The Log School-House on the Columbia

The October moon came up larger and larger night by night. It stood on the verge of the horizon now in the late afternoon, as if to see the resplendent setting of the sun. One wandered along the cool roads at the parting of day between the red sun in the west and the golden moon in the east, and felt in the light of the two worlds the melancholy change in the atmospheres of the year. The old volcanoes glistened, for a wintry crust was widening over their long-dead ovens. Mount Saint Helens, as the far range which led up to the relic of the ancient lava-floods that is now known by that name was called by the settlers, was wonderfully beautiful in the twilights of the sun and moon. Mount Hood was a celestial glory, and the shadows of the year softened the glimmering glories of the Columbia. The boatman's call echoed long and far, and the crack of the flint-lock gun leaped in its reverberations from hill to hill as though the air was a succession of hollow chambers. Water-fowl filled the streams and drifted through the air, and the forests seemed filled with young and beautiful animals full of happy life.

CHAPTER XIV

At the Cascades of the Columbia.

The full moon of October is a night sun in the empires of the Columbia and the Puget Sea. No nights in the world can be more clear, lustrous, and splendid than those of the mellowing autumn in the valleys of Mount Saint Helens, Mount Hood, and the Columbia. The moon rises over the crystal peaks and domes like a living glory, and mounts the deep sky amid the pale stars like a royal torch-bearer of the sun. The Columbia is a rolling flood of silver, and the gigantic trees of the centuries become a ghostly and shadowy splendor. There is a deep and reverent silence everywhere, save the cry of the water-fowl in the high air and the plash of the Cascades. Even the Chinook winds cease to blow, and the pine-tops to murmur.

It was such a night that the Potlatch began. On an open plateau overlooking the Columbia the old chief had caused a large platform to be built, and on this were piled all his canoes, his stores of blankets, his wampum, and his regal ornaments and implements of war. Around the plateau were high heaps of pine-boughs to be lighted during the Spirit-dance so as to roll a dark cloud of smoke under the bright light of the high moon, and cause a weird and dusky atmosphere.

The sun set; the shadows of night began to fall, but the plateau was silent. Not a human form was to be seen anywhere, not even on the river. Stars came out like lamps set in celestial windows, and sprinkled their rays on the crimson curtains of the evening.

The glaciers on Mount Hood began to kindle as with silver fires. The east seemed like a lifting gate of light. The great moon was rising.

Hark! At the first ray of the moon there are heard low, mysterious sounds everywhere. The forests are full of them—calls, like the coyote's bark, or bird-calls, or secret signals. They are human voices. They answer each other. There are thousands of voices calling and answering.

The full moon now hangs low over the forests, golden as the morning sun in the mists of the calm sea. There is a piercing cry and a roll of war-drums, and suddenly the edges of the forest are full of leaping and dancing forms. The plateau is alive as with an army. Pipes play, shells rattle, and drums roll, and the fantastic forms with grotesque motions pass and repass each other.

Up the Columbia comes a fleet of canoes like a cloud passing over the silvery ripples. The river is all alive with human forms, and airy paddles and the prows of tilting boats.

The plateau swarms. It is covered with waving blankets and dancing plumes. All is gayety and mirth.

There is another roll of drums, and then silence.

The circling blankets and plumes become motionless. The chief of the Cascades is coming, and with him is Benjamin and his young bride, and Gretchen.

The royal party mount the platform, and in honor of the event the torch-dance begins. A single torch flashes upon the air; another is lighted from it, another and another. A hundred are lighted—a thousand. They begin to dance and to whirl; the plateau is a dazzling scene of circling fire. Gretchen recalled the old fêtes amid the vineyards of the Rhine in her childhood.

Hither and thither the circles move—round and round. There is poetry in this fire-motion; and the great army of fire-dancers become excited under it, and prepared for the frenzy of the Spirit-dance that is to follow.

The torches go out. The moon turns the smoke into wannish clouds of white and yellow, which slowly rise, break, and disappear.

There is another roll of drums. Wild cries are heard in the forests. The "biters" are beginning their hunt.

Who are the biters? They are Indians in hides of bears and wolves, who run on their hands and feet, uttering terrible cries, and are followed by women, who, to make the scene more fearful, pretend to hold them back, and restrain them from violence. The Spirit-dance is held to be a sacred frenzy, and before it begins the biters are charged to hunt the woods for any who have not joined the army of dancers, and, if such are found, to bite them and tear their flesh with their teeth. They also guard the dance like sentinels, and fly at one who attempts to leave it before it is done.

The frenzied shrieks of these human animals, and of the women who follow them, produce a wonderful nervous effect upon the listening multitudes. All feel that they are about to enter into the ecstatic spiritual condition of departed souls, and are to be joined by the shades of the dead heroes and warriors of tradition and story.

