Читать книгу The Master of Life - W. D. Lighthall - Страница 5

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A few days later came the Maize-Harvest Feast at Hochelaga. All the night before the principal house of each of the three clans—Turtle, Bear and Wolf—rang with voices of women. For a maiden was being chosen and adorned by those of each clan to represent, or, in their thought, to be one of the Three, Beneficent Spirits in the Festival.

In the house of the Turtle, although discussion was long, it was not over the choice of their maiden, since all were agreed upon the orphan Quenhia, the child of the Ghost.

"What is the custom, O grandmother?" they enquired of the most venerable matron the white-haired Kâwi, The-Oldest-Woman-That-Ever-Lived.

"Our ancestors said: 'Ye shall choose the most beautiful,'" muttered the ancient Kâwi; and her decision was reverenced. And as no one thought of any other than Quenhia when beauty was the standard, they called the young girl to the side of Kâwi's fire near the sunset door of the house, and as she came up the long central corridor, the red light of the seven other fireplaces successively fell upon her, and the women sitting around them spoke pleasantly to her. When she came, the eldest matrons made way, and she stood among them.

"Yea," said garrulous Kâwi, "according to the tradition it was Adohasu the Beautiful who in times long ago was wooed by the youthful brave in his lodge in the forest. And at night, in the hour of dreams, he saw her flitting brightly out of the doorway and fleeing away with her wampum necklaces in her hands. And when he ran after her, she ran faster and faster, until his swift feet brought him near and he stretched out his hands and caught at her robe. But she raised her arms in her fright to the Moonmother. And Ataensic the Sorceress shone down upon her the light of ghosts, her feet became rooted in the earth with fear, her flying robes became long leaves, her hands and wampum beads became corn-ears, her hair became the tassels, the feathers in her hair became the corn-plumes. Then the young brave wailed and sat down to sing his death-song. But she said to him, 'Mourn not, my love, for now I am Osizy the Maize, who shall be thy friend and the friend of all thy race. I have two sisters, also friends, and together ye shall name us "Our Supporters."'"

Onata, Hiawatha's mother, threw a piece of bark on their fire, which flamed up, and at the same time pulled off Quenhia's deer-skin shoulder robe. The form of the girl, her softly moulded limbs and breasts were revealed in the crimson firelight, and what was more striking—her exceeding fairness and the delicate color of her cheeks and lips. The features also were clear-cut, sweet and spiritual.

"Verily she is Adohasu the Beautiful," exclaimed Kâwi.

"Thou art Osizy, the spirit of Maize, the daughter of the Sun," they told her, as they brought down from the pole shelves above the dress and ornaments which had been made. They placed upon her a sleeveless tunic of the rustling maize-leaves, which fell below her knees, girdled with a wide and figured belt as of wampum of varicolored corn kernels; armlets and garlands of twisted leaves fringed with the corn tassels; necklaces, bracelets and anklets of threaded kernels; they covered her head with the silken green tassel hair and crowned her with a head-dress curiously worked of plumes and kernels, and put in her hand a tall stem with the leaves still clinging and the top crested with the graceful flower.

Falling back to admire, they called upon the Sun and the Moon, the Turtle and the spirits of their ancestresses to come and be with her, and Adohasu herself to dwell in her.

Then all the matrons marching out with her under the light of the stars, across the broad square to the Council House, delivered her there to the Mystery Men, who solemnly received her, rattling their sacred rattles and beating their holy drums; and the matrons returned to the various houses over which they had the rulership. And when the women of the other clans had done the same, slumber fell upon the town.

