Sagamore

“ The sagamore plunged into the recesses of the forest, and at length emerged upon the river-bank, where, as boy and youth, he had idled his days in that ecstatic dream of love and youth, which so fills up the soul that the past is forgotten, the future hung with rainbow clouds, pavilioned with golden vaults and silvery sheen, thus exalting the glow of the present by an onward gorgeous perspective. ”

“ My Indians, silent and morose, their vengeance unslaked and now indefinitely deferred, moved at a dog trot through the forest, led by the Sagamore, whose eyes saw as clearly in the dark as my own by day.
And after a little while we noticed the stars above us, and felt ferns and grass under our feet, and came out into that same glade from whence runs the trail to Yndaia through the western hill cleft.
"People ahead!" whispered the Sagamore. "Their Sorceress and six Eries!"
"Are you certain?" I breathed, loosening my hatchet.
"Certain, Loskiel. Yonder they are halted within the ferns. ”

“ I began by saluting him with the most insidious and stately compliment I could possibly offer to a Sagamore of a conquered race—a race which already was nearly extinct—investing this Mohican Sagamore with the prerogatives of his very conquerors by the subtlety of my opening phrase:
"O Sagamore! Roya-neh! Noble of the three free clans of a free Mohican people! Our people have need of you. The path is dark to Catharines-town. Terror haunts those frightful shades. ”

“ The Sagamore is of the high blood of the Delawares, and is the great chief of their Tortoises! That some of this stock are among the people of whom the singer tells us, is plain by his words; and, had he but spent half the breath in prudent questions that he has blown away in making a trumpet of his throat, we might have known how many warriors they numbered. It is, altogether, a dangerous path we move in; for a friend whose face is turned from you often bears a bloodier mind than the enemy who seeks your scalp. ”

“ While the sagamore thus poured out his poetic rhapsody with beaming eyes, and looks unutterably tender, Hope’s dreamy eyes were fixed on the vapors circling the falls, which were ever and anon swept aside by the gusty wind which stirred in the bare branches of the trees. It was evident that much in the mind of her lover was to her a sealed book. Perhaps John Bonyton felt something of the kind. Who has not, at some time, poured out the unfathomed wealth of a soul upon an arid desert! ”

“ No, no, no, John Bonyton,” and she covered her face with her hands, to hide her relenting tears.
The sagamore was softened, and laid his hand upon her shoulder.
“Tell me what became of Hope Vines, Acashee, and I will forget all the past.”
“She was called away by the Great Spirit.” And her look and tone softened.
“Acashee, I know your falsehood and your thousand wiles. You do not speak truth. Tell me, I beseech you, where you have put her, for I feel in my very soul that she lives. She comes to me in my dreams, she walks by my side in the forest-path—there is no spot to me where Hope is not.” ”

“ I whispered; and the Mohican said with a derisive laugh:
"Four scalp-tufts from the mangy Cats of Amochol trim my hatchet-sheath. When the young men ask me what this sparse and sickly fur may be, I shall strip it off and cast it at their feet, saying it is but Erie filth to spit upon."
"Liar of a conquered nation!" roared the Erie, "for every priest of Amochol who fell by Otsego under your cowardly butcher's knife, a Siwanois Sagamore shall burn three days, and yet live to die the fourth! The day that August dies, so shall the Sagamore die at the Festival of Dreams in Catharines-town!" ”

“ She faltered, and her clear gaze became confused. "Why should your Indians question you?" she asked.
The last ray of the sun reddened the forest, lingered, faded, and went out in ashes. I said:
"God and Tharon are one. Priest and Sagamore, clergyman and Sachem, minister, ensign, Roya-neh—red men or white, all are consecrated before the Master of Life. If in these Indians' eyes you are still to remain sacred, then must you promise yourself to me, little Lois. And let the Sagamore perform the rite at once." ”

“ I can not live to see thee look with a weary heart—a half-heart, upon the Hope who is all thine.”
While the solitary child, pure as the unnamed crystal that hung from the cave in which she had been so long immured, gave expression to that untutored tenderness which she felt was to be a dream of the past, the sagamore suddenly started forward, and pointed to a high rock by the margin of the falls, upon which appeared the tall figure of Acashee. Hope saw her with a faint smile, which was not lost upon her lover. ”

