Sal-o-quah : or Boy-life among the Cherokees / by Rev. F. R. Goulding

THE WOODRUFF STORIES.
SAL-0-QUAH;
OR,
IfBOY-LIFE AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
BY
REV. F. R. GOULDING,
AUTHOR OF "YOUNG MAROONBRS," "MAROONKR'S ISLAND," " FRANK GORDON," Etc.
NEW YORK: DODD, MEAD & COMPANY.
1888.

RKMSEK fc HAJTSLTnfOMl, fe tfa* 0*er dw UbMim rf COMKM

CHAPTER I.
FAGB
READY TO START--LONG LIFE TO THE YOUNG--AT KANEEKA'S HOUSE--THE FAMILY--THE EVENING WORSHIP--SURPRISE NEXT DAY.-- "OLD WICKED," it
CHAPTER II.
HISTORY OF OLD WICKED--FORAY ON THE COWETAS-- "I WILL DIE FIGHTING"--MASSACRE AT MUSCLE SHOALS ......... 26
CHAPTER III.
VOLUNTARY EXILE--KENNESAW--THE BEGINNING OF A NOTED CHARACTER . . . . . . .36
CHAPTER IV.
A CHEROKEE LOCK--GEORGE GUESS--His PERSONAL APPEARANCE AND OCCUPATION -- His ALPHABET -- HISTORY OF ITS PROGRESS--ITS PECULIARITIES -- IM MEDIATE EFFECTS ON HIS NATION--CLOSE OF HIS LIFE . . . . . . . . . .44 vii

viii

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER V.
ADIEU TO SEE-QUO-YAH -- SCOSSITY'S WOLF-TRAP -- PEN FOR CROWS -- TURKEY NOOSE -- SCOSSITY'S HOUSE AND HOSPITALITY -- SPUNK A GOOD STYPTIC FOR CUTWOUNDS -- COUSIN ALECK READS FOR SCOSSIT-EQUAH, 59

CHAPTER VL
KANEEKA TELLS A REMARKABLE STORY-- INDIAN TRIAL FOR MANSLAUGHTER-- RESEMBLANCE OP CHEROKEE USAGE TO THAT OF THE ANCIENT HEBREWS-- EFFORTS TO SAVE THE LIFE OF THE CONDEMNED MAN -- DAY OF EXECUTION -- SO-TOT AND WHAT BECAME OF HIM, 67

(CHAPTER VM. FISHING EXCURSION-- THE FISH-SPEA*-- FLY-FISHING . 84

CHAPTER VIII.
FISHING WITH " LIVE BAIT " -- THE " FisHmnmT " AND " BUSH -DRAG" -- POISONING AND MUDDYING THB WATER -- THE SCOOP-NET . . . . . .92

CHAPTER IX.

MOONLIGHT AND Music -- UNEXPECTED RESULTS -- PAN

THERS

99

CHAPTER X.
FIRE-FLIES--MORE Music, BUT NOT FROM MAN--A
VbtUNTARY FROM A JMANY-VOICED CHOIR -- INTEREST ING CONVERSATION . ; . . . , . no

CONTENTS.

'

Ik

FAO*
ISocx MOUNTAIN---SPLENDID GLOWWORM--OLD MILIt -TAtiY FORTIFICATION --A THUNDER-STORM--SUNSET, 119
CHAPTER XH. Scmxfis STORY--KANBEKA'S EXPLANATION-*-THE PONY
' . 128
xm.
PLEASANT DISAPPOINT*|BNT--HdvfcL CORN-SHELLER-- BUCKET-TRACK--JACK OF ALL TRADES '. . . 140
CHAPTER XIV. ^HELPS' STORY--STEAMBOAT EXPLOSION--A TOMA
HAWKED CALF--THE BEAR AND THE TWO STEELTRAPS--A WHIRLWIND, AND -DEVICE FOR ESCAPE . 149
CHAPTER XV. DESTINY--# MISCHIEF-WORK'* AND " MURDER-BLOOD"--
WOUNDED Doo-MHASit1 SIMONS,--WARRANT BY WORD OF MOUTH--THE PERROT FAMILY--GARC.ON, 160
6HAPT1ER XVI.
KAMKttKA's REPORT OF THE PURSUIT--USE OF A MIR ROR -- DESPERADO -- SKILFUL LYING -- EXTEMPORE STRAIT-JACKET ... . . . . .171
CHAPTER XVII. SECRET SIGNS -- PONY CLUB AGAIN--HOT PURSUIT--
HALT I HALT!" --THE TRIAL --DYING CONFES-

X

CONTENTS.

PAOB
SIONS--YELLOW-JACKETS -- LORENZO'S SCARE--PRE PARING TO TRAVEL --VISIT TO SCOSSIT-EQUAH -- HOMINY MORTAR AND PESTLE -- CONNAHAYNEE -- SEE-QUO-YAH AGAIN ....... 182

CHAPTER XVIH.

ECONOMIZING FOOD, A LESSON FROM THE RICHEST BE-

ING IN THE UNIVERSE--CHEROKEE ELECTION-DAY,

AND METHOD OF ELECTION

202

SCIPIO--INDIAN DOCTORING--A FELLOW-TRAVELLER CN FOOT--CHEROKEE HOTEL--SLEEPING ACCOMMO DATIONS--MEETING OF TWO RARE CHARACTERS-- VANDEVER'S STORY .'..-.*. . . . . 212
CHAPTER XX.
WOLF-TRAP--CHEROKEE WEDDING AND FUNERAL -- ETOWAH RIVER--MR. MILLER'S--TA-KAH-TO-KUH . 229
CHAPTER XXI.
VISIT TO THE CAVE--ITS TWO ENTRANCES--PANTHER WITHIN, AND WHAT WAS DONE--PREPARATIONS FOR ENTERING--THE ANTE - ROOM--GALLERIES -- " THE SYLVAN TEMPLE"--BAT CHAMBER--SOMETHING ON FIRE--UNPLEASANT PREDICAMENT--CHEERLESS RE TREAT--EFFORTS TO HELP OURSELVES--EMERGING AT LAST -- THE MILLERS AGAIN--TO-KAH-TO-KUH, AND A PROSPECT--CONCLUSION . . . . .242

SAL-O-QUAH.
CHAPTER I.
READY TO START--LONG LIFE TO THE YOUNG-- AT KANEEKA'S HOUSE--THE FAMILY -- THE EVENING WORSHIP -- SURPRISE NEXT DAY -- "OLD WICKED."
EIGHO for Cherokee-landl" said my father at breakfast, the morning after our ride through* Nacoochee Valley. "'Are you all ready?" . *' Ready! Ready! Ready!" was the response from each and all. It was just a week and a day since we had left Athens. Was it only that ? It seemed a month rather than a week. But so it usually is with travellers, especially at the beginning of a tour. So it certainly is in the journey of life, and

12

SAL-O-SUAH ; OR, BOY-LIF&

probably for the same reason; every day is more or less marked with novelty. This is a new world on which the young have entered. Every thing is fresh. Successive weeks and months are but successive departments in a vast museum, filled with wonderful things that keep the atten tion wide awake. In middle life the world is no longer new. The exciting novelties which mark the progress of time are farther apart; a year seems but the half or the quarter of what it used to be. Later in life past fifty, past sixty, time rushes with fearful velocity. But this may not be due altogether to the lack of novelty: it may be the solemn warning which nature gives that the stream of life is hurrying to its plunge.
Late in the afternoon of Saturday, when the sun, as if weary with his day's labor, had laid his head upon a pillow-like cloud in the west, in anticipation of a night's repose, we left the great highway by which we had entered the Gherokee Territory, and turned into a newly opened road, very narrow, very winding, very level, but so little used that it was more dis-

marked by triages * on the trees than by marks of Wheels upon the ground. In passing ceftaln points of hilly ground, we could catch glimpses of a wide and fertile valley, and I petcieived that we were approaching obliquely the rich bottoms <of a river.
* I make it
Ire we turned off from the highway, SaSoquafi iiad suddenly left us by a pony path. A quarter of an hour afterward, while watering our horses -&* littte rivulet, we heard the clatter of his pony's hoofs among the rocks far down the ravine to our left.
A pleasant ride of three or four miles along this new road enabled us tQ look down upon an extendiv* wooded level, with feere and there a clearing for a farm, varying in size from ten to '<*ne hundred acres. On the brow of a rounded hill overlooking one of the largest of these clear-
* Blazes on trees " are, in backwoods phrase, conspicuous marks left by the axe in removing so much of the bark as to show the white wood beneath. In newly settled countries, it is the Usual mode of marking a fresh-opened track.

14

SAI>O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

ings, we saw a neat log-house, built upon the usual frontier plan of " two pens and a passage," with shed rooms in the rear, and surmounted by a roof of short clap boards. The house was white, as if covered with a coat of lime; and there was a piazza-like shed in front, supported by posts set in the ground. The floor of this piazza, was of earth, a little raised above the surrounding level; and the eye was delighted with the sight of a luxuriant vine gracefully climbing round each post
" That my house," said Kaneeka, pointing to it, with pride.
"A very different house from the one in which I first saw you," said my father.
" Had not been in white man's country then," returned Kaneeka, quickly; "had not learned white man's ways."
"Is your pretty house white-washed with lime ? " cousin Aleck asked.
" No, only white clay," Kaneeka answered. " It" is certainly very pure and very pretty," said my aunt, with delight. As we drew nearer, we saw Saloquah's pony

