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diff --git a/35502.txt b/35502.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..93532e0 --- /dev/null +++ b/35502.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4141 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Basket Woman, by Mary Austin + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Basket Woman + A Book of Indian Tales for Children + +Author: Mary Austin + +Release Date: March 7, 2011 [EBook #35502] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BASKET WOMAN *** + + + + +Produced by Chris Curnow, Joseph Cooper and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Diacritic marks over letters are enclosed within + square brackets. For example, [)a] represents small letter "a" with + breve. + + + + + THE BASKET WOMAN + + A BOOK OF INDIAN TALES + FOR CHILDREN + + BY + + MARY AUSTIN + + _SCHOOL EDITION_ + + + BOSTON, NEW YORK, AND CHICAGO + HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY + + The Riverside Press, Cambridge + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY MARY AUSTIN + COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + + + + [Illustration: From photograph by A. A. Forbes + THE BASKET WOMAN] + + + + +PREFACE + + +In preparing this volume of western myths for school use the object has +been not so much to provide authentic Indian Folk-tales, as to present +certain aspects of nature as they appear in the myth-making mood, that +is to say, in the form of strongest appeal to the child mind. Indian +myths as they exist among Indians are too frequently sustained by coarse +and cruel incidents comparable to the belly-ripping joke in _Jack the +Giant Killer_, or the blinding of Gloucester in _King Lear_, and when +presented in story form, too often fall under the misapprehension of the +myth as something invented and added to the imaginative life. It is, in +fact, the root and branch of man's normal intimacy with nature. + +So slowly does the mind awaken to the realization of consciousness and +personality as by-products of animal life only, that few escape carrying +over into adult life some obsession of its persistence in inanimate +things, say of malevolence in opals or luckiness in a rabbit's foot, or +the capacity of moral discrimination against their victims residing in +hurricanes and earthquakes. The chief preoccupation of the child in his +earlier years is the business of abstracting the items of his +environment from this pervading sense, and ascribing to them their +proper degrees of awareness. He arrives in a general way at knowing that +it hurts the cat's tail to be stepped on because the cat cries, and that +it does not hurt the stick. But if the stick were provided with a +squeaking apparatus he would be much longer in the process, and if the +stick becomes a steed or a doll it is quite possible for him to weep +with sympathetic pain at the abuse of it. + +He sees the tree and it is alive and sentient to him; you cut a stick +horse from its boughs, and that is separately alive; cut the stick again +into two horses, and they will prance whole and satisfying. Later when +the game is played out, the stick may burn and furnish live flame to +dance, live smoke to ascend, live ash to be treated with contumely; all +of which arises not so much in the mere trick of invention as in the +natural difficulty in thinking of objects freed from consciousness, +almost as great as the philosopher's in conceiving empty space. There is +a period in the life of every child when almost the only road to the +understanding is the one blazed out by the myth-making spirit, kept open +to the larger significance of things long after he is apprised that the +thunder did not originate in the smithy of the gods nor the Walrus talk +to the Carpenter. Any attempt, however, to hasten the proper +distinctions of causes and powers by the suppression of myth making is +likely to prove as disastrous as helping young puppies through their +nine days' blindness by forcibly opening their eyes. You might get a few +days' purchase of vision for some of them, but you would also have a +good many cases of total blindness. What can be done by way of turning +the myth-making period to advantage, this little book is partly to show. + +Of the three sorts of myths included, about a third are direct +transcriptions from Indian myths current in the campodies of the West, +but it must not be assumed that myths like _The Crooked Fir_ and _The +White Barked Pine_ are in any sense "made up," or to be laid to the +author's credit. Since the myth originates in an attitude of mind, it +must be understood that, to the primitive mind, nearly the whole process +of nature presents itself in mythical terms. It is not that the Indian +imagines the tree having sentience--he simply isn't able to imagine its +not having it. All his songs, his ceremonies, his daily speech, are full +of the aspect of nature in terms of human endeavor. The story of _The +Crooked Fir_ was suggested to me in the humorous comment of my Indian +guide on one of the forks of Kings River, the first time my attention +was caught by the uniform curve of the trunks, and he explained it to +me. The myth of _The Stream That Ran Away_ might arise as simply as in +the question of a child who has not lived long enough to understand the +seasonal recession of waters, wishing to know why a stream that ran +full some weeks ago is now dry. And if his mother has had trouble with +his straying too far from the camp she might say to him that it had run +away and the White people had caught it and set it to work in an +irrigating ditch, "and that is what will happen to you if you don't +watch out" ... or she might draw a moral on the neglect of duty if the +occasion demanded it ... or if she were gifted with fancy, tell him that +that was it which fell on us as rain in Big Meadow, and it would return +to its banks when it had watered the high places. But whatever she would +tell him would have an acute observation of nature behind it and would +be stated in personal terms. It is so that the child begins to +understand the continuity of natural forces and their relativity to the +life of man. + +There is a third sort of story included with these, which aside from +being of the stuff from which hero myths are made,--_Mahala Joe_ is in +point,--has a value which must be gone into more particularly. + +What is important for the teacher to understand is that the myth, +itself a living issue, will not bear too much handling; in the process +of making it a part of the child's experience, the meaning of it must +not be pulled up too often to learn if it has taken root. Unless it +elucidates itself in the course of time,--and one must recall how long a +period elapsed between the first reading of the _Ugly Duckling_, say, +and its final revelation of itself,--unless its content is broadly human +and personal, it has practically no educative value. It is not +absolutely indispensable that the whole unfolding of it should be within +the limited period of school life that affords it; some of the noblest +human myths reveal as it were successive layers of insight and purport, +taking change and color from the passing experience; but it remains true +that the best time to insinuate the myth in the child's mind is when he +is normally at the myth-making period. + +To make it, then, part of the child's possession it should be read to or +by him at convenient intervals, until he can give back a fairly succinct +version of it. Along with this must go the business of deepening and +extending the background; and whether this is to be done at the time of +the reading or intermediately, must depend largely on the local +background. Children in schools on the Pacific slope should find +themselves already tolerably furnished; any hill region in fact should +yield suggestive material, without overlaying the content of the myth +with trifling exactitudes of natural history. + +It is very difficult to say in a word all that is implied in the +extension of the background. One has only to consider the amount of time +spent in teaching the so-called Classic Myths, tremendous in their power +of vitalizing and coloring their own and related times, and reflect on +their failure to effect anything beyond their mere story interest in +modern life, to realize that the value of a myth is directly in +proportion as its background is common and accessible. What would happen +in a locality calculated to suggest and with a teacher properly equipped +to interpret the background of Greek and Roman mythology, is not +proven, but in practical school work the author has found it best to +defer the teaching of it until by general reading a point of contact is +established, which enables the child to read _backward_ into its +meaning, and for the actively myth-making period to use forms sprung +naturally from the child's own environment. The better he can visualize +and locate the objects mythically treated, the better they serve their +purpose of rendering personal the influences of nature and sustaining +him in that happy sense of the community of life and interest in the +Wild. + +It is for this purpose of extending the background that the introductory +sketches and some others are included in this collection. _The Golden +Fortune_ could be read with _The White Barked Pine_, and _The Christmas +Tree_ with _The Crooked Fir_. Any hill country or wooded district should +furnish additional color, but let it be cautioned here, that though all +the nature references in these tales are entirely dependable, the child +is not to be made unhappy thereby. Whatever branch of school work it is +found necessary to correlate with the myths, it should be in general +recreative rather than instructive; for what is comprehended in the term +Nature is after all not a miscellany of objects, but a state of mind set +up by their happiest coincidences. The least that can be said to achieve +a proper notion of a tree or a glacier is so much better than the most; +a casual application to a known and neighboring circumstance goes +further than any amount of explanation. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE + THE BASKET WOMAN--FIRST STORY 1 + THE BASKET WOMAN--SECOND STORY 17 + THE STREAM THAT RAN AWAY 31 + THE COYOTE-SPIRIT AND THE WEAVING WOMAN 43 + THE CHEERFUL GLACIER 59 + THE MERRY-GO-ROUND 71 + THE CHRISTMAS TREE 87 + THE FIRE BRINGER 107 + THE CROOKED FIR 119 + THE SUGAR PINE 129 + THE GOLDEN FORTUNE 141 + THE WHITE-BARKED PINE 161 + NA [:Y]ANG-WIT'E, THE FIRST RABBIT DRIVE 171 + MAHALA JOE 183 + PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY 221 + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + + THE BASKET WOMAN _Frontispiece_ + A "CAMPOODIE," OR INDIAN VILLAGE 30 + AN OLD MINE 142 + A "WICKIUP," OR INDIAN HUT 184 + + + + +THE BASKET WOMAN + +FIRST STORY + + +The homesteader's cabin stood in a moon-shaped hollow between the hills +and the high mesa; and the land before it stretched away golden and +dusky green, and was lost in a blue haze about where the river +settlements began. The hills had a flowing outline and melted softly +into each other and higher hills behind, until the range broke in a +ragged crest of thin peaks white with snow. A clean, wide sky bent over +that country, and the air that moved in it was warm and sweet. + +The homesteader's son had run out on the trail that led toward the +spring, with half a mind to go to it, but ran back again when he saw the +Basket Woman coming. He was afraid of her, and ashamed because he was +afraid, so he did not tell his mother that he had changed his mind. + +"There is the mahala coming for the wash," said his mother; "now you +will have company at the spring." But Alan only held tighter to a fold +of her dress. This was the third time the Indian woman had come to wash +for the homesteader's wife; and, though she was slow and quiet and had a +pleasant smile, Alan was still afraid of her. All that he had heard of +Indians before coming to this country was very frightful, and he did not +understand yet that it was not so. Beyond a certain point of hills on +clear days he could see smoke rising from the campoodie, and though he +knew nothing but his dreams of what went on there, he would not so much +as play in that direction. + +The Basket Woman was the only Indian that he had seen. She would come +walking across the mesa with a great cone-shaped carrier basket heaped +with brushwood on her shoulders, stooping under it and easing the weight +by a buckskin band about her forehead. Sometimes it would be a smaller +basket carried in the same fashion, and she would be filling it with +bulbs of wild hyacinth or taboose; often she carried a bottle-necked +water basket to and from the spring, and always wore a bowl-shaped +basket on her head for a hat. Her long hair hung down from under it, and +her black eyes glittered beadily below the rim. Alan had a fancy that +any moment she might pick him up with a quick toss as if he had been a +bit of brushwood, and drop him over her shoulder into the great carrier, +and walk away across the mesa with him. So when he saw her that morning +coming down the trail from the spring, he hung close by his mother's +skirts. + +"You must not be afraid of her, Alan," said his mother; "she is very +kind, and no doubt has had a boy of her own." + +The Basket Woman showed them her white, even teeth in a smile. "This one +very pretty boy," she said; but Alan had made up his mind not to trust +her. He was thinking of what the teamster had said when he had driven +them up from the railroad station with their belongings the day they +came to their new home and found the Basket Woman spying curiously in +at the cabin windows. + +"You wanter watch out how you behaves yourself, sonny," said the +teamster, wagging a solemn jaw, "she's likely to pack you away in that +basket o' her'n one of these days." And Alan had watched out very +carefully indeed. + +It was not a great while after they came to the foothill claim that the +homesteader went over to the campoodie to get an Indian to help at fence +building, and Alan went with him, holding fast by his father's hand. +They found the Indians living in low, foul huts; their clothes were also +dirty, and they sat about on the ground, fat and good-natured. The dogs +and children lay sleeping in the sun. It was all very disappointing. + +"Will they not hurt us, father?" Alan had said at starting. + +"Oh, no, my boy; you must not get any such notion as that," said the +homesteader; "Indians are not at all now what they were once." + +Alan thought of this as he looked at the campoodie, and pulled at his +father's hand. + +"I do not like Indians the way they are now," he said; and immediately +saw that he had made a mistake, for he was standing directly in front of +the Basket Woman's hut, and as she suddenly put her head out of the door +he thought by the look of her mysterious, bright eyes that she had +understood. He did not venture to say anything more, and all the way +home kept looking back toward the campoodie to see if anything came of +it. + +"Why do you not eat your supper?" said his mother. "I am afraid the long +walk in the hot sun was too much for you." Alan dared not say anything +to her of what troubled him, though perhaps it would have been better if +he had, for that night the Basket Woman came for him. + +She did not pick him up and toss him over her shoulder as he expected; +but let down the basket, and he stepped into it of his own accord. Alan +was surprised to find that he was not so much afraid of her after all. + +"What will you do with me?" he said. + +"I will show you Indians as they used to be," said she. + +Alan could feel the play of her strong shoulders as they went out across +the lower mesa and began to climb the hills. + +"Where do you go?" said the boy. + +"To Pahrump, the valley of Corn Water. It was there my people were +happiest in old days." + +They went on between the oaks, and smelled the musky sweet smell of the +wild grapevines along the water borders. The sagebrush began to fail +from the slopes, and buckthorn to grow up tall and thicker; the wind +brought them a long sigh from the lowest pines. They came up with the +silver firs and passed them, passed the drooping spruces, the wet +meadows, and the wood of thimble-cone pines. The air under them had an +earthy smell. Presently they came out upon a cleared space very high up +where the rocks were sharp and steep. + +"Why are there no trees here?" asked Alan. + +"I will tell you about that," said the Basket Woman. "In the old flood +time, and that is longer ago than is worth counting, the water came up +and covered the land, all but the high tops of mountains. Here then the +Indians fled and lived, and with them the animals that escaped from the +flood. There were trees growing then over all the high places, but +because the waters were long on the earth the Indians were obliged to +cut them down for firewood. Also they killed all the large animals for +food, but the small ones hid in the rocks. After that the waters went +down; trees and grass began to grow over all the earth, but never any +more on the tops of high mountains. They had all been burned off. You +can see that it is so." + +From the top of the mountain Alan could see all the hills on the other +side shouldering and peering down toward the happy valley of Corn Water. + +"Here," said the Basket Woman, "my people came of old time in the +growing season of the year; they planted corn, and the streams came +down from the hills and watered it. Now we, too, will go down." + +They went by a winding trail, steep and stony. The pines stood up around +and locked them closely in. + +"I see smoke arising," said Alan, "blue smoke above the pines." + +"It is the smoke of their hearth fires," said the Basket Woman, and they +went down and down. + +"I hear a sound of singing," said the boy. + +"It is the women singing and grinding at the quern," she said, and her +feet went faster. + +"I hear laughter," he said again, "it mixes with the running of the +water." + +"It is the maidens washing their knee-long hair. They kneel by the water +and stoop down, they dip in the running water and shake out bright drops +in the sun." + +"There is a pleasant smell," said Alan. + +"It is pine nuts roasting in the cones," said the Basket Woman; "so it +was of old time." + +They came out of the cleft of the hills in a pleasant place by singing +water. "There you will see the rows of wickiups," said the Basket Woman, +"with the doors all opening eastward to the sun. Let us sit here and see +what we shall see." + +The women sat by the wickiups weaving baskets of willow and stems of +fern. They made patterns of bright feathers and strung wampum about the +rims. Some sewed with sinew and needles of cactus thorn on deerskin +white and fine; others winnowed the corn. They stood up tossing it in +baskets like grains of gold, and the wind carried away the chaff. All +this time the young girls were laughing as they dried their hair in the +sun. They bound it with flowers and gay strings of beads, and made their +cheeks bright with red earth. The children romped and shouted about the +camp, and ran bare-legged in the stream. + +"Do they do nothing but play?" said Alan. + +"You shall see," said the Basket Woman. + +Away up the mountain sounded a faint halloo. In a moment all the camp +was bustle and delight. The children clapped their hands; they left off +playing and began to drag up brushwood for the fires. The women put away +their weaving and brought out the cooking pots; they heard the men +returning from the hunt. The young men brought deer upon their +shoulders; one had grouse and one held up a great basket of trout. The +women made the meat ready for cooking. Some of them took meal and made +cakes for baking in the ashes. The men rested in the glow of the fires, +feathering arrows and restringing their bows. + +"That is well," said the Basket Woman, "to make ready for to-morrow's +meat before to-day's is eaten." + +"How happy they are!" said the boy. + +"They will be happier when they have eaten," said she. + +After supper the Indians gathered together for singing and dancing. The +old men told tales one after the other, and the children thought each +one was the best. Between the tales the Indians all sang together, or +one sang a new song that he had made. There was one of them who did +better than all. He had streaked his body with colored earth and had a +band of eagle feathers in his hair. In his hand was a rattle of wild +sheep's horn and small stones; he kept time with it as he leapt and sang +in the light of the fire. He sang of old wars, sang of the deer that was +killed, sang of the dove and the young grass that grew on the mountain; +and the people were well pleased, for when the heart is in the singing +it does not matter much what the song is about. The men beat their hands +together to keep time to his dancing, and the earth under his feet was +stamped to a fine dust. + +"He is one that has found the wolf's song," said the Basket Woman. + +"What is that?" asked Alan. + +"It is an old tale of my people," said she. "Once there was a man who +could not make any songs, so he got no praise from the tribe, and it +troubled him much. Then, as he was gathering taboose by the river, a +wolf went by, and the wolf said to him, 'What will you have me to give +you for your taboose?' Then said the man, 'I will have you to give me a +song.' + +"'That will I gladly,' said the wolf. So the wolf taught him, and that +night he sang the wolf's song in the presence of all the people, and it +made their hearts to burn within them. Then the man fell down as if he +were dead, for the pure joy of singing, and when deep sleep was upon him +the wolf came in the night and stole his song away. Neither the man nor +any one who had heard it remembered it any more. So we say when a man +sings as no other sang before him, 'He has the wolf's song.' It is a +good saying. Now we must go, for the children are all asleep by their +mothers, and the day comes soon," said the Basket Woman. + +"Shall we come again?" said Alan. "And will it all be as it is now?" + +"My people come often to the valley of Corn Water," said she, "but it +is never as it is now except in dreams. Now we must go quickly." Far up +the trail they saw a grayness in the eastern sky where the day was about +to come in. + +"Hark," said the Basket Woman, "they will sing together the coyote song. +It is so that they sing it when the coyote goes home from his hunting, +and the morning is near. + + "The coyote cries ... + He cries at daybreak ... + He cries ... + The coyote cries" ... + +sang the Basket Woman, but all the spaces in between the words were +filled with long howls,--weird, wicked noises that seemed to hunt and +double in a half-human throat. It made the hair on Alan's neck stand up, +and cold shivers creep along his back. He began to shake, for the wild +howls drew near and louder, and he felt the bed under him tremble with +his trembling. + +"Mother, mother," he cried, "what is that?" + +"It is only the coyotes," said she; "they always howl about this time of +night. It is nothing; go to sleep again." + +"But I am afraid." + +"They cannot hurt you," said his mother; "it is only the little gray +beasts that you see trotting about the mesa of afternoons; hear them +now." + +"I am afraid," said Alan. + +"Then you must come in my bed," said she; and in a few minutes he was +fast asleep again. + + + + +THE BASKET WOMAN + +SECOND STORY + + +The next time Alan saw the Basket Woman he was not nearly so much afraid +of her, though he did not venture to speak of their journey to Pahrump. +He said to his mother, "Do you not wish the Indians could have stayed +the way they were?" and his mother laughed. + +"Why, no, child," she said, "I do not think that I do. I think they are +much better off as they are now." Alan, however, was not to be +convinced. The next time he saw the Basket Woman he was even troubled +about it. + +The homesteader had taken his family to the town for a day, and the +first thing Alan saw when he got down from the wagon was the Basket +Woman. She was sitting in a corner of the sidewalk with a group of other +mahalas, with her blanket drawn over her shoulders, looking out upon +the town, and her eyes were dull and strange. + +A stream of people went by them in the street, and minded them no more +than the dogs they stepped over, sprawling at the doors of the stores. +Some of the Indian women had children with them, but they neither +shouted nor ran as they had done in the camp of Corn Water; they sat +quietly by their mothers, and Alan noticed how worn and poor were the +clothes of all of them, and how wishful all the eyes. He could not get +his mind off them because he could not get them out of his sight for +very long at a time. It was a very small town, and as he went with his +mother in and about the stores he would be coming face to face with the +mahalas every little while, and the Basket Woman's eyes were always sad. + +His mother, when she had finished her shopping, gave him a silver dime +and told him that he might spend it as he wished. As soon as Alan had +turned the corner on that errand there was the Basket Woman with her +chin upon her knees and her blanket drawn over her shoulders. Alan +stopped a moment in front of her; he would have liked to say something +comforting, but found himself still afraid. + +Her eyes looked on beyond him, blurred and dim; he supposed she must be +thinking of the happy valley, and grew so very sorry for her that, as he +could not get the courage to speak, he threw his dime into her lap and +ran as fast as he could away. It seemed to him as he ran that she called +to him, but he could not be sure. + +That night, almost as soon as he had touched the pillow, she came and +stood beside him without motion or sound, and let down the basket from +her back. + +"Do we go to Corn Water?" asked Alan as he stepped into it. + +"To my people of old time," said the Basket Woman, "so that you need not +be so much sorry." + +Then they went out by the mesa trail, where the sage showed duskily +under a thin rim of moon. It seemed to Alan that they went slowly, +almost heavily. When they came to the parting of the ways, she let down +the basket to rest. A rabbit popped, startled, out of the brush, and +scurried into the dark; its white tail, like a signal, showed the way it +went. + +"What was that?" asked Alan. + +"Only little Tavwots, whom we scared out of his nest. Lean forward," she +said, "and I will tell you a tale about him." So the boy leaned his head +against the Basket Woman's long black hair, and heard the story of +Little Tavwots and How He Caught the Sun in a Snare. + +"It was long ago," said the Basket Woman. "Tavwots was the largest of +all four-footed things, and a mighty hunter. He would get up as soon as +it was day and go to his hunting, but always before him was the track of +a great foot on the trail; and this troubled him, for his pride was as +big as his body and greater than his fame. + +"'Who is this?' cried Tavwots, 'that goes with so great a stride before +me to the hunting? Does he think to put me to shame?' + +"'T'-sst!' said his mother, 'there is none greater than thee.' + +"'Nevertheless,' said Tavwots, 'there are the footprints in the trail.' +The next morning he got up earlier, but there were always the great +footprints and the long stride before him. + +"'Now I will set me a trap for this impudent fellow,' said Tavwots, for +he was very cunning. So he made a snare of his bowstring and set it in +the trail overnight, and in the morning when he went to look, behold, he +had caught the sun in his snare. All that quarter of the earth was +beginning to smoke with the heat of it. + +"'Is it you?' cried Tavwots, 'who made the tracks in my trail?' + +"'It is I,' said the sun. 