“ Unconsciously he had cast himself down by the wigwam of the prophet of the tribe. It was the custom of the Indians to build the tent or wigwam of those whose duty it was to watch all omens bearing upon the welfare of the people, in some secluded spot within the sound of great falls, or in proximity to some natural cave or grotto, where they might, undisturbed, exercise their spells and incantations. A hand, cold, and wasted by fastings nearly to the bone, was laid upon the shoulder of the sagamore. ”

“ And late that afternoon we rode out of the half-ruined village, northward. Our saddle-bags were full; our animals rested; and, beside us, strode the Sagamore, fully armed and accoutred, lock braided, body oiled and painted for war—truly a terrific shape in the falling dusk.
On the naked breast of this Mohican warrior of the Siwanois clan, which is called by the Delawares "The Clan of the Magic Wolf," outlined in scarlet, I saw the emblem of his own international clan—as I supposed—a bear. ”

“ Few modern practitioners, we presume, have surpassed the old Sagamore in the arts of legerdemain. These, however, were not his substantive profession, or at least not long. The politician soon emerged from the slough of the juggler. The Priest became a Sachem; the Sachem, the Grand Sagamore of Penacook; and the Sagamore preserved not only his own power, but his son's after him, by a series of diplomatic demonstrations, and a few words of "elegant" civility, which, without disparaging his importance with his countrymen, made him the most agreeable neighbor to the English. ”

“ Siward.... What is that furry hunch up there in that tall thin tree?”
“A raccoon,” he said presently. “Can you see the foxy head peeping so slyly down at us? Look at Sagamore nosing the air in that droll blind mole-like way. He knows there's something furry up aloft somewhere; and he knows it's none of his business.” ”

“ At length he seized a torch and flashed it full upon her face. The eyes of the two met, but not a word passed the lips of either. Returning to the council, the sagamore asked:
“Has the captive heard our proceedings?”
“No; the wind bears the sound away. The sapling to which she is bound is beyond earshot.”
“It is Acashee, the daughter of Samoset.”
The younger chiefs sprung to their feet, and would have buried their tomahawks in her brain, for they knew of the story of Hope Vines, and the grief of the sagamore. ”

“ What could the degraded acolytes of this Red Priest do against a consecrated Sagamore of the Lenape—against an ensign of the Enchanted Clan? Else why do you wear your crest—or the great Ghost Bear there rearing upon your breast?"
"It is true," he murmured uneasily. "What spell can Amochol lay upon us? What magic can he make to escape us? For the trail from Catharines-town is stopped by a Siwanois Sagamore and a Mohican warrior! It is closed by an Oneida Sachem who stand watching. When the Ghost Bear and the Were-Wolf watch, then the whole forest watches with them—Loup, Blue Wolf, and Bear. ”

“ He will never dance the war dance again, nor will he lead the war party. The sagamore dies, and who will tell his tribe? He falls like a leaf in the forest, like a pebble that is cast into the water. The leaf is not seen: the stream closes above the pebble—it is gone!" His voice rose into a chant, stern and mournful, and his vast form appeared to expand, to become taller. He threw down his gun and drew his long, bright knife.
"They are upon us!" cried Landless, and thrust Patricia behind him. ”

“ Does my brother Loskiel know where?"
"Sagamore," I said earnestly, "this maid is no wild gypsy thing—no rose-tinted forest pigeon. She has been bred at home, mannered and schooled. She knows the cote, I tell you, and not the bush, where the wild hawk hangs mewing in the sky. Why has she fled to the wilderness alone?"
The Indian said cunningly:
"Why has my brother Loskiel abandoned roof and fire for a bed on the forest moss?"
"A man must do battle for his own people, Sagamore."
"A white maid may do what pleases her, too, for aught I know," he said indifferently. ”

“ The mad-dog stone is a different species, used medicinally for the cure of hydrophobia, and the bite of venomous serpents. This latter is of oriental origin.
The sagamore would gladly have left all, and followed the oracle of the wizard, traveling toward the rising sun, where he now felt sure he should find Hope; but, as chief of the tribe he could not cast off the duties it involved, or forget the grave decorums of the office. He must await the return of the scout, and then follow the Terrentines and Androscoggins to their villages or hunting-grounds. ”