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

15

hitched near the gate, for the house was sur rounded with a little stockade fence, giving to it, and to all around it, a very picturesque ap pearance ; to add to which we saw Yellow-Bird, (or Chescoo-teleneh,)-Kaneeka's wife, standing in the doorway, holding little Sallicoo by the hand, while a boy, seemingly eight or ten years of age, dressed in fringed deerskin, was running fast as his nimble legs could carry him to meet his father.
"We are glad to find in these wild woods such a happy-looking home," said my aunt. " I was hardly prepared for it."
" Few homes in my own dear Scotland seem to be happier than this," said cousin Aleck.
Kaneeka's eye kindled. " Not everybody so. in Injin country," said he. "I not so either till He come," he added, point ing to my father> who, with a blush of pleasure, hastily inquired: "And pray what did I do to help your cause so much?" "You show me white man ways," said Kaneeka, with enthusiasm, and growing eloquent as

one thought suggested another, "You read me white man Bible. You tell me white man Saviour. You teach me and my wife love God, love pray, love good, love everybody. "Jlien our corn begin to grow, om? hog begin to get fat, our eow give plenty milk We get happy, and we get rich."
My father looked down for a moment, then, seemingly impressed with Kaneeka's assemblage of facts, he turned to cousin Aleck, and asked:
"Bo you recollect the thought you read to me the other, day about the ancient patriarchs ? that in those days, when men had little faith in a future life, God gave great prosperity to Abra ham, Job, and other of His distinguished ser vants, in order probably to convince men by sensible signs that godliness is gain." , " Yes," replied cousin Aleck; " and I recollect you added to it the thought, that it was probably for a similar purpose toward the present heathen, that God causes Christian countries to be so far in advance of pagans and anti-Christians in all that pertains to worldly well-being."
<f Now, take this case of Kaneeka," continued

my father. " Does it not give us reason to ex pect that God's mode of dealing with the patri archs may be repeated whenever it becomes necessary for the same purpose ?"
Cousin Aleck's eye brightened with emotion, as he replied:
" Our God i* the same yesltefday, tflrday, and forever -- changeless as Htft. owm heavens. As He dealt in the days of Abraham and Job, He is doubtless ready to deal yet."
Kaneeka could, of course, scarce comprehend the remark made about himself, yet he caught a glimpse of it, and his eye brightened too. So that it was with, the pleasant augury of an inter course such as became Christian people that we entered beneath the roof of that once heathen family.
Yellow-Bird, as has been said, was awaiting her husband in the doorway, holding her little girl by the hand Surrounded by graceful vines as they were, we could not but admire the pic ture. Kaneeka's face was radiant with joy, and his little family seemed equally rejoiced to wel come him back. There was a wild, Indian-like
VOL. III.--B

l8

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

beauty in the group, softened by a gentle Chris tian influence, so deeply impressive as to make itself felt even now as I write.
A room had already been prepared for my aunt and her maid, and she took possession of it without delay. The rest of us prepared to abide in our tents, which were pitched almost within talking distance of the house.
Soon after dark the open passage of the house was lighted by a candle, and we could see that Yellow-Bird had set in the midst a little table, covered with a white napkin, on which was something that looked suspiciously like a book. A few minutes afterward, Kaneeka came to our tent, and, with a cheerful, confident air, looking first at my father and cousin Aleck, then at us boys, he said: " Come; want all of you."
Not knowing what was to follow, we arose and went with him, as also did Quash and ScipiOj whom we beckoned to come. Seats were arranged against the walls, and when we had all taken our places, Kaneeka pointed my father to the table, and with a tone of voice that evidently admitted of no refusal, said:

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

I<>

w Come, read, sing, pray." IVJy father and cousin Aleck were amused, as well as gratified, at the free and easy spirit in which the act was performed. Kaneeka had often witnessed our evening worship during the journey, and had so greatly enjoyed it that he coveted the same privilege beneath his own roof, in the presence of his wife and children. Of course there was no refusal. By home training, we were all singers, and my father and cousin were used to the duties of a Christian household. Moreover, this simple act of Kaneeka's so touched their hearts that in all the exercises of that evening there was an unusual pathos. An old familiar tune was sung, in which four parts were carried, and the rich melody of the negro voices at the door, uniting with the deep bass of my father, and the soft second of my aunt, formed a compound of sweet notes that was exceedingly pleasant. Kaneeka and his wife were deeply moved. I saw Chescoo, In dian though she was, and trained to self-control, wipe away a tear"; and the coal-black eyes of her

3p

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

little ones fairly sparkled as they looked first upon one, then upon another of the singers. I am sure no one of the company ever forgot that first evening's worship in an Indian's house, in the heart of the Cherokee country.
Kaneeka seemed to delight in surprises. The next day was the Sabbath. We knew that there was no place of worship within several days' journey; nevertheless, according to custom, we had attired ourselves suitably to the day, but had made our preparations very leisurely, having no expectation of services other than a repetition of the pleasant scene of the preceding evening. Between nine and ten o'clock that morning, however, a decently clad old Indian and his wife came and seated themselves in silence on a log not far from our encampment. They were soon followed by a showily dressed young cou ple ; after whom came a rough-looking hunter, then an old*man of singular appearance, in whom the lamb and the wolf seemed to ,be struggling for predominance, and the wolf, as usual, prevailing. Finally, there assembled as many as fifty, who all took their seats in silence

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

21

\

upon two or three logs tl^at lay conveniently

near together, around a stump that might, in

case of necessity, be used as a table or pulpit

desk. Indeed, we subsequently learned that

these logs and that stump had served more than

once as a place of worship. When they had

assembled, Kaneeka, who acted as if perfectly

ignorant of their presence, and who had not

said a word to any of us on the subject, came

with smiling face to my father and cousin

Aleck, and said, pointing to the assembled

people:

" Come, preach!"

" But I am no preacher," returned my

father.

" You preach last night," said Kaneeka.

" You preach again to-day."

" But I have not thought of anything to talk

about."

"Can read Bible, and talk, and sing," per

sisted Kaneeka.

" But how can J read or talk to a people when

,1 do not understand their language and they do

not understand mine ?"

22

SArO-aUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

"You read and talk, /make them under stand." Thus ended Kaneeka.
There was no resisting his persuasion. My father and cousin selected the touching parable of the Prodigal Son, (Luke xv,) which was read and interpreted sentence by sentence. The Lord's Prayer formed the chief part of the two prayers, one at the opening, the other at the close of the service, both of which also were devoutly translated ioto Cherokee.
Our choir, toor was organized as on the pre ceding evening, and the effect upon the people of the simple music was very manifest. Their usually passionless faces continued to be dec orously turned toward the kader of the ser vices, but they were lighted up with undisguised pleasure.
I observed, during the reading and interpreta tion of the parable, indications of deep interest. Not an act Qr motion was indulged inconsistent with the most staid propriety -- for an Indian never violates decorum -- but some of them were strongly moved, especially the old couple who came -first, and the man described as of

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

23

singular appearance." The face of this last, which was at first so marked with savage fierce ness as to be painfully repulsive, began gradually to soften with the progress of the reading, until at that part of the narrative where the father is represented as saying, " Bring forth the best robe and put it on him," the eye of the savage, still directed toward the reader, filled with tears, and his lip quivered with emotion.
In the course of an hour, the services were pronounced ended, and the people dismissed. Several came up to shake hands, and to express by grunts how'much they had been gratified, and most of them on departure turned toward us a look of thanks. Quite a number, however, seemed loath to, depart They occupied their places on the log or walked about, looking ex pressively at Kaneeka, and exchanging a few brief sentences with each other. Among these, the most noticeable were the three old people already mentioned.
"Injin want more Bible," said Kaneeka. * Want to hear over"
The request, of course, was granted. The

24

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

parable was again read and interpreted, and theft all departed better satisfied.
In a talk with us, that afternoon, Kaneeka informed us that the man who had particularlyattracted our attention was a noted character, known among his people as Scossiteh or Scossit-equah, (Wicked^ or Big Wicked,) and by the white people as Jack, and Wicked Jack; that he had been one of the most desperate characters
*
known, being afraid of nothing, human or divine, and taking a fiendish delight in all sorts of mis chief and suffering; but that during the past few months he had heard the gospel for the first time, and had been so won by the gentle, loving character of Jesus Christ as to have gone to the Mission Station at Brainerd, and there begged to know more. From that time forward, his whole life had been changed, and the change had begun to show itself even in his face.*
* It may be gratifying to the readers of this narrative to be assured that " Old Wicked" was a real character, just as described; and those who have access to the old files of the "Missionary Herald," published at Boston, may see that in the following year, 1823, he united with the Mission Church, and was baptized under the singular name of Jack Crawfish.

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

2J

We subsequently learned that the assembly brought together that day was by no means accidental. It had been adroitly managed by Kaneeka the day before, when Saloquah left us on the road. He had taken a short cut home through the mountains, to inform Chescoo of our near approach, but had stopped also at the lodge of the old couple who were the first comers, and through them had invited the people to meet when the sun was " half-way up the sky."

CHAPTER II.
HISTORY OF OLD WICKED -- FORAY ON THE COWETAS -- "l WILL DIE FIGHTING"--MASSACRE AT MUSCLE SHOALS.
HE remarkable face of Old Wicked, so deeply marked with the lines of passion and of hate, but softened now, and partially transformed by a new and over powering influence, awakened in all of us so lively an interest that at the first conve nient moment Kaneeka was requested to tell us more about him. I remember distinctly the facts as they were then given, but must relate them in my own language, retaining only such characteristic peculiarities as impressed them selves upon my memory. Scossit-equah, or Big Wicked,, as his present name imports, was not always the bad man that
26

?Ji?:^?*^-y;,;;^^^

SAL-0-QUAH.

27

he became. He was naturally of a noble spirit always Ijrave, always true to his friends, al
ways scorning meanness; but his good quali ties were converted into gall and poison by evil influences.
In boyhood he was known as Tullo-tahe, or Two-killer, because, while learning the use of the bow, he had killed two squirrels at one shot. During the greater part of his early manhood, he was known as Coweta-tahe, or Coweta-killer, and the reason of the change was this: In one of the forays which were then very frequent between neighboring nations, he and a younger brother, to whom he was tenderly attached, made a night attack upon the Cowetas, a frontier tribe. - of the Coosas, and began their return with five scalps and a young woman of great beauty. They had left all danger behind them, as they supposed, having crossed the line, and plunged deep into a rayine, where they stopped to con ceal themselves and to rest. While smoking their pipes and trying'to comfort their captive in her loss of country and friends, they heard afar off the tramp of horses. Pursuers were upon
26

28

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

their track, and it was soon manifest that these were too numerous to be resisted. .Their only hope of escape was by a ruse. They hastened to ascend the opposite side of the ravine, and there left signs as though they had passed on; but they came back on a concealed trail, plunged into a thicket of briery vines, and there lay, awaiting the issue. Their captive was blindfolded and made to lie close.
By ,a most untoward accident, however, a young man rode into the ravine directly toward their concealment. He had left the trail, and was about to stumble upon them at random. They waited until he was within ten steps, when twang went Scossit-equah's bowstring, and the young man -- a handsome fellow, with the look of a great brave -- fell from his horse, pierced through the breast with an arrow. A moment after, the horse was caught and brought behind the vines for concealment; and scarcely had the lifeless body been dragged to the same place and the scalp taken, ere another horseman fol lowed the trail of the first, and shared his fate. This last act was by the hand of the brother,

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

29

t
who, hoping that both might now be furnished

with the means of flight, ran to catch the rider-\

less horse. He failed to do this, and the horse

ran wildly -away, carrying in its empty saddle

the tidings of disaster. Its return to the pursu

ing company was followed by a fierce yell of

hate and revenge. The tramp of horses' feet

sounded on all sides, and then ceased. The

fugitives were discovered and surrounded. Their

enemies had taken their stands, and were going

to hunt them like deer. Soon a heavy volume

of smoke rolled up the ravine. The dry herbage,

collected on the ground for years, untouched by

the annual fires, had been ignited, and the tall

flames, driven by the wind, came roaring their

threat of a horrible death. The two brave men

looked that dreadful enemy in the face, and the

younger said:

