The Trail Book Page 10

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  THE MAKING OF A SHAMAN: A TELLING OF THE IROQUOIS TRAIL, BY THE ONONDAGA

  Down the Mound-Builder's graded way the children ran looking for theOnondaga. Like all the trail in the Museum Country it covered a vasttract of country in a very little while, so that it was no time at allbefore they came out among high, pine-covered swells, that broke alongthe watercourses into knuckly granite headlands. From one of these,steady puffs of smoke arose, and a moment later they could make out thefigure of an Indian turning his head from side to side as he searchedthe surrounding country with the look of eagles. They knew him at once,by the Medicine bundle at his belt and the slanting Iroquois feather,for their friend the Onondaga.

  "I was looking for you by the lake shore trail," he explained as Oliverand Dorcas Jane climbed up to him. "You must have come by theMusking-ham-Mahoning; it drops into the Trade Trail of the Iroquoisyonder,"--he pointed south and east,--"the Great Trail, from theMohican-ittuck to the House of Thunder." He meant the Hudson River andthe Falls of Niagara. "Even at our village, which was at the head of thelake here, we could hear the Young Thunders, shouting from behind thefalls," he told them.

  A crooked lake lay below them like a splinter of broken glass betweenthe headlands. From the far end of it the children could see smokerising. "We used to signal our village from here when we went on thewar-trail," said the Onondaga; "we would cut our mark on a tree as wewent out, and as we came back we added the war count. I was looking foran old score of mine to-day."

  "Had it anything to do with the Mound-Builders?" Dorcas wished to know."He said you knew the end of that story."

  The Onondaga shook his head.

  "That was a hundred years before my time, and is a Telling of theLenni-Lenape. In the Red Score it is written, the Red Score of theLenni-Lenape. When my home was in the village there, the Five Nationsheld all the country between the lakes and the Mohican-ittuck. But therewere many small friendly tribes along the borders, Algonquian mostly."

  He squatted on his heels beside the fire and felt in his belt for thepipe and tobacco pouch without which no Telling proceeds properly.

  "In my youth," said the Onondaga, "I was very unhappy because I had noVision. When my time came I walked in the forest and ate nothing, butthe Mystery would not speak to me. Nine days I walked fasting, and thenmy father came to find me under a pine tree, with my eyes sunk in myhead and my ribs like a basket. But because I was ashamed I told him myMystery was something that could not be talked about, and so I toldthe Shaman.

  "My father was pleased because he thought it meant that I was to be avery great Shaman myself, and the other boys envied me. But in my heartI was uneasy. I did not know what to make of my life because the Holderof the Heavens had not revealed himself to me. To one of my friends hehad appeared as an eagle, which meant that he was to be a warrior, keenand victorious; and to another as a fox, so that he studied cunning; butwithout any vision I did not know what to make of myself. My heart wasslack as a wetted bowstring. My father reproached me.

  "'The old women had smoke in their eyes,' he said; 'they told me I had ason, now I see it is a woman child.'

  "My mother was kinder. 'Tell me,' she said, 'what evil dream unknots thecords of your heart?'

  "So at last I told her.

  "My mother was a wise woman. 'To a dog or a child,' she said, 'onespeaks the first word on the lips, but before a great Shaman oneconsiders carefully. What is a year of your life to the Holder of theHeavens? Go into the forest and wait until his message is ripe for you.'She was a wise woman.

  "So I put aside my bow and quiver, and with them all desire of meat andall thought of killing. With my tomahawk I cut a mark in that chestnutyonder and buried my weapon at the foot of it. I had my knife, my pipe,and my fire-stick. Also I felt happy and important because my mother hadmade me believe that the Holder of the Heavens thought well of me. I wasgiving him a year in which to tell me what to do with my life.

  "I turned east, for, I said, from the east light comes. It was an oldtrail even in those days. It follows the watershed from the lake toOneida, and clears the Mohawk Valley northward. It was the Moon ofTender Leaves when I set out, and by the time nuts began to ripen I hadcome to the lowest hills of the Adirondacks.

  "Sometimes I met hunting-parties or women gathering berries, and boughtcorn and beans from them, but for the most part I lived on seeds androots and wild apples.

