Louis Satanette on the hill to-day."
III.
THE FLAMING SWORD.
The changes which passed over her face were half concealed by the
twilight. She was grieved, indignant, and frightened, but over all other
expressions lurked the mischievous mirth of a bad child.
"I meant to tell you about it," she said.
"Hearken," said Adam, with a fierce stare. "I've stayed out on the lake
all day, and I'm quiet. At first I wasn't. But when he came by I gave
him nothing but a good word."
"I wish you'd scolded him instead of me," said Eva, propping her back
against the table and puckering her lips.
"_He_ did naught," said Adam, "but what any man would do that got lave.
It's you that gave him lave that are to blame."
"Don't be so serious about a little thing," put forth Eva. "We just
walked over to the counterfeiters' hole, and coming back we picked
strawberries, and he teased me like a girl, and caught hold of me and
kissed me. We've been such good friends in camp. I think it's this easy,
wild life made me do it."
"She'll blame the very sky over her instead of taking blame to
herself," ground out Adam from between his jaws. "I sat in me boat
below and saw you arch your head and look at him ways that I remember.
My God! why did you make this woman so false, and yet so sweet that a
mon canna help loving her in spite o' his teeth?"
"Because I'd die if folks didn't love me," burst out Eva, with a sob.
"And if men can't help loving me, what do you blame me for?"
"What right have you to breathe such a word when you're married to me?"
"But I'm not used to being married yet," pleaded Eva. "And I forgot,
this once."
"It's once and for all," said Adam, "You'll never be to me what you were
before. Is it the English-Canadian way to bring up women to kiss every
comer?"
"I didn't kiss anybody but Louis Satanette," maintained Eva, "and I
didn't really _want_ to kiss _him_"
"Never mind," said Adam. "Don't trouble your butterfly soul about it."
And he turned away and walked toward the tent.
"I'll not love you if you say such awful things to me," she flashed
after him.
"Ye can't take the breeks off a Hielandman," he replied, facing about,
"Ye never loved me. Not as I loved you. And it's no loss I've met, if I
could but think it."
"Oh, Adam!" Now she ran forward and caught him around the waist. "Don't
be so hard with me. I know I am very bad, but I didn't mean to be."
Some faint perception of that coarse fibre within her was breaking with
horror through her face. She held to his hands after he had separated
her from his person and held her off.
"All that you do still has its effect on me," said the man, gazing
sternly at her. "I love ye; but I despise myself for loving ye. This
morn I adored ye with reverence; this night you're as a bit o' that
earth."
Eva let go his hands and sat down on the ground. As he made his
preparations in the tent he could not help seeing with compassion how
abjectly her figure drooped. All its flexible proud lines, were suddenly
gone. She was dazed by his treatment and by the light in which he put
her trifling. She sat motionless until Adam came out with one of the
cots in his arms.
"I'm to sleep upon the hill in the pine woods to-night," said he. "Go
into the tent, and I'll fasten the flaps. You shan't be scared by
anything."
"Let me get in the boat and leave the island, if you can't breathe the
same air with me," said Eva. staggering up.
"No, I can't breathe the same air with ye to-night, but ye'll go into
the tent," said Adam, with authority.
"I'll not stay there," she rebelled. "I'll follow you. You don't know
what may be on this island."
"There can be nothing worse than what I've seen," said Adam; "and that's
done all the hairm it can do."
"Oh, Adam, are we both crazy?" the small creature burst out, weeping as
if her heart would break. "Don't go away and leave me so. I am not real
bad in my heart, I know I am not; and if you would be a little patient
with me and help me, I shall get over my silly ways. There is something
in me, you can depend upon, if I _did_ do that foolish thing. And my
mother didn't live long enough to train me, Adam; remember that. Won't
you please kiss me? My heart is breaking."
He put down the cot and took her by the shoulders, trembling as he did
so from head to foot:
"My wife, I belaive what you say. I'd give all the days remaining to me
if I could strain ye against my breast with the feeling I had this morn.