'Come now and set me free before the whole +earth is afire.' Then Tavwots saw what he had to do, so he drew his +knife and ran to cut the bowstring. But the heat was so great that he +ran back before he had done it, and was melted down to one half his +size. Then the smoke of the burning earth began to curl up against the +sky. + +"'Come again, Tavwots,' cried the sun. So he ran again and ran back, and +the third time he ran he cut the bowstring, and the sun was set free +from the snare. But by that time Tavwots was melted down to as small as +he is now, and so he remains. Still you may see by the print of his feet +as he leaps in the trail how great his stride was when he caught the sun +in his snare. + +"So it is always," said the Basket Woman, "that which is large grows +less, and my people, which were great, have dwindled away." + +After that she became quiet, and they went on over the mountain. Because +he was beginning to be acquainted with it, the way seemed shorter to +Alan than before. They passed over the high barren ridges, and he began +to look for the camp at Corn Water. + +"I see no smoke," said Alan. + +"It would bring down their enemies like buzzards on carrion," said the +Basket Woman. + +"There is no sound of singing nor of laughter," said the boy. + +"Who laughs in the time of war?" said she. + +"Is there war?" asked Alan. + +"Long and bitter," said the Basket Woman. "Let us go softly and come +upon them unawares." + +So they went, light of foot, among the pines until they saw the wickiups +opening eastward to the sun, but many of them stood ruined and awry. +There were only the very old and the children in the camp, and these did +not run and play. They stole about like mice in the meadow sod, and if +so much as a twig snapped in the forest, they huddled motionless as +young quail. The women worked in the growing corn; they dug roots on the +hill slope and caught grasshoppers for food. One made a noose of her +long black hair plucked out, and snared the bright lizards that ran +among the rocks. It seemed to Alan that the Indians looked wishful and +thinner than they should; but such food as they found was all put by. + +"Why do they do this?" asked the boy. + +"That the men who go to war may not go fasting," said the Basket Woman. +"Look, now we shall have news of them." + +A young man came noiselessly out of the wood, and it was he who had sung +the new song on the night of feasting and dancing. He had eagle feathers +in his hair, but they were draggled; there was beadwork on his leggings, +but it was torn with thorns; there was paint on his face and his body, +but it was smeared over red, and as he came into the camp he broke his +bow across his knee. + +"It is a token of defeat," said the Basket Woman; "the others will come +soon." But some came feebly because of wounds, and it seemed the women +looked for some who might never come. They cast up their arms and cried +with a terrible wailing sound that rose and shuddered among the pines. + +"Be still," said the young man; "would you bring our enemies down upon +us with your screeching?" Then the women threw themselves quietly in the +dust, and rocked to and fro with sobbing; their stillness was more +bitter than their crying. + +Suddenly out of the wood came a storm of arrows, a rush of strange, +painted braves, and the din of fighting. + +"Shut your eyes," said the Basket Woman, "it is not good for you to +see." Alan hid his face in the Basket Woman's dress, and heard the noise +of fighting rage and die away. When he ventured to look again on the +ruined huts and the trampled harvest, there were few left in the camp of +Corn Water, and they had enough to do to find food for their poor +bodies. They winnowed the creek with basket-work weirs for every +finger-long troutling that came down in it, and tore the bark off the +pine trees to get at the grubs underneath. + +"Why do they not go out and kill deer as before?" asked Alan. + +"Their enemies lurk in the wood and drive away the game," said the +Basket Woman. + +"Why do they not go to another place?" + +"Where shall they go, when their foes watch every pass?" said she. + +It seemed to Alan that many days and nights passed while they watched by +the camp; and the days were all sorrowful, and always, as before, the +best meat was set aside for the strongest. + +"Why is this so?" asked the boy. + +"Because," said the Basket Woman, "those who are strong must stay so to +care for the rest. It is the way of my people. You see that the others +do not complain." And it was so that the feeble ones tottered silently +about the camp or sat still a long time in one place with their heads +upon their knees. + +"How will it end?" asked Alan. + +"They must go away at last," said she, "though the cords of their hearts +are fastened here. But there is no seed corn, and the winter is close at +hand." + +Then there began to be a tang of frost in the air, and the people +gathered up their household goods, and, though there was not much of +them, they staggered and bent under the burden as they went up out of +the once happy valley to another home. The women let down their long +hair and smeared ashes upon it; they threw up their lean arms and +wailed long and mournfully as they passed among the pines. Alan began to +tremble with crying, and felt the Basket Woman patting him on the +shoulder. Her voice sounded to him like the voice of his mother telling +him to go to sleep again, for there was nothing for him to be troubled +about. After he grew quieter, the Indian woman lifted him up. "We must +be going," she said, "it is not good for us to be here." + +Alan wished as they went up over the mountain that she would help him +with talk toward forgetting what he had seen, but the long hair fell +over her face and she would not talk. He shivered in the basket, and the +night felt colder and full of fearsome noises. + +"What is that?" he whispered, as a falling star trailed all across the +dark. + +"It is the coyote people that brought the fire to my people," said the +Basket Woman. Alan hoped she would tell him a tale about it, but she +would not. They went on down the mountain until they came to the borders +of the long-leaved pines. Alan heard the sough of the wind in the +needles, and it seemed as if it called. + +"What is that?" he whispered. + +"It is Hi-no-no, the wind, mourning for his brother, the pine tree," but +she would not tell him that tale, either. She went faster and faster, +and Alan felt the stir of her shoulders under him. He listened to the +wind, and it grew fierce and louder until he heard the house beams +creak, for he was awake in his own bed. A strong wind drove gustily +across the mesa and laid hold of the corners of the roof. + +The next morning the homesteader said that he must go to the campoodie +and Alan might go with him. Alan was quite pleased, and said to his +mother while she was getting him ready, "Do you know, I think Indians +are a great deal better off as they are now." + +"Why, yes," said his mother, smiling, "I think so, too." + + + [Illustration: From photograph by A. A. Forbes + A "CAMPOODIE," OR INDIAN VILLAGE] + + + + +THE STREAM THAT RAN AWAY + + +In a short and shallow canyon on the front of Oppapago running eastward +toward the sun, one may find a clear brown stream called the creek of +Pinon Pines. That is not because it is unusual to find pinon trees on +Oppapago, but because there are so few of them in the canyon of the +stream. There are all sorts higher up on the slopes,--long-leaved yellow +pines, thimble cones, tamarack, silver fir and Douglas spruce; but here +there is only a group of the low-heading, gray nut pines which the +earliest inhabitants of that country called pinons. + +The canyon of Pinon Pines has a pleasant outlook and lies open to the +sun, but there is not much other cause for the forest rangers to +remember it. At the upper end there is no more room by the stream border +than will serve for a cattle trail; willows grow in it, choking the path +of the water; there are brown birches here and ropes of white clematis +tangled over thickets of brier rose. Low down the ravine broadens out to +inclose a meadow the width of a lark's flight, blossomy and wet and +good. Here the stream ran once in a maze of soddy banks and watered all +the ground, and afterward ran out at the canyon's mouth across the mesa +in a wash of bone-white boulders as far as it could. That was not very +far, for it was a slender stream. It had its source really on the high +crests and hollows of Oppapago, in the snow banks that melted and seeped +downward through the rocks; but the stream did not know any more of that +than you know of what happened to you before you were born, and could +give no account of itself except that it crept out from under a great +heap of rubble far up in the canyon of the Pinon Pines. And because it +had no pools in it deep enough for trout, and no trees on its borders +but gray nut pines; because, try as it might, it could never get across +the mesa to the town, the stream had fully made up its mind to run +away. + +"Pray what good will that do you?" said the pines. "If you get to the +town, they will turn you into an irrigating ditch and set you to +watering crops." + +"As to that," said the stream, "if I once get started I will not stop at +the town." Then it would fret between its banks until the spangled +frills of the mimulus were all tattered with its spray. Often at the end +of the summer it was worn quite thin and small with running, and not +able to do more than reach the meadow. + +"But some day," it whispered to the stones, "I shall run quite away." + +If the stream had been inclined for it, there was no lack of good +company on its own borders. Birds nested in the willows, rabbits came to +drink; one summer a bobcat made its lair up the bank opposite the brown +birches, and often deer fed in the meadow. Then there was a promise of +better things. In the spring of one year two old men came up into the +canyon of Pinon Pines. They had been miners and partners together for +many years, they had grown rich and grown poor, and had seen many hard +places and strange times. It was a day when the creek ran clear and the +south wind smelled of the earth. Wild bees began to whine among the +willows, and the meadow bloomed over with poppy-breasted larks. Then +said one of the old men, "Here is good meadow and water enough; let us +build a house and grow trees. We are too old to dig in the mines." + +"Let us set about it," said the other; for that is the way with two who +have been a long time together: what one thinks of, the other is for +doing. So they brought their possessions and made a beginning that day, +for they felt the spring come on warmly in their blood; they wished to +dig in the earth and handle it. + +These two men who, in the mining camps where they were known, were +called "Shorty" and "Long Tom," and had almost forgotten that they had +other names, built a house by the water border and planted trees. Shorty +was all for an orchard, but Long Tom preferred vegetables. So they did +each what he liked, and were never so happy as when walking in the +garden in the cool of the day, touching the growing things as they +walked and praising each other's work. + +"This will make a good home for our old age," said Long Tom, "and when +we die we can be buried here." + +"Under the pinon pines," said Shorty. "I have marked out a place." + +So they were very happy for three years. By this time the stream had +become so interested it had almost forgotten about running away. But +every year it noted that a larger bit of the meadow was turned under and +planted, and more and more the men made dams and ditches to govern its +running. + +"In fact," said the stream, "I am being made into an irrigating ditch +before I have had my fling in the world. I really must make a start." + +That very winter by the help of a great storm it went roaring down the +meadow over the mesa, and so clean away, with only a track of muddy +sand to show the way it had gone. All the winter, however, Shorty and +Long Tom brought water for drinking from a spring, and looked for the +stream to come back. In the spring they hoped still, for that was the +season they looked for the orchard to bear. But no fruit set on the +trees, and the seeds Long Tom planted shriveled in the earth. So by the +end of summer, when they understood that the water would not come back +at all, they went sadly away. + +Now what happened to the creek of Pinon Pines is not very well known to +any one, for the stream is not very clear on that point, except that it +did not have a happy time. It went out in the world on the wings of the +storm and was very much tossed about and mixed up with other waters, +lost and bewildered. Everywhere it saw water at work, turning mills, +watering fields, carrying trade, falling as hail, rain, and snow, and at +the last, after many journeys, found itself creeping out from under the +rocks of Oppapago in the canyon of Pinon Pines. Immediately the little +stream knew itself and recalled clearly all that had happened to it +before. + +"After all, home is best," said the stream, and ran about in its choked +channels looking for old friends. The willows were there, but grown +shabby and dying at the top; the birches were quite dead, but stood +still in their places; and there was only rubbish where the white +clematis had been. Even the rabbits had gone away. The little stream ran +whimpering in the meadow, fumbling at the ruined ditches to comfort the +fruit-trees which were not quite dead. It was very dull in those days +living in the canyon of Pinon Pines. + +"But it is really my own fault," said the stream. So it went on +repairing the borders with the best heart it could contrive. + +About the time the white clematis had come back to hide the ruin of the +brown birches, a young man came and camped with his wife and child in +the meadow. They were looking for a place to make a home. They looked +long at the meadow, for Shorty and Long Tom had taken away their house +and it did not appear to belong to any one. + +"What a charming place!" said the young wife, "just the right distance +from town, and a stream all to ourselves. And look, there are +fruit-trees already planted. Do let us decide to stay." + +Then she took off the child's shoes and stockings to let it play in the +stream. The water curled all about the bare feet and gurgled +delightedly. + +"Ah, do stay," begged the happy water, "I can be such a help to you, for +I know how a garden should be irrigated in the best manner." + +The child laughed and stamped the water up to his bare knees. The young +wife watched anxiously while her husband walked up and down the stream +border and examined the fruit-trees. + +"It is a delightful place," he said, "and the soil is rich, but I am +afraid the water cannot be depended upon. There are signs of a great +drought within the last two or three years. Look, there is a clump of +birches in the very path of the stream, but all dead; and the largest +limbs of the fruit-trees have died. In this country one must be able to +make sure of the water supply. I suppose the people who planted them +must have abandoned the place when the stream went dry. We must go on +farther." So they took their goods and the child and went on farther. + +"Ah, well," said the stream, "that is what is to be expected when one +has a reputation for neglecting one's duty. But I wish they had stayed. +That baby and I understood each other." + +He had quite made up his mind not to run away again, though he could not +be expected to be quite cheerful after all that had happened; in fact, +if you go yourself to the canyon of the Pinon Pines you will notice that +the stream, where it goes brokenly about the meadow, has quite a +mournful sound. + + + + +THE COYOTE-SPIRIT AND THE WEAVING WOMAN + + +The Weaving Woman lived under the bank of the stony wash that cut +through the country of the mesquite dunes. The Coyote-Spirit, which, you +understand, is an Indian whose form has been changed to fit with his +evil behavior, ranged from the Black Rock where the wash began to the +white sands beyond Pahranagat; and the Goat-Girl kept her flock among +the mesquites, or along the windy stretch of sage below the campoodie; +but as the Coyote-Spirit never came near the wickiups by day, and the +Goat-Girl went home the moment the sun dropped behind Pahranagat, they +never met. These three are all that have to do with the story. + +The Weaving Woman, whose work was the making of fine baskets of split +willow and roots of yucca and brown grass, lived alone, because there +was nobody found who wished to live with her, and because it was +whispered among the wickiups that she was different from other people. +It was reported that she had an infirmity of the eyes which caused her +to see everything with rainbow fringes, bigger and brighter and better +than it was. All her days were fruitful, a handful of pine nuts as much +to make merry over as a feast; every lad who went by a-hunting with his +bow at his back looked to be a painted brave, and every old woman +digging roots as fine as a medicine man in all his feathers. All the +faces at the campoodie, dark as the mingled sand and lava of the Black +Rock country, deep lined with work and weather, shone for this singular +old woman with the glory of the late evening light on Pahranagat. The +door of her wickiup opened toward the campoodie with the smoke going up +from cheerful hearths, and from the shadow of the bank where she sat to +make baskets she looked down the stony wash where all the trails +converged that led every way among the dunes, and saw an enchanted mesa +covered with misty bloom and gentle creatures moving on trails that +seemed to lead to the places where one had always wished to be. + +Since all this was so, it was not surprising that her baskets turned out +to be such wonderful affairs, and the tribesmen, though they winked and +wagged their heads, were very glad to buy them for a haunch of venison +or a bagful of mesquite meal. Sometimes, as they stroked the perfect +curves of the bowls or traced out the patterns, they were heard to sigh, +thinking how fine life would be if it were so rich and bright as she +made it seem, instead of the dull occasion they had found it. There were +some who even said it was a pity, since she was so clever at the craft, +that the weaver was not more like other people, and no one thought to +suggest that in that case her weaving would be no better than theirs. +For all this the basket-maker did not care, sitting always happily at +her weaving or wandering far into the desert in search of withes and +barks and dyes, where the wild things showed her many a wonder hid from +those who have not rainbow fringes to their eyes; and because she was +not afraid of anything, she went farther and farther into the silent +places until in the course of time she met the Coyote-Spirit. + +Now a Coyote-Spirit, from having been a man, is continually thinking +about men and wishing to be with them, and, being a coyote and of the +wolf's breed, no sooner does he have his wish than he thinks of +devouring. So as soon as this one had met the Weaving Woman he desired +to eat her up, or to work her some evil according to the evil of his +nature. He did not see any opportunity to begin at the first meeting, +for on account of the infirmity of her eyes the woman did not see him as +a coyote, but as a man, and let down her wicker water bottle for him to +drink, so kindly that he was quite abashed. She did not seem in the +least afraid of him, which is disconcerting even to a real coyote; +though if he had been, she need not have been afraid of him in any case. +Whatever pestiferous beast the Indian may think the dog of the +wilderness, he has no reason to fear him except when by certain signs, +as having a larger and leaner body, a sharper muzzle, and more evilly +pointed ears, he knows him the soul of a bad-hearted man going about in +that guise. There are enough of these coyote-spirits ranging in Mesquite +Valley and over towards Funeral Mountains and about Pahranagat to give +certain learned folk surmise as to whether there may not be a strange +breed of wolves in that region; but the Indians know better. + +When the coyote-spirit who had met the basket woman thought about it +afterward, he said to himself that she deserved all the mischance that +might come upon her for that meeting. "She knows," he said, "that this +is my range, and whoever walks in a coyote-spirit's range must expect to +take the consequences. She is not at all like the Goat-Girl." + +The Coyote-Spirit had often watched the Goat-Girl from the top of +Pahranagat, but because she was always in the open where no +lurking-places were, and never far from the corn lands where the old +men might be working, he had made himself believe he would not like that +kind of a girl. Every morning he saw her come out of her leafy hut, +loose the goats from the corral, which was all of cactus stems and broad +leaves of prickly-pear, and lead them out among the wind-blown hillocks +of sand under which the trunks of the mesquite flourished for a hundred +years, and out of the tops of which the green twigs bore leaves and +fruit; or along the