|LEELINAU was the favorite daughter of a hunter, who lived on the lake
shore near the base of the lofty highlands called Kang Wudjoo.
From her earliest youth Leelinau was observed to be thoughtful and
retiring. She passed much of her time in solitude and seemed ever
to prefer the companionship of her own shadow to the society of the
lodge-circle.
Whenever she could leave her father's lodge she would fly to remote
haunts and recesses in the woods, or sit in lonely reverie upon some
high promontory of rock overlooking the lake. In such places she would
often linger long, with her face turned upward, in contemplation of the
air, as if she were invoking her guardian spirit and beseeching him to
lighten her sadness.
But of all the leafy haunts, none drew her steps toward it so often as a
forest of pines on the open shore, called Manitowok, or the Sacred Wood.
It was one of those hallowed places which is the resort of the little
wild men of the woods, and of the turtle spirits or fairies which
delight in romantic scenes.
Owing to this circumstance, its green retirement was seldom visited
by Indians, who feared to fall under the influence of its mischievous
inhabitants. Whenever they were compelled by stress of weather to make
a landing on this part of the coast, they never failed to leave an
offering of tobacco or some other token, to show that they desired to
stand well with the proprietors of the fairy ground.
To this sacred spot Leelinau had made her way at an early age, gathering
strange flowers and plants, which she would bring home to her parents,
and relating to them all the haps and mishaps that had occurred in her
rambles.
Although they discountenanced her frequent visits to the place, they
were not able to restrain them, for she was of so gentle and delicate a
temper that they feared to thwart her.
Her attachment to the fairy wood, therefore, grew with her years. If she
wished to solicit her guardian spirits to procure pleasant dreams,
or any other maiden favor, Leelinau repaired to the Manitowok. If her
father remained abroad in the hunt later than usual, and it was feared
that he had been overwhelmed by the tempest or had met with some other
mischance, Leelinau offered up her prayers for safety at the Manitowok.
It was there that she fasted, mused, and strolled.
She at length became so engrossed by the fairy pines that her parents
began to suspect that some evil spirit had enticed her to its haunts and
had cast upon her a charm which she had not the power to resist.
This belief was confirmed when, one day, her mother, who had secretly
followed her, overheard her murmuring to some unknown and invisible
companion, appeals like these:
"Spirit of the dancing leaves!" whispered Leelinau, "hear a throbbing
heart in its sadness. Spirit of the foaming stream! visit thou my
nightly pillow, shedding over it silver dreams of mountain brook and
pebbly rivulet. Spirit of the starry night! lead my foot-prints to the
blushing mis-kodeed, or where the burning passion-flower shines with
carmine hue. Spirit of the greenwood plume!" she concluded, turning with
passionate gaze to the beautiful young pines which stood waving their
green beauty over her head, "shed on me, on Leelinau the sad, thy leafy
fragrance, such as spring unfolds from sweetest flowers, or hearts
that to each other show their inmost grief. Spirits! hear, oh, hear a
maiden's prayer!"
Day by day these strange communings with unseen beings drew away the
heart of Leelinau more and more from the simple duties of the lodge, and
she walked among her people, melancholy and silent, like a spirit who
had visited them from another land.
The pastimes which engaged the frolic moments of her young companions
passed by her as little trivial pageants in which she had no concern.
When the girls of the neighboring lodges assembled to play before the
lodge-door at the favorite game of pappus-e-kowaun, or the block and
string, Leelinan would sit vacantly by, or enter so feebly into the
spirit of the play as to show that it was irksome to her.
Again, in the evening, when the young people formed a ring around the
lodge, and the piepeendjigun, or leather and bone, passed rapidly from
one to the other, she either handed it along without attempting to play,
or if she took a part, it was with no effort to succeed.
The time of the corn-gathering had come, and the young people of the
tribe were assembled in the field, busy in plucking the ripened maize.
One of the girls, noted for her beauty, had found a red ear, and
every one congratulated her that a brave admirer was on his way to her
father's lodge. She blushed, and hiding the trophy in her bosom, thanked
the Good Spirit that it was a red ear, and not a crooked, that she had
found.
Presently it chanced that one who was there among the young men espied
in the hands of Leelinau, who had plucked it indifferently, one of
the crooked kind, and at once the word "Wa-ge-min!" was shouted aloud
through the field, and the whole circle was set in a roar.
"The thief is in the corn-field!" exclaimed the young man, Iagoo by
name, and famous in the tribe for his mirthful powers of story-telling;
"see you not the old man stooping as he enters the field? See you not
signs that he crouched as he crept in the dark? Is it not plain by this
mark on the stalk that he was heavily bent in his hack? Old man! be
nimble, or some one will take thee while thou art taking the ear."