Hochelaga, which thus slept silently under the stars, was walled about with a triple palisade in the form of a circle, lashed together with thongs of elm-bark. It was of the height of four warriors. The town had but one gate. Its open square in the centre, a good stone's throw across, was adorned with the painted Council House and the principal houses of the clans, and in its centre was the War-post, carved and painted with totems; the Turtle surmounting the Bear, and the Wolf below. Two thousand of the tribe slept in the many long and lofty bark houses with which it was packed. Intricate sandy lanes led here and there between these houses, some of which were more than fifty paces long. They were constructed of large squares of bark corded on a frame of saplings, an opening being left along the top for a smoke exit. The fires were on the ground down the centre, while partitions and sleeping platforms were made of poles on either side, where families slept. Corn-ears and other food were hung and stored on the light rafters above. Such houses were enlarged from time to time by adding to their length, hence in after times the Men of Men were called the People of the Long House. The dwellings were grouped into three wards, containing the houses of the Three Clans, each ward separated from the others by a wide street. The town stood on a slight elevation between two creeks, surrounded by its maize fields, which merged irregularly at the edges of their circle, into the surrounding woods. A broad trail about a mile in length led through the forest to the river. Behind the place was the mountain, towering in dusky mystery now, but by daylight a magnificent surge of living woods.

Next morning, at the earliest dawn, the chiefs of the Men of Men were seen sitting in their order before the Council House, looking silently towards the east. Opposite them, over oak woods which stood up sharply against the glowing horizon, the Red Chief of the Worlds Above and Below was appearing out of his Lodge Door. He gazed at them as he climbed up into their country, and while they watched him Hiawatha, newly entrusted with the honor and wearing his red-tipped feather, built a small sacred fire. Awitharoa lit it and diaphanous smoke was blown eastward towards the horizon, through the crystalline air. They were met to render the first thanks to their Father the Sun for his gift of the harvest. The first arrow from the rim of his bow shot in a flash of red-gold fire across the plain and flooded it with color. The council rose and bent their heads. Awitharoa, advancing to the fire, drew from an embroidered pouch a sacrificial offering of sumac bark and cast it upon the flames, and as the incense was wafted towards the splendor in the east, he prayed:

"O Host of the Warrior dead! Before thee we are smoke as thou art fire. Upon our soil thou hast poured thy shining arrows. They have risen through the stalks of the living maize and to-day we shall gather of their brightness to light our hearts during the darkness. Accept our thanks for corn and game, for fish and fruits, for thy child the fire, for thy long spears in the woods that slay the serpents of dark places, thy shield that chases the night. Continue, to listen, O Red Chief of men and spirits, our Ancestor!"

Even as he spoke the people had assembled. The figured mat at the door of the Council House, was pushed aside, and forty Mysterymen in masks and fantastic costumes ran forth. Some wore upon their backs and heads the skin and antlers of the elk and moose, some those of the wood-buffalo, some the huge pelts of the black bear, with its claws over their hands, the masks of some were black and marked with stripes of white or red, others were brown or green, with staring eyes of inlaid shell and mouths twisted up at one side, and in the hands of each was a hollow rattle of tortoise-shell or carved wood filled with dried beans. As they issued they danced a chant to the Chief of the Sky, and having reached the centre of the square, the disguised figures squatted on the grass in two rows facing each other, rattling and still chanting. They were no mere disguises. To take a shape was to be that thing.

"Listen!" they sang in wild chorus,—

"Listen, daughters of the Sun!

"Maize-maiden! Bean-maiden! Squash-maiden!

"Listen,

"Sitting at the town-gate, Maize-maiden,

"We have seen you in the moonlight flitting amidst the tasseled fields,

"We have heard you rustle your folds

"As you passed among the maize—the feather-crested warrior maize,

"The maize, generous and haughty as chiefs, holding in its hand the gift of our Father the Sun to his children.

"There, O Bean-maiden, we have seen you bend and twine around its stalks your vine,—the vine that brings to our children the fair white food, from your father the Bowman of the Blue Land.

"We have seen you, O Squash-maiden, also,

"Conferring with your sisters in the moonlight,

"Keeping away the black blight from the cob, and the worm from the root and the bear that eats the crops in the gloaming,

"And weaving of golden threads your golden flowers,

"And shaping of golden clay the jars that hold your life-sustaining fruit.

