The Bridge of the Gods/Book 3

by Frederic Homer Balch

CHAPTER IV.

AN INDIAN TRIAL.

Like flame within the naked hand
His body bore his burning heart.
DANTE ROSSETTI.

WAPPATTO Island had seen many gatherings of the tribes, but never before had it seen so large an assembly as on the opening day of the council. The great cottonwoods of the council-grove waved over an audience of sachems and warriors the like of which the oldest living Indian could not remember.

No weapons were to be seen, for Multnomah had commanded that all arms be left that day in the lodges. But the dissatisfied Indians had come with weapons hidden under their robes of deer or wolf skin, which no one should have known better than Multnomah. Had he taken any precautions against surprise? Evidently not. A large body of Willamette warriors, muffled in their blankets, lounged carelessly around the grove, with not a weapon visible among them; behind them thronged the vast and motley assemblage of doubtful allies; and back of them, on the outskirts of the crowd, were the faithful Cayuses, unarmed like the Willamettes. Had Multnomah's wonderful astuteness failed him now when it was never needed more?

eeded more?

He was on the council-seat, a stone covered with furs; the Willamette sachems sat in their places facing him; and mats were spread for the chiefs of the tributaries. On a bearskin before the stern war- chief lay a peace-pipe and a tomahawk; and to the Indians, accustomed to signs and symbols, the two had a grim significance.

One by one the chiefs entered the circle and took their seats on the mats provided for them. Those who were friendly to Multnomah first laid presents before him; those who were not, took their places without offering him either gift or salutation. Mult nomah, however, seemed unconscious of any neglect.

The chief of a Klamath tribe offered him a bril liantly dyed blanket; another, a finely fringed quiver, full of arrows; another, a long and massive string of hiagua shells. Each laid his gift before Multnomah and took his seat in silence.

The chief of the Chopponish presented him with a fine horse, the best belonging to his tribe. Multno mah accepted it, and a slave led it away. Then came Snoqualmie, bringing with him Cecil Grey. The chiefs hour of vengeance was at hand.

"Behold the white man from the land where the sun rises, the white shaman of whom all the tribes have heard. He is thine. Let him be the white slave of Multnomah. All the chiefs have slaves, but who will have a white slave like Multnomah? "

Cecil saw the abyss of slavery yawning before him, and grew pale to the lips. His heart sank within him; then the resolute purpose that never failed him in time of peril returned; he lifted his head and met Multnomah s gaze with dignity. The war-chief

AN INDIAN TRIAL. 133

bent on him the glance which read men to the heart.

"The white stranger has been a chief among his own people," he said to Cecil, more in the manner of one asserting a fact than asking a question.

"I have often spoken to my people in the gather ings to hear the word of the Great Spirit."

Again the keen, inscrutable gaze of the great chief seemed to probe his being to its core; again the calm, grave stranger met it without shrinking. The instinct, so common among savage races, of in some way knowing what a man is, of intuitively grasping his true merit, was possessed by Multnomah in a large degree; and the royalty in his nature instinctively recognized the royalty in Cecil s.

"The white guest who comes into the land of Multnomah shall be to him as a guest; the chief should still be chief in any land. White stranger, Multnomah gives you welcome; sit down among the chiefs."

Cecil took his place among them with all the com posure he could command, well knowing that he who would be influential among the Indians must seem to be unmoved by any change of fortune. He felt, how ever, not only the joy of personal deliverance, but mingled with it came the glad, triumphant thought that he had now a voice in the deliberations of the chiefs; it was a grand door opened for Indian evan gelization. As for Snoqualmie, his face was as im passive as granite. One would have said that Cecil s victory was to him a matter of no moment at all. But under the guise of indifference his anger burned fierce and deadly, not against Multnomah but aga inst Cecil

The last chief had taken his place in the council. There was a long, ceremonious pause. Then Mult- nomah arose. He looked over the council, upon the stern faces of the Willamettes and the loyal tributaries, upon the sullen faces of the malcontents, upon the fierce and lowering multitude beyond. Over the throng he looked, and felt as one feels who stands on the brink of a volcano; yet his strong voice never rang stronger, the grand old chief never looked more a chief than then.