mesa to browse on bitterbrush and the tops of +scrubby sage. Sometimes she plaited willows for the coarser kinds of +basket-work, or, in hot noonings while the flock dozed, worked herself +collars and necklaces of white and red and turquoise-colored beads, and +other times sat dreaming on the sand. But whatever she did, she kept far +enough from the place of the Coyote-Spirit, who, now that he had met the +Weaving Woman, could not keep his mind off her. Her hut was far enough +from the campoodie so that every morning he went around by the Black +Rock to see if she was still there, and there she sat weaving patterns +in her baskets of all that she saw or thought. Now it would be the +winding wash and the wattled huts beside it, now the mottled skin of the +rattlesnake or the curled plumes of the quail. + +At last the Coyote-Spirit grew so bold that when there was no one +passing on the trail he would go and walk up and down in front of the +wickiup. Then the Weaving Woman would look up from her work and give him +the news of the season and the tribesmen in so friendly a fashion that +he grew less and less troubled in his mind about working her mischief. +He said in his evil heart that since the ways of such as he were known +to the Indians,--as indeed they were, with many a charm and spell to +keep them safe,--it could be no fault of his if they came to harm +through too much familiarity. As for the Weaving Woman, he said, "She +sees me as I am, and ought to know better," for he had not heard about +the infirmity of her eyes. + +Finally he made up his mind to ask her to go with him to dig for roots +around the foot of Pahranagat, and if she consented,--and of course she +did, for she was a friendly soul,--he knew in his heart what he would +do. They went out by the mesa trail, and it was a soft and blossomy day +of spring. Long wands of the creosote with shining fretted foliage were +hung with creamy bells of bloom, and doves called softly from the +Dripping Spring. They passed rows of owlets sitting by their burrows and +saw young rabbits playing in their shallow forms. The Weaving Woman +talked gayly as they went, as Indian women talk, with soft mellow voices +and laughter breaking in between the words like smooth water flowing +over stones. She talked of how the deer had shifted their feeding +grounds and of whether the quail had mated early that year as a sign of +a good season, matters of which the Coyote-Spirit knew more than she, +only he was not thinking of those things just then. Whenever her back +was turned he licked his cruel jaws and whetted his appetite. They +passed the level mesa, passed the tumbled fragments of the Black Rock +and came to the sharp wall-sided canons that showed the stars at noon +from their deep wells of sombre shade, where no wild creature made its +home and no birds ever sang. Then the Weaving Woman grew still at last +because of the great stillness, and the Coyote-Spirit said in a hungry, +whining voice,-- + +"Do you know why I brought you here?" + +"To show me how still and beautiful the world is here," said the Weaving +Woman, and even then she did not seem afraid. + +"To eat you up," said the Coyote. With that he looked to see her fall +quaking at his feet, and he had it in mind to tell her it was no fault +but her own for coming so far astray with one of his kind, but the woman +only looked at him and laughed. The sound of her laughter was like water +in a bubbling spring. + +"Why do you laugh?" said the Coyote, and he was so astonished that his +jaws remained open when he had done speaking. + +"How could you eat me?" said she. "Only wild beasts could do that." + +"What am I, then?" + +"Oh, you are only a man." + +"I am a coyote," said he. + +"Do you think I have no eyes?" said the woman. "Come!" For she did not +understand that her eyes were different from other people's, what she +really thought was that other people's were different from hers, which +is quite another matter, so she pulled the Coyote-Spirit over to a +rain-fed pool. In that country the rains collect in basins of the solid +rock that grow polished with a thousand years of storm and give back +from their shining side a reflection like a mirror. One such lay in the +bottom of the black canyon, and the Weaving Woman stood beside it. + +Now it is true of coyote-spirits that they are so only because of their +behavior; not only have they power to turn themselves to men if they +wish--but they do not wish, or they would not have become coyotes in the +first place--but other people in their company, according as they think +man-thoughts or beast-thoughts, can throw over them such a change that +they have only to choose which they will be. So the basket-weaver +contrived to throw the veil of her mind over the Coyote-Spirit, so that +when he looked at himself in the pool he could not tell for the life of +him whether he was most coyote or most man, which so frightened him that +he ran away and left the Weaving Woman to hunt for roots alone. He ran +for three days and nights, being afraid of himself, which is the worst +possible fear, and then ran back to see if the basket-maker had not +changed her mind. He put his head in at the door of her wickiup. + +"Tell me, now, am I a coyote or a man?" + +"Oh, a man," said she, and he went off to Pahranagat to think it over. +In a day or two he came back. + +"And what now?" he said. + +"Oh, a man, and I think you grow handsomer every day." + +That was really true, for what with her insisting upon it and his +thinking about it, the beast began to go out of him and the man to come +back. That night he went down to the campoodie to try and steal a kid +from the corral, but it occurred to him just in time that a man would +not do that, so he went back to Pahranagat and ate roots and berries +instead, which was a true sign that he had grown into a man again. Then +there came a day when the Weaving Woman asked him to stop at her hearth +and eat. There was a savory smell going up from the cooking-pots, cakes +of mesquite meal baking in the ashes, and sugary white buds of the yucca +palm roasting on the coals. The man who had been a coyote lay on a +blanket of rabbit skin and heard the cheerful snapping of the fire. It +was all so comfortable and bright that somehow it made him think of the +Goat-Girl. + +"That is the right sort of a girl," he said to himself. "She has always +stayed in the safe open places and gone home early. She should be able +to tell me what I am," for he was not quite sure, and since he had begun +to walk with men a little, he had heard about the Weaving Woman's eyes. + +Next day he went out where the flock fed, not far from the corn lands, +and the Goat-Girl did not seem in the least afraid of him. So he went +again, and the third day he said,-- + +"Tell me what I seem to you." + +"A very handsome man," said she. + +"Then will you marry me?" said he; and when the Goat-Girl had taken time +to think about it she said yes, she thought she would. + +Now, when the man who had been a coyote lay on the blanket of the +Weaving Woman's wickiup, he had taken notice how it was made of willows +driven into the ground around a pit dug in the earth, and the poles +drawn together at the top, and thatched with brush, and he had tried at +the foot of Pahranagat until he had built another like it; so when he +had married the Goat-Girl, after the fashion of her tribe, he took her +there to live. He was not now afraid of anything except that his wife +might get to know that he had once been a coyote. It was during the +first month of their marriage that he said to her, "Do you know the +basket-maker who lives under the bank of the stony wash? They call her +the Weaving Woman." + +"I have heard something of her and I have bought her baskets. Why do you +ask?" + +"It is nothing," said the man, "but I hear strange stories of her, that +she associates with coyote-spirits and such creatures," for he wanted to +see what his wife would say to that. + +"If that is the case," said she, "the less we see of her the better. One +cannot be too careful in such matters." + +After that, when the man who had been a coyote and his wife visited the +campoodie, they turned out of the stony wash before they reached the +wickiup, and came in to the camp by another trail. But I have not heard +whether the Weaving Woman noticed it. + + + + +THE CHEERFUL GLACIER + + +Very many years ago, at the foot of a nameless peak between Mount Ritter +and Togobah, after three successive years of deep snow there was a +glacier born. It crept out fanwise from a furrow on the mountain-side, +very high up, above the limit of the white-barked pines, and its upper +end was lost under the drift of loose snow that trailed down the slope. +For three successive winters the gray veil of storms hung month-long +about the crest of the Sierras, while the snow came falling, falling, +and the wind kept heaping, heaping, until the drifts sagged and slipped +of their own weight down the long groove of the mountain; and since it +lay on the sunless northern slope, and as it happened the summers that +came between fell cool and rainy, there, when the spring thaw had +cleared the loose snow, spread out on a little stony flat lay the rim of +the glacier. Yet it was a very little one, a rod or two of clear +shining ice that ran into deep blue and gray sludge under a drift of +coarse, whitish granules, and very high up, fine dry particles of snow +like powdered glass. So it lay at the time of year when the mountain +sheep began to come back to their summer feeding-grounds. + +When the thaw had cleared the heather and warmed the lichened rocks, +they loosed their hold of the ice, and the great weight of it began to +crawl down the mountain. At the first slow thrill of motion the little +glacier creaked with delight. + +"Ah," it said, "it is evident that I am not a mere snow bank, for in +that case I should remain in one place. Now I know myself truly a +glacier." For up to that time it had been in some doubt. + +By the end of the summer it had advanced more than a span in the shadow +of the peak. Then the snows began, deep and heavy, but the glacier did +not complain; it hugged the floor of the rift where it lay, and thought +of the time when it should start on its travels again. So, because of +thinking about it so much, or because the snows were deeper and the +summers not so warm, the glacier increased and went forward until it had +quite crossed the stony flat, and began to believe it might make its +mark in the world. There were any number of reasons for thinking so. To +begin with, all that neighborhood was deeply scarred and scoured by the +trail of old glaciers, and the high peaks glittered with the keen polish +of ice floes. All down the slope shone glassy bosses of clear granite +succeeding to beds of cassiope and blue heather, polished slips of +granite, pentstemon and more heather, smooth granite that the feet could +take no hold upon, then saxifrage and meadowsweet, and so down to the +stream border, where the water quarreled with the stones. And by the +time the little glacier had settled that it would leave such a mark on +the mountain-side, shining and softened by small blossomy things, it had +come quite to the farthest border of the flat, and looked over the edge +of a sharp descent. It was much too far to bend over, for though the +glacier was all of brittle ice, it could bend a little. + +"But it is really nothing," said the glacier. "I have only to grind down +the cliff until it is the proper height;" and it took a firmer hold on +the sharp fragments of stones it had gathered on its way down the +ravine. The pressure of the sodden snow above kept on, however, and +before the glacier had fairly begun its grinding the ice rim was pushed +out beyond the bluff, broke off, and lay at the foot in a shining heap. + +"So much the better," said the cheerful glacier. "What with grinding +above and filling with broken ice below, the work will be accomplished +in half the time." + +But that never really happened, for this was the last season the ice +reached to the far edge of the flat. The next year there was less snow +and more sun. The long slope of bare rocks gathered up the heat and held +it so that the ice began to melt underneath, and a stream ran from it +and fell over the cliff in a fine silvery veil. + +"How very fortunate," said the glacier, "to become the head of a river +so early in my career. Besides, this is a much easier way of getting +over the falls." + +Then the water began to purr in sheer content where it went among the +stones; it increased and went down the canyon toward the white torrent of +the creek that flowed from Togobah, and the next summer a water ousel +found it. She came whirling up the course of the stream like a thrown +pebble, plump and slaty blue, scattering a spray of sound as clear and +round as the trickle of ice water that went over the falls. The ousel +sat on the edge of the ice rim to finish her song, and it timed with the +running of the stream. + +"You should understand," said the glacier, "that I started in life with +the intention of cutting my way down the mountain. But now I am become a +river I am quite as well pleased." + +"Everything is the best," said the ousel; "that has been the motto of my +family for a long time, and I am sure I have proved it." And if one +listened close as she flew in and out of the falls and sought in the +white torrent for her food, one understood that it was the burden of her +song. "Everything is the best," she sang, and kept on singing it when +the glacier had grown so small by running that it was quite hollowed out +under the roof of granulated snow, and the light came through it softly +and wonderfully blue. Then the ousel would go far up into this ice cave +until the sound of her singing came out wild and sweet, mixed with the +water and the tinkle of the ice. As for the words of her song, the +glacier never disagreed with her, though by now it had retreated clear +across its stony flat. But the wind brought in the seeds of dwarf willow +that sprouted and took root, and bright little buttercups began to come +up and shiver in the flood of ice water. + +"It seems I am to have a meadow of my own," said the glacier, by the +time there was stone-crop and purple pentstemon blowing in the damp +crevices about its border. "I do not believe there is a prettier ice +garden on this side of the mountain. And to think that all I once +wished was to leave a track of bare and shining stones! The ousel is +right, everything is for the best." + +The ousel always went downstream at the beginning of the winter, when +the running waters were shut under snow bridges and the pools were +puddles of gray sludge, down and down to the foothill borders, and at +the turn of the year followed up again in the wake of the thaw. So it +was not often that the ousel and the glacier saw each other between +October and June. + +"But of course," said the glacier, "the longer you are away, the more we +have to say to each other when you come." + +"And anyway it cannot be helped," said the ousel. For though she did not +mind the storms and cold weather, one cannot really exist without +eating. + +After one of these winter trips, the ousel noticed that the stream that +came over the fall had quite failed, ran only a slender trickle that +dripped among the shivering fern and was lost in the rock crevices, and +though she was such a cheerful little body, she did not like to be the +first to speak of it. It seemed as if the glacier could not last much +longer at that rate. So she flitted about in the lace-work caverns of +the ice, and sang airily and sweet, and the words of her song were what +they had always been. + +"That is quite true," said the glacier. "You see how it is with me; once +I was very proud to run over the fall with a splashing sound, but now I +find it better to keep all the water for my meadow." + +In fact, there was quite a border of sod all about where the ice had +been, and a great mat of white-belled cassiope in the middle. It grew +greener and more blossomy every year. The ousel grew so used to finding +it there, and so pleased with the society of the glacier, which was +quite after her own heart, that it was a great grief to her as she came +whirling up the stream in the flood tide of the year to find that they +had both, the meadow and the ice, wholly disappeared. + +That had been a winter of long, thunderous storms, and a great splinter +of granite had fallen away from the mountain peaks and slid down in a +heap of rubble over the place where the glacier had been. There was now +no trace of it under sharp, broken stones. + +But because they had been friends, the ousel could not keep quite away +from the place, but came again and again and flew chirruping around the +foot of the hill. One of those days when the sun was strong and the +heather white on the wild headlands, she saw a slender rill of water +creeping out at the bottom of the rubbish heap, and knew at once by the +cheerful sound of it that it must be her friend the glacier, or what was +left of it. + +"Yes, indeed," bubbled the spring, "it is really surprising what good +luck I have. As a glacier, I suppose I should have quite melted away in +a few summers; but with all this protection of loose stones, I shouldn't +wonder if I became a perennial spring." + +And in fact that is exactly what occurred, for with the snow that sifted +down between the broken boulders, and the snow water that collected in +the hollow where the meadow had been, the spring has never gone quite +dry. Every summer, when the heather and pentstemon and saxifrage on the +glacier slip are at their best, the cheerful water comes out of the foot +of the nameless peak and the ousel comes up from the white torrent and +sits upon the stones. Then they sing together, and their voices blend +perfectly; but if you listen carefully, you will observe that the words +of their song are always the same. + + + + +THE MERRY-GO-ROUND + + +The Basket Woman was washing for the homesteader's wife at the spring, +and Alan, by this time very good friends with her, was pulling up +sagebrush for the fire, when the coyote came by. It was a clear, wide +morning, warm and sweet, with gusty flaws of cooler air moving down from +Pine Mountain. There was a lake of purple lupins in the swale, and the +last faint flush of wild almonds burning on the slope. The grapevines at +the spring were full of bloom and tender leaf. Eastward, above the high +tilted mesa under the open sky, the buzzards were making a +merry-go-round. That was the way Alan always thought of their +performance when he saw them circling slantwise under the sun. Round and +round they went, now so low that he could see how the shabby wing +feathers frayed out at the edges, now so high that they became mere +specks against the sky. + +"What makes them go round and round?" asked Alan of the mahala. + +"They go about to wait for their dinner, but the table is not yet +spread," said she. The Basket Woman did not use quite such good English; +but though Alan understood her broken talk, you probably would not. The +little boy could not imagine, though he tried, what a buzzard's dinner +might be like. The high mesa, with the water of mirage rolling over it, +was a kind of enchanted land to him where almost anything might happen. +He would lie contentedly for hours with his head pillowed on the +hillocks of blown sand about the roots of the sage, and look up at the +merry-go-round. He noticed that, although others joined them from the +invisible upper sky, none ever seemed to go away, but hung and circled +and faded into the thin blue deeps of air. Often he saw them settle +flockwise below the rim of the mesa and beyond his sight, wondering +greatly what they might be about. + +The morning at the spring he watched them in the intervals of tending +the sagebrush fire, and then it was that the coyote came by, going in +that direction. His head was cocked to one side, and he seemed to watch +the merry-go-round out of the corner of his eye as he went. + +Alan thought the little gray beast had not seen them at the spring, but +in that he was mistaken. A quarter of an hour before, as he came up out +of the gully that hid his lair, the coyote had sighted the boy and the +Basket Woman and made sure in his own mind that they had no gun. So, as +it lay in his way, he came quite close to them; opposite the spring he +paused a moment with one foot lifted, and eyed them with a wise and +secret look. He went on toward the mesa, stopped again, looked back and +then up at the whirling buzzards, and went on again. + +"Where does that one go?" asked Alan. + +"Eh," said the Basket Woman, "he goes also to the dinner. It is good +eating they have out there on the mesa together." + +Alan looked after him, and the coyote paused and looked back over his +shoulder as one who expects to be followed, and quite suddenly it came +into the boy's mind to go up on the mesa and see what it was all about. +The Basket Woman was bent above her tubs and did not see him go; when +she missed him she supposed he had gone back to the house. Alan trotted +on after the coyote until he lost him in a sunken place full of boulders +and black sage; but he had been headed still toward that spot above +which the black wings beat dizzily, and that way Alan went, climbing by +the help of stout shrubs to the mesa, which here fell off steeply to the +valley, and then on until he saw his coyote or another one, going +steadily toward the merry-go-round. + +The mesa was very warm, and swam in misty blueness although the day was +clear. Dim shapes of mountains stood up on the far edge, and near by a +procession of lonely, low hills rounded like the backs of dolphins +appearing out of the sea. Stubby shrubs as tall as Alan's shoulder +covered the mesa sparingly, and in wide spaces there were beds of +yellow-flowered prickly-pear; singly and far stood up tall stems of +white-belled yucca, called in that country Candles of Our Lord. Alan +could not follow the coyote close among the scrub, but dropped presently +into a cattle trail that ran toward the place where he supposed the +coyote's dinner must be, and so trudged on in it while the sun wheeled +high in the heavens and the whole air of the mesa quivered with the +heat. + +It is certain that in his wanderings Alan must have traveled that day +and the next as much as twenty miles from the spring, though he might +easily have been lost in less time, for his head hardly came above the +tops of the scrub, and there were no landmarks to guide by, other than +the low hills which seemed to alter nothing whichever way one looked at +them. As for the buzzards, they rose higher and higher into the dim, +quivering air. Alan began to be thirsty, next tired, and then hungry. He +tried to turn toward home, but got no nearer, and finally understood +that he might be lost, so he ran about wildly for a time, which made +matters no better. He began to cry and to run eagerly at the same time +until, blind and breathless, he would fall and lie sobbing, and wish +that he might see his mother or the Basket Woman come walking across the +mesa with her basket on her back. By this time it was hot and close and +he had come where the scant-leaved shrubs were far between, and with +heat and running the tears were dried out of him. He sobbed in his +breath and his lips were cracked and dry. It fell cooler as night drew +on, but he grew sick with hunger, and shuddered with the fear of +darkness. Far off across the mesa the coyotes began to howl. + +Down in the homesteader's cabin nobody slept that night. When they first +missed Alan, which was at noon, no one had the least idea where he was. +His mother had supposed him at the spring, and the Basket Woman thought +he had gone to his mother. It was all open ground about the cabin from +the mesa and the foot of the hills, and below it toward the valley bare +stretches of moon-white sands. + +The homesteader thought that the boy might have gone to the campoodie; +but there they found he had not been, and none of the Indians had seen +him; but by three of the clock they were all out beating about the +spring to pick up the light trail of his feet, and there they were when +the quick dark came on and stopped them. + +By the earliest light of the next morning the Basket Woman, who was +really very fond of him, had come out of her hut to ask for news, but +when she had looked up to the sky for a token of what the day was to be, +she saw the buzzards come slantwise out of space and begin the +merry-go-round. All