  "By the time I had been a month or two without killing, the smell ofmeat left me. Rabbits ran into my hands, and the mink, stealing alongthe edge of the marsh to look for frogs, did not start from me. Deercame at night to feed on the lily buds on the lake borders. They wouldcome stealing among the alders and swim far out to soak their coats.When they had made themselves mosquito-proof, they would come back tothe lily beds and I would swim among them stilly, steering by the redreflection of my camp-fire in their eyes. When my thought that was notthe thought of killing touched them, they would snort a little andreturn to the munching of lilies, and the trout would rise in bubblyrings under my arms as I floated. But though I was a brother to all theEarth, the Holder of the Heavens would not speak to me.

  "Sometimes, when I had floated half the night between the hollow sky ofstars and its hollow reflection, the Vision seemed to gather on thesurface of the water. It would take shape and turn to the flash of aloon's wet wing in the dawning, Or I would sit still in the woods untilmy thought was as a tree, and the squirrels would take me for a tree andrun over me. Then there would come a strange stir, and the creeping ofmy flesh along my spine until the Forest seemed about to speak ... andsuddenly a twig would snap or a jay squawk, and I would be I again, andthe tree a tree....

  "It was the first quarter of the Moon of Falling Leaves," said theOnondaga filling his pipe again and taking a fresh start on his story."There was a feel in the air that comes before the snow, but I was veryhappy in my camp by a singing creek far up on the Adirondacks, and keptputting off moving the camp from day to day. And one evening when I camein from gathering acorns, I discovered that I had had a visitor. Mush ofacorn meal which I had left in my pot had been eaten. That is right, ofcourse, if the visitor is hungry; but this one had wiped out his trackswith a leafy bough, which looked like trickery.

  "It came into my mind that it might have been one of the Gahonga, thespirits that dwell in rocks and rivers and make the season fruitful."

  "Oh!" cried Dorcas, "Indian fairies! Did you have those?"

  "There are spirits in all things," said the Onondaga gravely. "There areOdowas, who live in the underworld and keep back the evil airs thatbring sickness. You can see the bare places under the pines where theyhave their dancing-places. And there are the Gandaiyah who loose wildthings from the traps and bring dew on the strawberry blossoms. But allthese are friendly to man. So I cooked another pot of food and lay downin my blanket. I sleep as light as a wild thing myself. In the middle ofthe night I was wakened by the sound of eating. Presently I heardsomething scrape the bottom of the pot, and though I was afraid, I couldnot bear to have man or spirit go from my camp hungry. So I spoke tothe sound.

  "'There is food hanging in the tree,' I said. I had hung it up to keepthe ants from it. But as soon as I finished speaking I heard the Thingcreeping away. In the morning I found it had left the track of one smalltorn moccasin and a strange misshapen lump. It came up from anddisappeared into the creek, so I was sure it must have been a Gahonga.But that evening as I sat by my fire I was aware of it behind me. No, Iheard nothing; I felt the thought of that creature touching my thought.Without looking round I said, 'What is mine is yours, brother.' Then Ilaid dry wood on the fire, and getting up I walked away without lookingback. But when I was out of the circle of light I looked and I saw theThing come out of the brush and warm its hands.

  "Then I knew that it was human, so I dropped my blanket over it frombehind and it lay without moving. I thought I had killed it, but when Ilifted the blanket I saw that it was a girl, and she was all but deadwith fright. She lay looking
at me like a deer that I had shot, waitingfor me to plunge in the knife. It is a shame to any man to have a girllook at him as that one looked at me. I made the sign of friendship andset food before her, and water in a cup of bark. Then I saw what hadmade the clumsy track; it was her foot which she had cut on the rocksand bound up with strips of bark. Also she was sick with fright andstarvation.

  "For two days she lay on my bed and ate what I gave her and looked at meas a trapped thing looks at the owner of the trap. I tried her with allthe dialects I knew, and even with a few words I had picked up from asummer camp of Wabaniki. I had met them a week or two before atOwenunga, at the foot of the mountains.

  "She put her hand over her mouth and looked sideways to find a way outof the trap.

  "I was sorry for her, but she was a great nuisance. I was so busygetting food for her that I had no time to listen for the Holder of theHeavens, and besides, there was a thickening of the air, what we callthe Breath of the Great Moose, which comes before a storm. If we did notwish to be snowed in, we had to get down out of the mountain, and onaccount of her injured foot we had to go slowly.

  "I had it in mind to take her to the camp of the Wabaniki at Owenunga,but when she found out where we were going she tried to run away. Afterthat I carried her, for the cut in her foot opened and bled.