These questions Iagoo accompanied with the action of one bowed with age
stealthily entering' the cornfield. He went on:
"See how he stoops as he breaks off the ear. Nushka! He seems for a
moment to tremble. Walker, be nimble! Hooli! It is plain the old man is
the thief."
He turned suddenly where she sat in the circle, pensively regarding the
crooked ear which she held in her hand, and exclaimed:
"Leelinau, the old man is thine!"
Laughter rang merrily through the corn-field, but Leelinau, casting down
upon the ground the crooked ear of maize, walked pensively away.
The next morning the eldest son of a neighboring chief called at her
father's lodge. He was quite advanced in years; but he enjoyed such
renown in battle, and his name was so famous in the hunt, that the
parents accepted him as a suitor for their daughter. They hoped that
his shining qualities would draw back the thoughts of Leelinau from that
spirit-land whither she seemed to have wholly directed her affections.
It was this chief's son whom Iagoo had pictured as the corn-taker, but,
without objecting to his age or giving any other reason, Leelinau
firmly declined his proposals. The parents ascribed the young daughter's
hesitancy to maiden shyness, and paying no further heed to her refusal,
fixed a day for the marriage-visit to the lodge.
The young warrior came to the lodge-door, and Leelinau refused to see
him, informing her parents, at the same time, that she would never
consent to the match.
It had been her custom to pass many of her hours in her favorite place
of retirement under a broad-topped young pine, whose leaves whispered in
every wind that blew; but most of all in that gentle murmur of the air
at the evening hour, dear to lovers, when the twilight steals on.
Thither she now repaired, and, while reclining pensively against the
young pine-tree, she fancied that she heard a voice addressing her. At
first it was scarcely more than a sigh; presently it grew more clear,
and she heard it distinctly whisper--
"Maiden! think me not a tree; but thine own dear lover; fond to be with
thee in my tall and blooming strength, with the bright green nodding
plume that waves above thee. Thou art leaning on my breast, Leelinau;
lean forever there and be at peace. Fly from men who are false and
cruel, and quit the tumult of their dusty strife for this quiet, lonely
shade. Over thee I will fling my arms, fairer than the lodge's roof. I
will breathe a perfume like that of flowers over thy happy evening rest.
In my bark canoe I'll waft thee over the waters of the sky-bine lake.
I will deck the folds of thy mantle with the sun's last rays. Come and
wander with me on the mountains, a fairy free!"
Leelinau drank in with eager ear these magical words. Her heart was
fixed. No warrior's son should clasp her hand. She listened in the hope
to hear the airy voice speak more; but it only repeated, "Again! again!"
and entirely ceased.
On the eve of the day fixed for her marriage, Leelinau decked herself in
her best garments. She arranged her hair according to the fashion of her
tribe and put on all of her maiden ornaments in beautiful array. With a
smile, she presented herself before her parents.
"I am going," she said, "to meet my little lover, the Chieftain of the
Green Plume, who is waiting for me at the Spirit Grove."
Her face was radiant with joy, and the parents, taking what she had
said as her own fanciful way of expressing acquiescence in their plans,
wished her good fortune in the happy meeting.
"I am going," she continued, addressing her mother as they left the
lodge, "I am going from one who has watched my infancy and guarded my
youth; who has given me medicine when I was sick and prepared my food
when I was well. I am going from a father who has ranged the forest to
procure the choicest skins for my dress and kept his lodge supplied with
the best spoil of the chase. I am going from a lodge which has been
my shelter from the storms of winter and my shield from the heats of
summer. Farewell, my parents, farewell!"
So saying, she sped faster than any could follow her to the margin of
the fairy wood, and in a moment was lost to sight.
As she had often thus withdrawn herself from the lodge, the parents were
not in fear but confidently awaited her return. Hour chased hour, as
the clouds of evening rolled up in the west; darkness came on, but no
daughter returned. With torches they hastened to the wood, but although
they lit up every dark recess and leafy gloom, their search was in vain.
Leelinau was nowhere to be seen. They called aloud, in lament, upon her
name, but she answered not.
Suns rose and set, but nevermore in their light did the bereaved
parents' eyes behold the lost form of their beloved child. Their
daughter was lost indeed. Whither she had vanished no mortal tongue
could tell; although it chanced that a company of fishermen, who were
spearing fish near the Spirit Grove, descried something that seemed to
resemble a maiden's figure standing on the shore. As the evening was
mild and the waters calm, they cautiously pulled their canoe toward
land, but the slight ripple of their oars excited alarm. The figure
fled in haste, but they could recognise in the shape and dress as she
ascended the hank, the lost daughter, and they saw the green plumes of
her fairy-lover waving over his forehead as he glided lightly through
the forest of young pines.
[Illustration: 0236]