" Brother, you have a horse, and may escape,

I am on foot, and must die. But I do not think

the Great Spirit intended me to be smoked to

death like a rabbit, or burnt to death like a

snake, or to die in captivity by the hands of

women. I will die fighting. Mount your horse*

3O

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

When my war-whoop sounds on one side of the ravine, all the warriors will collect there, and you can escape on the other. Farewell! Take these scalps from my girdle. Shaw them at home, and say that I died like a warrior."
His last act was to loose the captive woman, and tell her to go free. He rushed upon his enemies with a whoop so loud and divided as to sound like whoops from two different men. All the pursuers hastened to meet him. He shot down one, wounded another, and was fighting a third, when he fell pierced by a dozen arrows and balls. In the mean time, Scossit-equah, scarcely able to keep from fallowing and dying with him, mounted his horse, escaped unseen in the opposite direction, and brought home the story of his brother's h*eroism.
The poor woman, on being loosed, tore the bandage from her eyes, looked at the body of the young man, and, with a wail of anguish, threw herself upon it. She must have lain there long insensible, for when discovered by her deliverers, she was so badly burned that she begged to be at once killed and buried with him

whom she mourned. He was her lover, and they were soon to have been married.
Scossity, or as he was then called, Tullo-tahe, returned home with seven scalps hanging from his girdle--three of which had been taken by his brother. From that day forward, for many years, he was known as Coweta-tahe. But he often declared that no name of honor could compen sate for the loss of his brother; nor could his revenge be satisfied with less than as many Coweta scalps as there were days between one green-corn season and another. This was the beginning of his being what he afterward be came-- fierce, hateful, and hating.
A few years after this, while living in a distant part of the nation, far to the sun-setting, he and others of his town went with my uncle Bowls --you may have heard of him as General Bowls, for he was a famous man in his day -- to Tellico Blockhouse,* to receive from the United States
* Tellico Blockhouse was a military post and an agency of the United States for the Cherokees. It was in Tennessee, not far from the site of the present Chattanooga. General Bowls was a Cherokee chief, and the incidents here recorded of him, in connection with the names of Stewart and Scott, are parjt of

$2

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

Agent the money promised to be paid our peo ple, every year, for their lands. I was a little boy at the time, only seven or eight years old, but my uncle Bowls, who had conceived a jjreat liking to me, took me with him on the trip. We went to Tellico, received the share of money due to our town, and were returning home, when our provisions fell short, and we stopped to hunt. We made our camp at the head of the Big Shoals on the Tennessee River; you white people know them as the Muscle Shoals.
While we were encamped there, several boats loaded with white people and negroes, men, women, and children, came and landed near us. They were movers to some place down the Mis sissippi River. The boats were under the com mand of two white men, named Stewart and Scott, who not only calculated on making money by moving the families, but had provided them selves with trinkets for trading with any Indians they might meet on the way. Learning that the red men ashore were abundantly supplied with

the history "of his ill-starred people. The account given is cor roborated by the testimony of white persons who .were present

AMONG 'THE CHEROKEES.

33

money, they invited them into the boats, treated them to all appearance very hospitably, and supplied them so well with liquor that they became intoxicated. It is said that " a fool and his money are soon parted;" the proverb is certainly true of a drunken Indian, for as soon as he is drunk, he feels rich, and wants to buy everything.
The moment the liquor had taken effect, Stewart and Scott displayed their wares, and tempted the Indians to buy. In a few hours, all the money ashore had passed into the hands of these white men, and there remained with the Indians only a few worthless trinkets, which they had been induced to buy at the rate of twelve dollars for a string, of glass beads, six teen dollars for a little looking-glass with gilt edges, and thirty dollars an ounce for vermilion and other showy paints. When the Indians be came sober, and saw how they had been treated, they went aboard the boats, returned what they had purchased, and demanded a return of the money. But Stewart and Scott only laughed at them, saying that they were not children, to
VOL. in. -- c

34

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

make a bargain one moment and fly from it the next. The Indians argued that the act was not theirs, but the whisky's; and insisted on all being restored as before the trade, offering to pay for the whisky, which had been given them, at the rate of four dollars per gallon, which was probably ten times more than it cost Stewarfc and Scott, however, would listen to no arguments, and peremptorily ordered them to leave the boats. They did so, but collected on the river barik, and began to load their rifles, resolved that, at what ever cost, the money should be refunded. At this juncture, General Bowls, hoping to quiet the feelings of his people, took with him Scossity and several other men of tried courage and cool ness, went with them aboard the boats, earnestly warned the white men of the coming danger, and tried to persuade them to avoid it by undo ing the wrong they had done. Instead of heed ing them, these two men seized their boat-poles, rushed upon the red men, killed one of them by a blow upon the head, and another by piercing his breast with the iron-headed pole. The sur vivors hastily retreated to land, and, though ex-

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

35

cited almost beyond self-control, they strove

most earnestly to restrain the exasperated mul

titude. But all in vain. The blood of their

butchered brothers was before their eyes, and

deadly rifles were in their hands. In less than,

a minute, Stewart and Scott lay stretched upon

the deck, killed at the first fire, and soon every

other white man aboard shared the same fate.

The women and children were left undisturbed;

and one of them afterward testified that, even

during the horrors of the massacre, the non-

combatants were treated with respect and kind

ness.

,

The story is told of Scossity, that while

the women and children were bewailing their

slaughtered friends, whose bodies lay upon the

deck, his heart was so touched by the sight of

a woman weeping bitterly over the bloody re

mains of her husband and son, that he went to

'

*s.

her, and with the corner of her apron wiped her *

eyes, saying, in a gentle tone, " I sorry."

CHAPTER III.
VOLUNTARY EXILE -- KENNESAW -- THE BEGINNING
OF A NOTED CHARACTER.
FTER the massacre, the Indians took possession of the boats and their con tents, passed down the Tennessee into the Ohio; tjien down the Ohio into the Mis sissippi; then along the Mississippi to a cer tain point, where they placed all the white women and children aboard one boat, with the furniture and goods they claimed, with "provisions neces sary for the voyage, and with negro men enough to conduct the boat to New Orleans, and thus set them adrift. But, fearing that this massacre would bring upon them the vengeance of the whites, they poled their boats into one of the branches of the Mississippi, and there lived in the woods awaiting the result. The villany of
36

SA1>0-QUAH.

37

Stewart and Scott in plying them with liquor under the guise of hospitality, and their subse quent violence, caused Scossity to hate the whites almost as intensely as he hated the Cowetas, This was his second step in the downward course.
Soon after this, in close connection with it, there was a third. The leading men of the Nation, hearing of the massacre, and fearing that the whites would regard it as a violation of the treaty ratified not long before, assembled in council, memorialized the United States upon the subject, repudiated the act of the outraged people, and sent messengers to General Bowls and his company, demanding that they should come from their concealment, and stand trial for the killing of white men. We came, for I was still with my uncle in the woods; the case was tried, and, I am glad to say, in the spirit of justice; and when the facts came to be known, Bowls and his company were acquitted,.and the boats, with all their contents, were given to the captors as forfeited by the misconduct of Stewart and Scott

38

SAL-O-QUAH ; "OR, BOY-LIFE

This act of unexpected justice somewhat mollified Scossity's feelings toward the whites; but toward the rulers of his own people he becam.e intensely imbittered for what he regarded as their cowardly, or at least their selfish, fail ure to stand by them in their time of trial.
From this time forth, he began to regard the world as made up of thieves, liars, and cowards, who deserved only his contempt. He withdrew himself as far as possible from the haunts of men, acknowledging only a few choice friends, whom he loved all the more because they were so few, and being ready to turn his hand against every man, as he believed every man's hand to be turned against him. For many years, he and , others of the Bowls company lived in the wilds beyond the Mississippi; but hearing that there was plenty of buffalo and other game in a coun try farther north, bordering on the Osages, and partly settled by wandering Cherokees like themselves, they removed from White River, and settled there. News of this fine country, far from the whites, and abounding with all that a wild Indian desires, was soon carried back to

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

39

the Nation, and brought out many more settlers. Every year brought more and more, until now as I talk about it,* the Natio n is almost equally divided, half on this side of the Mississippi, half on that.
Jhis crowding upon him did not suit Scossitequah. He could not go farther west, for the Osages and other nations were there, of whom he had killed too many to be allowed to pass them alive. His heart began to yearn for friends of his early days -- Kennesaw and See-quo-yah --left in the old country. He returned to see them, and he has continued here ever since.
Kennesaw is one of our chiefs. He is a man of good heart and great courage, but he loves whisky, and, when under its influence, he is ready for any act of violence. Scossit-equah was one of the few who could control him. But one day Scossit-equah and others of the company all cjrank "together until they did not know what they were doing. They mounted their ponies, rode over the country whooping and yelling like crazy people, rushed into the town of Suwannee,
* In the year 1822.

4O

SAL-CHQUAil; OR, BOY-LIFE

drove out the people, and set the houses on fire. / This so enraged the inhabitants that they pro3/nounced sentence of death against the perpetra
tors, if ever caught within a certain distance of their town. Kennesaw and his crew were thus compelled to remove to a distance. Kennesaw lives now at the foot of a mountain whose top you can see from this place.*
When the company was thus broken up, Scossit-equah went to live for a while with his old friend See-quo-yah, who had now become too lame to do bis own hunting, and between whom and himself there existed a strong tie of hate to all white men, their ways, their laws, and their religion.
Among the white people there was one thing, however, which, with all his cherished hate, See-quo-yah could not help coveting, and that was what he called " their talking leaf." When

* He dwelt there until a short time before the Nation moved to Arkansas, when he died, leaving his name to the mountain, which is still called after him. It rises just outside the town of Marietta, and was. the scene of a fierce cannonade during the war of the Confederacy. Some of the old white settlers still speak of Kennesaw's drunken frolic in burning Suwannee.