  "She lay in my arms like a hurt fawn, but what could I do? There was atent of cloud all across the Adirondack, and besides, it is not properfor a young girl to be alone in the woods with a strange man," said theOnondaga, but he smiled to himself as he said it.

  "It was supper-time when we came to Crooked Water. There was a smell ofcooking, and the people gathering between the huts.

  "There was peace between the Five Nations and the Wabaniki, so I walkedboldly into the circle of summer huts and put the girl down, while Imade the stranger's sign for food and lodging. But while my hand wasstill in the air, there was a shout and a murmur and the women begansnatching their children back. I could see them huddling together likebuffalo cows when their calves are tender, and the men pushing to thefront with caught-up weapons in their hands.

  "I held up my own to show that they were weaponless.

  "'I want nothing but food and shelter for this poor girl,' I said. I hadlet her go in order to make the sign language, for I had but a few wordsof their tongue. She crouched at my feet covering her face with her longhair. The people stood off without answering, and somebody raised a cryfor Waba-mooin. It was tossed about from mouth to mouth until it reachedthe principal hut, and presently a man came swaggering out in the dressof a Medicine Man. He was older than I, but he was also fat, and for allhis Shaman's dress I was not frightened. I knew by the way the girlstopped crying that she both knew and feared him.

  "The moment Waba-mooin saw her he turned black as a thunderhead. Hescattered words as a man scatters seeds with his hand. I was too far tohear him, but the people broke out with a shower of sticks and stones.At that the girl sprang up and spread her arms between me and thepeople, crying something in her own tongue, but a stone struck her onthe point of the shoulder. She would have dropped, but I caught her, Iheld her in my arms and looked across at the angry villagers andWaba-mooin. Suddenly power came upon me....

  "It is something all Indian," said the Onon-daga,--"something White Mendo not understand. It is Magic Medicine, the power of the Shaman, thepower of my thought meeting the evil thought of the Wabaniki and turningit back as a buffalo shield turns arrows. I gathered up the girl andwalked away from that place slowly as becomes a Shaman. No more stonesstruck me; the arrow of Waba-mooin went past me and stuck in an oak. Mypower was upon me.

  "I must have walked half the night, hearing the drums at Crooked Waterscaring away evil influences. I would feel the girl warm and soft in myarms as a fawn, and then after a time she would seem to be a part of me.The trail found itself under my feet; I was not in the least wearied.The girl was asleep when I laid her down, but toward morning she woke,and the moment I looked in her eyes, I knew that whatever they hadstoned her for at Owenunga, her eyes were friendly.

  "'_M'toulin_,' she said, which is the word in her language for Shaman,'what will you do with me?'

  "There was nothing I could do but take her to my mother as quickly aspossible. There was a wilderness of hills to cross before we struck thetrail through Mohawk Valley. That afternoon the snow began to fall ingreat dry flakes, thickening steadily. The girl walked when she could,but most of the time I carried her. I had the power of a Shaman, thoughthe Holder of the Heavens had not yet spoken to me.

  "We pushed to the top of the range before resting, and all night wecould hear the click and crash of deer and moose going down before thesnow. All the next day there was one old bull moose kept just ahead ofus. We knew he was old because of his size and his being alone. Two orthree times we passed other bulls with two or three cows and theircalves of that season yarding among the young spruce, but the old bullkept on steadily down the mountain. His years had made him weather-wise.The third day the wind shifted the snow, and we saw him on the roundcrown of a hill below us, tracking."

  The Onondaga let his pipe go out while he explained the winter habits ofmoose.

  "When the snow is too deep for yarding," he said, "they look for thelower hills that have been burnt over, so that the growth is young andtender. When the snow is soft, after a thaw, they will track steadilyback and forth until the hill is laced with paths. They will work aslong as the thaw lasts, pushing the soft snow with their shoulders torelease the young pine and the birches. Then, when the snow crusts, theycan browse all along the paths for weeks, tunneling far under.

  "We saw our bull the last afternoon as we came down from the cloud cap,and then the white blast cut us off and we had only his trail to follow.When we came to the hill we could still hear him thrashing about in histrails, so I drew down the boughs of a hemlock and made us a shelter anda fire. For two days more the storm held, with cold wind and drivensnow. About the middle of the second day I heard a heavy breathing aboveour hut, and presently the head of the moose came through the hemlockthatch, and his eyes were the eyes of a brother. So I knew my thoughtwas still good, and I made room for him in the warmth of the hut. Hemoved out once or twice to feed, and I crept after him to gather grassseeds and whatever could be found that the girl could eat. We had hadnothing much since leaving the camp at Crooked Water.