Each dancer has a masque. It may be an owl's head with mother-of-pearl eyes, or a wooden pelican's beak, or a wolf's head. It may be a wooden animal's face, which can be pulled apart by a string, and reveal under it an effigy of a human face, the first masque changing into great ears. The museum at Ottawa, Canada, contains a great number of such masques, and some missionaries in the Northwest make curious collections of them.

The whirling begins. Everywhere are whirling circles—round and round they go. The sight of it all would make a spectator dizzy. Cries arise, each more and more fearful; the whole multitude are at last shrieking with dizzy heads and wildly beating pulses. The cries become deafening; an almost superhuman frenzy passes over all; they seem to be no longer mortal—the armies of the dead are believed to be about them; they think that they are reveling in the joys of the heroes' paradise. One by one they drop down, until the whole assembly is exhausted.

At midnight the great fires are kindled, and throw their lights and shadows over the frenzied sleepers. Such was the Tamanous-dance, and so ended the first night of the feast.

On the second night the old chief gave away his private possessions, and on the third the wedding ceremony was performed.

The wild and inhuman Death-dance, which the tribe demanded, was expected to end the festival at the going down of the shadowy moon. Could it be prevented after the traditions of unknown centuries, and at a time when the historical pride of the warriors was awakened to celebrate the barbarous deeds of their ancestors?

The wedding was simple. It consisted chiefly in gifts to the bride, Multoona. The girl was fantastically dressed, with ornaments of shells and feathers, and she followed the young prince demurely. After the ceremony of the bridal gifts came the Fire-fly dance, in which light-torches gleamed out in vanishing spirals here and there, and over all the plain. Then followed the Tamanous or Spirit dance, in which a peculiar kind of frenzy is excited, as has been described. The excitement was somewhat less than usual this night, on account of the great orgies which were expected to follow.

The third and great night of the Potlatch came. It was the night of the full October moon. The sun had no sooner gone down in the crimson cloud-seas among the mountains, than the moon, like another sun, broad and glorious, lifted its arch in the distant blue of the serene horizon.

The Indians gathered on the glimmering plain in the early shadows of evening, besmeared with yellow ochre and war-paint. Every head was plumed. There was a savagery in their looks that had not been seen before.

The wild dancers began their motions. The Spirit or Tamanous dance awakened a frenzy, and all were now impatient for the dance of the Evil Spirits to begin.

The moon hung low over the plateau and the river. The fires were kindled, and the smoke presently gave a clouded gold color to the air.

The biters were out, running hither and thither after their manner, and filling the air with hideous cries.

All was expectation, when the old chief of the Cascades stepped upon the platform, and said:

"Listen, my children—listen, O sons of the warriors of old. Twice four times sixty seasons, according to the notch-sticks, have the wings of wild geese cleaved the sky, and all these years I have lived in peace. My last moon has arisen—I have seen the smile of the Great Spirit, and I know that the last moon hangs over my head.

"Warriors, listen! You have always obeyed me. Obey me once more. Dance not the dance of the Evil Spirits to-night. Let me die in peace. Let not blood stain my last days. I want you to remember the days of Umatilla as the days of corn and maize and the pipes of peace. I have given you all I have—my days are done. You will respect me."

There were mutterings everywhere, suppressed cries of rage, and sharp words of chagrin and disappointment. The old chief saw the general dissatisfaction, and felt it like a crushing weight upon his soul.

"I am going to light the pipe of peace," said he, "and smoke it now before you. As many of you as love Umatilla, light the pipes of peace."

Not a light glimmered in the smoky air. There were words of hate and suppressed cries everywhere. A circle was forming, it widened, and it seemed as though the dreaded dance was about to begin in spite of the command of the old chief.

Suddenly a form in white stood beside Umatilla. It was Gretchen. A white arm was raised, and the martial strain of the "Wild Hunt of Lutzow" marched out like invisible horsemen, and caused every Indian to listen. Then there were a few sharp, discordant strains, and then the Traumerei lifted its spirit-wings of music on the air.

The murmurs ceased. The plain grew still. "Romance" followed, and then the haunting strain of the Traumerei rose again. It ceased. Lights began to glimmer here and there. Peace-pipes were being lighted.

"You have saved your people," said Umatilla. "Play it again."

Again and again the dream-music drifted out on the air. The plain was now filled with peace-pipes. When the last blended tones died away, the whole tribe were seated on the long plateau, and every old warrior was smoking a pipe of peace.