But there comes that sight. I never shall see the hill again, I never
shall see a spot of this island again, without seeing your mouth kissing
another man. Go into the tent. God knows I'd die before hairm should
come to you. But not to-night can I stay beside you. Or kiss you."
He carried her into the tent and put her on her bed. She had made all
the night-preparations herself, placing the pillows on both cots and
turning back the sun-sweetened blankets.
Adam left her sobbing, buttoned the tent-flaps outside, and placed a
barricade of kettles and pans which could not be touched without
disturbing him on the hill. Then, taking up his own bed, he marched off
through the ferns, edging his burden among dense boughs as he ascended.
When he had made the joints of his couch creak with many uneasy
turnings, had clinched at leaves, and started up to return to the tent,
only to check himself in the act as often as he started, he lost
consciousness in uneasy dreams rather than fell asleep.
He was smothering, and yet could not open his lips to gasp for a breath
of air. Then he was drowning: he gulped in vast sheets of water upon his
lungs. An alarm sounded from Eva's barricade. He heard the pans and
kettles clanging and her own voice in screams which pierced him, yet he
could not move. A nightmare of heat enveloped him; the smothering
element pouring upon his lungs was not water, but smoke; and he knew if
no effort of will could move his body to her rescue he must be perishing
himself.
After these brief sensations his existence was as blank as the empty
void outside the worlds, until his ears began to throb like drums, and
he felt water, like the tears he had shed in the morning, running all
over his face. Eva held him in her arms, and alternately kissed his head
and drenched it from the lake.
Moreover, he was in the boat, outside the bay, and their island glowed
like a furnace before his dazzled eyes.
Those pine woods where he had gone to sleep were roaring up toward
heaven in a column of fire. The tent was burning, all its interior
illuminated until every object showed its minutest lines. He thought he
saw some of Eva's dark hairs in an upturned hair-brush on the
wash-stand.
Fire ran along the cliff-edge and dropped hissing brands into the lake.
Old moss logs and pine-trees dry as tinder sent out sickening heat. The
light ran like a flash up the tree over their stove, and in an instant
its crown was wavering with flames. The grass itself caught here and
there, and in whatever direction the eye turned, new fires as
instantaneously sprang out to meet it.
Stumps blazed up like lighted altars, or like huge gas-jets suddenly
turned on. Adam saw one log lying endwise downhill, one side of which
was crumbling into coals of fierce and tremulous heat, while from the
other side still sprung unsinged a delicate tuft of ferns.
The smoke was driving straight upward in a quivering current, and in
Lake Magog's depths another island seemed to be on fire.
Sublime as the sight was, all these details impressed themselves on the
man in an instant, and he turned his face directly up toward the woman.
"Darling, your face looks blistered," said Adam.
"It feels blistered," replied Eva. "I'll put some water on it, now that
you've caught your breath again. I thought I could not get you out from
those burning trees."
"But you dragged me down the hill?"
"Yes, and then dipped you in the lake and pushed off with you in the
boat. I don't know how I did it. But here we are together."
Adam bathed her face carefully himself, and held her tight in his arms.
The unspeakable love of which he had dreamed, and the heat of the
burning island, seemed welding them together without other sign than the
fact.
Not a word was sighed out for forgiveness on either side. They held each
other and floated back into the lake. Adam took an oar and occasionally
paddled, without wholly releasing his hold of Eva.
"Don't you remember our fish's nest?" she whispered beside his neck. "I
wonder if the slim little silver thing is swimming around over the
gravel hollow, frightened by all this glare? I hope those overhanging
bushes won't catch fire and drop coals on her; for she's a silly
thing,--she might not want to dart out in deep water and lose her
unhatched family."
Adam smiled into his wife's eyes. He was quite singed, but did not know
it.
"Ay, burn," he spoke out exultantly, apostrophizing the island. "Burn up
our first home and all. It's worth it. We're the other side o' the world
of fire now. We've passed through it, and are afloat on the sea of
glass."
M. H. CATHERWOOD.
PROBATION.
Full slow to part with her best gifts is Fate:
The choicest fruitage comes not with the spring,
But still for summer's mellowing touch must wait,
For storms and tears that seasoned excellence bring;
And Love doth fix his joyfullest estate
In hearts that have been hushed 'neath Sorrow's brooding wing.