at once she remembered Alan's question of the day +before, and though she could not reasonably expect any one to take any +notice of it, an idea came into her head and a gleam into her beady +eyes. She caught her pony from the corral, riding him astride as Indian +women ride, with the wicker water bottle slung across her shoulder and a +parcel of food hid in her bosom. She went up the mesa rim toward the +spot where the buzzards swung circling in the sky. + +When Alan awoke that morning under the creosote bush, he thought he +must have come nearly to the place he had meant to find the day before. +There was the coyote skulking out in the cactus scrub, and the buzzards +wheeling low and large. It was a hot, smoky morning, the soil was all of +coarse gravel, loose and white. Over to the right of him lay a still +blue pool, and a broad river flowed into it in soft billows without +sound. The coyote went toward it, looking back over his shoulder, and +Allan followed, for his tongue was swollen in his mouth with thirst. The +little boy was quite clear in his mind; he knew that he was lost, that +he was very hungry, and that it was necessary to find his father and +mother very soon. As he had come toward the mountains the day before, he +thought that he should start directly away from them. He thought he +could not be far from the campoodie, for it came to him dimly that he +had heard the Indians singing the coyote song in the night, but he meant +to have a drink in the soft still billows of the stream. A little ahead +of him the coyote seemed to have gone into it, his head just cleared +the surface, and the water heaved to the movements of his shoulders. But +somehow Alan got no nearer to it. The stream seemed to loop and curve +away from him, and presently he saw the lake behind him and could not +think how that could be, for he did not understand that it was a lake +and river of mirage. He saw the trees stand up on its borders, and +fancied that the air which came from it was moist and cool. Always the +coyote went before and showed him the way, and at last he lifted up his +long thin muzzle and made a doleful cry. Mostly it seemed to Alan that +the coyotes howled like dogs, but a little crazily; now it appeared that +this one spoke in words that he could understand. When he told his +mother of it afterwards, she said it was only the fever of his thirst +and fatigue, but the Basket Woman believed him. + +"Ho, ho!" cried the coyote, "come, come, my brothers, to the hunting! +Come!" + +A great black shadow of wings fell over them and a voice cried huskily, +"What of the quarry?" + +"The quarry is close at hand," said the coyote, and Alan wondered +dizzily what they might be talking about. He could not look up, for his +eyes were nearly blinded by the light that beat up from the sand, but he +saw wing shadows thickening on the ground. + +"Where do you go now?" cried the voice in the upper air. + +"Round and about to the false water until he is very weary," said the +coyote; and it seemed to Alan that he must follow where the gray dog +went in a maze of moving shadows. He trembled and fell from weakness a +great many times and lay with his face in the shelter of the prickle +bushes, but always he got up and went on again. + +"Have a care," cried the voice in the air, "here comes one of his own +kind." + +"What and where?" said the coyote. + +"It is a brown one riding on a horse; she comes up from the gully of big +rocks." + +"Does she follow a trail?" panted the coyote. + +"She follows no trail, but rides fast in this direction," croaked the +voice, but Alan took no interest in it. He did not know that it was the +Basket Woman coming to rescue him. He thought of the merry-go-round, for +he saw that he had come back to the creosote bush where he had spent the +night, and he thought the earth had come round with him, for it rocked +and reeled as he went. His tongue hung out of his mouth and his lips +cracked and bled, his feet were blistered and aching from the sharp +rocks, the hot sands, and cactus thorns. Round and round with him went +scrub and sand, on one side the shadow of black wings, and on the other +the smooth flow of mirage water which he might never reach. Through it +all he could hear the soft _biff, biff_ of the broad wings and the long, +hungry, whining howl that seemed to detach itself from any throat and +come upon him from all quarters of the quivering air. Dizzily went the +merry-go-round, and now it seemed that the false water swung nearer, +that it went around with him, that it bore him up, for he no longer felt +the earth under him, that it buoyed and floated him far out from the +place where he had been, that it grew deliciously cool at last, that it +laved his face and flowed in his parched throat; and at last he opened +his eyes and found the Basket Woman trickling water in his mouth from +her wicker water bottle. It was noon of his second day from home when +she found him on Cactus Flat, by going straight to the point where she +saw the black wings hanging in the air. She laid him on the horse before +her and dripped water in his mouth and coaxed and called to him, but +never left off riding nor halted until she came up with others of the +search party who had followed up by the place where Alan had climbed to +the mesa, and followed slowly by a faint trail. But to Alan it was all +as if he had dreamed that the Basket Woman had brought him as before +from the valley of Corn Water. The first that he realized was that his +father had him, and that his mother was crying and kissing the Basket +Woman. It was several days before he was able to be about again, and +then only under promise that he would go no farther than the spring. +The first thing he saw when he looked up was the buzzards high up over +the mesa making a merry-go-round in the clear blue, and it was then he +remembered that he had not yet found out what it was all about. + + + + +THE CHRISTMAS TREE + + +Eastward from the Sierras rises a strong red hill known as Pine +Mountain, though the Indians call it The Hill of Summer Snow. At its +foot stands a town of a hundred board houses, given over wholly to the +business of mining. The noise of it goes on by day and night,--the creak +of the windlasses, the growl of the stamps in the mill, the clank of the +cars running down to the dump, and from the open doors of the drinking +saloons, great gusts of laughter and the sound of singing. Billows of +smoke roll up from the tall stacks and by night are lit ruddily by the +smelter fires all going at a roaring blast. + +Whenever the charcoal-burner's son looked down on the red smoke, the +glare, and the hot breath of the furnaces, it seemed to him like an +exhalation from the wickedness that went on continually in the town; +though all he knew of wickedness was the word, a rumor from passers-by, +and a kind of childish fear. The charcoal-burner's cabin stood on a spur +of Pine Mountain two thousand feet above the town, and sometimes the boy +went down to it on the back of the laden burros when his father carried +charcoal to the furnaces. All else that he knew were the wild creatures +of the mountain, the trees, the storms, the small flowering things, and +away at the back of his heart a pale memory of his mother like the faint +forest odor that clung to the black embers of the pine. They had lived +in the town when the mother was alive and the father worked in the +mines. There were not many women or children in the town at that time, +but mining men jostling with rude quick ways; and the young mother was +not happy. + +"Never let my boy grow up in such a place," she said as she lay dying; +and when they had buried her in the coarse shallow soil, her husband +looked for comfort up toward The Hill of Summer Snow shining purely, +clear white and quiet in the sun. It swam in the upper air above the +sooty reek of the town and seemed as if it called. Then he took the +young child up to the mountain, built a cabin under the tamarack pines, +and a pit for burning charcoal for the furnace fires. + +No one could wish for a better place for a boy to grow up in than the +slope of Pine Mountain. There was the drip of pine balm and a wind like +wine, white water in the springs, and as much room for roaming as one +desired. The charcoal-burner's son chose to go far, coming back with +sheaves of strange bloom from the edge of snow banks on the high ridges, +bright spar or peacock-painted ores, hatfuls of berries, or strings of +shining trout. He played away whole mornings in glacier meadows where he +heard the eagle scream; walking sometimes in a mist of cloud he came +upon deer feeding, or waked them from their lair in the deep fern. On +snow-shoes in winter he went over the deep drifts and spied among the +pine tops on the sparrows, the grouse, and the chilly robins wintering +under the green tents. The deep snow lifted him up and held him among +the second stories of the trees. But that was not until he was a great +lad, straight and springy as a young fir. As a little fellow he spent +his days at the end of a long rope staked to a pine just out of reach of +the choppers and the charcoal-pits. When he was able to go about alone, +his father made him give three promises: never to follow a bear's trail +nor meddle with the cubs, never to try to climb the eagle rocks after +the young eagles, never to lie down nor to sleep on the sunny, south +slope where the rattlesnakes frequented. After that he was free of the +whole wood. + +When Mathew, for so the boy was called, was ten years old, he began to +be of use about the charcoal-pits, to mark the trees for cutting, to +sack the coals, to keep the house, and cook his father's meals. He had +no companions of his own age nor wanted any, for at this time he loved +the silver firs. A group of them grew in a swale below the cabin, tall +and fine; the earth under them was slippery and brown with needles. +Where they stood close together with overlapping boughs the light among +the tops was golden green, but between the naked boles it was a vapor +thin and blue. These were the old trees that had wagged their tops +together for three hundred years. Around them stood a ring of saplings +and seedlings scattered there by the parent firs, and a little apart +from these was the one that Mathew loved. It was slender of trunk and +silvery white, the branches spread out fanwise to the outline of a +perfect spire. In the spring, when the young growth covered it as with a +gossamer web, it gave out a pleasant odor, and it was to him like the +memory of what his mother had been. Then he garlanded it with flowers +and hung streamers of white clematis all heavy with bloom upon its +boughs. He brought it berries in cups of bark and sweet water from the +spring; always as long as he knew it, it seemed to him that the fir tree +had a soul. + +The first trip he had ever made on snow-shoes was to see how it fared +among the drifts. That was always a great day when he could find the +slender cross of its topmost bough above the snow. The fir was not very +tall in those days, but the snows as far down on the slope as the +charcoal-burner's cabin lay shallowly. There was a time when Mathew +expected to be as tall as the fir, but after a while the boy did not +grow so fast and the fir kept on adding its whorl of young branches +every year. + +Mathew told it all his thoughts. When at times there was a heaviness in +his breast which was really a longing for his mother, though he did not +understand it, he would part the low spreading branches and creep up to +the slender trunk of the fir. Then he would put his arms around it and +be quiet for a long beautiful time. The tree had its own way of +comforting him; the branches swept the ground and shut him in dark and +close. He made a little cairn of stones under it and kept his treasures +there. + +Often as he sat snuggled up to the heart of the tree, the boy would slip +his hand over the smooth intervals between the whorls of boughs, and +wonder how they knew the way to grow. All the fir trees are alike in +this, that they throw out their branches from the main stem like the +rays of a star, one added to another with the season's growth. They +stand out stiffly from the trunk, and the shape of each new bough in the +beginning and the shape of the last growing twig when they have spread +out broadly with many branchlets, bending with the weight of their own +needles, is the shape of a cross; and the topmost sprig that rises above +all the star-built whorls is a long and slender cross, until by the +springing of new branches it becomes a star. So the two forms go on +running into and repeating each other, and each star is like all the +stars, and every bough is another's twin. It is this trim and certain +growth that sets out the fir from all the mountain trees, and gives to +the young saplings a secret look as they stand straight and stiffly +among the wild brambles on the hill. For the wood delights to grow +abroad at all points, and one might search a summer long without finding +two leaves of the oak alike, or any two trumpets of the spangled +mimulus. So, as at that time he had nothing better worth studying +about, Mathew noticed and pondered the secret of the silver fir, and +grew up with it until he was twelve years old and tall and strong for +his age. By this time the charcoal-burner began to be troubled about the +boy's schooling. + +Meantime there was rioting and noise and coming and going of strangers +in the town at the foot of Pine Mountain, and the furnace blast went on +ruddily and smokily. Because of the things he heard Mathew was afraid, +and on rare occasions when he went down to it he sat quietly among the +charcoal sacks, and would not go far away from them except when he held +his father by the hand. After a time it seemed life went more quietly +there, flowers began to grow in the yards of the houses, and they met +children walking in the streets with books upon their arms. + +"Where are they going, father?" said the boy. + +"To school," said the charcoal-burner. + +"And may I go?" asked Mathew. + +"Not yet, my son." + +But one day his father pointed out the foundations of a new building +going up in the town. + +"It is a church," he said, "and when that is finished it will be a sign +that there will be women here like your mother, and then you may go to +school." + +Mathew ran and told the fir tree all about it. + +"But I will never forget you, never," he cried, and he kissed the trunk. +Day by day, from the spur of the mountain, he watched the church +building, and it was wonderful how much he could see in that clear, thin +atmosphere; no other building in town interested him so much. He saw the +walls go up and the roof, and the spire rise skyward with something that +glittered twinkling on its top. Then they painted the church white and +hung a bell in the tower. Mathew fancied he could hear it of Sundays as +he saw the people moving along like specks in the streets. + +"Next week," said the father, "the school begins, and it is time for you +to go as I promised. I will come to see you once a month, and when the +term is over you shall come back to the mountain." Mathew said good-by +to the fir tree, and there were tears in his eyes though he was happy. +"I shall think of you very often," he said, "and wonder how you are +getting along. When I come back I will tell you everything that happens. +I will go to church, and I am sure I shall like that. It has a cross on +top like yours, only it is yellow and shines. Perhaps when I am gone I +shall learn why you carry a cross, also." Then he went a little timidly, +holding fast by his father's hand. + +There were so many people in the town that it was quite as strange and +fearful to him as it would be to you who have grown up in town to be +left alone in the wood. At night, when he saw the charcoal-burner's +fires glowing up in the air where the bulk of the mountain melted into +the dark, he would cry a little under the blankets, but after he began +to learn, there was no more occasion for crying. It was to the child as +though there had been a candle lighted in a dark room. On Sunday he +went to the church and then it was both light and music, for he heard +the minister read about God in the great book and believed it all, for +everything that happens in the woods is true, and people who grow up in +it are best at believing. Mathew thought it was all as the minister +said, that there is nothing better than pleasing God. Then when he lay +awake at night he would try to think how it would have been with him if +he had never come to this place. In his heart he began to be afraid of +the time when he would have to go back to the mountain, where there was +no one to tell him about this most important thing in the world, for his +father never talked to him of these things. It preyed upon his mind, but +if any one noticed it, they thought that he pined for his father and +wished himself at home. + +It drew toward midwinter, and the white cap on The Hill of Summer Snow, +which never quite melted even in the warmest weather, began to spread +downward until it reached the charcoal-burner's home. There was a great +stir and excitement among the children, for it had been decided to have +a Christmas tree in the church. Every Sunday now the Christ-child story +was told over and grew near and brighter like the Christmas star. Mathew +had not known about it before, except that on a certain day in the year +his father had bought him toys. He had supposed that it was because it +was stormy and he had to be indoors. Now he was wrapped up in the story +of love and sacrifice, and felt his heart grow larger as he breathed it +in, looking upon clear windless nights to see if he might discern the +Star of Bethlehem rising over Pine Mountain and the Christ-child come +walking on the snow. It was not that he really expected it, but that the +story was so alive in him. It is easy for those who have lived long in +the high mountains to believe in beautiful things. Mathew wished in his +heart that he might never go away from this place. He sat in his seat in +church, and all that the minister said sank deeply into his mind. + +When it came time to decide about the tree, because Mathew's father was +a charcoal-burner and knew where the best trees grew, it was quite +natural to ask him to furnish the tree for his part. Mathew fairly +glowed with delight, and his father was pleased, too, for he liked to +have his son noticed. The Saturday before Christmas, which fell on +Tuesday that year, was the time set for going for the tree, and by that +time Mathew had quite settled in his mind that it should be his silver +fir. He did not know how otherwise he could bring the tree to share in +his new delight, nor what else he had worth giving, for he quite +believed what he had been told, that it is only through giving the best +beloved that one comes to the heart's desire. With all his heart Mathew +wished never to live in any place where he might not hear about God. So +when his father was ready with the ropes and the sharpened axe, the boy +led the way to the silver firs. + +"Why, that is a little beauty," said the charcoal-burner, "and just the +right size." + +They were obliged to shovel away the snow to get at it for cutting, and +Mathew turned away his face when the chips began to fly. The tree fell +upon its side with a shuddering sigh; little beads of clear resin stood +out about the scar of the axe. It seemed as if the tree wept. But how +graceful and trim it looked when it stood in the church waiting for +gifts! Mathew hoped that it would understand. + +The charcoal-burner came to church on Christmas eve, the first time in +many years. It makes a difference about these things when you have a son +to take part in them. The church and the tree were alight with candles; +to the boy it seemed like what he supposed the place of dreams might be. +One large candle burned on the top of the tree and threw out pointed +rays like a star; it made the charcoal-burner's son think of Bethlehem. +Then he heard the minister talking, and it was all of a cross and a +star; but Mathew could only look at the tree, for he saw that it +trembled, and he felt that he had betrayed it. Then the choir began to +sing, and the candle on top of the tree burned down quite low, and +Mathew saw the slender cross of the topmost bough stand up dark before +it. Suddenly he remembered his old puzzle about it, how the smallest +twigs were divided off in each in the shape of a cross, how the boughs +repeated the star form every year, and what was true of his fir was true +of them all. Then it must have been that there were tears in his eyes, +for he could not see plainly: the pillars of the church spread upward +like the shafts of the trees, and the organ playing was like the sound +of the wind in their branches, and the stately star-built firs rose up +like spires, taller than the church tower, each with a cross on top. The +sapling which was still before him trembled more, moving its boughs as +if it spoke; and the boy heard it in his heart and believed, for it +spoke to him of God. Then all the fear went out of his heart and he had +no more dread of going back to the mountain to spend his days, for now +he knew that he need never be away from the green reminder of hope and +sacrifice in the star and the cross of the silver fir; and the thought +broadened in his mind that he might find more in the forest than he had +ever thought to find, now that he knew what to look for, since +everything speaks of God in its own way and it is only a matter of +understanding how. + +It was very gay in the little church that Christmas night, with laughter +and bonbons flying about, and every child had a package of candy and an +armful of gifts. The charcoal-burner had his pockets bulging full of +toys, and Mathew's eyes glowed like the banked fires of the +charcoal-pits as they walked home in the keen, windless night. + +"Well, my boy," said the charcoal-burner, "I am afraid you will not be +wanting to go back to the mountain with me after this." + +"Oh, yes, I will," said Mathew happily, "for I think the mountains know +quite as much of the important things as they know here in the town." + +"Right you are," said the charcoal-burner, as he clapped his boy's hand +between both his own, "and I am pleased to think you have turned out +such a sensible little fellow." But he really did not know all that was +in his son's heart. + + + + +THE FIRE BRINGER + + +This is one of the stories that Alan had from the Basket Woman after she +came to understand that the boy really loved her tales and believed +them. She would sit by the spring with her hands clasped across her +knees while the clothes boiled and Alan fed the fire with broken brush, +and tell him wonder stories as long as the time allowed, which was never +so long as the boy liked to hear them. The story of the Fire Bringer +gave him the greatest delight, and he made a game of it to play with +little Indian boys from the campoodie who sometimes strayed in the +direction of the homesteader's cabin. It was the story that came +oftenest to his mind when he lay in his bed at night, and saw the stars +in the windy sky shine through the cabin window. + +He heard of it so often and thought of it so much that at last it seemed +to him that he had been part of the story himself, but his mother said +he must have dreamed it. The experience came to him in this way: He had +gone with his father to the mountains for a load of wood, a two days' +journey from home, and they had taken their blankets to sleep upon the +ground, which was the first time of Alan's doing so. It was the time of +year when white gilias, which the children call "evening snow," were in +bloom, and their musky scent was mingled with the warm air in the soft +dark all about him. + +He heard the camp-fire snap and whisper, and saw the flicker of it +brighten and die on the lower branches of the pines. He looked up and +saw the stars in the deep velvet void, and now and then one fell from +it, trailing all across the sky. Small winds moved in the tops of the +sage and trod lightly in the dark, blossomy grass. Near by them ran a +flooding creek, the sound of it among the stones like low-toned, +cheerful talk. Familiar voices seemed to rise through it and approach +distinctness. The boy lay in his blanket harking to one recurring note, +until quite suddenly it separated itself from the babble and called to +him in the Basket Woman's voice. He was sure it was she who spoke his +name, though he could not see her; and