"O Three! Come forth!

"Keep watch!

"Come forth and let us worship! Come forth!"

At the loud and long-drawn all-together of the last "Come forth!" the thousands of watching eyes turned from the Mystery Men to the Council House. The mat which constituted its door, woven in colors with the figure of a Thunderbird, trembled, was lifted, and from it issued the Spirit of the Maize. Following the Maize-maiden came the other two Spirits invoked. The three figures slowly advanced in a measured step towards the Mysterymen, halting, swaying their arms, entwining them in loving embraces, and looking this way and that as if in surprise.

Low exclamations passed among the women.

"They are the most beautiful ever chosen!" exclaimed an old one.

The Spirit of the Bean was covered with the leaves and tendrils of her vine; the Squash-spirit with her large leaves and yellow flowers; but Quenhia was decorated, as we saw, in devices of the corn-plumes and corn-tassels, and wide armlets, a belt as of wampum and several necklaces made of the golden grain; and at different changes in her dance she threw kernels from a pouch towards the people.

No sooner had the three reached the Mysterymen than all the hundreds of young women around the sides of the square ran forward, surrounded the Spirits, raised their arms on high, and commenced a measured dance. The matrons followed, forming a circle of their own, and singing their own chant to the same step. A little later the young men formed their circle, and in time all but the oldest were engaged in invocation to the daughters of the Sun who thus had come among them from the sky. Then, with the chiefs at their head, the population marched in order out of the gate, following Quenhia to the fields, where to the songs of the Spirit-maidens, the procession of women spread out into a wide army of workers and entered vigorously upon the harvesting, and heaps of corn and squash began to delight the warriors who, arrayed in their festal ornaments, sat in numbers on the slope before the gate shaping pipes, mending nets and bows, chaffing, and overlooking the busy fields.

Awitharoa, standing within the top of the town wall, on its platform of defence, above the gate, surveyed them. The sun was well risen, and the brilliant moving scene before his eyes, with the forest fringing it round, had a great fascination in that land where men were so few and solitudes so complete. The Peace-Chief delighted in the numbers and comfort of his people. No poor and no greed nor avarice were known here. These fields belonged to no one proprietor: their fruits, the product of the united labor, were the common property of all. None could go hungry while a handful of corn was to be found in Hochelaga. The aged, the brave and the wise were looked up to, but otherwise all were equals as a single family and old and young were all to Awitharoa his children. He called Hiawatha. The young runner sprang up the nearest ladder to his side.

"Hochelaga is a happy people!" the Chief exclaimed.

But even as he began to speak his voice dropped.

"Hearken!" The Peace-Chief did not alter his expression a tittle, but Hiawatha, following his glance towards the woods, saw six young Algonkins in hunting gear advancing in file by the trail which led from the river. The Black Wolverine was their leader, and both Hiawatha and the Chief marked his furtive but prolonged glance at Quenhia as she sang—a glance like the gaze of the wildcat which has sighted an oriole. Yet his countenance was watchfully expressionless as he approached the nearest Hochelagan warrior, holding out his clay pipe in token of friendliness.