  "And by and by with the hunger and anxiety about Nukewis, which was thename she said she should be called by, my thought was not good any more.I would look at the throat of the moose as he crowded under the hemlockand think how easily I could slit it with my knife and how good moosemeat toasted on the coals would taste. I was glad when the storm clearedand left the world all white and trackless. I went out and prayed to theHolder of the Heavens that he would strengthen me in the keeping of myvow and also that he would not let the girl die.

  "While I prayed a rabbit that had been huddling under the brush and thesnow, came hopping into my trail; it hopped twice and died with thecold. I took it for a sign; but when I had cooked it and was feeding itto the girl she said:--

  "'Why do you not eat, M'toulin,' for we had taught one another a fewwords of our own speech.

  "'I am not hungry,' I told her.

  "'While I eat I can see that your throat is working with hunger,' sheinsisted. And it was true I could have snatched the meat from her like awolf, but because of my vow I would not.

  "'M'toulin, there is a knife at your belt; why have you not killed themoose to make meat for us?'

  "'Eight moons I have done no killing, seeking the Vision and the Voice,'I told her. 'It is more than my life to me.'

  "When I had finished, she reached over with the last piece of rabbit andlaid it on the fire. It was a sacrifice. As we watched the flame lick itup, all thought of killing went out of my head like the smoke ofsacrifice, and my thought was good again.

  "When the meat she had eaten had made her strong, Nukewis sat up andcrossed her hands on her bosom.

  "'M'to
ulin,' she said, 'the evil that has come on you belongs to me. Iwill go away with it. I am a witch and bring evil on those who arekind to me.'

  "'Who says you are a witch?'

  "'All my village, and especially Waba-mooin. I brought sickness on thevillage, and on you hunger and the breaking of your vow.'

  "'I have seen Waba-mooin,' I said. 'I do not think too much of hisopinions.'

  "'He is the Shaman of my village,' said Nukewis. 'My father was Shamanbefore him, a much greater Shaman than Waba-mooin will ever be. Hewanted my father's Medicine bundle which hung over the door to protectme; my father left it to me when he died. But afterward there was asickness in the village, and Waba-mooin said it was because the powerfulMedicine bundle was left in the hands of an ignorant girl. He said forthe good of the village it ought to be taken away from me. But _I_thought it was because so many people came to my house with their sick,because of my Medicine bundle, and Waba-mooin missed their gifts. Hesaid that if I was not willing to part with my father's bundle, that hewould marry me, but when I would not, then he said that I was a witch!'

  "'Where is the bundle now?' I asked her.

  "'I hid it near our winter camp before we came into the mountains. Butthere was sickness in the mountains and Waba-mooin said that it also wasmy fault. So they drove me out with sticks and stones. That is why theywould not take me back.'

  "'Then,' I said, 'when Waba-mooin goes back to the winter camp, he willfind the Medicine bundle.'

  "'He will never find it,' she said, 'but he will be the only Shaman inthe village and will have all the gifts. But listen, M'toulin, by nowthe people are back in their winter home. It is more than two days fromhere. If you go without me, they will give you food and shelter, butwith me you will have only hard words and stones. Therefore, I leaveyou, M'toulin.' She stood up, made a sign of farewell.

  "'You must show me the way to your village first,' I insisted.

  "I saw that she meant what she said, and because I was too weak to runafter her, I pretended. I thought that would hold her.

  "We should have set out that moment, but a strange lightness came in myhead. I do not know just what happened. I think the storm must havebegun again early in the afternoon. There was a great roaring as of windand the girl bending over me, wavering and growing thin like smoke.Twice I saw the great head of the moose thrust among the hemlock boughs,and heard Nukewis urging and calling me. She lifted my hands and claspedthem round the antlers of the moose; I could feel his warm breath.... Hethrew up his head, drawing me from my bed, wonderfully light upon myfeet. We seemed to move through the storm. I could feel the hairyshoulder of the moose and across his antlers Nukewis calling me. I feltmyself carried along like a thin bubble of life in the storm that poureddown from the Adirondack like Niagara. At last I slipped into darkness.

  "I do not know how long this lasted, but presently I was aware of alight that began to grow and spread around me. It came from the face ofthe moose, and when I looked up out of my darkness it changed to theface of a great kind man. He had on the headdress of a chief priest, thetall headdress of eagle plumes and antlers. I had hold of one of them,and his arm was around and under me. But I knew very well who held me.