" *

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

4!

he was quite a young man, a prisoner had been taken, in whose pocket was a paper which said exactly the same words to everybody that could read it This was a new and wonderful thing to our people, and they regarded the paper with great reverence, for the prisoner informed them that the art oC talking thus was a gift of the Great Spirit But See-quo-yah Had his own views upon the subject; he regarded the art as a human device, and though it puzzles, him to know how it is to be done, he cannot be con tent without having some similar device for the Cherokees. He cannot speak a word of Eng lish; he does not know a letter in any book; he seeks no help from others; yet his whole being is engaged in trying to give a written language to his people.
About a year since, Scossit-equah brought him to this neighborhood, the better to serve him in hunting and fishing. He first built a little lodge near his own, then mounted his pony and went after him. On his way out, Scossijy met with a rough-looking white man by the name of Thompson, to whom he took a great

42

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFB

fancy. Thompson was a good blacksmith, and Scossity watched his works with great interest, to learn as much as possible of his art. But the blacksmith was, at the same time, a warm-hearted Christian, and while teaching Scossity such things as he desired to know about the working of iron, he taught him such things also as he did not desire to know, about Jesus Christ. This new light disturbed him. He tried, but in vain, to banish it from his mind. The idea, conceived for the first time, of a Being of wonderful love who " came into this world to save sinners, even the chief," haunted him through every conscious hour. He remained day after day in Thomp son's neighborhood, professedly learning to work in iron, but really hoping to hear more of "that Wonderful One.
From that day to the present he has been a changed man, and every one can see it. Seequo-yah, to whom nothing had been said on the subject before his removal, and who attributed Scossity's softened manner to the effect of years, gladly accepted his friend's offer, and has lived with him until the present time. His mind has

M-

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

43

been so completely absorbed with his invention that for a long time he had no't a suspicion of the nature and extent of Scossity's change. But he perceives it now, and is preparing to return to his old home.
/'Which I trust he will not do until I can see him I" exclaimed cousin Aleck, deeply interested, "Why, this man See-quo-yah* is a modern Cadmus! If he succeeds, his name will probably outlast both his language and his nation. I must see him, if it is only to know how he looks."

* Better known among the whites by his English name of George Guess.
27

CHAPTER IV.
A CHEROKEE LOCK -- GEORGE GUESS--HIS PER SONAL APPEARANCE AND OCCUPATION -- HIS ALPHABET -- HISTORY OF ITS PROGRESS -- ITS PECULIARITIES--IMMEDIATE EFFECTS ON HIS NATION -- CLOSE OF HIS LIFE.
MODERN Cadmus," cousin Aleck called him. But George Guess was more. Cadmus only introduced into Greece an imperfect alphabet of sixteen let ters -- some say eleven -- which had been taught him in Phoenicia,, and which was gra dually improved, so that in the course of a thousand years it amounted to twenty-two let ters. George Guess, or See-quo-yah, as he was called in Cherokee, perfectly untaught, and un assisted except by having an old spelling-book, of which he did not know a letter, devised a
44

SAL-O-QUAH.

45

peculiar alphabet of eighty-six characters, so \ easily learned that in three days' time an apt scholar could begin to read and write Cherokee, and so perfectly suited to the language that from that day to the present it has never needed improvement But I must tell my story before saying more.
Early next morning, after the unexpected " preaching" described in the last chapter, cousin Aleck announced his intention to make Seequo-yah a visit. My father and I offered to ac company him, and under the guidance of Kaneeka we trotted over to Scossit-equah's cabin, about four miles distant.
This cabin, although well put together* and proof against wind and rain, was far from being a model of architectural beauty. It was a pen of poles, fifteen feet square, high as a man's head, chinked with clay, and surmounted by a roof of split boards. On drawing rein at its front, we saw the door closed, and a peeled sapling leaned against it. Kaneekalooked disappointed.
" Scossit not here. Gone after deer, I s'pose/' he said.

40

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

"But what is the meaning of that skinned pole ? " cousin Aleck asked.
"That Cherokee lock" Kaneeka answered. We afterward learned, during our intercourse with these simple-minded people, that a skinned sapling at the door was a perfect protection to the house and all its contents. No one except the nearest intimate, or a neighbor in dire neces sity, ever presumed to pass it. The penalty was loss of character, and to an Indian this was equivalent to loss of life. " Must go, now, to See-quo-yah. Not far," said Kaneeka. He led us by a blind path over the sharp spur of a hill, and in the course of a quarter of a mile we heard from behind a thick growth of grape-vines, the clink of a small hammer. " That See-quo-yah, now," Kaneeka said. " He work in silver. He make rings, he make spoons, he make anything of silver." " He is a silversmith, then ? " my father inter
rogatively remarked. "Silversmith," returned Kaneeka, in an as
senting tone.

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

4/

0 Stop a moment, all of you," said my father.

"I must think of some work to engage See-

quo-yah, to do for me, as an excuse for coming.

Johnnie," he added, "is your pony never in need

of a spur ? "

"Never," I replied; "but Lorenzo's some

times is."



"That is enough," he remarked, and we went

on. . ' *.

Reaching a spot where we could command

a view beyond the grape-vines, we saw two men

under a tree, one of whom we recognized as

Scossit-equah. He came instantly to meet us,

his face beaming with pleasure. On learning

that we had stopped at his house on our way,

he urgently insisted that we should return and

complete our visit; but my father replied that

he had a little job in silver-smithing which he

would be glad to have See-quo-yah do for him,

if not too busy. Scossit-equah's face bright

ened, and he replied in an undertone through

Kaneeka:

" See-quo-yah don't love white people; but

he love work. Come, he glad to see you."

48

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

With this intimation we approached, and saw

a man of fifty-five or sixty years of age, sparely

built, with thin face, and broad forehead, sitting

beside a block, on which were a few tools, and

a basket containing more. He was fashioning

a thin strip of silver into ornaments for the arms

and wrists. A word from Scpssity caused him

to look up and give a grunt. That was our only

welcome, for he at once resumed his work. Such

a reception from a white man would have been

accounted unpromising; indeed, it was not very *

encouraging even from an Indian.

"Tell him," said my father, through Kaneeka,

" that I wish to have a pair of silver spurs made

for my son. Ask what they will cost, and when

I may expect to have them."

A few words were interchanged in Cherokee,

when Kaneeka turned and asked who was to

furnish, the, material. My father put his hand

jnto his pocket, drew forth several silver coins,

and showed them in reply. See-quo-yah's face

-'



relaxed into a grim expression of approval, as

he replied, through Kaneeka:

"Can make that do; but I have better."

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

49

It was. soon and satisfactorily settled that a pair of boy's spurs should be made, also some silver trinkets for Kaneeka's children. Then the conversation turned to the subject of the alphabet. At cousin Aleck's suggestion, Kaneeka said to him:
"The white men have heard that you are trying to make paper talk Cherokee/ They say this is good, and that they are glad to hear of it."
See-quo-yah gave his visitors each a searching look, uttered a doubtful grunt, and resumed his work.
"They say," added Kaneeka, "that they can make paper talk Cherokee now, and that they will be glad to help on your work."
See-quo-yah looked incredulous. Kaneeka went on to say:
" If See-quo-yah will tell me anything in my ear, I will go with one of them to yonder tree, and we will send it back to you on paper."
See-quo-yah whispered a word in his ear. Ka neeka beckoned cousin Aleck to a neighboring tree, where the Cherokee words were written in
VOL. in.--D

5O

SATL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

the Roman character, and the paper sent back by Scossit-equah. He brought it to my father, who read it as well as he could, yet imperfectly, for the reason that some of the sounds of Cherokee have no exact counterpart in the English. The message was:
"See-quo-yah wants paper to talk Cherokee."
That it could be understood, however, was plainly to be seen in the twinkle of the old man's eye. He took the paper, scrutinized its various parts, then returned it to my father with a message in Cherokee, which was written down, syllable by syllable, from his lips.
" Paper don't talk plain. Marks too many." This message produced a laugh at the other tree, which convinced See-quo-yah that it had been understood. He was evidently much in terested in the experiment, but gave no token of this farther than to request that " the talking leaf" should be left with him. He did not invite us into his cabin, nor show us any of his attempts at writing, nor respond to any inquiries we made as to his plans or his

progress. It was not long after this, however, before we heard that See-quo-yah had succeeded in his attempt; and a most wonderful work it was, both for its perfectness and its originality. The facts gathered at the time, and those ob tained long afterward, I throw together here, that the reader may have the history as a unit.
See-quo-yah, better known by his English name of George Guess, was born about the year 1765, and was a half-grown boy at the begin ning of our colonial struggle with the mother country. How or where he became first ac quainted with the white man's wonderful art of talking on paper, authorities are not agreed. Some say it was in early life, some say in later manhood; but all agree that the art powerfully interested him, and for a time so perfectly ab sorbed his thoughts that many esteemed him crazy. Nobody was more troubled about it than his wife, who, seeing him neglect his hunting and fishing, and his corn and potato patches, and give himself up daily to making marks with an old nail upon pieces of bark, as if this was of more importance than providing food, could

5?-.

SAL-O-QUAH; OR^ BOY-LIFE

account for it only on the score of insanity, and who, as the best means' of curing him, burned up all his marks. This was a sore loss; but he rallied from it, and went to work more vigor ously than ever.
He did not know a letter of any alphabet, nor a word of any language but his own; nor did he seek assistance from any person skilled in the white man's art. He had shrewdness enough to believe that the wonderful "talking leaf," which some ascribed to witchcraft, and which others held to be a gift of the Great Spirit, was nothing more than a human device by which, marks were substituted for sounds in expressing thought. Convinced more and more deeply of this fact,' he began to say that he thought "paper could be made to talk Cherokee," and he finally undertook the task.
The only helps to his work were that, living not far from a mission school, he occasionally saw books in the hands of the children. He also managed at last to obtain an old spellingbook, which he freely used in furnishing him self with marks of different kinds, while his mode

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

53

of using them proved that he did not know the power of a single letter.
It is said that his first attempt was to devise a sign or character for every word of his language; but after extending his hieroglyphics to many hundreds some say, to thousands he became convinced that the plan was too cumbrous, and gave it up. ,
After this it occurred to him that, although the words of his language were many, the syl lables were few, simple, terminating in vowels, and made to express different things by being used in different orders. This was his grand starting-point, and he pushed -on from it with rapidity and success. For instance, his own name, See-quo-yah, was made up of three sounds, each, of which-was often repeated in other Words. He therefore put down a mark for See, another for quo, and another for yah. In coming to the word See-quah, which means hog, he found that he already had in his own name a character for .See; it was the white man's P, turned bottom upward, and wrongside-before, almost a letter b. All he wanted, now, to spell his word, was a

54

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFB

mark for quak. To get this he took another letter from the white man's spelling-book. It was the letter H. But not knowing how to use it, he laid it over on its side, and so bX put to* gether spelled See-guah, the Cherokee for hog.
Thus he went qn, inventing new marks for new syllables, or taking such as could be found in books without regard to their previous use, until he had obtained eighty-six> each of which stood for a syllable, and by means of which he could write every word in his language. For certain letters of our alphabet he has shown great partiality. For instance, the letter J is used five times, with its tail turned different ways, or tied into a loop, rightside-up, or upsidedown, each standing for a different syllable. But our letters and signs, even whe"n standing as we are accustomed to see them, have alto gether different powers in Cherokee; for in stance, D4Z DB spell the two words, " Ah-se-no ah-yuh," and mean, "But I" (say unto you, etc.), Matt. v. 22, etc.
When See-quo-yah arrived at the stage of his invention in which the alphabet of syllables was