"He is every inch a king," thought Cecil. The chief spoke in the common Willamette language, at that time the medium of intercourse between the tribes as the Chinook is now. The royal tongue was not used in a mixed council.

"Warriors and chiefs, Multnomah gives you wel come. He spreads the buffalo-robe." He made the Indian gesture of welcome, opening his hands to them with a backward and downward gesture, as of one spreading a robe. "To the warriors Multnomah says, The grass upon my prairies is green for your horses; behold the wood, the water, the game; they are yours.* To the chiefs he says, The mat is spread for you in my own lodge and the meat is cooked. The hearts of the Willamettes change not as the winters go by, and your welcome is the same as of old. Word came to us that the tribes were angry and had spoken bitter things against the Willamettes; yes, that they longed for the confederacy to be broken and the old days to come again when tribe was divided against tribe and the Shoshones and Spokanes trampled upon you all. But Multnomah trusted his allies; for had they not smoked the peace-pipe with him and gone

AN INDIAN TRIAL. 135

with him on the war- trail? So he stopped his ears and would not listen, but let those rumors go past him like thistle-down upon the wind.

"Warriors, Multnomah has shown his heart. What say you? Shall the peace-pipe be lighted and the talk begin?"

He resumed his seat. All eyes turned to where the peace-pipe and the tomahawk lay side by side before the council. Multnomah seemed waiting for them to choose between the two.

Then Snoqualmie, the bravest and most loyal of the tributaries, spoke.

"Let the peace-pipe be lighted; we come not for strife, but to be knit together."

The angry malcontents in the council only frowned and drew their blankets closer around them. Toho- mish the seer, as the oldest chief and most renowned medicine-man present, came forward and lighted the pipe, a long, thin piece of carving in black stone, the workmanship of the Nootkas or Hydahs, who made the more elaborate pipes used by the Indians of the Columbia River.

Muttering some mystical incantation, he waved it to the east and the west, to the north and the south; and when the charm was complete, gave it to Multnomah, who smoked it and passed it to Sno qualmie. From chief to chief it circled around the whole council, but among them were those who sat with eyes fixed moodily on the ground and would not so much as touch or look at it. As the pipe passed round tnere was a subdued murmur and move ment in the multitude, a low threatening clamor, as yet held in check by awe of Multnomah and dread

of the Willamette warriors. But the war-chief seemed unconscious that any had refused the pipe. He now arose and said,

"The pipe is smoked. Are not our hearts as one? Is there not perfect trust between us? Now let us talk. First of all, Multnomah desires wise words from his brethren. Last winter one of the tribes rose up against Multnomah, saying that he should no longer be elder brother and war- chief of the tribes. But the rebels were beaten and all of them slain save the chief, who was reserved to be tried before you. You in your wisdom shall decide what shall be done with the warrior who has rebelled against his chief and stained his hands with the blood of his brethren."

Two Willamette braves then entered the circle, bringing with them one whose hands were tied be hind him, whose form was emaciated with hunger and disease, but whose carriage was erect and haughty. Behind came a squaw, following him into the very presence of Multnomah, as if resolved to share his fortunes to the last. It was his wife. She was in stantly thrust back and driven with brutal blows from the council. But she lingered on the outskirts of the crowd, watching and waiting with mute, sullen fidelity the outcome of the trial. No one looked at her, no one cared for her; even her husband s sympathizers jostled the poor shrinking form aside, for she was only a squaw, while he was a great brave.

He looked a great brave, standing there before Multnomah and the chiefs with a dignity in his mien that no reverse could crush, no torture could destroy. Haggard, starved, bound, his eyes gleamed deathless and unconquerable hate on council and war- chief alike.

AN INDIAN TRIAL. 137

There were dark and menacing looks among the mal contents; in the captive they saw personified their own loss of freedom and the hated domination of the Willamettes.