Youth sues to Fame: she coldly answers, "Toil!"
He sighs for Nature's treasures: with reserve
Responds the goddess, "Woo them from the soil."
Then fervently he cries, "Thee will I serve,--
Thee only, blissful Love." With proud recoil
The heavenly boy replies, "To serve me well--deserve."
FLORENCE EARLE COATES.
THE PIONEERS OF THE SOUTHWEST.
TWO PAPERS. II.
The route of Robertson lay over the great Indian war-path, which led, in
a southwesterly direction, from the valley of Virginia to the Cherokee
towns on the lower Tennessee, not far from the present city of
Chattanooga. He would, however, turn aside at the Tellico and visit
Echota, which was the home of the principal chiefs. While he is pursuing
his perilous way, it may be as well to glance for a moment at the people
among whom he is going at so much hazard.
The Cherokees were the mountaineers of aboriginal America, and, like
most mountaineers, had an intense love of country and a keen
appreciation of the beautiful in nature, as is shown by the poetical
names they have bequeathed to their rivers and mountains. They were
physically a fine race of men, tall and athletic, of great bravery and
superior natural intelligence. It was their military prowess alone that
enabled them to hold possession of the country they occupied against the
many warlike tribes by whom they were surrounded.
They had no considerable cities, or even villages, but dwelt in
scattered townships in the vicinity of some stream where fish and game
were found in abundance. A number of these towns, bearing the musical
names of Tallassee, Tamotee, Chilhowee, Citico, Tennassee, and Echota,
were at this time located upon the rich lowlands lying between the
Tellico and Little Tennessee Rivers. These towns contained a population,
in men, women, and children, estimated at from seven to eight thousand,
of whom perhaps twelve hundred were warriors. These were known as the
Ottari (or "among the mountains") Cherokees.
About the same number, near the head-waters of the Savannah, in the
great highland belt between the Blue Ridge and the Smoky Mountains, were
styled the Erati (or "in the valley") Cherokees. Another body (among
whom were many Creeks), nearly as large, and much more lawless than
either of the others, occupied towns lower down the Tennessee and in the
vicinity of Lookout Mountain. These, from their residence near the
stream of that name, were known as the Chickamaugas.
These various bodies were one people, governed by an Archimagus, or
King, who, with a supreme council of chiefs, which sat at Echota,
decided all important questions in peace or war. Under him were the
half-or vice-king and the several chiefs who governed the scattered
townships and together composed the supreme council. In them was lodged
the temporal power. Spiritual authority was of a far more despotic form
and character. It was vested in one person, styled the Beloved man or
woman of the tribe, who, over a people so superstitious as the
Cherokees, held a control that was wellnigh absolute. This person was
generally of superior intelligence, who, like the famous Prophet of the
Shawnees, officiated as physician, prophet, and intercessor with the
invisible powers; and, by virtue of the supernatural authority which he
claimed, he often by a single word decided the most important questions,
even when opposed by the king and the principal chiefs.
Echota was located on the northern bank of the Tellico, about five miles
from the ruins of Fort Loudon, and thirty southwest from the present
city of Knoxville. It was the Cherokee City of Refuge. Once within its
bounds, an open foe, or even a red-handed criminal, could dwell in peace
and security. The danger to an enemy was in going and returning. It is
related that an Englishman who, in self-defence, once slew a Cherokee,
fled to this sacred city to escape the vengeance of the kindred of his
victim. He was treated here with such kindness that after a time he
thought it safe to leave his asylum. The Indians warned him against the
danger, but he left, and on the following morning his body was found on
the outskirts of the town, pierced through and through with a score of
arrows.
