XXXVII
THE MINGLING OF THE OLD AND THE NEW
Early on the morning of the great day--before the dawn, in truth--theTetongs came riding in over the hills from every quarter of the earth,bringing their finest clothing, their newest blankets, and their whitesttepees, all lashed on long poles between which the patient ponies walkedas in the olden time. Every man, woman, and child able to sit a horsewas mounted. No one wore a white man's hat or shoes or vest; all were inleggings and moccasins, fringed and painted, and they carried theirsummer blankets as they once carried their robes of the buffalo-skin.Even the boys of six and seven wore suits cunningly fashioned anddecorated like those of their elders. The young warriors, painted, andwith fluttering feathers, rode their fleetest ponies, with shouldersbare and gleaming like bronze in the sun.
With all due form, without hurry or jostling, the whole tribe camped ina wide ellipse, each clan in its place, each family having a fixedposition in the circle. The tepees rose like magic, and their threads ofsmoke began to creep up into the clear sky like mysterious plants,slender and wavering.
Greetings passed from camp to camp, the head men met in council, and, asthe sun rose higher, swarms of the young men galloped to and fro,laying out a racing-course and making up for a procession under Wilson'sdirection.
Curtis said: "I am not interdicting any of their customs merely becausethey belong to their old life, but because some of them are coarse orhurtful. Their dance is not harmful unless protracted to the point ofinterfering with their work. That they are all living somewhat in thepast, to-day, is true; but they will put away this finery and go to workwith me to-morrow. To cut them off from all amusement is cruelfanaticism. No people can endure without amusement."
"How appropriate their gay colors seem in this hot, dun land!" remarkedElsie. "They would look gaudy in a studio; but out here they aregrateful to the sense."
In the centre of the wide circle of tepees a huge bower of pines wasbeing erected for the dance, and pulsing through the air the voice ofthe criers could be heard, as they rode slowly round the circlepublishing the programme of the day.
"Looking over the camp towards the hills it is not difficult to imagineone's self back in the old days," said Maynard. "I saw Sitting Bullcamped like this. See, here is the 'Soldier Lodge' or chief'sheadquarters," and he pointed to a large, handsome tepee set in one ofthe foci of the big ellipse.
Everywhere they went Curtis and his friends met with hearty greeting."Hoh--hoh! The Little Father!" the old men cried, and came to shakehands, and the women smiled, looking up from their work. The littlechildren, though they ran away at first, came out again when they knewthat it was the Captain who called. Jennie gave hints about the cooking,and praised the neat tepees and the pretty dresses, while Elsie, lookingupon it all with reflective eyes, could not help thinking, "Such will bemy work if I do my duty as a wife."
Once she looked at the firm, bold, facial outlines of the man she hadlearned to love, and snuggled a little closer into his shelter; he wouldtoil to make every hardship light, that was certain; but, oh! the drearywinters! There were moments when she took to herself a part of the loveand obedience this people showed Curtis. Here was a little kingdom overwhich Curtis reigned, a despotic monarch, and she, if she did her duty,would reign by his side. It had, at least, the virtue of being anunconventional self-sacrifice. And then, again, she smiled to think thatElsie Bee Bee should feel a touch of pride in being the wife of anIndian agent!
Driving his guests back to the agency, Curtis returned to the camp andmoved about on foot among his people. Wherever he went he seemed to givezest to the sports, and knowing this he remained with them till noon,and only came in to rest his weary feet and aching eyes for half an hourbefore lunch.
It was unutterably sweet to stretch out in his big, battered easy-chair,in the shaded coolness of the library, and feel Elsie's smooth, lighthand in his hair.
"And you are never to leave me," he said, dreamily. "I can't realize ityet." After a pause he added: "I am demanding too much of you,sweetheart."
"You are demanding nothing, sir; if you did you wouldn't get it. If Ichoose to _give_ you anything, you are to be grateful and discreetlysilent."
"Can't I say, 'Thank you'?"
"Not a word."
"I am content," he said, and closed his eyes again to express it, andshe, being unasked, bent and kissed his forehead.
Rousing up a few minutes later, he said, "I have a present in keepingfor you."
"Have you? What is it? Is it from you? Why didn't you let me see itbefore?"
He rose and opened a closet door. "Because the proper time had not come.Before I show it to you I want you to promise to wear it."
"I promise," she instantly replied.
"Don't be so ready; I intend it to be a symbol of your change of heart."
"Well, then, I don't promise," she said, backing away.
"I don't mean your change of heart towards me; I have a ring to expressthat; this is to express your change of heart towards--"
"Towards Injuns?"
"No; towards all 'the small peoples of the earth.'"
"Well, then, I can't wear it; I haven't changed. Down with them!" sheshouted, in smiling bravado.