  "'You have appeared to me at last,' I said to him.

  "'I have appeared, my son.' His voice was kind as the sound of summerwaters.

  "'I looked for you long, O Taryenya-wagon!'

  "'You looked for me among your little brothers of the wild,' he said,'and for you the Vision was among men, my son.'

  "'How, among men?'

  "'What you did for that poor girl when you put your good thought betweenher and harm. That you must do for men.'

  "'I am to be a Shaman, then?' I thought of my father.

  "'According to a man's power,' said the Holder of the Heavens,--'as mypower comes upon him....'"

  The Onondaga puffed silently for a while on his pipe.

  Dorcas Jane fidgeted. "But I don't understand," she said at last; "justwhat was it that happened?"

  "It was my Mystery," said the Onondaga; "my Vision that came to me outof the fasting and the sacrifice. You see, there had been very littlefood since leaving Crooked Water, and Nukewis--"

  "You gave it all to her." Dorcas nodded. "But still I don't understand?"

  "The moose had begun to travel down the mountain and like a good brotherhe came back for me. Nukewis lifted me up and bound me to his antlers,holding me from the other side, but I was too weak to notice.

  "We must have traveled that way for hours through the storm until wereached the tall woods below the limit of the snow. When I came tomyself, I was lying on a bed of fern in a bright morning and Nukewis wascooking quail which she had snared with a slip noose made of her hair. Iate--I could eat now that I had had my Vision--and grew strong. All theupper mountain was white like a tent of deerskin, but where we werethere was only thin ice on the edges of the streams.

  "We stayed there for one moon. I wished to get my strength back, andbesides, we wished to get married, Nukewis and I."

  "But how could you, without any party?" Dorcas wished to know. She hadnever seen anybody get married, but she knew it was always spoken of asa Wedding Party.

  "We had the party four months later when we got back to my own village,"explained the Onondaga. "For that time I built a hut, and when I had ledher across the door, as our custom was, I scattered seeds uponher--seeds of the pine tree. Then we sat in our places on either sidethe fire, and she made me cake of acorn meal, and we made a vow as weate it that we would love one another always.

  "We were very happy. I hunted and fished, and the old moose fed in ourmeadow. Nukewis used to gather armfuls of grass for him. When we wentback to my wife's village he trotted along in the trail behind us like adog. Nukewis wished to go back after her father's Medicine bag, andbeing a woman she did not wish to go to my mother without her dower.There were many handsome skins and baskets in her father's hut which hadbeen given to him when he was Medicine Man. She felt sure Waba-mooinwould not have touched them. And as for me, I was young enough to wantWaba-mooin to see that I was also a Shaman.

  "We stole into Nukewis's hut in the dark, and when it was morning alight snow was over the ground to cover our tracks, and there was oursmoke going up and the great moose standing at our door chewing his cudand over the door the Medicine bag of Nukewis's father. How theneighbors were astonished! They ran for Waba-mooin, and when I saw himcoming in all his Shaman's finery, I put on the old Medicine Man's shirtand his pipe and went out to smoke with him as one Shaman with another."

  The Onondaga laughed to himself, remembering. "It was funny to see himtry to go through with it, but there was nothing else for him to do. Iought to have punished him a little for what he did to Nukewis, but myheart was too full of happiness and my Mystery. And perhaps it waspunishment enough to have me staying there in the village with all thefolk bringing me presents and neglecting Waba-mooin. I think he was gladwhen we set out for my own village in the Moon of the Sap Running.

  "I knew my mother would be waiting for me, and besides, I wished my sonto be born an Onondaga."

  "And what became of the old moose?"

  "Somewhere on the trail home we lost him. Perhaps he heard his own tribecalling...and perhaps... He was the Holder of the Heavens to me, andfrom that time neither I nor my wife ate any moose meat. That is how itis when the Holder of the Heavens shows Himself to his children. Butwhen I came by the tree where I had cut the first score of my search forHim, I cut a picture of the great moose, with my wife and I on eitherside of him."

  The Onondaga pointed with his feathered pipe to a wide-boled chestnut arod or two down the slope. "It was that I was looking for to-day," hesaid. "If you look you will find it."

  And continuing to point with the long feathered stem of his pipe, thechildren rose quietly hand in hand and went to look.