got up on his feet at once. He +knew, too, that he was Alan, and yet it seemed, without seeming strange, +that he was the boy of the story who was afterward to be called the Fire +Bringer. The skin of his body was dark and shining, with straight, black +locks cropped at his shoulders, and he wore no clothing but a scrap of +deerskin belted with a wisp of bark. He ran free on the mesa and +mountain where he would, and carried in his hand a cleft stick that had +a longish rounded stone caught in the cleft and held by strips of skin. +By this he knew he had waked up into the time of which the Basket Woman +had told him, before fire was brought to the tribes, when men and beasts +talked together with understanding, and the Coyote was the Friend and +Counselor of man. They ranged together by wood and open swale, the boy +who was to be called Fire Bringer and the keen, gray dog of the +wilderness, and saw the tribesmen catching fish in the creeks with their +hands and the women digging roots with sharp stones. This they did in +summer and fared well, but when winter came they ran nakedly in the snow +or huddled in caves of the rocks and were very miserable. When the boy +saw this he was very unhappy, and brooded over it until the Coyote +noticed it. + +"It is because my people suffer and have no way to escape the cold," +said the boy. + +"I do not feel it," said the Coyote. + +"That is because of your coat of good fur, which my people have not, +except they take it in the chase, and it is hard to come by." + +"Let them run about, then," said the Counselor, "and keep warm." + +"They run till they are weary," said the boy, "and there are the young +children and the very old. Is there no way for them?" + +"Come," said the Coyote, "let us go to the hunt." + +"I will hunt no more," the boy answered him, "until I have found a way +to save my people from the cold. Help me, O Counselor!" + +But the Coyote had run away. After a time he came back and found the boy +still troubled in his mind. + +"There is a way, O Man Friend," said the Coyote, "and you and I must +take it together, but it is very hard." + +"I will not fail of my part," said the boy. + +"We will need a hundred men and women, strong and swift runners." + +"I will find them," the boy insisted, "only tell me." + +"We must go," said the Coyote, "to the Burning Mountain by the Big Water +and bring fire to your people." + +Said the boy, "What is fire?" + +Then the Coyote considered a long time how he should tell the boy what +fire is. "It is," said he, "red like a flower, yet it is no flower; +neither is it a beast, though it runs in the grass and rages in the wood +and devours all. It is very fierce and hurtful and stays not for asking, +yet if it is kept among stones and fed with small sticks, it will serve +the people well and keep them warm." + +"How is it to be come at?" + +"It has its lair in the Burning Mountain, and the Fire Spirits guard it +night and day. It is a hundred days' journey from this place, and +because of the jealousy of the Fire Spirits no man dare go near it. But +I, because all beasts are known to fear it much, may approach it without +hurt and, it may be, bring you a brand from the burning. Then you must +have strong runners for every one of the hundred days to bring it safely +home." + +"I will go and get them," said the boy; but it was not so easily done as +said. Many there were who were slothful and many were afraid, but the +most disbelieved it wholly, for, they said, "How should this boy tell us +of a thing of which we have never heard!" But at the last the boy and +their own misery persuaded them. + +The Coyote advised them how the march should begin. The boy and the +Counselor went foremost, next to them the swiftest runners, with the +others following in the order of their strength and speed. They left the +place of their home and went over the high mountains where great jagged +peaks stand up above the snow, and down the way the streams led through +a long stretch of giant wood where the sombre shade and the sound of the +wind in the branches made them afraid. At nightfall where they rested +one stayed in that place, and the next night another dropped behind, and +so it was at the end of each day's journey. They crossed a great plain +where waters of mirage rolled over a cracked and parching earth and the +rim of the world was hidden in a bluish mist; so they came at last to +another range of hills, not so high but tumbled thickly together, and +beyond these, at the end of the hundred days, to the Big Water quaking +along the sand at the foot of the Burning Mountain. + +It stood up in a high and peaked cone, and the smoke of its burning +rolled out and broke along the sky. By night the glare of it reddened +the waves far out on the Big Water when the Fire Spirits began their +dance. + +Then said the Counselor to the boy who was soon to be called the Fire +Bringer, "Do you stay here until I bring you a brand from the burning; +be ready and right for running, and lose no time, for I shall be far +spent when I come again, and the Fire Spirits will pursue me." Then he +went up the mountain, and the Fire Spirits when they saw him come were +laughing and very merry, for his appearance was much against him. Lean +he was, and his coat much the worse for the long way he had come. +Slinking he looked, inconsiderable, scurvy, and mean, as he has always +looked, and it served him as well then as it serves him now. So the Fire +Spirits only laughed, and paid him no farther heed. Along in the night, +when they came out to begin their dance about the mountain, the Coyote +stole the fire and began to run away with it down the slope of the +Burning Mountain. When the Fire Spirits saw what he had done, they +streamed out after him red and angry in pursuit, with a sound like a +swarm of bees. + +The boy saw them come, and stood up in his place clean limbed and taut +for running. He saw the sparks of the brand stream back along the +Coyote's flanks as he carried it in his mouth and stretched forward on +the trail, bright against the dark bulk of the mountain like a falling +star. He heard the singing sound of the Fire Spirits behind and the +labored breath of the Counselor nearing through the dark. Then the good +beast panted down beside him, and the brand dropped from his jaws. The +boy caught it up, standing bent for the running as a bow to speeding the +arrow; out he shot on the homeward path, and the Fire Spirits snapped +and sung behind him. Fast as they pursued he fled faster, until he saw +the next runner stand up in his place to receive the brand. So it passed +from hand to hand, and the Fire Spirits tore after it through the scrub +until they came to the mountains of the snows. These they could not +pass, and the dark, sleek runners with the backward-streaming brand bore +it forward, shining star-like in the night, glowing red through sultry +noons, violet pale in twilight glooms, until they came in safety to +their own land. Here they kept it among stones, and fed it with small +sticks, as the Coyote had advised, until it warmed them and cooked their +food. As for the boy by whom fire came to the tribes, he was called the +Fire Bringer while he lived, and after that, since there was no other +with so good a right to the name, it fell to the Coyote; and this is the +sign that the tale is true, for all along his lean flanks the fur is +singed and yellow as it was by the flames that blew backward from the +brand when he brought it down from the Burning Mountain. As for the +fire, that went on broadening and brightening and giving out a cheery +sound until it broadened into the light of day, and Alan sat up to hear +it crackling under the coffee-pot, where his father was cooking their +breakfast. + + + + +THE CROOKED FIR + + +The pipsissawa, which is sometimes called prince's pine, is half as tall +as the woodchuck that lives under the brown boulder; and the seedling +fir in his first season was as tall as the prince's pine, so for the +time they made the most of each other's company. The woodchuck and the +pipsissawa were never to be any taller, but the silver fir was to keep +on growing as long as he stood in the earth and drew sap. In his second +season, which happened to be a good growing year, the fir was as tall as +the woodchuck and began to look about him. + +The forest of silver firs grew on a hill-slope up from a water-course as +far as the borders of the long-leaved pines. Where the trees stood close +together the earth was brown with the litter of a thousand years, and +little gray hawks hunted in their green, windy glooms. In the open +spaces there were thickets of meadowsweet, fireweed, monkshood, and +columbine, with saplings and seedlings in between. When the fir which +was as tall as the woodchuck had grown a year or two longer, he made a +discovery. All the firs on the hill-slope were crooked! Their trunks +bulged out at the base toward the downward pitch of the hill; and it is +the proper destiny of fir trees to be straight. + +"They should be straight," said the seedling fir. "I feel it in my +fibres that a fir tree should be straight." He looked up at the fir +mother very far above him on her way to the sky, with the sun and the +wind in her star-built boughs. + +"I shall be straight," said the seedling fir. + +"Ah, do not be too sure of it," said the fir mother. But for all that +the seedling fir was very sure, and when the snow tucked him in for the +winter he took a long time to think about it. The snows are wonderfully +deep in the canyon of the silver firs. From where they gather in the +upper air the fir mother shakes them lightly down, packing so softly +and so warm that the seedlings and the pipsissawas do not mind. + +About the time the fir had grown tall enough to be called a sapling he +made another discovery. The fir mother had also a crooked trunk. The +sapling was greatly shocked; he hardly liked to speak of it to the fir +mother. He remembered his old friend the pipsissawa, but he had so +outgrown her that there was really no comfort in trying to make himself +understood, so he spoke to the woodchuck. The woodchuck was no taller +than he used to be, but when he climbed up on the brown boulder above +his house he was on a level with the sapling fir, and though he was not +much of a talker he was a great thinker and had opinions. + +"Really," said the fir, "I hardly like to speak of it, but you are such +an old friend; do you see what a crook the fir mother has in her trunk? +We firs you know were intended to be straight." + +"That," said the woodchuck, "is on account of the snow." + +"But, oh, my friend," said the sapling, "you must be mistaken. The snow +is soft and comfortable and braces one up. I ought to know, for I spend +whole winters in it." + +"_Gru-r-ru-_," said the woodchuck crossly; "well for you that you do, or +I should have eaten you off by now." + +After this the little fir kept his thoughts to himself; he was very much +afraid of the woodchuck, and there is nothing a young fir fears so much +as being eaten off before it has a chance to bear cones. But in fact the +woodchuck spent the winter under the snow himself. He went into his +house and shut the door when the first feel of snow was in the air, and +did not come out until green things began to grow in the cleared spaces. + +Not many winters after that the fir was sufficiently tall to hold the +green cross, that all firs bear on their topmost bough, above the snow +most of the winter through. Now he began to learn a great many things. +The first of these was about the woodchuck. + +"Really that fellow is a great braggart," said the fir; "I cannot think +how I came to be afraid of him." + +In those days the sapling saw the deer getting down in the flurry of the +first snows to the feeding grounds on the lower hills, saw the mountain +sheep nodding their great horns serenely in the lee of a tall cliff +through the wildest storms. In the spring he saw the brown bears +shambling up the trails, ripping the bark off of dead trees to get at +the worms and grubs that harbored there; lastly he saw the woodchuck +come out of his hole as if nothing had ever happened. + +And now as the winters came on, the fir began to feel the weight of the +snow. When it was wet and heavy and clung to its branches, the little +fir shivered and moaned. + +"Droop your boughs," creaked the fir mother; "droop them as I do, and +the snow will fall." + +So the sapling drooped his fan-spread branches until they lay close to +the trunk; and the snow wreaths slipped away and piled thickly about his +trunk. But when the snow lay deep over all the slope, it packed and +slid down toward the ravine and pressed strongly against the sapling +fir. + +"Oh, I shall be torn from my roots," he cried; "I shall be broken off." + +"Bend," said the fir mother, "bend, and you will not break." So the +young fir bent before the snow until he was curved like a bow, but when +the spring came and the sap ran in his veins, he straightened his trunk +anew and spread his branches in a star-shaped whorl. + +"After all," said the sapling, "it is not such a great matter to keep +straight; it only requires an effort." + +So he went on drooping and bending to the winter snows, growing strong +and straight with the spring, and rejoicing. About this time the fir +began to feel a tingling in his upper branches. + +"Something is going to happen," he said; something agreeable in fact, +for the tree was fifty years old, and it was time to grow cones. For +fifty years a silver fir has nothing to do but to grow branches, thrown +out in annual circles, every one in the shape of a cross. Then it grows +cones on the topmost whorl, royal purple and burnished gold, erect on +the ends of the branches like Christmas candles. The sapling fir had +only three in his first season of bearing, but he was very proud of +them, for now he was no longer a sapling, but a tree. + +When one has to devote the whole of a long season to growing cones, one +has not much occasion to think of other things. By the time there were +five rows of cone-bearing branches spread out broadly from the silver +fir, the woodchuck made a remark to the pipsissawa which is sometimes +called prince's pine. It was not the same pipsissawa, nor the same +woodchuck, but one of his descendants, and his parents had told him the +whole story. + +"It seems to me," said he, "that the fir tree is not going to be +straight after all. He never seems quite to recover from the winter +snow." + +"Ah," said the pipsissawa, "I have always thought it better to have +your seeds ripe and put away under ground before the snow comes. Then +you do not mind it at all." + +The woodchuck was right about the fir; his trunk was beginning to curve +toward the downward slope of the hill with the weight of the drifts. And +that went on until the curve was quite fixed in the ripened wood, and +the fir tree could not have straightened up if he had wished. But to +tell the truth, the fir tree did not wish. By the end of another fifty +years, when he wagged his high top above the forest gloom, he grew to be +quite proud of it. + +"There is nothing," he said to the sapling firs, "like being able to +endure hard times with a good countenance. I have seen a great deal of +life. There are no such snows now as there used to be. You can see by +the curve of my trunk what a weight I have borne." + +But the young firs did not pay any attention to him. They had made up +their minds to grow up straight. + + + + +THE SUGAR PINE + + +Before the sugar pine came up in the meadow of Bright Water it had swung +a summer long in the burnished cone of the parent tree, until the wind +lifted it softly to the earth where it swelled with the snow water and +the sun, and began to grow into a tree. But it knew nothing whatever of +itself except that it was alive and growing; and in its first season was +hardly so tall as the Little Grass of Parnassus that crowded the sod at +the Bright Water. In fact, it was a number of years before it began to +overtop the meadowsweet, the fireweed, the tall lilies, the monkshood, +and columbine, and under these circumstances it could not be expected to +have much of an opinion of itself. + +During those years the young pine suffered a secret mortification +because it had no flowers. It stood stiff and trimly in its plain dark +green, every needle like every other one, and no honey-gatherer visited +it. When all the meadow ran over with rosy and purple bloom, the pine +tree trembled and beads of clear resin oozed out upon its bark like +tears; and the trouble really seemed worse than it was because everybody +made so much of it. Even the hummingbirds as they came hurtling through +the air would draw back conspicuously when they came to the pine, and +though they said politely, "I beg your pardon, I took you for a flower," +the seedling felt it would have been better had they said nothing at +all. + +"Well, why don't you grow flowers?" said the meadowsweet; "it is easy +enough. Just do as I do," and she spread her drift of blossoms like a +fragrant snow. But the sugar pine found it impossible to be anything but +stiff and plainly green, though every year in the stir and tingle of new +sap he felt a promise of better things. + +"I suppose," he said one day, "I must be in some way different from the +rest of you." + +"Ah, that is the way with you solemn people," said the fireweed, "always +imagining yourself better than those about you to excuse your +disagreeableness. Any one can see by the way you hold yourself that you +have too much of an opinion of yourself." + +The little pine tree sighed; he had not said "better," only "different," +and he began to realize year by year that this was so. + +"You should try to be natural," said the meadowsweet; "do not be so +stiff, and then every one will love you though you are so plain." + +Then the sugar pine reached out and tried to mingle with the flowers, +but the sharp needles tore their frills and the stiff branches did not +suit with their graceful swaying, so he was obliged to give it up. It +seemed, in fact, the more he tried to be like the others the worse he +grew. + +"If only you were not so odd," said all the flowers. None of the young +growing things in the meadow understood that it is natural for a pine +tree to be stiff. + +The sugar pine was not always unhappy. There were days when he caught +golden glints of the stream that ran smoothly about the meadow, in a bed +of leopard-colored stones, and, reflecting all the light that fell into +the hollow of the hills, gave the place its name; days when the air was +warm and the sky was purely blue, and the resinous smell of the pines on +the meadow border came to the seedling like a sweet savor in a dream, +for as yet he did not understand what he was to be. He was pleased just +to be looking at the summer riot of the flowering things, and loved the +cool softness of the snow when he was tucked into comfortable darkness +to dream of the spring odor of the pines. Then, when it seemed that the +meadow had forgotten him, the little tree would fall to thinking the +thoughts proper to his kind, and found the time pass pleasantly. + +"I suppose," he thought, "it is not good for me to flower as the other +plants. If I began like them I should probably end like them, and I feel +that I could not be satisfied with that. After all, one should not try +to be so much like others, but to be the very best of one's own sort." + +Very early the young tree had noticed that he was the only one of all +that company that kept green and growing the winter through. He would +have been secretly very proud of it, but the flowers took good care to +let him know their opinion of such airs. + +"It is simply that you wish to be considered peculiar," said the +columbine; "one sees that you like nothing so much as to be in other +people's mouths, but let me tell you, you will not get yourself any +better liked by such behavior." After that the little tree wished +nothing so much as that he might be the commonest summer-flowering weed. + +"But I am not," he said; "no, I am not, and I would do very well as I am +if they would let me be happy in my own way." + +That summer the seedling grew as tall as the meadowsweet, and could look +across the open space to the parent pine poised on her noble shaft, her +spreading crown gathering sunshine from the draughts of upper air. She +seemed to rock a little as if she dozed upon her feet, and the great +sweep of limbs with pendulous golden cones made a gentle sighing. Then +the despised little seedling felt a thrill go through him, and felt a +shaking in all his slender twigs. He bowed himself among the lilies, and +was both glad and ashamed, for though he could not well believe it, he +knew himself akin to the great sugar pines. After that he gave up trying +to be one of the flowers. Once he even ventured to speak of it to the +meadowsweet. + +"Well, if it is any satisfaction to you to think so; but do not let any +one else hear you say that. You are likely to get yourself +misunderstood. I tell you this because I am your friend," said the +meadowsweet, but really she had misunderstood him herself. + +Then a rumor arose in the neighborhood that the sombre, stubborn shrub +conceited himself to be a pine, and the rumor ran with laughter and +nodding the length of the meadow until it reached the old alder on the +edge of Bright Water. The alder had stood with his feet in the stream +for longer than the meadowsweet could remember, and saw everything that +went on by reflection. + +"Do not laugh too soon," said the alder tree, "I have seen stranger +things than that happen in this meadow," for he was indeed very old. + +"We have known him a good many seasons," said the fireweed, "and he has +not done anything worth mentioning yet." + +All this was very hard for the young pine to bear, but there was better +coming. That summer the forest ranger came riding in Bright Water and a +learned man rode with him, praising the flowers and counting the numbers +and varieties of bloom. How they prinked and flaunted in their pride! + +"That is all very pretty, as you say," answered the ranger as they came +by the place of the pine, "and I suppose they perform a sort of service +in keeping the soil covered, but the trees are the real strength of the +mountain. Ah, here is a seedling of the right sort! I must give that +fellow a chance," and he began pulling up great handfuls of the +blossoming things around the tree. + +"What is it?" asked his companion. + +"A sugar pine," he said; "probably a seedling of that splendid specimen +yonder," and he went on clearing the ground to let in sun and air. + +"But you must admit," said his friend, "that a seedling pine cuts rather +a poor figure among all this flare of bloom." + +"Oh, you wait fifty or sixty years," said the ranger, "and then you will +see what sort of a figure it makes. It really takes a pine of this sort +a couple of hundred years to reach its prime," and they rode talking up +the trail. + +Word of what had happened was carried all about the meadow and made a +great stir. When it came to the alder tree he wagged his old head. "Ah, +well," he said, "I told you so." + +"I will not believe it until I see it," said the fireweed. + +"They might have known it before," sighed the young pine, "and they +ought to be proud to think I grew up in the same meadow with them." + +But they were not; they went on flaunting their blossoms as if nothing +had occurred, and the young tree grew up as he was meant to be, and the +pines on the meadow border sent him greeting on the wind. He still kept +his trim spire-shaped habit, but he could very well put up with that for +the time being. He felt within himself the promise of what he was to be. +After fifty or sixty years, as the ranger had said, he began to put out +strong cone-bearing boughs that shaped themselves by the storms and the +wind in sweeping, graceful lines, and spread out to shelter the horde of +flowering things below. Squirrels ran up the trunk and whistled cheerily +in his windy top. + +"He grew here in our neighborhood," said the tall lilies; "we knew him +when he was a seedling sprig, and now he is the tallest of the pines." + +"Suppose he is," said the fireweed. "What is the good of a pine tree +anyway?" + +But the sugar pine did not hear. He had grown far above the small folk +of the meadow, and went on growing for a hundred years. He gathered the +sun in his high branches and rocked upon his shaft. He talked gently in +his own fashion with his own kind. + + + [Illustration: AN OLD MINE + From