About two hundred cabins and wigwams, scattered, with some order but at
wide intervals, along the bank of the river, composed the village. The
cabins, like those of the white settlers, were square and built of logs;
the wigwams were conical, with a frame of slender poles gathered
together at the top and covered with buffalo-robes, dressed and smoked
to render them impervious to the weather. An opening at the side formed
the entrance, and over it was hung a buffalo-hide, which served as a
door. The fire was built in the centre of the lodge, and directly
overhead was an aperture to let out the smoke. Here the women performed
culinary operations, except in warm weather, when such employments were
carried on outside in the open air. At night the occupants of the lodge
spread their skins and buffalo-robes on the ground, and then men, women,
and children, stretching themselves upon them, went to sleep, with their
feet to the fire. By day the robes were rolled into mats and made to
serve as seats. A lodge of ordinary size would comfortably house a dozen
persons; but two families never occupied one domicile, and, the
Cherokees seldom having a numerous progeny, not more than five or six
persons were often tenants of a single wigwam.
These rude dwellings were mostly strung along the two sides of a wide
avenue, which was shaded here and there with large oaks and poplars and
trodden hard with the feet of men and horses. At the back of each lodge
was a small patch of cleared land, where the women and the negro slaves
(stolen from the white settlers over the mountains) cultivated beans,
corn, and potatoes, and occasionally some such fruits as apples, pears,
and plums. All labor was performed by the women and slaves, as it was
considered beneath the dignity of an Indian brave to follow any
occupation but that of killing, either wild beasts in the hunt or
enemies in war. The house-lots were without fences, and not an enclosure
could be seen in the whole settlement, cattle and horses being left to
roam at large in the woods and openings.
In the centre of Echota, occupying a wide opening, was a circular,
tower-shaped structure, some twenty feet high and ninety in
circumference. It was rudely built of stout poles, plastered with clay,
and had a roof of the same material sloping down to broad eaves, which
effectually protected the walls from moisture. It had a wide entrance,
protected by two large buffalo-hides hung so as to meet together in the
middle. There were no windows, but an aperture in the roof, shielded by
a flap of skins a few feet above the opening, let out the smoke and
admitted just enough light to dissipate a portion of the gloom that
always shrouded the interior. Low benches, neatly made of cane, were
ranged around the circumference of the room. This was the great
council-house of the Cherokees. Here they met to celebrate the
green-corn dance and their other national ceremonials; and here the king
and half-king and the princes and head-men of the various towns
consulted together on important occasions, such as making peace or
declaring war.
At the time of which I write, several of the log cabins of Echota were
occupied by traders, adventurous white men who, tempted by the profit of
the traffic with the Cherokees, had been led to a more or less constant
residence among them. Their cabins contained their stock in
trade,--traps, guns, powder and lead, hatchets, looking-glasses,
"stroud," beads, scarlet cloth, and other trinkets, articles generally
of small cost, but highly prized by the red-men, and for which they gave
in exchange peltries of great value. The trade was one of slow returns,
but of great profits to the trader. And it was of about equal advantage
to the Indian; for with the trap or rifle he had gotten for a few skins
he was able to secure more game in a day than his bow and arrow and rude
"dead-fall" would procure for him in a month of toilsome hunting. The
traders were therefore held in high esteem among the Cherokees, who
encouraged their living and even marrying among them. In fact, such
alliances were deemed highly honorable, and were often sought by the
daughters of the most distinguished chiefs. Consequently, among the
trader's other chattels would often be found a dusky mate and a
half-dozen half-breed children; and this, too, when he had already a
wife and family somewhere in the white settlements.
These traders were an important class in the early history of the
country. Of necessity well acquainted with the various routes traversing
the Indian territory, and with the state of feeling among the savages,
and passing frequently to and fro between the Indian towns and the white
settlements, they were often enabled to warn the whites of intended
attacks, and to guide such hostile parties as invaded the Cherokee
territory. Though often natives of North Carolina or Virginia, and in
sympathy with the colonists, they were, if prudent of speech and
behavior, allowed to remain unmolested in the Indian towns, even when
the warriors were singing the war-song and brandishing the war-club on
the eve of an intended massacre of the settlers.
Living in Echota at this time was one of this class who, on account of
his great services to the colonists, is deserving of special mention.