"Speak! You that were a chief, you whose people sleep in the dust, what have you to say in your defence? The tribes are met together, and the chiefs sit here to listen and to judge."

The rebel sachem drew himself up proudly and fixed his flashing eyes on Multnomah.

"The tongue of Multnomah is a trap. I am brought not to be tried but to be condemned and slain, that the tribes may see it and be afraid. No one knows this better that Multnomah. Yet I will speak while I still live, and stand here in the sun; for I go out into the darkness, and the earth will cover my face, and my voice shall be heard no more among men.

"Why should the Willamettes rule the other tribes? Are they better than we? The Great Spirit gave us freedom, and who may make himself master and take it away?

"I was chief of a tribe; we dwelt in the land the Great Spirit gave our fathers; their bones were in it; it was ours. But the Willamettes said to us, * We are your elder brethren, you must help us. Come, go with us to fight the Shoshones. Our young men went, for the Willamettes were strong and we could not refuse them. Many were slain, and the women wailed despairingly. The Willamettes hunted on our hunting-grounds and dug the camas on our prairies, so that there was not enough for us; and when winter came, our children cried for food. Then the run ners of the Willamettes came to us through the snow,

saying, Come and join the war-party that goes to iight the Bannocks.

"But our hearts burned within us and we replied, Our hunting-grounds and our food you have taken; will you have our lives also? Go back and tell your chief that if we must fight, we will fight him and not the Bannocks. Then the Willamettes came upon us and we fought them, for their tyranny was so heavy that we could not breathe under it and death had become better than life. But they were the stronger, and when did the heart of a Willamette feel pity? To-day I only am left, to say these words for my race.

"Who made the Willamettes masters over us? The Great Spirit gave us freedom, and none may take it away. Was it not well to fight? Yes; free my hands and give me back my people from the cairns and the death-huts, and we will fight again! I go to my death, but the words I have spoken will live. The hearts of those listening here will treasure them up; they will be told around the lodge-fires and repeated in the war-dance. The words I speak will go out among the tribes, and no man can destroy them. Yes, they go out words, but they will come back arrows and war in the day of vengeance when the tribes shall rise against the oppressor.

"I have spoken, my words are done."

He stood erect and motionless. The wrath and dis dain passed from his features, and stoicism settled over them like a mask of stone. Multnornah s cold regard had not faltered a moment under the chiefs invective. No denunciation could shake that iron self-control.

AN INDIAN TRIAL. 139

The rebellious chiefs interchanged meaning glances; the throng of malcontents outside the grove pressed closer upon the ring of Willamette warriors, who were still standing or squatting idly around it. More than one weapon could be seen among them in defi ance of the war-chiefs prohibition; and the presage of a terrible storm darkened on those grim, wild faces. The more peaceably disposed bands began to draw themselves apart. An ominous silence crept through the crowd as they felt the crisis approaching.

But Multnomah saw nothing, and the circle of Wil lamette warriors were stolidly indifferent.

"Can they not see that the tribes are on the verge of revolt?" thought Cecil, anxiously, fearing a bloody massacre.

"You have heard the words of the rebel. What have you to say? Let the white man speak first, as he was the last to join us."

Cecil rose and pictured in the common Willamette tongue, with which he had familiarized himself during his long stay with the Cayuses, the terrible results of disunion, the desolating consequences of war, tribe clashing against tribe and their common enemies trampling on them all. Even those who were on the verge of insurrection listened reverently to the " white wizard," who had drawn wisdom from the Great Spirit; but it did not shake their purpose. Their own dream ers had talked with the Great Spirit too, in trance and vision, and had promised them victory over the Willamettes.