photograph by A. A. Forbes] + + + + +THE GOLDEN FORTUNE + + +A little way up from the trail that goes toward Rex Monte, not far from +the limit of deep snows, there is what looks to be a round dark hole in +the side of the mountain. It is really the ruined tunnel of an old mine. +Formerly a house stood on the ore dump at one side of the tunnel, a +little unpainted cabin of pine; but a great avalanche of snow and stones +carried them, both the house and the dump, away. The cabin was built and +owned by a solitary miner called Jerry, and whether he ever had any +other name no one in the town below Kearsarge now remembers. + +Jerry was old and lean, and his hair, which had been dark when he was +young, was now bleached to the color of the iron-rusted rocks about his +mine. For thirty years he had prospected and mined through that country +from Kearsarge to the Coso Hills, but always in the pay of other men, +and at last he had hit upon this ledge on Rex Monte. To all who looked, +it showed a very slender vein between the walls of country rock, and the +ore of so poor a quality that with all his labor he could do no more +than keep alive; but to all who listened, Jerry could tell a remarkable +story of what it had been, and what he expected it to be. Very many +years ago he had discovered it at the end of a long prospect, when he +was tired and quite discouraged for that time. There was not much +passing then on the Rex Monte, and Jerry drew out of the trail here in +the middle of the afternoon to rest in the shadow of a great rock. So +while he lay there very weary, between sleeping and waking, he gazed out +along the ground, which was all strewn with rubble between the stiff, +scant grass. As he looked it seemed that certain bits of broken stone +picked themselves out of the heap, and grew larger, in some way more +conspicuous, until, Jerry averred, they winked at him. Then he reached +out to draw them in with his hand, and saw that they were all +besprinkled with threads and specks of gold. You may guess that Jerry +was glad, then that he sprang up and began to search for more stones, +and so found a trail of them, and followed it through the grass stems +and the heather until he came to the ledge cropping out by a dike of +weathered rocks. And in those days the ledge was ah, so rich! Now it +seemed that Jerry was to have a mine of his own. So he named it the +Golden Fortune, and told no man what he had found, but went down to the +town which lies in a swale at the foot of Kearsarge, and brought back as +much as was needful for working the mine in a simple way. + +It was nearing the end of the summer, when the hills expect the long +thunder and drumming rain, and, not many weeks after that, the quiet +storms that bring the snow. Jerry had enough to do to make all safe and +comfortable at the Golden Fortune before winter set in. It was too steep +here on the hill-slope for the deep snows to trouble him much, so he +built his cabin against the rock, with a covered way from it to the +tunnel of the mine, that he might work on all winter at no unease +because of storms. + +It was perhaps a month later, with Jerry as busy as any of the wild folk +thereabout, and the nights turning off bitter cold with frost. Of +mornings he could hear the thin tinkle of the streams along fringes of +delicate ice. It was the afternoon of a day that fell warm and dry with +a promise of snow in the air. Jerry was roofing in his cabin, so intent +that a voice hailed him before he was aware that there was a man on the +trail. Jerry knew at once by his dress and his speech that he was a +stranger in those parts, and he saw that he was not very well prepared +for the mountain passes and the night. He knew this, I say, with the +back of his mind, but took no note of it, for he was so occupied with +his house and his mine. He suffered a fear to have any man know of his +good fortune lest it should somehow slip away from him. So when the +stranger asked him some questions of the trail, it seemed that what +Jerry most wished was to get rid of him as quickly as possible. He was +a young man, ruddy and blue-eyed, and a foreigner, what was called in +careless miners' talk, "some kind of a Dutchman," and could not make +himself well understood. Jerry gathered that he desired to know if he +were headed right for the trail that went over to the Bighorn Mine, +where he had the promise of work. So they nodded and shrugged, and Jerry +made assurance with his hands, as much as to say, it is no great way; +and when the young man had looked wistfully at the cabin and the boding +sky, he moved slowly up the trail. When he came to the turn where it +goes toward Rex Monte, he lingered on the ridge to wave good-by, so +Jerry waved again, and the man dropped out of sight. At that moment the +sun failed behind a long gray film that deepened and spread over all +that quarter of the sky. + +Jerry had cause to remember the stranger in the night and fret for him, +for the wind came up and began to seek in the canyon, and the snow fell +slanting down. It fell three days and nights. All that while the gray +veil hung about Jerry's house; now and then the wind would scoop a great +lane in it to show how the drifts lay on the heather, then shut in tight +and dim with a soft, weary sound, and Jerry, though he worked on the +Golden Fortune, could not get the young stranger out of his mind. + +When the sun and the frost had made a crust over the snow able to bear +up a man, he went over the Pass to Bighorn to inquire if the stranger +had come in, though he did not tell at that time, nor until long after, +how late it was when the man passed his cabin, how wistfully he turned +away, nor what promise was in the air. The snow lay all about the Pass, +lightly on the pines, deeply in the hollows, so deeply that a man might +lie under it and no one be the wiser. And there it seemed the stranger +must be, for at the Bighorn they had not heard of him, but if he were +under the snow, there he must lie until the spring thaw. Of whatever +happened to him, Jerry saw that he must bear the blame, for, by his own +account, from that day the luck vanished from the Golden Fortune; not +that the ore dwindled or grew less, but there were no more of the golden +specks. With all he could do after that, Jerry could not maintain +himself in the cabin on the slope of Rex Monte. So it came about that +the door was often shut, and the picks rusted in the tunnel of the +Golden Fortune for months together, while Jerry was off earning wages in +more prosperous mines. + +All his days Jerry could not quite get his mind away from the earlier +promise of the mine, and as often as he thought of that he thought of +the stranger whom he had sent over the trail on the evening of the +storm. Gradually it came into his mind in a confused way that the two +things were mysteriously connected, that he had sent away his luck with +the stranger into the deep snow. For certainly Jerry held himself +accountable, and in that country between Kearsarge and the Coso Hills to +be inhospitable is the worst offense. + +Every year or so he came back to the mine to work a little, and +sometimes it seemed to promise better and sometimes not. Finally, Jerry +argued that the luck would not come back to it until he had made good to +some other man the damage he had done to one. This set him looking for +an opportunity. Jerry mentioned his belief so often that he came at +last, as is the way of miners, to accept it as a thing prophesied of old +time. Afterward, when he grew old himself, and came to live out his life +at the Golden Fortune, he would be always looking along the trail at +evening time for passers-by, and never one was allowed to go on who +could by any possibility be persuaded to stay the night in Jerry's +cabin. Often when there was a wind, and the snow came slanting down, +Jerry fancied he heard one shouting in the drift; then he would light a +lantern and sally forth into the storm, peering and crying. + +About that time, when he went down into the town below Kearsarge once in +a month or so for supplies, the people smiled and wagged their heads, +but Jerry conceived that they whispered together about the unkindness +he had done to the stranger so many years gone, and he grew shyer and +went less often among men. So he companioned more with the wild things, +and burrowed deeper into the hill. His cabin weathered to a semblance of +the stones, rabbits ran in and out at the door, and deer drank at his +spring. + +From the slope where the cabin stood, the trail, which led up from the +town, winding with the winding of the canyon, went over the Pass, and so +into a region of high meadows and high, keen peaks, the feeding-ground +of deer and mountain sheep. The ravine of Rex Monte was the easiest +going from the high valleys to the foothills, where all winter the feed +kept green. Every year Jerry marked the trooping of the wild kindred to +the foothill pastures when the snow lay heavily on all the higher land, +and saw their returning when the spring pressed hard upon the borders of +the melting drifts. So, as he grew older and stayed closer by his mine, +Jerry learned to look to the furred and feathered folk for news of how +the seasons fared, and what was doing on the high ridges. When the +grouse and quail went down, it was a sign that the snow had covered the +grass and small seed-bearing herbs; the passing of deer--shapely bulks +in a mist of cloud--was a portent of deep drifts over the buckthorn and +the heather. Lastly, if he saw the light fleeting of the mountain sheep, +he looked for wild and bitter work on the crest of Kearsarge and Rex +Monte. It was mostly at such times that Jerry heard voices in the storm, +and he would go stumbling about with his lantern into the swirl of +falling snow, until the wind that played up and down the great canyon, +like the draughts in a chimney, made his very bones a-cold. Then he +would creep back to drowse by the warmth of his fire and dream that the +blue-eyed stranger had come back and brought the luck of the Golden +Fortune. So he passed the years until the winter of the Big Snow. It was +so called many winters after, for no other like it ever fell on the east +slope of Kearsarge. + +It came early in the season, following a week of warm weather, when the +sky was full of a dry mist that showed ghostly gray against the sun and +the moon; great bodies of temperate air moved about the pines with a +sound of moaning and distress. The deer, warned by their wild sense, +went down before ever a flake fell, and Jerry, watching, shivered in +sympathy, recalling that so they had run together, and such a spell of +warm weather had gone before a certain snow, years ago before the luck +departed from the Golden Fortune. As the fume of the storm closed in +about the cabin, and flakes began to form lightly in the middle air, the +old man's wits began to fumble among remembrances of the stranger on the +trail, and he would hearken for voices. The snow began, then increased, +and fell steadily, wet and blinding. + +The third night of its falling Jerry waked out of a doze to hear his +name shouted, muffled and feebly, through the drift. So it seemed to +him, and he made haste to answer it. There was no wind; on the very +steep slope where the cabin stood was a knee-deep level, soft and +clogging; in the hollows it piled halfway up the pines. Jerry's lantern +threw a faint and stifled gleam. There was no further cry, but something +struggled on the trail below him; dim, unhuman shapes wrestled in the +smother of the snow. Jerry sent them a hail of assurance cut off short +by the white wall of the storm. + +There was a little sag in the hill-front where the trail turned off to +the cabin, and here the moist snow fell in a lake, into which the trail +ran like a spit, and was lost. Down this trail at the last fierce end of +the storm came the great wild sheep, the bighorn, the heaviest-headed, +lightest-footed, winter-proof sheep of the mountains that God shepherds +on the high battlements of the hills. Down they came when there was no +meadow, nor thicket, nor any smallest twig of heather left uncovered on +the highlands, and took the lake of soggy snow by Jerry's cabin in the +dark. They had come far under the weight of the great curved horns +through the clogging drifts. Here where the trail failed in the white +smudge they found no footing, floundered at large, sinking belly-deep +where they stood, and not daring to stand lest they sink deeper. If any +cry of theirs, hoarse and broken, had reached old Jerry's dreaming, they +spent no further breath on it. By something the same sense that made him +aware of their need, Jerry understood rather than saw them strain +through the falling veil of snow. It was a sharp struggle without sound +as they won out of the wet drift to the firmer ground. They went on like +shadows pursued by the ghost of a light that wavered with the old man's +wavering feet. It was no night for a man to be abroad in, but Jerry +plowed on in the drift till he found the work that was cut out for him. +There where the snow was deepest, yielding like wool, he found the +oldest wether of the flock, sunk to the shoulders, too feeble for the +struggle, and still too noble for complaining. How many years had Jerry +waited to do a good turn on the trail where he had done his worst: and +in all these years he had lost the sense of distinction which should be +between man and beast. He put his shoulder under the fore shoulder of +the sheep, where he could feel the heart pound with certain fear. + +Jerry knew the trail, as he knew the floor of his mine, by the feel of +the ground under him, so as he heaved and guided with his shoulder, the +great ram grew quieter and lent himself to the effort till they came +clear of the swale, and the sweat ran down from Jerry's forehead. But +the bighorn could do no more. In the soft fleece of the snow he stood +cowed and trembling. The snow came on faster, and wiped out the trail of +the flock; he made no motion to go after. Such a death comes to the wild +sheep of the mountains often enough: to fail from old age in some sudden +storm, to sink in the loose snow and await the quest of the wolf, or the +colder mercy of the drift. He turned his back to the storm which began +to slant a little with the rising wind, and looked not once at Jerry nor +at the hills where he had been bred. But Jerry cast his eye upon the +sheep, which was full heavier then than he, and then up at the steep +where his cabin stood, remembering that he had nothing there that might +serve a sheep for food. Then he bent down again, and by dint of pulling +and pushing, and by a dim sense that began to filter through the man's +brain to the beast, they made some progress on the trail. They went over +broken boulders and floundered in the drifts, where Jerry half carried +the sheep and was half borne up and supported by the spread of the great +horns. They crossed Pine Creek, which ran dumbly under the snow, housed +over by the stream tangle. The flakes hissed softly on Jerry's lantern +and struck blindingly on his eyes, but ever as they went the sheep was +eased of his labor, grew assured, and carried himself courageously. +Finally they came where the storm thinned out, and whole hill-slopes +covered with buckthorn and cherry warded off the snow by springy arches, +and Jerry drew up to rest under a long-leaved pine while the sheep went +on alone, nodding his great horns under the branches of the scrub. He +neither lingered nor looked back, and met the new chance of life with as +much quietness as the chance of death. Jerry was worn and weary, and +there was a singing in his brain. The pine trees broke the wind and shed +off the snow in curling wreaths. It seemed to the old man most good to +rest, and he drowsed upon his feet. + +"If I sleep I shall freeze," he said; and it seemed on the whole a +pleasant thing to do. So it went on for a little space; then there came +a shape out of the dark, a hand shook him by the shoulder, and a voice +called him by name. Then he started out of dreaming as he had started at +that other call an hour ago, and it seemed not strange to him, the +night, nor the storm, nor the face of the blue-eyed man that shone out +of the dark, but whether by the light of his lantern he could not tell. +He shook the snow from his shoulders. + +"I have expected you long," he said. + +"And now I have come," said the stranger and smiled. + +"Have you brought the luck again?" + +"Come and see," said the man. + +Then Jerry took his hand and leaned upon him, and together they went up +the trail between the drifts. + +"You bear me no ill-will for what I did?" said Jerry. + +And the stranger answered, "None." + +"I have wished it undone many times," said the old man. "I have tried +this night to repay it." + +"By what you have done this night I am repaid," said the stranger. + +"It was only a sheep." + +"It was one of God's creatures," said the man. + +So they went on up the trail, and it seemed sometimes to Jerry that he +wandered alone in the dark, that he was cold, and his lantern had gone +out; and again he would hear the stranger comfort and encourage him. At +last they came toward the cabin, and saw the light stream out of the +window and the fire leap in the stove. Then Jerry thought of the mine, +and that the stranger had brought back the luck again. It seemed that +the young man had promised him this, though he could not be sure of +that, nor very clear in his mind on any point except that he had come +home again. But as he drew near, it seemed a brightness came out of the +tunnel of the mine, a warmth and a great light. As he came into it +tremblingly, he saw that the light came from the walls, and from the +lode at the far end of it, and it was the brightness of pure gold. And +Jerry smiled and stretched out his arms to it, making sure that the luck +had come again. + +After the week of the Big Snow there were people in the town who +remembered Jerry, and wondered how he fared. So when the snow had a +crust over it, they came up by the windy canyon and sought him in his +house, where the door stood open and a charred wick flared feebly in the +lamp, and in his mine, where they found him at the far end of the +tunnel, and it seemed as if he slept and smiled. + +"It is a worthless lode," they said, "but he loved it." + +So they took powder and made a blast, and with it a great heap of +stones, shutting off the end of the tunnel from the outer air, and so +left him with his luck and the Golden Fortune. + + + + +THE WHITE-BARKED PINE + + +The white-barked pine grew on the slope of Kearsarge highest up of all +the pines, so high that nothing grew above it but brown tufts of grass +and the rosy Sierra primroses that shelter under the edges of broken +boulders. The white-barked pines are squat and short, trunks creeping +along the rocks, and foliage all matted in a close green thatch by the +winter's weight. Snow lies on the slope of Kearsarge eight months in the +year, deep and smooth over the pines and the jagged rocks; other months +there are great storms of rain, and always a strong wind roaring through +the Pass, so that, try as it might, no tree could stand erect on those +heights. The white-barked pine stretched its body along the ground, and +though it was four hundred years old, it was no thicker than a man's +leg, and its young branches of seventy-five or a hundred years were +still so supple that one could tie knots in them. It grew near the +trail, which here crossed through a gap in the crest of the range and +straggled on down the other side of the mountain. + +Along this trail went many strange things in their season. Early in the +year, before the snow had melted at all on the high places, went a great +lumbering bear that had a lair above Big Meadows, going down to the +calf-pens and pig-sties of the town at the foot of Kearsarge. He ranged +back and forth on these little excursions of fifteen or twenty miles in +the hungry season of the year, and sometimes there were hunters on his +trail with dogs and guns, but nothing ever came of it. When the trail +began to run a rivulet from the drip of melting snow banks, the forest +ranger went up the Pass, singing as he went and beating his arms to keep +himself warm. Afterwards when the snow water was all drained off, he +came back and mended the trail. All through the summer there would be +parties of miners and hunters with long strings of pack mules, going +over Kearsarge to camp in Big Meadows or on the fork of King's River. +Sometimes there were parties of Indians with women and children, making +very merry with berries, fish, and deer meat. Nearly always, whatever +went over the mountain came back again, and the white pine noticed that +the same people came again another season. In four hundred years one has +space for observation and reflection. Gradually the pine tree grew into +the conviction that the other side of the mountain must be much finer +than this. + +"Else why," said he, "should so many people go there every year?" + +It was very fine, you may be sure, on the white pine's side, but the +tree had known it all for so many years, it no longer pleased him. From +where he grew he looked down between the ridges on a great winding canyon +full of singing trees, with blue lakes like eyes winking between them. +He could watch in the open places the white feet of the water on its way +to the valley, and from the falls long rainbows of spray blown out as if +they were blowing kisses to the white-barked pine. Below all this lay +the valley, hollow like a cup, full of fawn-colored and violet mist, +and the farms and orchards lay like dregs at the bottom of the cup. +Beyond the valley rose other noble ranges with cloud shadows playing all +along their slopes. + +"It is very tiresome to look at the same things for four hundred years," +said the white-barked pine. "If I could only get to the top, now. Do +tell me, what is it like on the other side?" he said to the wind. + +"Oh!" said the wind, "it rains and snows. There are trees and bushes and +blue lakes. It is not at all different from this side." + +A deer said the same thing when it slept one night under the thatch of +the highest pine. "It is all meadows and hills, only sometimes the grass +is not so good there, and again sometimes it is better. It is very much +like this." + +"I do not believe them," said the pine to himself. "They are simply +trying to console me for not realizing my ambition. But I am not a +sapling any longer, let me tell you that." + +"At least," said a young tree that grew a little farther down, "you are +higher up than any of us." + +"Of what use is that if I do not get to the top?" said the unhappy pine. +"There is a bunch of blue flowers there, I can see it quite plainly just +where the trail dips over the ridge. Surely I am as capable of climbing +as any blue weed." + +"But," said the young pine, "weeds do not have to grow cones." + +"Oh, as for cones," cried the tree quite crossly, "the seasons are so +short I hardly ever ripen any, and if I do the squirrels get them. I do +believe I have not started a seedling these two hundred years. It is no +use to talk to me, I shall be happy only when I have seen the other side +of the mountain." + +It seems what one desires with all one's heart for a long time finally +comes to pass in some fashion or other. That very season the +white-barked pine went up over Kearsarge to the other side. Early in the +summer, when the rosy primroses had just begun to blow beside the drifts +that hugged the shade of the boulders, a party of miners went up the +trail with a long string of pack mules burdened with picks and shovels, +flour and potatoes, and other things that miners use. The last pull up +the Kearsarge trail is the hardest, over a steep waste of loose stones +that want very little encouragement to go roaring down as an avalanche +into the ravine below. The miners shouted, the mules scrambled and +panted on the steep, but just as they came by the last of the +white-barked pines, one slipped and went rolling over and over on the +jagged stones. As happens very frequently when a pack animal falls, the +mule was not very much hurt, but the pack saddle was quite ruined. + +"We must do the best we can," said one of the men, and he cut down the +white-barked pine. He chopped off the boughs, and split the trunk in +four pieces to mend the pack. It was a very small tree though it was so +old. + +"Ah! Ah!" said the tree, "it hurts, but one does not mind that when one +is realizing an ambition. Now I shall go to