He closed the door. "Very well, then, you shall not even see thepresent; you are not worthy of it."
"Oh, please! please! I'll forgive all the heathens of Africa, if youwill only let me see."
"I don't believe I like that, either," he replied. "You are now tooflippant. However, I'll hold you to the word. If you don't mean it nowyou will by-and-by."
Elsie clapped her hands with girlish delight as he held up a finebuckskin dress, beautifully adorned with beads and quills. It wasexquisitely tanned, as soft as silk, and a deep cream color.
"Isn't it lovely! I'll wear it whether my heart is changed or not."
"Here are the leggings and moccasins to match."
She gathered them all up at a swoop. "I'm going to put them on at once."
"Wait!" he commanded. "Small Bird, who made these garments, is out inthe kitchen. I want to call her; she can be your maid for this time."
As Small Bird sidled bashfully into the hall Elsie cried out in delightof her. She was dressed in the old-time Tetong dress, and wasexceedingly comely. Her face was carefully painted and her hair shonewith much brushing and oil. Her teeth were white and even.
"Can she speak English?" asked Elsie.
"Not very well; but she understands. Small Bird, the lady says, thankyou. She thinks they are very fine. Her heart is glad. Go help herdress."
"Come!" cried Elsie, eagerly, and fairly ran up the stairs in her hasteto be transformed into a woman of the red people.
When she returned she was a sister to Small Bird. Her dark hair wasbraided in the Tetong fashion, her face was browned, and her little feetwere clothed in glittering, beaded moccasins.
"You look exactly like some of the old engravings of Mohawk princesses,"cried Curtis. "Now you are ready to sit by my side and review theprocession."
"Are we to have a procession?"
"Indeed we are, as significant as any mediaeval tournament. I am theresident duke before whom the review takes place, and I shall be in mybest dress and you are to sit by my side--my bride-elect."
"Oh no!"
"Oh yes. It is decided." He drew himself up haughtily. "I have said it,and I am chief to-day. It is good, Small Bird," he said, as the Tetonggirl started to go. "My wife likes it very much."
Elsie ran towards the girl and took her by the shoulders as if to makeher understand the better. "Thank you; thank you!"
Small Bird smiled, but surrendered to her timidity, and, turning, ranswiftly out of the room.
Curtis hooked Elsie in his right arm. "Now all is decreed. You have puton the garb of my people," and his kiss stopped the protest shestruggled to utter.
Surely the day was a day strangely apart. Everything that could be doneto make it symbolic, to make it idyllic, was done. Curtis appeared af
terlunch in a fine costume of buckskin, trimmed with green porcupine quillsand beads, and for a hat he wore a fillet of beaver-skin with a singlefeather on the back. Across his shoulder he carried the sash of a finelybeaded tobacco pouch, and in his hand a long fringed bag, very ancient,containing a peace-pipe, which had been transmitted to Crawling Elk byhis father's father, a very precious thing, worn only by chieftains.
"Oh, I shall paint you in that dress," cried Elsie.
So accoutred, he led the way to the canopied platform under theflag-pole, where the reviewing party were to sit. In order that noinvidious distinctions might be drawn, two or three of the old chiefsand their wives had been given seats thereon, and they were already inplace. Not many strangers were present, for Curtis had purposelyrefrained from setting a day too long ahead, but Lawson's friends andsome relatives of the employes, and several of the young officers fromthe fort made up the outside representation. Maynard was in hisbrightest uniform, and Jennie, looking very nice in a muslin gown, and abroad, white hat, sat by his side.
From the seats in the stand, the camp, swarming with horsemen, could beseen. Wilson, as grand marshal, was riding to and fro, assisted byLawson, who had entered into the game with the self-sacrificing devotionof a drum-major. His make-up was superb, and when at last he approached,leading the cavalcade, Elsie did not recognize him. His lean face, darkwith paint, was indistinguishably Tetong, seen from a distance, and hesat his horse in perfect simulation of his red brethren. He was butre-enacting scenes of his early life. His hunting-shirt was dark withuse, and his splendid war-bonnet trailed grandly down his back. He rodeby, looking neither to the right nor the left, singing a new song.
"We are passing. See us passing by. We are leaving the old behind us. The new we seek to find. We are passing, passing by."
Crawling Elk followed, holding aloft a spear with a green plume; it wasa turnip thrust through with a sharp-pointed, blackened stick, andbehind him, two and two, came fifty of his young warriors carryingshining hoes upright, as of old they carried their lances, while attheir shoulders, where quivers of arrows should have swung, dangled trimsheaves of green wheat and golden barley. The free fluttering of theirfeather-ornamented hair, the barbaric painting on their faces and hands,symbolized the old life, as the green arrows of the grain prefigured thenew. Behind them rode their women, each bearing in her left hand a bunchof flowers. Those who could read wore on their bosoms a small, shiningmedal, and in their hair an eagle feather. No Tetong woman had ever worna plume before.