Tohomish followed; and Cecil, who had known some of the finest orators in Europe, listened in amazement to a voice the most musical he had ever

140 THE BRIDGE OF THE GODS,

heard. He looked in wonder on the repulsive fea tures that seemed so much at variance with those melodious intonations. Tohomish pleaded for union and for the death of the rebel. It seemed for a moment as if his soft, persuasive accents would win the day, but it was only for a moment; the spell was broken the instant he ceased. Then Snoqualmie spoke. One by one, the great sachems of the Willamettes gave their voices for death. Many of the friendly allies did not give their decision at all, but said to Multnomah,

"You speak for us; your word shall be our word." When the dissatisfied chiefs were asked for their counsel, the sullen reply was given,

"I have no tongue to-day; " or " I do not know." Multnomah seemed not to notice their answers. Only those who knew him best saw a gleam kindling in his eyes that told of a terrible vengeance drawing near. The captive waited passively, seeming neither to see nor hear.

At length all had spoken or had an opportunity to speak, and Multnomah rose to give the final decision. Beyond the circle of Willamettes, who were still indif ferent and unconcerned, the discontented bands had thrown aside all concealment, and stood with bared weapons in their hands; all murmurs had ceased; there was a deathlike silence in the dense mob, which seemed gathering itself together for a forward rush, the commencement of a fearful massacre.

Behind it were the friendly Cayuses, but not a weapon could be seen among them. The chief saw all; saw too that his enemies only waited for him to pronounce sentence upon the captive, that that

AN INDIAN TRIAL. 141

was the preconcerted signal for attack. Now among some of the tribes sentence was pronounced not by word but by gesture; there was the gesture for acquittal, the gesture for condemnation.

Multnomah lifted his right hand. There was breathless suspense. What would it be? Fixing his eyes on the armed malcontents who were waiting to spring, he clinched his hand and made a downward gesture, as if striking a blow. It was the death- signal, the death-sentence.

In an instant a deafening shout rang through the grove, and the bloodthirsty mob surged forward to the massacre.

Then, so suddenly that it blended with and seemed a part of the same shout, the dreaded Willamette war- cry shook the earth. Quick as thought, the Willam- ettes who had been lounging so idly around the grove were on their feet, their blankets thrown aside, the weapons that had been concealed under them ready in their hands. A wall of indomitable warriors had leaped up around the grove. At the same mo ment, the Cayuses in the rear bared their weapons and shouted back the Willamette war-cry.

The rebels were staggered. The trap was sprung on them before they knew that there was a trap. Those in front shrank back from the iron warriors of Multnomah, those in the rear wavered before the fierce Cayuses. They paused, a swaying flood of humanity, caught between two lines of rock.

142 THE BRIDGE OF THE CODS.

CHAPTER V.

SENTENCED TO THE WOLF-DEATH.

The other, great of soul, changed not Countenance stern.

DANTE.

T N that momentary pause Multnomah did something

• that showed the cold disdainfulness of his char

acter as nothing else could have done. He had given the death- sign; he had not yet told how or when death was to be inflicted. He gave the sentence now, as if in utter scorn of the battle-cloud that hung quivering, ready to burst.

"He would have torn the confederacy to pieces; let him be left bound in the wood of the wolves, and torn limb from limb by them as he would have rent the tribes asunder."

The two warriors who had brought the criminal into the council came forward, flung a covering over his head and face, and led him away. Perhaps no custom of the northwestern Indians was more sombre than this, the covering of the culprit s eyes from the time of his sentence till his death. Never again were those eyes to behold the sun.

Then, and not till then, did Multnomah turn his gaze on the malcontents, who stood, desperate but hesitating, hemmed in by the Willamettes and the Cayuses.

"You have chosen the tomahawk instead of the peace-pipe. Shall Multnomah choose the tomahawk also? Know you not that Multnomah holds your lives in his hand, and that he can crush you like an egg shell if he chooses?"

The war-chief lifted his arm as he spoke, and slowly closed his fingers till his hand was clinched. The eyes of Willamette and tributary alike hung on those slowly closing fingers, with their own strained on their tomahawks. That was half the death-signal! Would he give the other half, the downward gesture? The baffled rebels tasted all the bitterness of death in that agonizing suspense. They felt that their lives were literally in his grasp; and so the stern autocrat wished them to feel, for he knew it was a lesson they would never forget.

