapaha, who was made a man by the Spirits of the Mountain.