In the evening, when the Black Wolverine and his companions were called into the Council House to state their errand to the chiefs, Hiawatha sat at his mother's fire in the House of the Turtle, on the door of which was painted, large and brilliant, the Turtle, their token. This was Kawi's house, for his great grandmother was the ancient Kawi, who, being a hundred and forty years old, was called "The Oldest Woman Who Ever Lived." She sat opposite him, her watery eyes peering out of her little wrinkled face, and of the embroidered deer-skin shawl over her head, while she slowly smoked her queer reed-stemmed pipe, from which the black head on the bowl grinned at her great-grandson. Hiawatha's mother, Onata, bent near her, tending the pot of broth, a vessel whose flared edge and ornamental markings bore witness to her success in the woman's art of pottery. It was half buried in the ashes beside the fire and from time to time she dropped into it a red-hot stone, setting the pottage boiling from the inside. While she was cooking thus the line of fires extending down the house illumined here and there some similar steaming pot and its attendant, some group of olive-skinned maidens musically laughing over the day's work and procession, some knot of agile athletes smoking, while one recounted a bear-hunt; the kind Awitharoa entertaining children with fairy tales of the Stone Giants and the race of the Bodiless Heads; prankish boys and girls chasing about under the eyes of parents; and the watchful, beady eyes of many pappooses looking down from their gaudy cradle-boards hung on the end of nearly every partition. Wood smoke enveloped all in blue mist; deep shadows wrapped the recesses; moonlight peeped in on the corn hung along the smoke-slit in the ceiling, and the great Turtle, pictured in black, white and red, watched its descendants from each end of the long house. Onata was a highly honored name among the nation and clan. For was she not the mother of Hiawatha, the young hero. The son and his glory belong to the mother.

All at once old Kâwi's eyes sparkled and Hiawatha, looking around, saw Quenhia standing near.

"My child, sit down here; you do not eat with us often enough," said Onata, watching her pot. Going back between the platforms behind her, she drew from a shelf of poles a beaver pelt and placed it by the fire for the girl. As the latter seated herself Onata passed her arm over her shoulders most tenderly and added, "Everybody must be the orphan's mother, beloved little one."

Quenhia looked at her and smiled. It was a happy life to be an orphan in Hochelaga. Onata ladled the first of the pottage for Hiawatha into a carved bowl of basswood. She served Quenhia, the guest; then Kâwi: "The custom of the Mothers," she said—"The men before the women; the guests before the household; old before young."

"Where is your stag-skin?" Quenhia laughed to Hiawatha. "How does it feel to be a chief?"

"The skin is soaking in the brook," put in Onata. "I am making him a shirt of it."

"Let me come and embroider it with you," the orphan cried. "I will put on a figure of a man with a long feather."

"Dress not a crow in eagle's clothes," Hiawatha retorted.

"Here," Quenhia said, raising something on her spoon, "here is one of the ankle-bones in my pottage."

"Then wait," croaked Kâwi, "the slayer must say the invocation."

Hiawatha bent his head. "O Stag," he said gravely, "bear me no ill-will for slaying thee: it was for the glory of my tribe. Graze in endless peace with thy people in the forests of the Land of Souls."

"When you are a great chief, Hiawatha, when you walk sternly among the warriors, do not forget your little sister Quenhia. When I saw you go up to the council-place this morning it seemed as if I had lost my brother."

"Fear not, my little one," returned the hero. "Let us go out and sit at the brookside and listen to the Voice of the Night."

"Go, lose not the beautiful moonlight," exclaimed Onata to her, lifting another hot stone into the pottage.

The orphan and Hiawatha rose to go.

"Beware of the Men-eating Ghosts Beware them, thou who art their child, for they will claim thee," croaked Kâwi.

The youth led Quenhia by the hand out of the house, through the town gate and eastward by a path across the cornfields, until they sat down under a spreading butternut tree which leaned across the little glen of the east brook. Both were full of inherited love of and insight into the matchless music and the matchless art of Nature. They looked up and saw the round moon's light break in melting brightness on the branches and thin black leafage of the butternut, against the liquid sky above. They heard the soft song of the stream splashing gently down the slope. They heard from the fields and woods the concert of the ever-replying cicadas, the shrill pulsating myriad crooning of the crickets and the sweet treble of the treetoads; all singing together to Ataentsic, the Moon-mother, in one harmony, of which some unseen one was leader; and all these voices were one—the Voice of Night.

Listening, with the incense of the forest in their nostrils, they kept intently still and were filled with happiness. Sometimes before they had sat thus listening the whole night through.

Enchanted, Quenhia sat. She rested her face against his arm and looked up.