At length he spoke.

"Drop your weapons and Multnomah will forget what he has seen, and all will be well. Strike but a blow, and not one of you will ever go back over the trail to his home."

Then he turned to the chiefs, and there was that in his tones which told them to expect no mercy.

"How comes it that your braves lift their toma hawks against Multnomah in his own council and on his own land? Speak! chiefs must answer for their people."

There was sullen silence for a little time; then one of them muttered that it was the young men; their blood was hot, they were rash, and the chiefs could not control them.

"Can you not control your young men? Then you are not fit to be chiefs, and are chiefs n o longer."

He gave a signal to certain of the Willamettes who had come up behind the rebellious leaders, as they stood confused and hesitating in the council. They were seized and their hands bound ere they could defend themselves; indeed, they made no effort to do so, but submitted doggedly.

"Take them down the Wauna in the sea-canoes and sell them as slaves to the Nootkas who hunt seal along the coast. Their people shall see their faces no more. Slaves in the ice-land of the North shall they live and die."

The swarthy cheeks of the captives grew ashen, and a shudder went through that trapped and surrounded mob of malcontents. Indian slavery was always terri ble; but to be slaves to the brutal Indians of the north, starved, beaten, mutilated, chilled, and benumbed in a land of perpetual frost; to perish at last in the bleak snow and winter of almost arctic coasts, that was a fate worse than the torture-stake.

Dreadful as it was, not a chief asked for mercy. Silently they went with their captors out of the grove and down the bank to the river s edge. A large sea- canoe, manned by Chinook paddlers, was floating at the beach. They quickly embarked, the paddles dipped, the canoe glided out into the current and down the stream. In a few moments the cotton- wood along the river s edge hid it from sight, and the rebels were forever beyond the hope of rescue.

Swift and merciless had the vengeance of Multno- mah fallen, and the insurrection had been crushed at a blow. It had taken but a moment, and it had all passed under the eyes of the malcontents, who were still surrounded by the loyal warriors.

When the canoe had disappeared and the gaze of that startled and awed multitude came back to Mult nomah, he made a gesture of dismissal. The lines drew aside and the rebels were free.

While they were still bewildered and uncertain what to do, Multnomah instantly and with consummate address called the attention of the council to other things, thereby apparently assuming that the trouble was ended and giving the malcontents to understand that no further punishment was intended. Sullenly, reluctantly, they seemed to accept the situation, and no further indications of revolt were seen that day.

Popular young men, the bravest of their several tribes, were appointed by Multnomah to fill the va cant chieftainships; and that did much toward allay ing the discontent. Moreover, some troubles between different tribes of the confederacy, which had been referred to him for arbitration, were decided with rare sagacity. At length the council ended for the day, the star of the Willamettes still in the ascendant, the revolt seemingly subdued.

So the first great crisis passed.

That evening a little band of Willamette warriors led the rebel sachem, still bound and blindfolded, down to the river s bank, where a canoe lay waiting them. His wife followed and tried to enter it with him, as if determined to share his fortunes to the very last; but the guard thrust her rudely away, and started the canoe. As it moved away she caught the prow wildly, despairingly, as if she could not let her warrior go. One of the guards struck her hands 10

brutally with his paddle, and she released her hold. The boat glided out into the river. Not a word of farewell had passed between the condemned man and his wife, for each disdained to show emotion in the presence of the enemy. She remained on the bank looking after him, mute and despondent, a forlorn creature clothed in rags and emaciated with hunger, an outcast from all the tribes. She might have been regarded as a symbolic figure representing woman among the Indians, as she stood there with her bruised hands, throbbing with pain where the cruel blow had fallen, hanging, in sullen scorn of pain, uncared for by her side. So she stood watching the canoe glide down the river, till it was swallowed up in the gathering shadows of evening.