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

$5

the plan proposed, he withdrew himself from everybody, and continued in close retirement untrl he was able to announce that now he "COULD make paper talk Cherokee"
The rumor of this fact brought many people to him. In the mean time he had instructed cme of his daughters, so that when the people arrived, he and she, in different rooms, could, communicate by writing such short sentences as were dictated by those present.
The people were deligftted. "See-quo-yah has made paper talk Cherokee," spread like wild fire over the Nation. Soon the chiefs made in quiry into the matter. On See-quo-yah's invi tation they brought their sons to be instructed, and were delighted to find that not only was the rumor true, but that the new method was so simple and so easily acquired that a bright boy, after three days' practice, could write a letter which could be read a thousand miles away. See-quo-yah had made the art of reading and writing so easy that the whole Nation was excited, and multitudes began to learn. This was in the years 1822 and 1823. Teachers of the new

-56

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

alphabet went to Arkansas to instruct the Cherokees of the West, and soon letters in large* numbers were passing between friends who lived on different sides of the Father of Waters.
In vain the missionaries who had preached and- taught among them strove to content the people with the ordinary Roman alphabet, by which they might read books in other languages besides their own. The white man's writing was too cumbrous and too difficult to learn. A week's practice with the new alphabet enabled .them to read ^and write Cherokee better than a year's with the old ; indeed, a few hours' practice would enable them to begin their reading.
In the year 1826, application was made to the American Bible Society to print the New Testa ment in Guess' character. This was done. I have a copy of it now before me as I write; also a primer for beginners, with the alphabet and reading lessons. My young readers may be surprised to hear it, but a Cherokee school-book has no spelling lessons. None are needed, as with us. Every letter spells its' own syllable; and a Cherokee boy or girl, as soon as the alphabet

AMONG THE CHEROKEES

J*7

is learned, is able to read any book in his lan guage.
As soon as the new font of type was cast for printing the Bible in Guess' character, a news paper was begun in the Nation, and was read with ease by multitudes who three years be fore were perfectly illiterate. Since that time the constitution and laws of the Nation have been printed in the same character.
Were it possible for our language to be repre sented in the same way, the labor of learning to read and write would be reduced a hundred or a thousand-fold; but ours is not a syllabic lan guage, and cannot be made such.
In the year T&zS, the United States Govern ment appropriated "five hundred dollars for the use of George Guess, for the great benefits he has conferred on the Cherokee people/in the bene ficial results they are now experiencing from the use of the alphabet discovered by him"* -- a small amount for a white man, but in those days a valuable one for a wild Indian.
In the year 1829, See-quo-yah removed to
* See treaty with the Cherokees in 1828.

$8

SAL-O-QUAH.

Arkansas, from which he afterward went still farther West; and in the year 1843, al>ed seventyeight, he died, and (so says a letter recently re ceived from an educated Cherokee in Arkansas) was buried in a romantic valley in New Mexico, but without any monument to mark his restingplace. Peace to his ashes!

CHAPTER V.

ADIEU TO SEE-QUO-YAH -- SCOSSITY'S WOLF-TRAP -- PEN FOR CROWS--TURKEY NOOSE -- SCOSSITY'S HOUSE AND HOSPITALITY -- SPUNK A GOOD STYP TIC FOR CUT-WOUNDS -- COUSIN ALECK READS FOR SCOSSIT-EQUAH.

E did not keep See-quo-yah long from

his silver-smithing. Much interested

though we were in him, he did not

seem to be so in us. Indeed, we could not

but believe, from his undisguised restlessness,

that he would be better satisfied if we should

take ourselves away. My father and cousin left

reluctantly, for they would have been glad to

learn more from his own lips of his labors and

plans, and to have lent a helping hand in his

praiseworthy efforts. But See-quo-yah was

strongly marked with two prominent traits of

Indian character -- taciturnity, and a proud self-

28

59

60

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

reliance. Our parting was as unceremonious as our meeting; we wished him " Good day," inter preted for us by Kaneeka, to which the only response he returned was a grunt.
In the act of leaving, .Scossity went to a closely shaded nook, and there uncovered the half of a slaughtered deer, nicely wrapped in its own skin. It had been killed that morning, and the other part given to See-quo-yah. The portion reserved for himself was thrown over his shoul der, and with easy pace he preceded us in the trail that led to his house.
On our way we saw, what had been concealed by the bushes in our passing in the other direc tion, a singular-looking pen, not far from our path, which, we were informed, was Scossity's wolf-trap. It was closely floored with poles, and the sides shortened toward the top, so as to leave an entrance scarcely a foot square. This en trance it was usual to leave wide open until the wolf had entered and taken the bait often enough to feel secure, when it was made so narrow and so high that there could be no leaping out, and no climbing against the inclined wall.

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

61

A trap for crows, Kaneeka -informed us, was constructed on the same plan, only of smaller "dimensions, and more closely built. After being several times well baited with .corn, the entrance would be so narrowed that, although the crows could easily drop in, they could not pass out on outspread wing. We were much amused with these instances of ingenuity.
" Have you no traps for dear and turkeys ? " cousin Aleck asked.
".Oh, yes, for all," Kaneeka answered; and then he went on to describe a simple noose for turkeys, set between rows of corn, where these birds come to depredate upon the peas. The turkey, mistaking the noose for a pea-vine, inserts its Jiead and neck into the fatal circle, and is soon .choked to death by its violent efforts to escape. He commenced to describe also pen of poles, in which sometimes the greater part of a flock of wild turkeys would be caught; but before the description was half given we arrived at Scossity's house.
Then the peeled sapling was removed from the door, and we were all invited to, enter. "No

62

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

chairs, tables, or other articles of furniture were to be seen nothing except a narrow bed in one corner, raised about knee-high from the dirt floor by a single post driven into the ground, on which rested a side and foot pole, each having its other end supported by being stuck in a crevice -in the wall. The sides of this bed were boarded up, and the space beneath served evi dently for a chest or place of safety for stores. In the middle of the room was a small heap of ashes surrounded by stones, showing that the fireplace was there, while the blackened roof overhead gave tokens of the smoke that had often and long rolled up from below. Under this roof hung several hams of dried venison, and many ears of corn in the shuck, tied to the rafters. We were invited to seats made of deer skin, spread upon the floor next the wall.
" Come, eat," said Scossity, reaching down a dried ham from above, and bringing out a cleanlooking calabash of parched corn and peas from the space beneath his bed.
We knew enough of Indian manners not to decline the offer, and indeed there was no need

\-

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

63

to refuse, except from the want of appetite. Each of us took a handful of the parched corn, and cut a small slice of the dried venison, and seemed greatly to enjoy it. We could see from Scossity's eye that he was pleased, for nothing gratifies an Indian more than to appreciate his hospitality. I confess that my own share was %so much relished that I was tempted to take another slice, in doing which, however, my knife slipped and cut a gash in my hand. Scossity, seeing the blood flow profusely, took from his pouch a piece of spunk, such as he used for tinder, cut from it a thin slip, laid it upon the wound, and bound it there with, a strip of fibrous hemplike bark. The bleeding soon stopped, so that I was able to go on with my eating, and the surgery was so effectual that my little wound needed no more attention until it healed. I may as well state here as a useful fact, that the spunk (which is a fungous growth in the crevices of trees, sometimes in thin sheets like paper or kidskin, sometimes in thick knots like a man's fist) is an excellent styptic in cases of cut-wounds: it not only stops" the flow of blood, but adheres

64

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

to the lips of tHe wound, helping to keep them together, and to assist nature in the effort to heal by what is known as " first intention/'
We enjoyed the hearty hospitality of this simple child of the forest, and he seemed equally to value our presence; but as the parties knew only a few words of the other's language, it was not possible to exchange many thoughts except through an interpreter. Of all the incidents of the occasion I can never forget the flash of Scossity's eye when, after a little scattering con versation, he saw my father take from his pocket the little Testament used in the service the day before, and the earnest attention which he gave to the interpreted words of the chapter read to him by cousin Aleck. No field parched with drought ever drank in more eagerly the drops of a refreshing shower than his mind drank in the precious words of Scripture.
Of all that was said by him on the occasion, I recollect that the ruling desire expressed was that his friend, See-quo-yah, might hear the gospel from some one able to make it plain and attractive to him. This made me think of the.

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

65

X
apostle Andrew, of whom it is said (John i. 41)

that he "first findeth his own brother Simon, and

saith unto him,* we have found the Messias." I have noticed ever since that those who become

sincere and earnest Christians are apt to show it

by trying; to have all whom they-love brought

to experience the same blessing. In the case of

See-quo-yah, however, there is reason to believe

this desire was never realized. He soon left the

neighborhood and went back to Wills Valley;

a few years afterward he removed to Arkansas ;

after that he moved farther West, wishing by each

remove to get away farther from the white man

and his religion. He was always a moral man,

but it is said that he never became a Christian

by profession, and never ceased to express dis

like for the change which had come over the

religion of his people.

Before we mounted our horses,-Kaneeka and

Scossit-equah walked aside and had an earnest

conversation in a low tone. On our way, Ka

neeka looked very grave. He had apparently

received some painful news. My father, at last,

took the liberty of inquiring whether his trouble

VOL. III.--E

66

SAL-O-QUAH.

was of such kind as might be helped by any thing we could do.
" Don't know. But I tell you," he answered, and then went on to give, in brief, the following singular account, to which I have added manj details that were subsequently gathered.

CHAPTER VI.
KANEEKA TELLS A REMARKABLE STORY -- INDIAN TRIAL FOR MANSLAUGHTER---RESEMBLANCE OF CHEROKEE USAGE TO THAT OF THE ANCIENT HEBREWS -- EFFORTS TO SAVE THE LIFE OF THE CONDEMNED MAN--DAY OF EXECUTION--SO-TIH, AND WHAT BECAME OF HIM.
URING the past week, a young Indian of fine .character, the only son of his mother, had met with a great misfor tune. While watching for deer at a hidden stand, he heard at a distance the bleat of a doe; then not far from him the rustle of leaves, which was soon after followed by the appear*ance of a brown skin and branching antlers. Without waiting to see more, he levelled and fired. But on rushing forward with his knife, what was his horror to see, underlying the body,
67

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the rifle and hands of a- man! Some still hunter had adopted the oft-practised but dangerous de vice of wrapping himself in the hide of a buck, and had thus paid the penalty of his rashness.* So-tih, for that was the young man's name, did not stop to make any further examination. He only called aloud to know if the person were alive and needed help, but receiving no answer, and seeing the blood flowing from a bullet-hole that must have been near the heart, he left the body just as it was, went with all speed to Sawnee, the nearest chief, to whom he surrendered . himself, and told the tale of his misfortune.
The usages of the Cherokees at the time, in
* An accident, almost identical with this, happened within five miles of the spot where the writer now sits. In the year 1835, a white man, hunting contrary to law on Indian ground, saw, in the bushes near him, the brown side and branching horns of a deer. He fired, and the next moment saw, struggling in the air above the body, the moccasined feet of an Indian.