"Thou art the mountain," she said, "and I am a little sumach tree on one of its ledges. What art thou saying to thyself? Does the mountain see far above the sumach?"

The young brave laughed.

"I was thinking how like the night is to a river, and the red dawn to a Mysteryman, and the sun to a victor in battle, and how quiet is twilight, and how pleasant are swift hunting and racing and archery and listening to the adventures of renowned chiefs; but more than all, how the greatest joy would be war. We of the Sacred Island are dishonored for want of enemies. In the spring I will give a feast to the young men, and call on them to follow me to the Town of the Rock,^[2] and there we will form a party to take up the hatchet against the Toudamans, the enemy of the Stadaconas. In that way I shall bring honor upon our town, the mother and leader of the Men of Men."

"But, Hiawatha, will not the Toudamans come in return and kill some of us?"

"They will come, they will lie in wait for us among the islands and reeds, and along the paths of the woods, even up to the wall of the town—they will slay here and there some of our braves, but then we shall hunt them again and bring home the long scalps and the trophies—they shall be hung up on the poles before our lodges, and the fires shall shine upon warriors telling glorious deeds, and we shall be indeed men of men."

"But what of those that would fall, my brother, and would wander in the dark swamps of death?"

"Those that fall—or are tortured?"

"Tortured?"

"Yes, by fire—they will die singing their exploits and taunting the Toudamans."

"Thy thoughts are the thoughts of the Mountain, but I am only the little sumach. I hear the wailing of the women; the widows are many; the mothers have blackened their faces, and the virgins fear to go into the cornfields."

"Warriors must endure these things; to be men is first before all."

"And what," she gasped, "if the Toudamans should kill thee also in the woods or among the reeds?"

"Then the mother of Hiawatha will not be ashamed."

"She hath but thee."

"Yes," he mused, "me only."

"Tall brother," whispered Quenhia, "it is but the rustle of the sumach—perhaps honor prevents thee from listening."

"Speak on."

"The spirits, my people, whisper to me—they whisper to me, 'Peace.' My father the Spirit taught my mother that the Master of Life hateth war; that His Son is Lord of Peace; and that when wounded he smote not back, but was tied to the stake."

"How could so mighty a chief endure such shame?"

"It is the teaching of the Spirits."

Hiawatha fell into the deepest silence.

"The wisdom of spirits is wonderful," he said.

A bright light spread all at once around them, a rocket seemed to leap through the sky and six or seven meteors sprang over it in quick succession. Quenhia leaped up, hid her face, and caught at his arm.

"Ataentsic, the Sorceress! O we gazed at her!"

"Nay, be calm, little sister," returned he peacefully, "those were spirits of braves rushing to the Land of Souls."

"Many will die!" she cried. "Let us leave. O! I fear it!"

"There is no danger."

"Thou art brave: I am foolish, Hiawatha."

"Every little tree shakes in the wind."

"But mournful visions have come to me from my father's people the spirits." Then she added in sweet, far-off tones which vibrated many years in his memory:

"If I ask thee for something wilt thou give it?"

"Have I ever refused thee anything?"

"A white bead, then, from thy belt."

"White wampum is the token of lovers: I am but thy older brother, little one. We are of the same clan, between whom there can be no marriage."

"That is well," she said, "for my father taught that I must be holy to the Master of Life; but give me a single bead, my brother, to hang about my neck: when thou art absent thou wilt live in it to me."

The brave drew his knife, and, sawing off a pearly bead, gave it to Quenhia, who removed the corn-grains from a string of her necklace, and, replacing them by the bead, suspended it at her neck.

Suddenly he bent alertly and listened.

The Voice of Night hushed, in part.

"Hark! Behold!" he whispered, sharply nodding towards the field of corn-stalks stacked on their hills like Algonkin wigwams.

An indistinct shape was making its way across.

"A ghost!" she gasped.

