1
have the scenes themselves. White men measure mountains. Does the Indian measure a mountain that he can climb? "
Mr. Spalding had been explaining the use of the compass.
"What care we for the compass?" scoffed Delaware Tom. "We follow the stars. The trail leads to the hunt. The shores guide our canoes. The green leaves tell us when it is spring; the yellow, when to pitch our winter teepees. White men have the locomotive what need, when our own fleet feet out-travel the horse? The missionary teaches you to weave cloth. Has not the buffalo spun a robe for you? The white man tears up the soil, it becomes full of worms and weeds. He makes a garden. Are not your meadows full of camas, your rivers full of fish, your father's hillsides stocked with game? Who would obstruct the streams with bridges? Does not the beaver build bridges enough for you? "
This talk drove the Nez Perec's into a frenzy of excitement. Tom Hill would gallop down from the mountains, talk around a few days, then go back for weeks of solitary hunting. He refused to wear anything made of cloth; day in and day out his squaw sat beating the buffalo skin to make it soft and pliant for the couch of her lord. Mr. Spalding heard of the Delaware's instructions and warned his people against them. But the Indians looked up to Tom Hill as a mighty tyee, learned in the secrets of the white man. A few left the main tribe and camped with the Delaware on the mountain. The Nez Perc6 chiefs only laughed, and went on cultivating their farms and gardens.
Mr. Spalding went to the mountains for material