He waited to see no more, but, confident that his own death would immediately follow a discovery of the accident, he hur ried to the house of a neighboring white man, told him of the misfortune, begged him to see after the unfortunate Indian, then made all haste across the river. He never afterward dared to show himself in the Indian country.

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cases of involuntary manslaughter, strongly re sembled those of the ancient Israelites, both in the sacredness attached to life, and in the mode by which homicide was to be avenged. Such was their horror of taking human life, except in the way of justice, or in the act of war, that a degree of criminality was imputed to it even when it happened by accident.
Saw-nee, as bound by the customs of his peo ple, although a personal friend of the young man and his mother, and believing him innocent of " malice aforethought," put him ufjder guard to await his trial, but in the mean time despatched him with his guard to show the place of the body, in order that the relatives, whoever they were, might give it a decent burial, and take such other steps as were necessary.
So-tin's friends were pained to discover that the slain man belonged to a family with whom he was at feud--a feud so old and deadly that no settlement but a bloody one could be reason ably anticipated. Fifty years before, So-tih's grandfather had accidentally killed the grand father of the deceased man in the same way.

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Thirty years afterward, So-tih's father fell a victim to the family quarrel that arose. More than one on both sides had come to violent [death in consequence, so that each of the two families had now but one male representative-- So-tih in the one, and Tunk-sa-le-ne, brother of the dead man, in the other.
When So-tih's friends discovered this, they were much disturbed, not only because they were sorry to embitter the family quarrel, but on account of an old usage which decided that although one death by accident might be for given, two accidents of the kind between the same parties were to be regarded as equivalent to intentional manslaughter. They therefore urged So-tih to flee the country, offering to bribe his guard and set him free.
"Go to the far sunsetting; go to the Choctaws; go to the Catawbas; go anywhere; but do not stay here to die," they said.
So-tih was in a great strait. He dearly loved ,his people and his home. He was the only ^support of his now aged mother. More than that, he expected at the time of the next green-

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corn dance, only one moon off, to take to his home a beautiful bride, the girl he had loved from her childhood. Life was very sweet -- sweeter to him than ever before; but So-tih was too much of a man to fly either from his enemy or from the law of his people.
" No" said he, peremptorily, to his advisers. "So-tih live here, If people say, Live; So-tih die here, if people say, Die."
Without delay the relatives of the dead man were informed of his fate, and the body placed at their disposal. As was to be expected, they were dreadfully enraged, and swore vengeance against So-tih, whom they accused of intentional "and cowardly murder.
The trial was held the next day, for, according to the simple customs of the time, all such acts were marked with great promptness. Many a time has a manslayer committed his crime, been tried, and executed between the rising and the setting of the same sun.* It was, no doubt, due

* This was true of the Creeks, as well as of the Cherokees, ft memorable instance of which occurred in the year 1817, at Fort Hawkins, about a mile east of the present city of Macon.

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in part to the awful promptitude of justice that so few wilful murders were committed among' themselves.
All the chiefs within easy reach of the neigh boring council-house were summoned to attend. Before them stood So-tih, surrounded by his guard, and Tunk-sa-le-ne with a great club, at tended by his kinsmen, all avengers of blood. The case was quickly disposed of. There were no witnesses except those whom So-tih had piloted to the scene of the accident. There was no testimony except what So-tih himself gave in his brief narrative of the case. There was nothing to postpone the decision of the judges except the artless appeal made by' one of his friends, based upon his well-known excellence and nobleness of character. The judges decided, not that So-tih intended to kill his enemy, but that the hand of his family had now the second
While the principal chiefs of the Creek Nation were assembled there on business with the U. S. Agent, one of them became drunk, and killed his own nephew. His case was instantly tried, and, though he was the second chief in rank, (General Mclntosh being first,) he was executed -within an hour after committing the act.

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time, within the memory of the judges, been against the life of one of the other family, and therefore, .by the usages of the land, he was to be delivered into the hands of the slain man's friends.
This sentence, received with Tow murmurs of dissatisfaction from many of the people, was no sooner pronounced than the avengers of blood prepared to execute it. Tunk-sa-le-ne brand ished his terrible war-club, and, accompanied by his friends, went toward the spot where the in tended victim stood.
So-tih never moved, nor changed color. He waved back his executioners by a motion of his hand, and said calmly to the judges:
" So-tih not ready to die to-day. Count him six days to be free, and he will come here at high sun, ready for the club."
In a white man's court such a proposition would have been laughed to scorn; but not so in an Indian's of that day. The white man might be expected to burst through every bond to save his life; but if an Indian of character once gave his word, he was as sure to keep it as the day

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was to come round: otherwise followed a penalty worse than death -- the contempt of his people.
Tunk-sa-le-ne and his friends looked disap pointed. They expected instant revenge. But the decision of the judges was .*
" Loose him! Hear, everybody! Young man^ not ready to die. Count six sleeps; then meet him here at high sun." .
Three " sleeps " had already passed when Kaneeka gave us this account. The people, with out a word to say against the uprightness of their chiefs, or the sacredness of ancient law, were becoming much excited at the prospect of allowing a young man, highly esteemed for his many excellences, to be sacrificed, even in obedience to ancient usage, for the sake of a worthless family, such as the Tunk-sa-le-ne tribe had ever been. But what to do ? was the ques tion.
." Is there no higher court to which you may appeal ? " asked cousin Aleck.
Kaneeka answered, " None." "What does Tunk-sa-le-ne love most?" my father inquired.

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To which Kaneeka oddly replied : " Hate, whisky, and money." "Which of these does he love most?" my father again asked. Kaneeka answered: " Hate^ much; whisky, more; money, most." "Then" said my father, "perhaps we can buy him off." " Yes, yes," Kaneeka answered, " if money 'nough."
On consultation, it was supposed that one hundred dollars might suffice to save the life of this young man, in whom my father and cousin began to feel as lively an interest as the people themselves. But one' hundred dollars was a large sum to be raised in so poor a neighbor hood. Kaneeka offered to give ten of it. He was sure Sawnee would give a pony, equal to ten more. Others would give also, but, all told, the- prospective amount was only the half of what was needed.
After a little thought, my father spoke again. " Kaneeka," said he, " there are some things of which we white people know more than you, our
29

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red brothers, and I think this is one of them. Let me advise you what to do. We will first o and see Sawnee. If he agrees with you that Tunk-sa-le-ne may be bought off from his pur pose, I will have more to say."
They went off that same afternoon ; and Kaneeka did not return until the day appointed for the execution. My father reported to us the next evening that his own part of the mission had been successful. He had seen Sawnee, who, being an Indian of the old school, had never thought of trying to have his young friend re leased. Painful as it was, his mind had been fixed upon the enforcement of law, without re gard to feeling. But the moment the plan was proposed of trying secretly to buy off the "bloodavenger," his eye flashed with delight, and he exclaimed: " Tunk-sa-le-ne love blood, but he love money more."
He not only gave a pony, as Kaneeka xpecteo1, but volunteered to go and see some of the other chiefs, and engage them to prepare Tunk-sa-le-ne's mind for doing what the people so generally thought was right in the case.

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When the terrible day came, Lorenzo and I went too to the council-ground, not for the pur pose of witnessing the horrid scene of execution -- for my father said he thought the act was not possible, and even should it happen^he would see that we boys were not spectators -- but in order to witness'the honorable act of a man delivering himself to die in redemption of his plighted word.
The crowd assembled was the largest ever known at the ground. It was strongly agi tated, too, for people must not suppose that In dians are without feeling. Cold as frozen rock they may appear outwardly, while a volcano of fire is burning within. Those present,,accus tomed to watch the fleeting indications of eye and lip, reported a state of feeling unusually deep.
When eleven o'clock passed, those of us who had watches might be seen closely observing their hands, while the eye of many an Indian was turned as observingly to the sun or the sha dows. Neither the victim nor the avenger had yet appeared. As the minutes passed, various surmises were expressed,-- by some that the parties had somehow met, and there had been

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another fearful tragedy -- by others, that So-tih had attempted to escape, and that Tunk-sa-le-ne was in pursuit; but these surmises were indulged only by the more impatient. The greater part of the multitude were as quiet and passive as though there were no unusual event 'expected. The friends and members of the averiging'party were heard occasionally to say, with grinding teeth:
" Knew he would not come. So-tih a woman. So-tih afraid to die."
A few minutes before "high sun," however, the hearts of all were moved by a piercing sound from the adjacent woods. It was the wail of women. So-tih's mother, sisters, and bride had bidden him farewell. But scarcely had it been heard before it was drowned by a manly voice singing a loud and plaintive song; and then there appeared the figure of a handsomely dressed hunter, walking with firm and rapid steps toward the council-house. On approach ing the door where the judges sat, the song ceased: the man stood before them, saying, " I come!" then folded his arms in silence.

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The people gathered close around him, as if anxious to breathe the air and drink irr the .spirit' of one having so much the aspect of a hero, and a soft buzz of applause pervaded the crowd. The judges sat upon a log before the door. A few white people and some of the dignitaries of the land stood behind them. Immediately in front was So-tih. But where- was Tunk-sale-ne with his fatal club ?
When the sun threw its shadows due north, Saw-nee, the senior chief, waved his hand for silence.
" Here is So-tih," said he, with a look of pride. " We are glad to see him. He has kept his word like a warrior and a warrior's son."
He paused, then added: ." Tunk-sa-le-ne is not here." As he spoke, a man stood forward in the crowd, respectfully waiting until the judge had 4 uttered what he had to say, but giving signs of a wish to speak. Saw-nee paused on seeing him, and said: " Speak on, brother." "Tunk-sa-le-ne sends word," said the man,

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" that the voice of the people shall rule who say that So-tih ought not to die for what he has done. Let So-tih live, but let him never cross Tunk-sa-le-ne's path."
A murmur of joy ran through the.assembly. I observed So-tih's eye and face quicken with a degree of satisfaction, which, however, almost as quickly disappeared.
"Must not cross Tunk-sa-le-ne's pathj" he repeated, scornfully. "Is So-tih to turn foxt and hide in a hole ? "
Tunk-sa-le-ne's representative said: " Let him leave the country."
"I love my people," replied So-tih. "To give them up is to die. I can but die if I stay. I am ready to die now."
Some one suggested that after the breaking up of the next frost, Tunk-sa-le-ne expected to remove to the Nation west, and that So-tih's withdrawal would be only temporary. Kaneeka also went to him, pointed to my father, and said: " Go with him. He take you."
" To be white man's slave ? " he quickly asked. "No, never."