"Elk!" he whispered, and she descried in the moonlight a heavy antlered stag which two does and a fawn were following. The stag paused and sniffed from corn-hill to corn-hill, while his companions nibbled the vines and weeds behind him. Raising his head, he trotted straight to the gateway. He stopped, sniffed as if in curiosity, and finally entered. The does and fawn, hesitating, huddled together, and whistled in fear, and as the stag did not answer, they whistled again, bewildered.

Hiawatha was already half way towards the gate, and in a few moments the clang of its bars came to Quenhia and she knew that the buck was a prisoner within the walls. Its companions darted back to the woods, and the yelping of all the dogs of Hochelaga could be heard. She fled to the gate in an agony of superstition. Every brave in the town sprang for his arms, war cries echoed among the houses and the elk fled towards the middle of the square—and disappeared!

Now, here was a marvel. The first dogs that rushed to the attack turned tail and stood howling; the jaws of the rest that rushed on after them met in nothing but an empty skin. The excited warriors who reached the scene found but a mangled pelt and head of antlers. The Mysterymen agreed that the spirit of a great brave had visited them in the form of an elk. The dogs were whipped off and the pelt dragged to Awitharoa. The old chief commanded fire to be brought. He examined the pelt closely by its light, which splashed and flickered on many awe-struck faces. Then he walked carefully over the ground where it had fallen, examining every blade and grain of sand, till a red gleam shone in some grass before him. It was green-rusted, slender, shapely—a copper axe. The Hochelagans had no copper. Moreover, the handle was carved in strange patterns.

Awitharoa stood still.

"This was no elk, and no god. This was two strangers—good hunters—mighty warriors. They came from the sunset: they must be followed—the matter is grave. Let the criers call the braves to Council and thither let Kâwi and the aged men be brought."

When the Peace-chief thus solved the problem the assembly marvelled that none else had remembered how the old traditions told that spies cover themselves like hunters with heads and skins of beasts and imitate their gait. But what skill, when the very does were made to follow the slayers of their master! The town fell into a ferment of excitement. The Council-house was speedily full; chiefs, matrons and warriors sat in their order; in the centre Awitharoa lit the fire, and they passed the calumet around. Firelight, shadows and faces made a wild scene. On a mat opposite the Peace-chief sat "The Oldest Woman That Ever Lived," little, wrinkled, white-haired, half-blind, feebleness itself, yet in some way mistress of the assembly. On each side of her was placed a very old man, so old in both cases that each was sightless and toothless.

Awitharoa explained the circumstances to her. She motioned for the hatchet. Hiawatha brought it to her and she examined it as closely as her emaciated hands would permit.

"I am the last of the children of the founders,—yea, the last. When I was a pappoose on the board, as my mother told me, we came out of the Land of the Sun. We see the bright edges of that land at the end of the day. There all was great. Great seas, that cannot be seen across were there, the greatest of woods, the greatest of falls, the greatest of warriors; and they dwelt in many towns walled like Hochelaga, and there were many cornfields and much red copper and red stone for pipes, the holy gift of the Master of Life. There was hunting of all beasts and fishing of all fish, and there were warriors wearing armor of cords and twigs and round shields, and warring constantly. Of that people sprang our forefathers, who dwelt in these towns and villages until the Holder of the Heavens said: 'Ye must build canoes and sail down the river towards the sunrise. I have made for you an island; I have made for you there the most beautiful country in the world, full of herds of deer and monstrous sturgeons and sparkling waters and lofty forests. For ye are the Men of Men.' Thus the Holder of the Heavens led us to this sacred Tiotiaké. We were but a little people, and our chief was Tekari the Eloquent—he of the double gift of speech, the ancestor of Tekarihoken, who is here.

"Now the totem of this axe, which it bears on its handle, is the Crane. It is the totem of the axe of my grand uncle that he brought from the sunset. It was lost in the Rapids when I was a child, but I knew it well in the house of my grandmother. This axe has been borne by one of our kindred who dwell in the sunset."

