"Well, these Arrapahoes are our neighbours; often, very often, too much
so (as many of our widows can say), when they unbury their tomahawk and
enter the war-path against the Shoshones. Why; can two suns light the
same prairie, or two male eagles cover the same nest? No. Yet numerous
stars appear during night, all joined together, and obedient to the
moon. Blackbirds and parrots will unite their numerous tribes and take
the same flight to seek altogether a common rest a shelter for a night;
it is a law of nature. The Red-skin knows none but the laws of nature.
The Shoshone is an eagle on the hills, a bright sun in the prairie, so
is an Arrapahoe; they must both struggle and fight till one sun is
thrown into darkness, or one eagle, blind and winged, falls down the
rocks and leaves the whole nest to its conqueror. The Arrapahoes would
not fight a cowardly Crow, except for self-defence, for he smells of
carrion; nor would a Shoshone.
"Crows, Umbiquas, and Flat-heads, Cayuses, Bonnaxes, and Callapoos can
hunt all together and rest together; they are the blackbirds and the
parrots; they must do so, else the eagle should destroy them during the
day, or the hedgehog during the night.
"Now, Owato Wanisha, or his Manitou, has offered a bold thing. I have
thought of it, I have spoken of it to the spirits of the Red-skin; they
said it was good; I say it is good! I am a chief of many winters; I know
what is good, I know what is bad! Shoshones, hear me! my voice is weak,
come nearer; hearken to my words, hist! I hear a whisper under the
ripples of the water, I hear it in the waving of the grass, I feel it on
the breeze!--hist, it is the whisper of the Master of Life,--hist!"
At this moment the venerable chief appeared abstracted, his face
flushed; then followed a trance, as if he were communing with some
invisible spirit.
Pages:
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182