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"To be white man's friend" Kaneeka an swered aloud--then whispered a word or two in his ear, which made So-tih's face shine with pleasure, and his eye turn gratefully toward my father, as he replied:
"Yes, I go." Kaneeka had told him of the part my father had acted in his deliverance. The matter was soon arranged. So-tih con sented, from love to his people, and a desire for peace, *to withdraw from the Nation until Tunksa-le-ne was out of the way. His mother and sisters were then called from the woods and informed of the change; and Kaneeka and Scossity pledged themselves to So-tih to fill his place to them while he was absent. Another duty yet remained. A beautiful young woman of eighteen or twenty summers came with the mother and sisters. She was instructed to stand before the judges, face to face with So-tih, in an open space left by the crowd. She and So-tih slowly approached each other. He gave her something, (I could hot see what,) and she gave him something. When
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standing side by side, he drew off his orna mented hunting - shirt or tunic, and threw it around the shoulders of both, and the people with a shout of joy acknowledged her as his wife. This was not the ordinary ceremony, only in approach to it on the spur of the occasion. That evening, So-tih and his bride crossed the river, and came finally to my father's, where he more than earned his livelihood by supplying my mother's table with venison and fish.
So-tih returned home before the winter was over. Tunk-sa-le-ne never removed West. In midwinter he was found dead in a brush-wood, never having drawn a sober breath from the day that he was seen to receive two small, but heavylooking bags.
So-tih and his wife did not cease their visits to us with the necessity which first brought them. -They never forgot that act of friendly intervention which so unexpectedly gave him back to life, and gave them to each other. A neat little pole-house, built in a retired grove on my father's place, near the river, was always kept for them, and called So-tih's house. Every

83
year, they were sure to make us a visit, with their youngest child, and to stay one or two weeks, hunting and fishing, -as at first. I recol lect that in the last visit they made, and the last time I saw them there, they were as happy-look ing as ever. They were by the riverside with their youngest boy, Jau-nee Stee-ka, (or Little John,) gathering a boat-load of wood for a barbecue the next day. Before the hour came on, however, Lorenzo and I Were called suddenly from home, and did not return until after they had left. The next we heard, they had removed to the far West, where they lived long in happi ness and increasing honor, and, for aught known to the contrary, may be living yet.

CHAPTER VII.
FISHING EXCURSION ^-THE FISH-SPEAR -- FLY
FISHING.
HE morning after the exciting scene recorded in the preceding chapter, cousin Aleck proposed a fishing ex cursion. We had so often heard of the abund ance of fine trout in a neighboring stream that we longed for an opportunity to try them. My father had gone with Kaneeka to make certain promised arrangements for So-tih's mother, or, no doubt, he too would have been one of the party; but we had nothing else to do, and there fore concluded to go, and at least explore the ground. " Shall we try with flies or with minnows ? " I inquired of cousin Aleck. "With flies, of course," he answered, "unless we ascertain that the fish refuse them."
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85

In mentioning the word "flies," I observed Saloquah's face assume a look of inquiry, fol lowed by a half-mischievous smile, but, Indianlike, he said nothing. We brought out our dis jointed rods from the cases in which they were kept,.put the parts together, to see if they were ready for use, and then selected such lines and hooks as we deemed suitable. The moment Saloquah saw our delicately tapering rods, and web-like lines, he shook his head, saying:
" These never do for our fish." " Why not ?" cousin Aleck asked. " Line too small; pole too small/' he answered. " Fish break them." " Perhaps not," cousin Aleck returned, with a smile. *' / want some fish. I go fetch my catcher," said Saloquah, looking incredulously at our tackle, and going, as he spoke, toward the rear of the house, whence he quickly returned with a small light spear, eight feet long, straight as an arrow, with a point of steel. " This will catch and hold too," he said. It was a neatly made instrument, and un-

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questionably capable of great execution, but to be of any avail it manifestly required a skilful hand and practised eye. We examined it with admiration, poised it, tried it at a safe mark, then gave it back to him, and gathering up our own implements, we went, under his guidance, to the fishing-ground, a mile distant.
The scenery of the place was beautiful. Tall hills, with steep sides, in some places rocky and precipitous, flanked a narrow valley, crowded with kalmias,.rhododendrons, and azaleas, some of which were yet in bloom, while through them gambolled a playful stream, clear as crystal, vary ing in width from thirty to three times thirty feet, now flowing soberly through some wide basin, now prancing wildly over a rough and rocky bed, and then occasionally throwing a summerset over a sheer descent of several feet. Its fall, during the mile through which we fol lowed it, could not have been less than a hun dred feet, and cousin Aleck, looking with the eye of a utilitarian upon its rapid flow and con venient location, exclaimed:
"The time will come in which the water-

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power of this stream will be made to do the work of a hundred thousand men!" *
Our first care, on arriving, was to select such pools and eddies as seemed to be haunts for the fish, and on the adjoining banks to clear away the bushes and branches that threatened to inter fere with the wielding of our flies.- An hour's time sufficed for this, and also to allow the scared fish to recover from - their disturbance; after which we made ready for sport.
Saloquah, meanwhile, watched our movements with lpoks of decided unbelief. He still said nothing, but when he at last saw that our lines were little more than hairs in thickness, and that the bait which we were preparing to use was composed principally of dry feathers and hair, which could not reasonably be expected to tempt the appetite of any living fish, his sides fairly shook with laughter, and the tears ran down his cheeks. His merriment was contagious, and we enjoyed it exceedingly, knowing, or rather be lieving, that the laugh would soon be on our side.
* This prediction has been partly realized already in the Roswell Factory. .

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The so-called fly selected for us by cousin Aleck out of the variety brought, closely re sembled in shape and color those which at that season were to be seen flying over the water and occasionally falling in. Lorenzo and I took the places assigned us, threw our flies lightly upon the water, with rods fourteen feet long, and with lines as long as our rods, and drew them with a quivering motion along the surface, to imitate the struggles of a real fly.
Neither he nor I continued our fly-fishing many minutes, for we were not practised in the art, and it was not long before I entangled my line in the branches of a tree, and gave up in despair. Saloquah laughed and said: "I thought so."
Cousin Aleck, however, still plied his fly. He was an expert angler, and knew how to guard against dangers. He gave his line a whirl o,r two around the taper end of his rod, and sent the fly sailing out into the basin, where it alighted softly, and began trembling and flutter ing, as if trying to escape. This he repeated, time and again, without success, though we saw

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the trout rise and break water more than once, in the immediate neighborhood of his hook.
" I am afraid," said he, at last, " that either we have not selected the right fly for the season, or that these fish are not civilized enough to take it like our fish in the old country."
As he said this, Saloquah grasped his fishspear and said: ".I go try my way."
Scarcely had he spoken, however, and begun to move, when cousin Aleck's fly disappeared, and his line moved rapidly under water. A slight jerk, at the right time, fastened the hook in the fish's mouth; and now came the struggle between strength and skill. The fish pulled so hard that the "rod bent, and the delicate line looked as if it must give way under the increas ing strain. But the rod was in a master-hand, which regulated every movement, and kept the line so taut by the reel attached, that the fish .was in a constant struggle, and after diving to various depths, and floundering until its strength was exhausted, it was gradually drawn shore ward, and landed where it could be lifted by hand without straining either rod or line.

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" That is a bouncer!" Lorenzo and I ex claimed, for the fish was more than half as long as a man's arm, and weighed at least five pounds.
"What do you say now?" cousin Aleck asked of Saloquah, who had watched the con test with great interest.
" I say that little line and dry bait can catch big fish," he answered.
" I will try them at another place," said cousin Aleck. " But I think that after having seen our mode of fishing, you are bound, Saloquah, to show us yours."
"'Will show you, if I can," he answered. " But could do better if I had canoe."
He went softly along the bank, peering stealthily into every nook and corner where it was probable that fish would lie. It was long before he made any attempt to throw his spear. He saw fish in abundance, he said, but they were too shy, or too deep. At last, quick as a flash, the spear flew from his hand, aimed at a point ten feet distant, and without waiting to see whether or not the blow had been successful, he plunged after it. The fish struck was evidently

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a strong one, but its wound was mortal, and it soon rose to the surface, buoyed up by the light staff. '
"Hurra for Cherokee!" Lorenzo and I ex claimed, as Saloquah shoved before him, still hanging to the spear-head, a fish scarcely less in size than the one just caught.
" Spear 'most beat hook!" said cousin Aleck, uttering very sincerely the boast that he knew was in the mind of our young friend, and ex pressing himself in the half-broken English which he generally used.
This success encouraged Lorenzo and myself to renew our efforts. We changed our hooks, baited with worms, and tried for perch and bream, of which we saw great numbers, but caught only a few, for the water was too clear for anything but trout. Of these, the spear and the fly each brought ashore another of good size, and then cousin Aleck insisted that we should cease, for he said that these were as many as were at present needed for food, and that we had no right to take the life of God's creatures merely for sport.
30

CHAPTER VIII.
FISHING WITH "LIVE BAIT"--THE " FISH - HUNT " AND "BUSH-DRAG".-- POISONING AND MUDDY ING THE WATER --THE SCOOP-NET.

UR fishing, however, did not end with

that day's pastime. When my father

returned to dinner, and saw the fine

fish we had taken, his own enthusiasm was

enkindled. He resolved to have his time the

next day,; and Kaneeka, willing to furnish a

sample of the Indian mode, resolved to have his

part of the sport on a large scale. He therefore

despatched Saloquah to invite Scossit-equah and

other neighbors to join him in a " fish-hunt" the

next morning, and in the mean time went to the

intended place for the purpose of making ready.

The sun had scarcely risen- before we angfers

had breakfasted and made our start; for in all

-

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streams, beyond the influence of tide-water, the early morning or late evening hours are best for rod-and-line fishing. Kaneeka waited at home for his expected company, saying that, when Indians go a-fishing, they never ask how high the sun is.
The day was exactly such as fishermen love-- warm, without being hot. Light clouds hung in the sky, tempering the otherwise unpleasant glare. A gentle hreeze also gave a slight ripple to the water, and came from the right quarter of the compass, for, as old fishermen say --

"Wind from the West, fish bite best."*

Lorenzo and I, discouraged by our experience in fly-fishing the day before, resolved to depend this time upon what is called " live bait," that is, minnows; and Saloquah went to show us a place where they could be caught. With a dozen or so of these in a bucket of water kept

* The rest of this rhyming rule is -- "Wind from the East, fish bite least; Wind from the South, bait in fish's mouth."
For Wind from the North " there is no rule.