Exclamations, breathless and low, all around the Council-house, followed her words; and the old dame gave way with the fatigue of her effort, and fell into a stupor.

The two aged men feebly agreed with what she had said.

Fierce Iakonon, the War-chief, surnamed The Buffalo, next spoke. His head was shaven, except the scalplock; his long robe fell to the ground. Its upper part was edged with black bearskin, and upon it the feats and scenes of his career were pictured.

"Kinsmen come not at midnight in elkskins," he cried. "The laws of war are the people's safety, and the kinsmen that do this thing will slay us if they be not sacrificed in the fire. Let the swiftest runners seek their tracks and let all strangers understand well that it is best to keep far from our country."

Other speakers spoke briefly, and then Awitharoa resumed the matter:

"My children, our fathers said: 'Kindred must not be destroyed.' If the men be found ye must offer them the pipe and receive them by the fires; ye must share with them the pottage that is ready and pick the thorns from their limbs if they have travelled through brambles. But their trail must first be found. In the earliest of the morning, all the warriors who have taken scalps or led races must follow, and finding them, offer the pipe, for the laws of peace are the people's safety as well as the laws of war. But every night the gate-keepers must now keep watch by turns at the gate and along the top of the wall."

With this the Council separated, but the shock destroyed the sleep of all the households, Quenhia, trying to close her eyes, tossed tormented with the thought of Ataentsic, the beautiful Moonwoman, and of the rush of spirits to the Land of Souls, and heard "The Oldest Woman That Ever Lived" taking on to Onata in the waning light of the fire.

"No such trouble hath come," said Kâwi, "since the visit of the Men-eating Ghosts."

Quenhia clasped the bead at her neck and whispered an invocation to her oki the Echo.

"It is like it," continued garrulous Kâwi. "In the time of the orphan's grandmother came the Men-eating Ghosts to the town. They came from the Sunrise out of the Great Water in the canoes of the white clouds. Their faces were pale as snow, and it was by this that we knew they were the ghosts; but at first we took them for beneficent gods, for they brought thunder in their hands and lightning, and gave gifts and spoke softly. Their robes, their belts, their leggins, were not as of men; they were of skins of animals that live not on earth—some scarlet, some yellow, some like fresh charcoal; and many were sheathed hard like the beetles about their waists and their heads, and their sheaths shone like blue water. They had long knives of white copper, and spears of it, made by spirits, and small gods of stone like the sun. And they drank the blood of demons from cups of ice that did not melt. We received them at the river and brought them into the town and up to the top of the mountain and worshipped them reverently. The chief of the ghosts spoke many things to us in the language of the dead, healing also our sick by magic with his hands, for the dead know the secrets of sickness. He gave us gifts made by spirits, some of which I will show thee, for their beauty is great. But all these things were false and terrible, for afterwards the Peace-chief of Stadacona and some of his people were carried away by them, eaten, and never heard of again, and such was their intention toward us.^[3]

"Some of the Stadaconans pretended they were White Men, but who ever saw men that were white unless they were dead; and no men have articles of such magic. One such was the lover of the orphan's mother—the father of Quenhia, and he drew her to him into the land of the dead. The Ghosts came once again, but the warriors, with charmed arrows and the Mysterymen with their masks, by the aid of our Uncle the Thunder, and the Echo, drove them away like a mist. Still, plague followed and slew many of our people the same winter, and some of the sick saw the pale ghosts in the night. Now these elk-men, see how they, too, will bring us affliction! This is my wisdom—to compare one event with another."

Then the voice of a crier pealed loudly through the House of the Turtle, like the wind on a stormy night, proclaiming the business of the six Algonkins, which was to invite an equal number of the Hochelagan youth to hunt bear with them beyond the distant Two Mountains.

[2]	Stadacona, now Quebec.

[3]	The visit of Jacques Cartier, in 1535.