spears
of the enemy are thicker in your path than ferns along the Santiam? You promise that though you fall in death, the summons shall go on?"
The spokesman of the runners, the runner to the Chopponish, stepped forward. With gestures of per fect grace, and in a voice that rang like a silver trumpet, he repeated the ancient oath of the Wik lamettes, the oath used by the Shoshones to-day.
"The earth hears us, the sun sees us. Shall we fail in fidelity to our chief?"
There was a pause. The distant cry of swans came from the river; the great trees of council rus tled in the breeze. Multnomah rose from his seat, gripping the bow on which he leaned. Into that one moment he seemed gathering yet repressing all the fierceness of his passion, all the grandeur of his will. Far in the shade he saw Tohomish raise his hand imploringly, but the eyes of the orator sank once more under the glance of the war-chief.
"Go 1 "
An electric shock passed through all who heard; and except for the chiefs standing on its outskirts like sombre shadows, the grove was empty in a moment.
Beyond the waters that girdled the island, one runner took the trail to Puyallup, one the trail to Umatilla, one the path to Chelon, and one the path to Shasta; another departed toward the volcano-rent desert of Klamath, and still another toward the sea- washed shores of Puget Sound.
The irrevocable summons had gone forth; the council was inevitable, the crisis must come.
Long did Multnomah and his chiefs sit in council