Standing Elk, quaint and bent, rode by, singing a war-song, magnificentin his dress as war chief, leading some twenty young men. His hands wereempty of the signs of peace, and his face was rapt with dreams of thepast, but his young men carried long-handled forks which flamed in thesun, and bracelets of green grass encircled their firm, brown arms.They, too, were painted to signify their clan and their ancestry, andthe "medicine" they affected was on their breasts. Their wives wereclose behind, each bearing a stalk of corn in bloom; their beadedsaddles and gay blankets were pleasant to see. Every weapon bespokewarfare against weeds. Every ornament represented the better nature, thestriving, the aspiration of its wearer.
Then came the school-children, adding a final note of pathos, poorlittle brown men and women trudging on foot to symbolize that they mustgo through life, plodding in the dust of the white man's chariotwheel--their toes imprisoned in a shapeless box of leather, their hairclosely clipped, their clothing hot and restrictive. Each carried a bookand a slate, and their faces were very intent and serious as they pacedby on their way from the old to the new. They were followed by theschool-band playing "The Star-Spangled Banner," with splendid disregardof the broken faith of the government whose song it was.
And so they streamed by, these folk, accounted the most warlike of allred men, genially carrying out the wishes of their chief, illustrating,without knowing it, the wondrous change which had come to them; the oldmen still clinging to the past, the young men careless of the future,the children already transformed, and, as they glanced up, some smiling,some grave and dreaming, Elsie shuddered with a species of awe; itseemed as if a people were being disintegrated before her eyes; that theevolution of a race having proceeded for countless ages by almostimperceptible degrees was now and here rushing, as by mighty bounds,from war to peace, from hunting to harvesting, from primitive indolenceto ordered thrift. They were, indeed, passing, as the plains and thewild spaces were passing; as the buffalo had passed; as every wild thingmust pass before the ever-thickening flood of white ploughmen pressingupon the land.
Twice they circled, and then, as they all massed before him, Curtis roseto sign to them.
"I am very proud of you. All my friends are pleased. My heart is bigwith emotion and my head is full of thoughts. This is a great day foryou and also for me. Some of you are sad, for you long for the oldthings--the big, broad plain, the elk, and the buffalo. So do I. Iloved those things also. But you have seen how it is. The water of thestream never turns back to the spring, the old man never grows young,the tree that falls does not rise up again. So the old things come neveragain. We have always to look ahead. Perhaps, in the happyhunting-ground all will be different, but here now we must do our bestto live upon the earth. It is the law that, now the game being gone, wemust plough and sow and reap the fruit of the soil. That is the meaningof all we have done to-day. We have put away the rifle; we here take upthe hoe.
"I am glad; my heart is like a bird; it sings when I see you happy.Listen--I will tell you a great secret. You see this young woman," hetouched Elsie. "You see she wears the Tetong dress, the same as I; thatmeans much. It signifies two things: Last year her heart was hardtowards the Tetongs; now it is soft. She is proud of what you have done.She wears this dress for another reason; she is going to be my wife, andhelp me show you the good way." At this moment a chorus of pleasedoutcries broke forth. "Now, go to your feast. Let everything be orderly.To-night we will come to see you dance."
With an outburst of jocular whooping, the young men wheeled their horsesand vanished under cover of a cloud of dust, while the old men and thewomen and the children moved sedately back to camp; the women chatteringgayly over the day's exciting shows, and in anticipation of the dancewhich was to come.
* * * * *
There were tears in Elsie's eyes as she looked up at Curtis. "They haveso far to go, poor things! They can't realize how long the road tocivilization is."
"I do not care whether they reach what you call civilization or not; theroad to happiness and peace is not long, it is short; they are even nowentering upon it. They can be happy right here, and so can we," heended, looking at her with a tender wistfulness. "Can't you understand?"
"You have conquered," she said, with deep feeling. "Under the spell ofthis day, I feel your work to be the only thing in the world worthdoing." Her words, her voice, so moved him that he bent and laid a kissupon her lips. When he could speak, he said: "Now I want to asksomething of you. I have a leave of absence for six months. Show me theOld World."
She sprang up. "Ah! Can you go?"
"When the crops are garnered and sifted, and my people clothed andsheltered."
"I'd rather show you Paris than anything else in the world!" she cried."I'd almost marry you to do that."
"Very well, marry me; we will spend our honeymoon there; perhaps thenyou will be willing to spend one more year here with me, andthen--well--Never cross the range till you get to it is a maxim of thetrail."
THE END
The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop Page 37