Gretchen saw that her spirit, through the violin, had calmed the sea. She was sure now that she had rightly read her mission in life. Amid the scene of glimmering peace-pipes, a heavenly presence seemed near her. She had broken the traditions of centuries by the sympathetic thrill of four simple strings. She felt that Von Weber was there in spirit, and Schumann. She felt that her father's soul was near her; but, more than all, she felt that she was doing the work of the Great Commission. She bowed her head on the instrument, thought of poor, terrorized Mrs. Woods in her lonely home, and wept.

A seen and unseen world had come to her—real life. She saw her power; the gates of that mysterious kingdom, in which the reborn soul is a new creation, had been opened to her. Her spirit seemed to rise as on new-created wings, and the world to sink beneath her. She had spiritual sight, ears, and senses—a new consciousness of Divine happiness. Her purpose became strong to live for the soul alone, and she sung, over and over again, amid the silence of the peace-pipes and the rising of those puffs of smoke in the silver illumination of the high moon—

CHAPTER XV.

CHAPTER XVI.

Multnomah Falls.

As the canoe glided on amid the still fishermen of other tribes, the Indian maiden began to sing. It was a strange song, of immortality, and of spiritual horizons beyond the visible life. The Umatillas have poetic minds. To them white Tacoma with her gushing streams means a mother's breast, and the streams themselves, like the Falls of the distant Shoshone, were "falling splendors."

She sang in Chinook, and the burden of her song was that horizons will lift forever in the unknown future. The Chinook word tamala means "to-morrow"; and to-morrow, to the Indian mind, was eternal life.

The young warrior joined in the refrain, and the old Indian listened. The thought of the song was something as follows:

The paddle dipped in the wave at the word tamala, and lifted high to mark the measure of the song, and strew in the warm, soft air the watery jewels colored by the far fires of the Sound. So the boat swept on, like a spirit bark, and the beautiful word of immortality was echoed from the darkening bluffs and the primitive pine cathedrals.

The place where the grave had been made was on the borders of the Oregon desert, a wild, open region, walled with tremendous forests, and spreading out in the red sunset like a sea. It had a scanty vegetation, but a slight rain would sometimes change it into a billowy plain of flowers.

The tribe had begun to assemble about the grave early in the long afternoon. They came one by one, solitary and silent, wrapped in blankets and ornamented with gray plumes. The warriors came in the same solitary way and met in silence, and stood in a long row like an army of shadows. Squaws came, leading children by the hand, and seated themselves on the soft earth in the same stoical silence that had marked the bearing of the braves.

A circle of lofty firs, some three hundred feet high, threw a slanting shadow over the open grave, the tops gleaming with sunset fire.

Afar, Mount Hood, the dead volcano, lifted its roof of glaciers twelve thousand feet high. Silver ice and black carbon it was now, although in the long ages gone it had had a history written in flame and smoke and thunder. Tradition says that it sometimes, even now, rumbles and flashes forth in the darkness of night, then sinks into rest again, under its lonely ice palaces so splendid in the sunset, so weird under the moon.

Just as the red disk of the sun sunk down behind this stupendous scenery, a low, guttural sound was uttered by Potlatch Hero, an old Indian brave, and it passed along the line of the shadowy braves. No one moved, but all eyes were turned toward the lodge of the old Umatilla chief.

He was coming—slowly, with measured step; naked, except the decent covering of a blanket and a heroic ornament of eagle-plumes, and all alone.

The whole tribe had now gathered, and a thousand dusky forms awaited him in the sunset.

There was another guttural sound. Another remarkable life-picture came into view. It was the school in a silent procession, following the tall masks, out of the forest trail on to the glimmering plain, the advent of that new civilization before which the forest lords, once the poetic bands of the old Umatillas, were to disappear. Over all a solitary eagle beat the luminous air, and flocks of wild geese made their way, like V-letters, toward the Puget Sea.

The school soon joined the dusky company, and the pupils stood with uncovered heads around their Yankee pedagogue. But the old chief came slowly. After each few steps he would stop, fold his arms, and seem lost in contemplation. These pauses were longer as he drew near the silent company.

Except the honks of the pilots of the flocks of wild geese, there was a dead silence everywhere. Only eyes moved, and then furtively, toward the advancing chief.

The old chief stood stoical and silent.

He reached the grave at last by these slow movements, and stepped upon the earth that had been thrown out of it, and folded his arms in view of all. A golden star, like a lamp in the windows of heaven, hung over Mount Hood in the fading splendors of the twilight, and the great chief bent his eye upon it.