the top." So he went over +Kearsarge on mule-back quite like an old traveler. + +"Well, we are rid of his complaining," said the pine who stood next to +him, "and now _I_ am the highest up of all the pines. I wonder if it is +really so much finer on the other side." + +His old companion, in four pieces, was swinging down the other side of +the mountain, and as he went, he saw high peaks and soddy meadows, long +winding canons with white glancing waters; and heard the chorus of the +falls. When it was night the miners lit a fire and loosened up the +packs, and after dark, when the wind began to move among the trees and +the fire burned low, one of the men threw a piece of the white-barked +pine on it. + +"Oh! Oh!" cried the pine as the flames caught hold of it, "and is this +really the end of all my travels?" + +"How that green wood sputters!" said the man; "it is not fit even for +firewood." + +The next day the wind took up the ash and carried it back over the pass, +and dropped it where the chopped boughs lay fainting on the ground. + +"Ah, is that you?" they said; "now you can tell us what it is like on +the other side." + +"How ignorant you are," said the ash of the white-barked pine, "one +would know you have never traveled. It is exactly like this side." But +he could not hear what they had to say to that, for the wind whirled him +away. + + + + +NA'[:Y]ANG-WIT'E, THE FIRST RABBIT DRIVE + + +The Basket Woman was walking over the mesa with the great carrier at her +back. Behind her straggled the children and the other women of the +campoodie, each with a cone-shaped basket slung between her shoulders. +Alan clapped his hands when he saw them coming, and ran out along the +path. + +"You come see rabbit drive," she said, twinkling her shrewd black eyes +under the border of her basket cap. Alan took hold of a fold of her +dress as he walked beside her, for he was still a little afraid of the +other Indians, but since the time of his going out to see the buzzards +making a merry-go-round, he knew he should never be afraid of the Basket +Woman again. The other women laughed a great deal as they looked at him, +showing their white teeth and putting back the black coarse hair out of +their eyes, and Alan felt that the things they said to each other were +about him, though they could hardly have been unpleasant with so much +smiling. Now he could see the men swarm out of the huts under the hill, +all afoot but a dozen of the old men, who rode small kicking ponies at a +tremendous pace, digging their heels into the horses' ribs. They passed +up the mesa in a blur of golden dust; westward they dwindled to a speck, +something ran between them from man to man, now thick like a cord, then +shaken out and vanishing in air. Then the riders dropped from their +horses and fumbled on the ground. Alan plucked at the Basket Woman's +dress. + +"Tell me what it is they do," he said. + +"It is the net which they set with forked stakes of willow," answered +the Basket Woman. Now the young men and the middle-aged began to form a +line across the mesa, standing three man's lengths apart in the sage. +Some of them were armed with guns and others had only clubs; all were +merry, laughing and calling to one another. They began to move forward +evenly with a marching movement, beating the brush as they went. +Presently up popped a rabbit from the sage and ran before them in long +flying leaps; far down the line another bounded from a stony wash, his +lean flanks turned broadside to the sun. + +Then the hunters broke into shouts of laughter and clapping, then one +began to sing and the song passed from man to man along the line; then +the men crouched a little as Indians do in singing, then their bodies +swayed and they stamped with each staccato note as they moved forward. +Rabbits sprang up in the scrub and went before them like the wind, and +as each one leaped into view and laid back his ears in flight, the cries +and laughter grew and the singing rose louder. The wind blew it back to +the women and children straggling far behind, who took it up, and the +burden of it was this,-- + + [Illustration: E - ya - ha hi, E - ya, E - ya - hi!] + +But every man sang it for himself, beginning when he liked and leaving +off, and when a rabbit started up under foot or one over-leaped himself +and went sprawling to the sand the refrain broke out again, but the +words, when there were any, seemed not to have anything to do with the +hunt, and sounded to Alan like a game. + +"_He-yah-hi, hi!_ he has it; he has it, he has the white, he has it!" + +"_Na'yang-wit'e!_" chuckled the Basket Woman. "_Na'yang-wit'e, +na'yang-wit'e!_ It is as it was of old time, look now and you shall +see." + +Alan looked at the hunters again, and whether it was because of the +blown dust of the mesa, or the quiver of heat that rose up from the +sand, or because the Basket Woman had laid her hand upon him, he saw +that they were not as they had been a moment since. Now they wore no +hats and were naked from the waist up, clothed below with deerskin +garments. Quivers of the skin of cougars with the tails hanging down +were slung between their shoulders, and the arrows in them were pointed +with tips of obsidian and winged with eagle feathers. Every man carried +his bow or his spear in his hand. Bright beads and bits of many-colored +shell hung and glittered in their hair. Rabbits went before them like +grasshoppers for number, and the song and the shouting were fierce and +wild. "But what is it all about?" asked Alan. + +"_Na'yang-wit'e, na'yang-wit'e_," laughed the Basket Woman. "Wait and I +will tell you the story of that song, for it is so that every song has +its story, without which no one may understand it. It is not well to go +too near the guns; sit you here and I will tell." + +So Alan bent down the sagebrush to make him a springy seat and the +Basket Woman sat upon the ground with her hands clasped about her knees. + +"Long and long ago," said the Basket Woman, "when men and beasts talked +together, there were none so friendly and none so much about the +wickiups as the rabbit people, and some of our fathers have told that +it was they who taught my people the game of _na'yang-wit'e_. I know +not if that be true, but there were none so cunning as they to play it. +And this is the manner of the game: there should be two sticks, or +better, two bits of bone of the fore leg of a deer, made smooth and +small to fit the palm. One of them is all white and the other has sinew +of deer stained black and wound about it. These the players pass from +hand to hand, and another will guess where is the place of the white, +and he who guesses best shall win all the other's goods. It is good +sport playing, and between man and man it comes even in the end, for +sometimes one has the goods and sometimes another, but when my people +played with the rabbit people it was not good, for the rabbits won every +time. Then my people drew together, all the Indians of every sort, and +made a great game against the rabbit people. There were two long rows +across the mesa, and between them were all the goods piled high, all the +beads and ornaments of shell, all the feather work and fine dressed +deerskin, all the worked moccasins, the quivers, the bows, all the +blankets, the baskets, and the woven mats. So they played at sunrise, so +at noon, so when it was night and the fires were lit. So on into the +night, and when it was morning the game was done, for the Indians had no +more goods. _Ay-aiy!_" said the Basket Woman, "long will the rabbit +people sorrow for that day, for it was then that the Indians first +contrived together how they might be rid of them. Then they gathered up +the milkweed," and she reached out and plucked a tall stem of it growing +beside her, white flowered and slender, with fine leaves like grass. +"Then they broke it so," and she laid it across a stone and beat it +lightly with a stick, "then they drew out the threads soft and white, +and so they rolled it into string." + +She stretched the fibre with one hand and rolled it on her knee with the +other, twisting and twining it. "Thus was the string made and afterward +woven into nets. The mesh of the net was just enough to let a rabbit's +head through, but not his body, and the net was a little wider than a +rabbit's jump when he goes fast and fleeing, and long enough to stretch +half across the world. So on a day the net was set and the drive was +begun as you have seen it, and as the Indians went they remembered their +anger and taunted the rabbit people. So the song of _Na'yang-wit'e_ was +made. Now let us go and see how it fares with the rabbit people, for as +it was of old so will it be to-day." + +All this time the line of men moved steadily across the mesa toward the +net. Now and then a rabbit turned, made bold by fright, and passed +between the men as they marched. Then the nearest turned to shoot him as +he ran, but it was left to the women to pick up the game. Already the +foremost rabbits were at the net, turned back by it, leaping toward the +hunters and fleeing again to the net. The old men closed in the ends of +the lane where the rabbits ran about distractedly with shrill squeals of +anguished fear. Some got their heads through the mesh but never their +bodies, and as it is not the nature of rabbits to go backward they +struggled and cried, getting themselves the more entangled; some blind +with their haste came against it in mid-leap, and were thrown back +stunned upon the sand. The men sang no more, for they had work to do, +serious work, for on the dried flesh of the rabbits and the blankets +made of their skins the campoodie must largely count for food and warmth +in the winter season. They closed in to the killing and made short work +of it with clubs and the butt ends of their guns. Then the women came up +with the children and heaped up the great carriers with the game while +the men wrung the sweat from their foreheads and counted up the kill. +Most of the rabbits were the kind Alan had learned to call jack rabbits, +but the Basket Woman picked up a fat little cotton-tail. + +"This is little Tavwots," said she, "and you shall have him for your +supper." Alan's mind still ran on the story of the first drive. "But is +it true?" he asked her, before he had given thanks for the gift. + +"Now this is the sign I shall give you that the tale is true," said the +Basket Woman. "Ever since that day if one of the rabbit people meets an +Indian in the trail he flees before him as you saw them flee to-day, and +that is because of _na'yang-wit'e_ and the first rabbit drive." Then she +laughed, but Alan took his share of the kill on his shoulder and went +back across the mesa slowly, wondering. + + + [Illustration: From photograph by A. A. Forbes + A "WICKIUP," OR INDIAN HUT] + + + + +MAHALA JOE + + +I + +In the campoodie of Three Pines, which you probably know better by its +Spanish name of Tres Pinos, there is an Indian, well thought of among +his own people, who goes about wearing a woman's dress, and is known as +Mahala Joe. He should be about fifty years old by this time, and has a +quiet, kindly face. Sometimes he tucks up the skirt of his woman's dress +over a pair of blue overalls when he has a man's work to do, but at +feasts and dances he wears a ribbon around his waist and a handkerchief +on his head as the other mahalas do. He is much looked to because of his +knowledge of white people and their ways, and if it were not for the +lines of deep sadness that fall in his face when at rest, one might +forget that the woman's gear is the badge of an all but intolerable +shame. At least it was so used by the Paiutes, but when you have read +this full and true account of how it was first put on, you may not think +it so. + +Fifty years ago the valley about Tres Pinos was all one sea of moving +grass and dusky, greenish sage, cropped over by deer and antelope, north +as far as Togobah, and south to the Bitter Lake. Beside every +considerable stream which flowed into It from the Sierras was a Paiute +campoodie, and all they knew of white people was by hearsay from the +tribes across the mountains. But soon enough cattlemen began to push +their herds through the Sierra passes to the Paiutes' feeding-ground. +The Indians saw them come, and though they were not very well pleased, +they held still by the counsel of their old men; night and day they made +medicine and prayed that the white men might go away. + +Among the first of the cattlemen in the valley about Tres Pinos was Joe +Baker, who brought a young wife, and built his house not far from the +campoodie. The Indian women watched her curiously from afar because of +a whisper that ran among the wattled huts. When the year was far gone, +and the sun-cured grasses curled whitish brown, a doctor came riding +hard from the fort at Edswick, forty miles to the south, and though they +watched, they did not see him ride away. It was the third day at evening +when Joe Baker came walking towards the campoodie, and his face was set +and sad. He carried something rolled in a blanket, and looked anxiously +at the women as he went between the huts. It was about the hour of the +evening meal, and the mahalas sat about the fires watching the +cooking-pots. He came at last opposite a young woman who sat nursing her +child. She had a bright, pleasant face, and her little one seemed about +six months old. Her husband stood near and watched them with great +pride. Joe Baker knelt down in front of the mahala, and opened the roll +of blankets. He showed her a day-old baby that wrinkled up its small +face and cried. + +"Its mother is dead," said the cattleman. The young Indian mother did +not know English, but she did not need speech to know what had happened. +She looked pitifully at the child, and at her husband timidly. Joe Baker +went and laid his rifle and cartridge belt at the Paiute's feet. The +Indian picked up the gun and fingered it; his wife smiled. She put down +her own child, and lifted the little white stranger to her breast. It +nozzled against her and hushed its crying; the young mother laughed. + +"See how greedy it is," she said; "it is truly white." She drew up the +blanket around the child and comforted it. + +The cattleman called to him one of the Indians who could speak a little +English. + +"Tell her," he said, "that I wish her to care for the child. His name is +Walter. Tell her that she is to come to my house for everything he +needs, and for every month that he keeps fat and well she shall have a +fat steer from my herd." So it was agreed. + +As soon as Walter was old enough he came to sleep at his father's house, +but the Indian woman, whom he called _Ebia_, came every day to tend +him. Her son was his brother, and Walter learned to speak Paiute before +he learned English. The two boys were always together, but as yet the +little Indian had no name. It is not the custom among Paiutes to give +names to those who have not done anything worth naming. + +"But I have a name," said Walter, "and so shall he. I will call him Joe. +That is my father's name, and it is a good name, too." + +When Mr. Baker was away with the cattle Walter slept at the campoodie, +and Joe's mother made him a buckskin shirt. At that time he was so brown +with the sun and the wind that only by his eyes could you tell that he +was white; he was also very happy. But as this is to be the story of how +Joe came to the wearing of a woman's dress, I cannot tell you all the +plays they had, how they went on their first hunting, nor what they +found in the creek of Tres Pinos. + +The beginning of the whole affair of Mahala Joe must be laid to the +arrow-maker. The arrow-maker had a stiff knee from a wound in a +long-gone battle, and for that reason he sat in the shade of his +wickiup, and chipped arrow points from flakes of obsidian that the young +men brought him from Togobah, fitting them to shafts of reeds from the +river marsh. He used to coax the boys to wade in the brown water and cut +the reeds, for the dampness made his knee ache. They drove bargains with +him for arrows for their own hunting, or for the sake of the stories he +could tell. For an armful of reeds he would make three arrows, and for a +double armful he would tell tales. These were mostly of great huntings +and old wars, but when it was winter, and no snakes in the long grass to +overhear, he would tell Wonder-stories. The boys would lie with their +toes in the warm ashes, and the arrow-maker would begin. + +"You can see," said the arrow-maker, "on the top of Waban the tall +boulder looking on the valleys east and west. That is the very boundary +between the Paiute country and Shoshone land. The boulder is a hundred +times taller than the tallest man, and thicker through than six horses +standing nose to tail; the shadow of it falls all down the slope. At +mornings it falls toward the Paiute peoples, and evenings it falls on +Shoshone land. Now on this side of the valley, beginning at the +campoodie, you will see a row of pine trees standing all upstream one +behind another. See, the long branches grow on the side toward the hill; +and some may tell you it is because of the way the wind blows, but I say +it is because they reach out in a hurry to get up the mountain. Now I +will tell you how these things came about. + +"Very long ago all the Paiutes of this valley were ruled by two +brothers, a chief and a medicine man, Winnedumah and Tinnemaha. They +were both very wise, and one of them never did anything without the +other. They taught the tribes not to war upon each other, but to stand +fast as brothers, and so they brought peace into the land. At that time +there were no white people heard of, and game was plenty. The young +honored the old, and nothing was as it is now." + +When the arrow-maker came to this point, the boys fidgeted with their +toes, and made believe to steal the old man's arrows to distract his +attention. They did not care to hear about the falling off of the +Paiutes; they wished to have the tale. Then the arrow-maker would hurry +on to the time when there arose a war between the Paiutes and the +Shoshones. Then Winnedumah put on his war bonnet, and Tinnemaha made +medicine. Word went around among the braves that if they stood together +man to man as brothers, then they should have this war. + +"And so they might," said the arrow-maker, "but at last their hearts +turned to water. The tribes came together on the top of Waban. Yes; +where the boulder now stands, for that is the boundary of our lands, for +no brave would fight off his own ground for fear of the other's +medicine. So they fought. The eagles heard the twang of the bowstring, +and swung down from White Mountain. The vul-tures smelled the smell of +battle, and came in from Shoshone land. Their wings were dark like a +cloud, and underneath the arrows flew like hail. The Paiutes were the +better bowmen, and they caught the Shoshone arrows where they struck in +the earth and shot them back again. Then the Shoshones were ashamed, and +about the time of the sun going down they called upon their medicine +men, and one let fly a magic arrow,--for none other would touch +him,--and it struck in the throat of Tinnemaha. + +"Now when that befell," went on the arrow-maker, "the braves forgot the +word that had gone before the battle, for they turned their backs to the +medicine man, all but Winnedumah, his brother, and fled this way from +Waban. Then stood Winnedumah by Tinnemaha, for that was the way of those +two; whatever happened, one would not leave the other. There was none +left to carry on the fight, and yet since he was so great a chief the +Shoshones were afraid to take him, and the sun went down. In the dusk +they saw a bulk, and they said, 'He is still standing;' but when it was +morning light they saw only a great rock, so you see it to this day. As +for the braves who ran away, they were changed to pine trees, but in +their hearts they are cowards yet, therefore they stretch out their arms +and strive toward the mountain. And that," said the arrow-maker, "is how +the tall stones came to be on the top of Waban. But it was not in my day +nor my father's." Then the boys would look up at Winnedumah, and were +half afraid, and as for the tale, they quite believed it. + +The arrow-maker was growing old. His knee hurt him in cold weather, and +he could not make arrow points fast enough to satisfy the boys, who lost +a great many in the winter season shooting at ducks in the tulares. +Walter's father promised him a rifle when he was fifteen, but that was +years away. There was a rock in the canyon behind Tres Pinos with a great +crack in the top. When the young men rode to the hunting, they shot each +an arrow at it, and if it stuck it was a promise of good luck. The boys +scaled the rock by means of a grapevine ladder, and pried out the old +points. This gave them an idea. + +"Upon Waban where the fighting was, there must be a great many arrow +points," said Walter. + +"So there must be," said Joe. + +"Let us go after them," said the white boy; but the other dared not, for +no Paiute would go within a bowshot of Winnedumah; nevertheless, they +talked the matter over. + +"How near would you go?" asked Walter. + +"As near as a strong man might shoot an arrow," said Joe. + +"If you will go so far," said Walter, "I will go the rest of the way." + +"It is a two days' journey," said the Paiute, but he did not make any +other objection. + +It was a warm day of spring when they set out. The cattleman was off to +the river meadow, and Joe's mother was out with the other mahalas +gathering taboose. + +"If I were fifteen, and had my rifle, I would not be afraid of +anything," said Walter. + +"But in that case we would not need to go after arrow points," said the +Indian boy. + +They climbed all day in a bewildering waste of boulders and scrubby +trees. They could see Winnedumah shining whitely on the ridge ahead, but +when they had gone down into the gully with great labor, and up the +other side, there it stood whitely just another ridge away. + +"It is like the false water in the desert," said Walter. "It goes +farther from you, and when you get to it there is no water there." + +"It is magic medicine," said Indian Joe. "No good comes of going against +medicine." + +"If you are afraid," said Walter, "why do you not say so? You may go +back if you like, and I will go on by myself." + +Joe would not make any answer to that. They were hot and tired, and awed +by the stillness of the hills. They kept on after that, angry and apart; +sometimes they lost sight of each other among the boulders and +underbrush. But it seemed that it must really have been as one or the +other of them had said, for when they came out on a high mesa presently, +there was no Winnedumah anywhere in sight. They would have stopped then +and taken counsel, but they were too angry for that, so they walked on +in silence, and the day failed rapidly, as it will do in high places. +They began to draw near together and to be afraid. At last the Indian +boy stopped and gathered the tops of bushes together, and began to weave +a shelter for the night, and when Walter saw that he made it large +enough for two, he spoke to him. + +"Are we lost?" he said. + +"We are lost for to-night," said Joe, "but in the morning we will find +ourselves." + +They ate dried venison and drank from the wicker bottle, and huddled +together because of the dark and the chill. + +"Why do we not see the stone any more?" asked Walter in a whisper. + +"I do not know," said Joe. "I think it has gone away." + +"Will he come after us?" + +"I do not know. I have on my elk's tooth," said Joe, and he clasped the +charm that hung about his neck. They started and shivered, hearing a +stone crash far away as it rolled down the mountain-side, and the wind +began to move among the pines. + +"Joe," said Walter, "I am sorry I said that you were afraid." + +"It is nothing," said the Paiute. "Besides, I am afraid." + +"So am I," whispered the other. "Joe," he said again after a long +silence, "if he comes after us, what shall we do?" + +"We will stay by each other." + +"Like the two brothers, whatever happens," said the white boy, "forever +and ever." + +"We are two brothers," said Joe. + +"Will you swear it?" + +"On my elk's tooth." + +Then they each took the elk's tooth in his hand and made a vow that +whether Winnedumah came down from his rock, or whether the Shoshones +found them, come what would, they would stand together. Then they were +comforted, and lay down, holding each other's hands. + +"I hear some one walking," said Walter. + +"It