His name was Isaac Thomas, and he is said to have been a native of
Virginia. He is described as a man about forty years of age, over six
feet in height, straight, long-limbed, and wiry, and with a frame so
steeled by twenty years of mountain-life that he could endure any
conceivable hardship. His features were strongly marked and regular, and
they wore an habitual expression of comic gravity; but on occasion his
dark, deep-set eye had been known to light up with a look of
unconquerable pluck and determination. He wore moccasins and
hunting-shirt of buckskin, and his face, neck, and hands, from long
exposure, had grown to be of the same color as that material. His
coolness and intrepidity had been shown on many occasions, and these
qualities, together with his immense strength, had secured him high
esteem among the Cherokees, who, like all uncivilized people, set the
highest value upon personal courage and physical prowess. It is related
that shortly before the massacre at Fort Loudon he interfered in a
desperate feud between two Cherokee braves who had drawn their tomahawks
to hew each other in pieces. Stepping between them, he wrenched the
weapons from their hands, and then, both setting upon him at once, he
cooled their heated valor by lifting one after the other into the air
and gently tossing him into the Tellico. Subsequently, one of these
braves saved his life at the Loudon massacre, at the imminent risk of
his own. If I were writing fiction, I might make of this man an
interesting character: as it is, it will be seen that facts hereinafter
related will fully justify the length of this description.
A wigwam, larger and more pretentious than most of the others in Echota,
stood a little apart from the rest, and not far from the council-house.
Like the others, it had a frame of poles covered with tanned skins; but
it was distinguished from them by a singular "totem,"--an otter in the
coils of a water-snake. Its interior was furnished with a sort of rude
splendor. The floor was carpeted with buffalo-hides and panther-skins,
and round the walls were hung eagles' tails, and the peltries of the
fox, the wolf, the badger, the otter, and other wild animals. From a
pole in the centre was suspended a small bag,--the mysterious
medicine-bag of the occupant. She was a woman who to this day is held in
grateful remembrance by many of the descendants of the early settlers
beyond the Alleghanies. Her personal appearance is lost to tradition,
but it is said to have been queenly and commanding. She was more than
the queen, she was the prophetess and Beloved Woman, of the Cherokees.
At this time she is supposed to have been about thirty-five years of
age. Her father was an English officer named Ward, but her mother was of
the "blood royal," a sister of the reigning half-king Atta-Culla-Culla.
The records we have of her are scanty, as they are of all her people,
but enough has come down to us to show that she had a kind heart and a
sense of justice keen enough to recognize the rights of even her
enemies. She must have possessed very strong traits of character to
exercise as she did almost autocratic control over the fierce and
wellnigh untamable Cherokees when she was known to sympathize with and
befriend their enemies the white settlers. Not long before the time of
which I am writing, she had saved the lives of two whites,--Jeremiah
Jack and William Rankin,--who had come into collision with a party of
Cherokees; and subsequently she performed many similar services to the
frontier people.
Other wigwams as imposing as that of Nancy Ward, and not far from the
council-house, were the habitations of the head-king Oconostota, the
half-king Atta-Culla-Culla, and the prince of Echota, Savanuca,
otherwise called the Raven. Of these men it will be necessary to say
more hereafter: here I need only remark that they have now gathered in
the council-house, with many of the principal warriors and head-men of
the Ottari Cherokees, and that the present fate of civilization in the
Southwest is hanging on their deliberations.
They are of a gigantic race, and none of those at this conclave, except
Atta-Culla-Culla, are less than six feet in height "without their
moccasins." Squatted as they are gravely around the council-fire, they
present a most picturesque appearance. Among them are the
Bread-Slave-Catcher, noted for his exploits in stealing negroes; the
Tennassee Warrior, prince of the town of that name; Noon-Day, a
wide-awake brave; Bloody Fellow, whose subsequent exploits will show the
appropriateness of his name; Old Tassell, a wise and reasonably just
old man, afterward Archimagus; and John Watts, a promising young
half-breed, destined to achieve eminence in slaughtering white people.
As one after another of them rises to speak, the rest, with downcast
eyes and cloudy visages, listen with silent gravity, only now and then
expressing assent by a solitary "Ugh!"