Suddenly the air was rent by a wail, and a rattle of shells and drums. The body of Benjamin was being brought out of the lodge. It was borne on a bier made of poles, and covered with boughs of pine and fir and red mountain phlox. It was wrapped in a blanket, and strewn with odorous ferns. Four young braves bore it, besmeared with war-paint. They were followed by musicians, who beat their drums, and rattled shell instruments at irregular times, as they advanced. They came to the grave, lifted the body on its blanket from the bier of evergreens and flowers, and slowly lowered it. The old chief stood stoical and silent, his eye fixed on the star in the darkening shadows.

The face of Benjamin was noble and beautiful in its death-sleep. Over it were two black eagle's plumes. The deep black hair lay loosely about the high, bronze forehead; there was an expression of benevolence in the compressed lips, and the helpless hands seemed like a picture as they lay crossed on each other.

As soon as the body was laid in the earth, the old chief bent his face on the people. The mysterious dimness of death was in his features. His eyes gleamed, and his bronze lips were turning pale.

"My nation, listen; 'tis my last voice. I am a Umatilla. In my youth the birds in the free lakes of the air were not more free. I spoke, and you obeyed. I have but one more command to give. Will you obey me?

"You bow, and I am glad.

"Listen!

"My fathers were men of war. They rolled the battle-drums. I taught my warriors to play the pipes of peace, and sixty years have they played them under the great moons of the maize-fields. We were happy. I was happy.

"I had seven sons. The white man's plague came; the shadow fell on six of them, and they went away with the storm-birds. They entered the new canoe, and sailed beyond us on the sea of life. They came back no more at the sunrisings and sun settings, at the leaf-gatherings of the spring, or the leaf-fallings of the autumn. They are beyond.

"One son was left me—Benjamin. He was no common youth; the high spirits were with him, and he came to be like them, and he has gone to them now. I loved him. He was my eyes; he was my ears; he was my heart. When I saw his eyes in death, my eyes were dead; when he could hear me call his name no longer, my ears lost their hearing; when his young heart ceased to beat, my own heart was dead. All that I am lies in that grave, beside my dead boy.

"My nation, you have always obeyed me. I have but one more command to make. Will you obey me?

"You bow again. My life-blood is growing cold. I am about to go down into that grave.

"One step! The clouds fly and darken, and you will see them return again, but not I.

"Two steps! Farewell, sun and light of day. I shall see thee again, but not as now.

"Three steps! Downward to the grave I descend to meet thee, my own dear boy. Adieu, my people. Adieu, hearts of faith. Farewell, ye birds of the air, ye mighty forests, ye sun of night, and ye marches of stars. I am dying.

"Two steps more I will take. There he lies before me in the unfolded earth, the life of my life, the heart of my heart.

"You have promised to obey me. I repeat it—you have promised to obey me. You have always done so. You must do so now. My hands are cold, my feet are cold, and my heart beats very slow. Three steps more, and I shall lay myself on the body of my boy. Hear, then, my last command; you have promised to obey it like brave men.

"When I have taken my last three steps of life, and laid down beside the uncovered bed of earth beside my boy, fill up the grave forever; my breath will be gone; Umatilla will be no more. You must obey.

"One step—look! There is fire on the mountain under the curtains of the night. Look, the peak flashes; it is on fire.—O Spirit of All, I come! One step more! Farewell, earth. Warriors, fill the grave! The black eagle's plumes will now rest forever."

There was deep silence, broken only by the sobs of the little school. A warrior moved and passed round the grave, and uttered the word "Dead!" The braves followed him, and the whole tribe like shadows. "Dead!" "Dead!" passed from mouth to mouth. Then a warrior threw a handful of earth into the grave of the father and son. The braves followed his example, then all the tribe.

As they were so doing, like phantoms in the dim light, Mount Saint Helens[D] blazed again—one volcanic flash, then another; then all was darkness, and the moon arose in a broad sea of light like a spectral sun.

The grave was filled at last. Then they brought the Cayuse pony of Benjamin toward the grave, and a young brave raised the hatchet to kill it, that it might bear the dead boy into the unknown land.

There was a cry! It came from Gretchen. The girl rushed forward and stood before the hatchet. The pony seemed to know her, and he put his head over her shoulder.

"Spare him!" she said. "Benjamin gave him to me—the soul of Benjamin would wish it so."

"Let the girl have her way," said the old warriors.

The moon now moved free in the dark-blue sky, and sky, forest, and plain were a silver sea. The Indians began to move away like shadows, one by one, silent and slow. Gretchen was the last to go. She followed the school, leading the pony, her soul filled with that consciousness of a new life that had so wonderfully come to her. Her way in life now seemed clear: she must teach the Umatillas.

She left the pony in a grassy clearing, on the trail that led to her home, and hurried toward the cabin to describe all the events of the day to her foster-mother.

CHAPTER XVII.

CHAPTER XVIII.