is the wind among the pines," said Joe. + +A twig snapped. "What is that?" said the one boy. + +"It is a fox or a coyote passing," said the other, but he knew better. +They lay still, scarcely breathing, and throbbed with fear. They felt a +sense of a presence approaching in the night, the whisper of a moccasin +on the gravelly soil, the swish of displaced bushes springing back to +place. They saw a bulk shape itself out of the dark; it came and stood +over them, and they saw that it was an Indian looking larger in the +gloom. He spoke to them, and whether he spoke in a strange tongue, or +they were too frightened to understand, they could not tell. + +"Do not kill us!" cried Walter, but the Indian boy made no sound. The +man took Walter by the shoulders and lifted him up. + +"White," said he. + +"We are brothers," said Joe; "we have sworn it." + +"So," said the man, and it seemed as if he smiled. + +"Until we die," said both the boys. The Indian gave a grunt. + +"A white man," he said, "is--white." It did not seem as if that was what +he meant to say. + +"Come, I will take you to your people. They search for you about the +foot of Waban. These three hours I have watched you and them." The boys +clutched at each other in the dark. They were sure now who spoke to +them, and between fear and fatigue and the cramp of cold they staggered +and stumbled as they walked. The Indian stopped and considered them. + +"I cannot carry both," he said. + +"I am the older," said Joe; "I can walk." Without any more words the man +picked up Walter, who trembled, and walked off down the slope. They went +a long way through the scrub and under the tamarack pines. The man was +naked to the waist, and had a quiver full of arrows on his shoulder. +The buckthorn branches whipped and scraped against his skin, but he did +not seem to mind. At last they came to a place where they could see a +dull red spark across an open flat. + +"That," said the Indian, "is the fire of your people. They missed you at +afternoon, and have been looking for you. From my station on the hill I +saw." Then he took the boy by the shoulders. + +"Look you," he said, "no good comes of mixing white and brown, but now +that the vow is made, see to the keeping of it." Then he stepped back +from them and seemed to melt into the dark. Ahead of them the boys saw +the light of the fire flare up with new fuel, and shadows, which they +knew for the figures of their friends, moved between them and the flame. +Swiftly as two scared rabbits they ran on toward the glow. + +When Walter and Joe had told them the story at the campoodie, the +Paiutes made a great deal of it, especially the arrow-maker. + +"Without a doubt," he said, "it was Winnedumah who came to you, and +not, as some think, a Shoshone who was spying on our land. It is a great +mystery. But since you have made a vow of brothers, you should keep it +after the ancient use." Then he took a knife of obsidian and cut their +arms, and rubbed a little of the blood of each upon the other. + +"Now," he said, "you are one fellowship and one blood, and that is as it +should be, for you were both nursed at one breast. See that you keep the +vow." + +"We will," said the boys solemnly, and they went out into the sunlight +very proud of the blood upon their bared arms, holding by each other's +hands. + + +II + +When Walter was fifteen his father gave him a rifle, as he had promised, +and a word of advice with it. + +"Learn to shoot quickly and well," he said, "and never ride out from +home without it. No one can tell what this trouble with the Indians may +come to in the end." + +Walter rode straight to the campoodie. He was never happy in any of his +gifts until he had showed them to Joe. There was a group of older men at +the camp, quartering a deer which they had brought in. One of them, +called Scar-Face, looked at Walter with a leering frown. + +"See," he said, "they are arming the very children with guns." + +"My father promised it to me many years ago," said Walter. "It is my +birthday gift." + +He could not explain why, and he grew angry at the man's accusing tone, +but after it he did not like showing his present to the Indians. + +He called Joe, and they went over to a cave in the black rock where they +had kept their boyish treasures and planned their plays since they were +children. Joe thought the rifle a beauty, and turned it over admiringly +in the shadow of the cave. They tried shooting at a mark, and then +decided to go up Oak Creek for a shot at the gray squirrels. There they +sighted a band of antelope that led them over a tongue of hills into +Little Round Valley, where they found themselves at noon twelve miles +from home and very hungry. They had no antelope, but four squirrels and +a grouse. The two boys made a fire for cooking in a quiet place by a +spring of sweet water. + +"You may have my rifle to use as often as you like," said Walter, "but +you must not lend it to any one in the campoodie, especially to +Scar-Face. My father says he is the one who is stirring up all this +trouble with the whites." + +"The white men do not need any one to help them get into trouble," said +Joe. "They can do that for themselves." + +"It is the fault of the Indians," said Walter. "If they did not shoot +the cattle, the white men would leave them alone." + +"But if the white men come first to our lands with noise and trampling +and scare away the game, what then will they shoot?" asked the Paiute. + +Walter did not make any answer to that. He had often gone hunting with +Joe and his father, and he knew what it meant to walk far, and fasting, +after game made shy by the rifles of cattlemen, and at last to return +empty to the campoodie where there were women and children with hungry +eyes. + +"Is it true," he said after a while, "that Scar-Face is stirring up all +the Indians in the valley?" + +"How should I know?" said Joe; "I am only a boy, and have not killed big +game. I am not admitted to the counsels of the old men. What does it +matter to us whether of old feuds or new? Are we not brothers sworn?" + +Then, as the dinner was done, they ate each of the other's kill, for it +was the custom of the Paiutes at that time that no youth should eat game +of his own killing until he was fully grown. As they walked homeward the +boys planned to get permission to go up on Waban for a week, after +mountain sheep, before the snows began. + +Mr. Baker looked grave when Walter spoke to him. + +"My boy," he said, "I wish you would not plan long trips like this +without first speaking to me. It is hardly safe in the present state of +feeling among the Indians to let you go with them in this fashion. A +whole week, too. But as you have already spoken of it, and it has +probably been talked over in the campoodie, for me to refuse now would +look as if I suspected something, and might bring about the thing I most +fear." + +"You should not be afraid for me with Joe, father, for we are brothers +sworn," said Walter, and he told his father how they had mixed the blood +of their arms in the arrow-maker's hut after they had come back from +their first journey on Waban. + +"Well," said Mr. Baker, who had not heard of this before, "I know that +they set great store by these superstitious customs, but I have not much +faith in the word of a Paiute when he is dealing with a white man. +However, you had better go on with this hunting trip. Take Hank with +you, and Joe's father, and do not be gone more than five days at the +outside." + +Hank was one of Mr. Baker's vaqueros, and very glad to get off for a +few days' hunting on the blunt top of Waban. On the Monday following +they left the Baker ranch for the mountain. As the two boys rode up the +boulder-strewn slope it set them talking of the first time they had gone +that way on their fruitless hunt for arrow points about the foot of +Winnedumah, and of all that happened to them at that time. The valley +lay below them full of purple mist, and away by the creek of Tres Pinos +the brown, wattled huts of the campoodie like great wasps' nests stuck +in the sage. Hank and Joe's father, with the pack horses, were ahead of +them far up the trail; Joe and Walter let their own ponies lag, and the +nose of one touched the flank of the other as they climbed slowly up the +steep, and the boys turned their faces to each other, as if they had +some vague warning that they would not ride so and talk familiarly +again, as if the boiling anger of the tribes in the valley had brewed a +sort of mist that rose up and gloomed the pleasant air on the slope of +Waban. + +"Joe," said Walter, "my father says if it came to a fight between the +white settlers and the Paiutes, that you would not hold by the word we +have passed." + +"That is the speech of a white man," said Joe. + +"But would you?" the other insisted. + +"I am a Paiute," said Joe; "I will hold by my people, also by my word; I +will not fight against you." + +"Nor I against you, but I would not like to have my father think you had +broken your word." + +"Have no care," said the Indian, "I will not break it." + +Mr. Baker looked anxiously after his son as he rode to the hunting on +Waban; he looked anxiously up that trail every hour until the boy came +again, and that, as it turned out, was at the end of three days. For the +trouble among the Indians had come to something at last,--the wasps were +all out of nest by the brown creeks, and with them a flight of stinging +arrows. The trouble began at Cottonwood, and the hunting party on Waban +the second day out saw a tall, pale column of smoke that rose up from +the notch of the hill behind the settlement, and fanned out slowly into +the pale blueness of the sky. + +It went on evenly, neither more nor less, thick smoke from a fire of +green wood steadily tended. Before noon another rose from the mouth of +Oak Creek, and a third from Tunawai. They waved and beckoned to one +another, calling to counsel. + +"Signal fires," said Hank; "that means mischief." + +And from that on he went with his rifle half cocked, and walked always +so that he might keep Joe's father in full view. By night that same day +there were seven smoke trees growing up in the long valley, and +spreading thin, pale branches to the sky. There was no zest left in the +hunt, and in the morning they owned it. Walter was worried by what he +knew his father's anxiety must be. Then the party began to ride down +again, and always Hank made the Indian go before. Away by the foot of +Oppapago rose a black volume of smoke, thick, and lighted underneath by +flames. It might be the reek of a burning ranch house. The boys were +excited and afraid. They talked softly and crowded their ponies together +on the trail. + +"Joe," said Walter whisperingly, "if there is battle, you will have to +go to it." + +"Yes," said Joe. + +"And you will fight; otherwise they will call you a coward, and if you +run away, they will kill you." + +"So I suppose," said Joe. + +"Or they will make you wear a woman's dress like To-go-na-tee, the man +who got up too late." This was a reminder from one of the arrow-maker's +tales. "But you have promised not to fight." + +"Look you," said the Indian boy; "if a white man came to kill me, I +would kill him. That is right. But I will not fight you nor your +father's house. That is my vow." + +The white boy put out his hand, and laid it on the flank of the foremost +pony. The Indian boy's fingers came behind him, and crept along the +pony's back until they reached the other hand. They rode forward without +talking. + +Toward noon they made out horsemen riding on the trail below them. As it +wound in and out around the blind gullies they saw and lost sight of +them a dozen times. At last, where the fringe of the tall trees began, +they came face to face. It was Mr. Baker and a party of five men; they +carried rifles and had set and anxious looks. + +"What will you have?" said Indian Joe's father as they drew up before +him under a tamarack pine. + +"My son," said the cattleman. + +"Is there war?" said the Indian. + +"There is war. Come, Walter." + +The boys were still and scared. Slowly Hank and Walter drew their horses +out of the path and joined the men. Indian Joe and his father passed +forward on the trail. + +"Do them no harm," said Joe Baker to those that were with him. + +"Good-by, Joe," said Walter half aloud. + +The other did not turn his head, but as he went they noticed that he had +bared his right arm from the hunting shirt, and an inch above the elbow +showed a thin, white scar. Walter had the twin of that mark under his +flannels. + +Mr. Baker did not mind fighting Indians; he thought it a good thing to +have their troubles settled all at once in this way, but he did not want +his son mixed up in it. The first thing he did when he got home was to +send him off secretly by night to the fort, and from there he passed +over the mountains with other of the settlers' families under strong +escort, and finally went to his mother's people in the East, and was put +to school. As it turned out he never came back to Tres Pinos, he does +not come into this story any more. + +When the first smoke rose up that showed where the fierce hate of the +Paiutes had broken into flame, the Indians took their women and children +away from the pleasant open slopes, and hid them in deep canons in +secret places of the rocks. There they feathered arrows, and twisted +bowstrings of the sinew of deer. And because there were so many grave +things done, and it was not the custom for boys to question their +elders, Joe never heard how Walter had been sent away. He thought him +still at the ranch with his father, and it is because of this mistake +that there is any more story at all. + +You may be sure that, of those two boys, Joe's was the deeper loving, +for, besides having grown up together, Walter was white, therefore +thinking himself, and making the other believe it, the better of the +two. But for this Walter made no difference in his behavior; had Joe to +eat at his table, and would have him sleep in his bed, but Joe laughed, +and lay on the floor. All this was counted a kindness and a great honor +in the campoodie. Walter could find out things by looking in a book, +which was sheer magic, and had taught Joe to write a little, so that he +could send word by means of a piece of paper, which was cleverer than +the tricks Joe had taught him, of reading the signs of antelope and elk +and deer. The white boy was to the Indian a little of all the heroes +and bright ones of the arrow-maker's tales come alive again. Therefore +he quaked in his heart when he heard the rumors that ran about the camp. + +The war began about Cottonwood, and ran like wildfire that licked up all +the ranches in its course. Then the whites came strongly against the +Paiutes at the Stone Corral, and made an end of the best of their +fighting men. Then the Indians broke out in the north, and at last it +came to such a pass that the very boys must do fighting, and the women +make bowstrings. The cattlemen turned in to Baker's ranch as a centre, +and all the northern campoodies gathered together to attack them. They +had not much to hope for, only to do as much killing as possible before +the winter set in with the hunger and the deep snows. + +By this time Joe's father was dead, and his mother had brought the boy a +quiver full of arrows and a new bowstring, and sent him down to the +battle. + +And Joe went hotly enough to join the men of the other village, nursing +his bow with great care, remembering his father, but when he came to +counsel and found where the fight must be, his heart turned again, for +he remembered his friend. The braves camped by Little Round Valley, and +he thought of the talk he and Walter had there; the war party went over +the tongue of hills, and Joe saw Winnedumah shining whitely on Waban, +and remembered his boyish errand, the mystery of the tall, strange +warrior that came upon them in the night, their talk in the hut of the +arrow-maker, and the vow that came afterward. + +The Indians came down a ravine toward Tres Pinos, and there met a band +of horses which some of their party had run in from the ranches; among +them was a pinto pony which Walter had used to ride, and it came to +Joe's hand when he called. Then the boy wondered if Walter might be +dead, and leaned his head against the pony's mane; it turned its head +and nickered softly at his ear. + +The war party stayed in the ravine until it grew dark, and Joe watched +how Winnedumah swam in a mist above the hills long after the sun had +gone quite down, as if in his faithfulness he would outwatch the dark; +and then the boy's heart was lifted up to the great chief standing still +by Tinnemaha. "I will not forget," he said. "I, too, will be faithful." +Perhaps at this moment he expected a miracle to help him in his vow as +it had helped Winnedumah. + +In the dusk the mounted Indians rode down by the Creek of Tres Pinos. +When they came by the ruined hut where his father had lived, Joe's heart +grew hot again, and when he passed the arrow-maker's, he remembered his +vow. Suddenly he wheeled his pony in the trail, hardly knowing what he +would do. The man next to him laid an arrow across his bow and pointed +it at the boy's breast. + +"Coward," he whispered, but an older Indian laid his hand on the man's +arm. + +"Save your arrows," he said. Then the ponies swept forward in the +charge, but Joe knew in an instant how it would be with him. He would +be called false and a coward, killed for it, driven from the tribe, but +he would not fight against his sworn brother. He would keep his vow. + +A sudden rain of arrows flew from the advancing Paiutes; Joe fumbled his +and dropped it on the ground. He was wondering if one of the many aimed +would find his brother. Bullets answered the arrow flight. He saw the +braves pitch forward, and heard the scream of wounded ponies. + +He hoped he would be shot; he would not have minded that; it would be +better than being called a coward. And then it occurred to him, if +Walter and his father came out and found him when the fight was done, +they would think that he had broken his word. The Paiutes began to seek +cover, but Joe drove out wildly from them, and rode back in the friendly +dark, and past the ruined campoodie, to the black rocks. There he crept +into the cave which only he and Walter knew, and lay on his face and +cried, for though he was an Indian he was only a boy, and he had seen +his first fight. He was sick with the thought of his vow. He lay in the +black rocks all the night and the day, and watched the cattlemen and the +soldiers ranging all that county for the stragglers of his people, and +guessed that the Paiutes had made the last stand. Then in the second +night he began to work back by secret paths to the mountain camp. It +never occurred to him not to go. He had the courage to meet what waited +for him there, but he had not the heart to go to it in the full light of +day. He came in by his mother's place, and she spat upon him, for she +had heard how he had carried himself in the fight. + +"No son of mine," said she. + +He went by the women and children and heard their jeers. His heart was +very sick. He went apart and sat down and waited what the men would say. +There were few of them left about the dying fire. They had washed off +their war paint, and their bows were broken. When they spoke at last, it +was with mocking and sad scorn. + +"We have enough of killing," said the one called Scar-Face. "Let him +have a woman's dress and stay to mend the fire." + +So it was done in the presence of all the camp; and because he was a +boy, and because he was an Indian, he said nothing of his vow, nor +opened his mouth in his defense, though his heart quaked and his knees +shook. He had the courage to wear the badge of being afraid all his +life. They brought him a woman's dress, though they were all too sad for +much laughter, and in the morning he set to bringing the wood for the +fire. + +Afterward there was a treaty made between the Paiutes and the settlers, +and the remnant went back to the campoodie of Tres Pinos, and Joe +learned how Walter had been sent out of the valley in the beginning of +the war, but that did not make any difference about the woman's dress. +He and Walter never met again. He continued to go about in dresses, +though in time he was allowed to do a man's work, and his knowledge of +English helped to restore a friendly footing with the cattlemen. The +valley filled very rapidly with settlers after that, and under the +slack usage of the tribe, Mahala Joe, as he came to be known, might have +thrown aside his woman's gear without offense, but he had the courage to +wear it to his life's end. He kept his sentence as he kept his vow, and +yet it is certain that Walter never knew. + + + + + PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY Of + INDIAN NAMES AND WORDS + + + CAMPOODIE (k[)a]mp'[=o]-dy). A group of Indian huts, from the + Spanish campo, a field or prairie. In some localities written + "_campody_." + + HINONO (h[)i]-n[)o]-n[)o]). A legendary Indian hero. + + MAHALA (m[.a]-h[:a]'l[)a]). An Indian woman, perhaps a corruption + from the Spanish _mujer_, woman. + + MESA (m[=a]'sae). A table-land, or plateau with a steeply sloping + side or sides. + + MESQUITE (m[)e]s-k[=e]t'). A thorny desert shrub, bearing edible + pods, like the locust tree, which are ground into meal for food. + + NA'[:Y]ANG-WIT'E. An Indian gambling game. + + OPPAPAGO (op-p[)a]-p[=a]'g[=o]). A mountain peak near Mt. Whitney. + The name signifies "The Weeper," in reference to the streams that + run down from it continually like tears. + + PAHRUMP (p[.a]h-r[)u]mp'). From the Indian words _pah_, water, and + rump, corn, "corn-water," i. e. a place where there is water + enough to grow corn. + + PAIUTES (p[=i]'[=u]t). The name of a large tribe of Indians + inhabiting middle California and Nevada. The name is derived from + the Indian word _pah_, water, and is used to distinguish this + tribe from the related tribe of Utes, who lived in the desert away + from running water. + + PENSTEMON (p[)e]ni-st[=e]'m[)o]n). A wild flower common to the + lower slopes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. + + PHARANAGAT (ph[)a]-r[)a]n-[)a]-g[)a]t'). An Indian name of a + place. The meaning is uncertain. + + PINON (p[.=e]-ny[=o]n'). The Spanish name for the one-leaved, nut + pine. + + PIPSISEWA (p[)i]p-s[)u]s'[=e]-w[.a]). A wild flower common to + the lower slopes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. + + QUERN (kw[^u]rn). A primitive mill for grinding corn. It consists + of two circular stones, the upper being turned by hand. + + SHOSHONE (sh[.=o]-sh[=o]'n[.=e]). An Indian tribe split in two by + the Pintes, and living north and south of them. In this book the + southern division only is referred to. + + TABOOSE (t[.a]-b[)oo]s'). Small tubercles of the joint grass; + they appear on the joints of the roots early in spring, and are an + important item of food to the Indians. + + TAVWOTS (t[)a]v-w[)o]ts'). The rabbit. + + TINNEMAHA (tin-ny-m[.a]-hae'). A legendary Indian hero. + + TOGOBAH (t[=o]-g[=o]-bae'). } Indian names of places. The + TOGONATEE (t[=o]-g[=o]-n[)a]-t[=e]'). } meaning is uncertain. + + TULARE (t[=oo]-lae're). A marshy place overgrown with the bulrushes + known as _tule_. + + VAQUERO (vae-k[=a]'r[=o]). The Spanish word for cowboy (from + _vaca_, a cow). + + WABAN (w[)a]-b[)a]n'). An Indian name of a place. The meaning is + uncertain. + + WICKIUP (w[)i]k'[)i]-[)u]p). An Indian hut of brush, or reeds. It + is often pieced out with blankets and tin cans. + + WINNEDUMAH (win-ny-d[=u]'m[)a]h). A legendary Indian hero. + + + + + Books by Mary Austin + + + THE FLOCK. Fully illustrated by E. Boyd Smith. + Square crown 8vo. $2.00, _net_. Postage, 18 cents. + + ISIDRO. Illustrated by Eric Pape. 12mo, $1.50. + + THE LAND OF LITTLE RAIN. California Sketches. + With Illustrations by E. Boyd Smith. 8vo, $2.00, _net_. + Postage, 24 cents. + + THE BASKET WOMAN. Square 12mo, $1.50. + + + HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY + BOSTON AND NEW YORK + + + + + The Riverside Press + CAMBRIDGE. MASSACHUSETTS + U. S. A. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Basket Woman, by Mary Austin + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BASKET WOMAN *** + +***** This file should be named 35502.txt or 35502.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/5/5/0/35502/ + +Produced by Chris Curnow, Joseph Cooper and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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