“ But before he spake I knew why too.
"Does a Sagamore ask idle questions of a woman?" he said coldly. "Do the Siwanois babble?"
"No. And yet—and yet——"
"Birds sing, maidens chatter. A Mohican considers ere his tongue is loosed."
"Aye—it is your nature, Sagamore.... But tell me—what was it in the mention of my name that made you think of magic?"
"Loskiel, you came two hundred miles to ask of me the question that this maid had asked in every camp."
"What question?"
"Where lay the trail to Catharines-town," he said. ”

“ Duncan observed with uneasiness that the scout began to look anxiously about him, as if searching for some further means of assisting their flight.
"Edge her a little more from the sun, Sagamore," said the stubborn woodsman; "I see the knaves are sparing a man to the rifle. A single broken bone might lose us our scalps. Edge more from the sun, and we will put the island between us." ”

“ The wounded doe seeks the deepest covert in which to die.”
She turned away, but the sagamore, rushing forward, folded her in his arms, saying:
“You must not leave me, Hope; do you not love me?”
She answered by a low wail, more eloquent than words, and it was long before her sobs allowed her utterance. At length, she looked up with a wistful, earnest gaze, and answered:
“I see it all now, John Bonyton. I see that Hope is a child, you are man. Hear me say it all—I am a child such as I was years ago; you are not the John Bonyton who played with pebbles upon the beach. Look at the eagle-plume! ”

“ Let us in our hearts pray God to speed them. For if we do our part as worthily, only then shall their labour be not in vain. Their true title to glory is in our keeping, locked inevitably with our own. If we fail, they have failed. Judge, therefore, O Sagamore, judge, you Yellow Moth, and you Oneidas—Grey-Feather, with your war-chief's feather and your Sachem's ensign, Tahoontowhee, chieftain to be—judge, all of you, where the real glory lies—whether behind us in the rifle smoke or before us in the red glare of Amochol's accursed altar! ”

“ The Sagamore Samoset, he saw, was a tall, straight man, of complexion like an English gypsy, smooth-faced, with coarse black hair that fell to his shoulders behind, but was cut before. Since his coming into the settlement, his English hosts had put upon him a horseman's coat, which he wore with much pride and dignity; indeed, all his gestures and carriage were not only decent, but of a certain stateliness. "Why, he is somewhat like other men," Miles whispered softly to Giles, but Trug grumbled in his throat. ”

“ And a finer sight I never saw; for the tall and magnificently formed Siwanois was in scarlet war-paint from crown to toe, oiled, shaven save for the lock, and crested with a single scarlet plume—and heaven knows where he got it, for it was not dyed, but natural.
His scarlet and white beaded sporran swung to his knees; his ankle moccasins were quilled and feathered in red and white; the Erie scalps hung from his girdle, hooped in red, and he bore only a light pack-slung, besides his rifle and short red blanket.
"Salute, O Sagamore! Roya-neh!" I said in a low voice, passing him. ”

“ Upon the headland overlooking the falls, and hidden by the heavy but stunted vegetation of the rocky hight, stood a small group of ancient warriors, the sole remnant of a once powerful band. These, after taking into their unwilling minds the terrible truth of ambush, defeat and death, stole away to the village to hasten the departure of the women and children.
Not so Acashee. She watched intently the group below in the midst of which floated the white, abundant locks of Hope Vines. With jealous rage she saw the sagamore fold the slight form to his breast ”

“ It was determined that two hundred picked warriors, headed by the sagamore, would be sufficient to effect the surprise and discomfiture of the eastern alliance, which had proposed to wait till the hunting season was finished before they started upon their warlike expedition. But the Sacos boasted that the grass never grew in the trail of their warriors, and now, headed by their brave and untiring sagamore, they were confident of success. ”

“ Lastly, the minister came slowly down the pulpit-stairs, and walked down the aisle, and then John Bonyton strode forth, and walked, in a slow and stately manner, up the main street of the village, along the river-bank, and up the mountain gorges. No man dared lay hands upon him.
The Sagamore of Saco was no ordinary man, and the men of the times felt it. ”