The canoe dropped down the river to a lonely point on the northern shore, a place much frequented by wolves. There, many miles below the encampment on the island, they disembarked and took the captive into the wood. He walked among them with a firm and even tread; there was no sign of flinching, though he must have known that his hour was close at hand. They bound him prostrate at the foot of an oak, tying him to the hard, tough roots that ran over the ground like a network, and from which the earth had been washed away, so that thongs could be passed around them.

Head and foot they bound him, drawing the raw hide thongs so tight that they sank into the flesh, and knotting them, till no effort possible to him could have disentangled him. It was on his lips to ask them to leave one arm free, so that he might at least die fighting, though it were with but one naked hand.

/ SENTENCED TO THE WOLF-DEATH. I47

But he hated them too much to ask even that small favor, and so submitted in disdainful silence.

The warriors all went back to the canoe, except one, an old hunter, famed for his skill in imitating every cry of bird or beast. Standing beside the bound and prostrate man, he sent forth into the forest the cry of a wolf. It rang in a thousand echoes and died away, evoking no response. He listened a moment with bated breath, but could hear nothing but the deep heart-beat of the man at his feet. Another cry, with its myriad echoes, was followed by the oppressive sense of stillness that succeeds an outcry in a lonely wood. Then came a faint, a far-off sound, the answer of a wolf to a supposed mate. The Indian replied, and the answer sounded nearer; then another blended with it, as the pack began to gather. Again the In dian gave the cry, wild and wolfish, as only a barba rian, half- beast by virtue of his own nature, could have uttered it. An awful chorus of barking and howling burst through the forest as the wolves came on, eager for blood.

The Indian turned and rejoined his comrades at the canoe. They pushed out into the river, but held the boat in the current by an occasional paddle-stroke, and waited listening. Back at the foot of the tree the captive strained every nerve and muscle in one mighty effort to break the cords that bound him; but it was useless, and he lay back with set teeth and rigid muscles, while his eyes sought in vain through their thick covering to see the approach of his foes. Pres ently a fierce outburst of howls and snarls told the listeners that the wolves had found their prey. They lingered and listened a little longer, but no sound or

cry was heard to tell of the last agony under those rending fangs; the chief died in silence. Then the paddles were dipped again in the water, and the canoe glided up the river to the camp.

When they reached the shore they found the rebel s wife awaiting them in the place where they had left her. She asked no questions; she only came close and looked at their faces in the dusk, and read there the thing she sought to know. Then she went silently away. In a little while the Indian wail for the dead was sounding through the forest.

"What is that?" asked the groups around the camp-fires.

"The rebel chiefs wife wailing the death-wail for her husband," was the low reply; and in that way the tribes knew that the sentence had been carried out. Many bands were there, of many languages, but all knew what that death-wail meant the instant it fell upon their ears. Multnomah heard it as he sat in council with his chiefs, and there was something in it that shook even his iron heart; for all the wilder, more superstitious elements of the Indians thrilled to two things, the war-cry and the death- wail. He dismissed his chiefs and went to his lodge. On the way he encountered Tohomish, lurking, as was his wont, under the shadow of the trees.

"What think you now, Tohomish, you who love darkness and shadow, what think you? Is not the arm of the Willamette strong? Has it not put down revolt to-day, and held the tribes together? "

The Pine Voice looked at him sorrowfully.

"The vision I told in the council has come back to me again. The cry of woe I heard far off then is

nearer now, and the throng on the death-trail passes thicker and swifter. That which covered their faces is lifted, and their faces are the faces of Willam- ettes, and Multnomah is among them. The time is close at hand."

"Say this before our enemies, and, strong tomano- wos though you are, you die!" said the chief, laying his hand on his tomahawk. But the seer was gone, and Multnomah stood alone among the trees.

Every evening at dusk, the widow of the rebel sachem went out into the woods near the camp and wailed her dead. Every night that wild, desolate lament was lifted and rang through the great en campment, a cry that was accusation, defiance, and lament; and even Multnomah dared not silence her, for among the Indians a woman lamenting her dead was sacred. So, while Multnomah labored and plot ted for union by day, that mournful cry raised the spirit of wrath and rebellion by night. And thus the dead liberator was half avenged.