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always fresh, we returned to the trout stream. Selecting a stand where we could keep perfectly concealed, we softly approached the bank and dropped in our lines, baited each with a lively minnow, hooked through the back, and kept by a cork near the surface. We had scarcely been in position ten minutes before Lorenzo's cork was suddenly carried under the water, and his line almost fizzed with its rapidity of motion.
" Let him run, Lorenzo!" I exclaimed. " Give him plenty of time to swallow the bait. He '11 not let go, unless you scare him."
It was fully half a minute before he gave his rod the fatal jerk, but the moment he did so there was a struggle. A large trout had swal lowed the bait. The hook was sticking far down its throat, and there was no possibility of its escape, except by breaking the line. For a time the contest was exciting, for Lorenzo, having no reel, was compelled to depend or| the elas ticity of his rod, which at times was bent almost double. By proper playing, however, the strength of the fish was exhausted, and it was drawn around to a convenient landing.

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Shortly afterward, my own cork and line fol lowed the lead of Lorenzo's, and I, too, was favored with a fish. By the time our bait was consumed, we could count about half as many trout as we had had minnows.
Our seniors, meanwhile, had been equally busy and successful with the fly. When Kaneeka and his company arrived about eight o'clock, we could show a dozen large trout, and as many small ones, the fruit of our morning's work.
On the coming of our red friends, we con tinued only long enough to show them, at Kaneeka's request, our mode; we then put up our trappings, and followed to see theirs.
First of all, they provided a straight grapelrf|i^l0ii^ enough to reach across the creek. Tothis jthey fastened thickly-leaved branches^ head downward, so closely set that scarcely a minnow could pass through. This " bush-drag," as it was called, was used as a seine, and pulled down stream by two men at each end, while two followed behind to aid, in case of obstructions, and two more on each wing scared the fish from the banks, and stood ready to spear those which

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attempted to pass. Driving the fish thus before them, they at last came to a shoally place, where was a wall of loose stones piled so as to compel the fish into a little nook. Here the drag was stretched and staked, its leafy wall preventing all egre.ss. And now commenced the sport. The nook was perfectly alive with fish of all sorts and sizes, and turtles too; while in the hand of every man and boy was to be seen a spear, six, eight, or ten feet long, poised hori zontally, and darted quickly, and with almost unerring precision, at fish fifteen or twenty feet away. In a short time all the fish worth taking were speared and deposited in bags brought for the purpose, when the " fish-hunters " proceeded to drag toward another shoal still farther below. The spoils thus taken were at last fairly divided, according to established rule, and furnished a comfortable shoulder-load to each of the party.
We of the hook and line were compelled to acknowledge that we were fairly beaten by them of the " drag." The quantity taken was so much more than the families represented could prob ably consume fresh, that my father inquired

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what was their mode of curing. To his sur prise, he learned they had none, but that they proceeded at once to roast, broil, or barbecue, for eating, as soon as possible. He then de scribed to them the mode pursued by fishermen on the seaboard, by splitting down the back, removing'the entrails and backbones,.and, if the fish was large, slicing the flesh into layers, then drying quickly with a little salt and much smoke. This was a piece of information which they seemed much pleased to learn, and some of them expressed the intention to act upon it as soon as they reached home.
On our way home, cousin Aleck inquired of Kaneeka the different plans for taking fish pursued by his people, and was informed that, be sides the "bush-drag," the mode furnishing the largest results was by poisoning the water. A sufficient number of persons would assemble at a stream, each furnished with a spear, and with a basketful of pounded root of the buckeye.* Wading into the water, they would churn it with

* This is a dwarf forest-tree, resembling the horse-chestnut, producing large beautiful nuts of chestnut shape, and rich
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their baskets until the fish, intoxicated with the juice of the buckeye, rose to the surface, when they were easily taken by hand, net, or spear. A poisoned stream would often be followed for miles, the baskets being occasionally dipped into the water to keep up the poisoning.
Another mode was by muddying. For this purpose a lagoon is usually selected, its ends closed against egress, and the bottom so dis turbed by trampling and dragging that the fish cannot breathe, but must rise to the surface for air, when they are speared.
The mode most in favor with the women,' he informed us, was by means of a spoon-shaped, or bag-shaped net, attached to a long handle. Several would take their places in a narrow sluice of water down which the fish descended, or were driven by persons above, and dip for them as they pass. Sometimes a hundred dips would be made without taking a single fish, though at other times the success would be encouraging. Every fish caught was. signalized by a whoop of joy.
mahogany color, two or three being enveloped .in a thomless ise, *^he nut is poisonous, as well as the root.

CHAPTER IX.
MOONLIGHT AND MUSIC -- UNEXPECTED RESULTS -- PANTHERS.
UR fishing, that day, was followed by an evening of delicious moonlight Not that it was so brilliant, for I have often seen brighter, but so soft, and sweet, and soothing. The moon, scarcely half full, hung like a silver lamp from a crystal roof, and looked down so lovingly upon the reposing earth that it made me feel poetical. Moonlight and music are noted companions all the world over. Lorenzo and I took our flutes T--for we had had some instruction, and often practised together -- and seated ourselves on a log within easy hail of the tent door, where my father and cousin Aleck sat, discussing a subject of exciting interest. Their, topic was the
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war in Greece, which had formally begun the January preceding, and which was to be marked, the following year, by the fall of Ma*co Bozzaris, a name known to every school-boy as the " Leonidas of Modern Greece."
One of the fishermen that day had brought my father a newspaper, sent by Mr. Scupper, of Vann's Ferry, the nearest post-office. The paper was dated Saturday, June I5th, 1822, and was just a week old on the day we received it. The chief article of intelligence it contained was the massacre of the Greeks in the island of Scio, April II th, 1822, when, out of 100,000 men, women, and children, only 10,000 were reported to have escaped the Turkish sword.
The news .saddened us. We did not recover from it all day. And it was as a sort of refuge from thought that Lorenzo and I, after supper, took our flute,s and went, as has been said, to enjoy a little music in the moonlight. The airs we selected were mostly plaintive, and we must have executed them with more than usual pathos, for my father and cousin slackened their discus sion to listen to us. Saloquah, too, came with

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noiseless tread, stealing from a covert of bushes, and we could see Kaneeka, with his wife, and their little boy, sitting in their doorway, and seeming to drink in the softened harmonies floating to them on the evening breeze. "
This was probably the first time that the notes of the flute had ever been heard in that solitude ; and whether it were that we boys were so far inspired as to rival the powers of Orpheus, or whether by a singular conjuncture of circum stances, the results were laughable. The first response we had, besides tokens of pleasure in our human friends, was from a company of frogs in the neighboring low ground. They had com menced their concert before us, in every variety of note, of tenor, treble, and alto, but, while we played, their efforts were redoubled, as if they were resolved not to be outdone; and finally they were helped out by the heavy bass of a bullfrog, whose " Bloody-noun -- bloody-noun!" was uttered in a tone so deeply guttural, and at the same time according so perfectly with our low flute-notes, as almost to convert the whole into burlesque.

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Scarcely had the remark been made, in an in terval of the music, " Hear that fellow's bass!" iwhen a whip-poor-will, that had been very earnestly uttering at -a distance his melancholy strain, perched himself lengthwise along a branch directly over our heads, and there repeated his notes as fast as he could tumble them out.
Lorenzo and I laughed. But soon the whippoor-will's song was cut short by another voice, far more imperative, if not so musical. It was the " Oo-oo-ah-oo-ah!" of a hooting owl, seated solemnly on the top of a dead tree, within bis cuit-throw, and staring at us with his big, impu dent eyes.
"Boys, you must stop that music, or you will draw the whole woods upon us," said my father, in a merry tone.
" Yes, sir; only one piece more," we replied. ,^ We had just played the air, "Oh, dear! what can the matter be ? " and had given to it a lively, rattling expression. We felt ourselves bound, therefore, by the rules of public playing, to foliow it with something plaintive. We selected " Robin Adair," and played it with all the dole-

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fulness possible; at least we played as much of it as we could, for we were interrupted. In the midst of the mostilugubrious strain, there came from a neighboring thicket the wail of a child, as it seemed or rather of a sound midway between the distressed cry of a child and the fierce scream of an Indian so near, so loud, so emphatic, that we sprang to our feet, ex claiming :
" Who! what child can that be?" " No child! Nobody!" answered Saloquah. " Only a panther!" " Only f " we echoed in horror, moving at the same time rapidly toward the tent. " Is that the way you talk of panthers ? " "Panther won't hurt you here.. People too many," Saloquah returned, in a soothing tone. On inquiry, we learned that panthers were plentiful in all parts of this wild country, and that their visits were not unusual even in the farms, and sometimes in the yards of the in^. habitants, but that they seldom attacked human beings, confining their ravages mainly to cattle, hogs, and poultry. One of them, he informed

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us, had even been daring enough tb make its home for a time under Kaneeka's roof.
" Indeed! how was that ? " we asked. The answer was.not immediately given, for Kaneeka had come with, gun and dog, and pro posed to cousin Aleck to join him in a short tour through the woods, in hopes of getting a shot at the intruder, in which effort we boys were permitted, within certain limits, to join them. In less than half an hour we had re turned to the tent, when Saloquah went on with his story. He said that while their present house was in an unfinished state, Kaneeka had gone to enter him (Saloquah) at the Mission School, and was absent about ten days, leaving Chescoo to take care of herself and the children. Before a week had passed, she was annoyed by losing first a favorite fowl, then a pig, and afterward by hear ing, just before daylight, a scratching at the gable end of the house, as if- something were climbing there. When her husband returned, she informed him of these facts, and also that she thought she heard at times during the day

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the sound of a snore, or a yawn, from the open loft above. Without delay he took his rifle, raised himself so as to reach the loose boards overhead, softly removed one of them, and peeped around. To his surprise and horror, he saw a great brown object quietly rolled up in one corner. Descending noiselessly^ he gathered his children into a well-protected room, stationed Chescoo below him with a loaded gun, stuck a long knife in his belt, and again ascended with his rifle. The creature lay sleeping as before -- he could hear it breathe. Its head and breast were turned from him, and were thus protected from a deadly shot by its hinder parts. All ready for shooting, he made a slight noise. The creature awoke, looked sleepily at him, and he sent a rifle - ball directly between its eyes. Quick as thought he with drew* his head, and re placed the board above him. But not one moment too soon; for the panther, mortally wounded, but not killed, sprang at him, and tore furiously at the place where he disappeared. While it was pulling at the board within a foot of his head, Kaneeka thrust his knife through a

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crevice, and wounded it so painfully in the foot that, with a howl of rage, it rushed to the un finished gable, leaped to the ground, and was running frantically past the door when a quick shot from Chescoo's gun laid it upon its side.
While Saloquah was giving this account, Kaneeka came in from the woods, and not onlyconfifmed the statement, but assured us that, in former years, panthers and all other wild beasts were much more plentiful than they Were then.
" When I was a boy," said he, " my uncle Bowls gave me the pup of a large, fierce dog. It be came the best panther dog in the country. One day, during a heavy snow, a white boy from the neighborhood came to say that his father had seen the track of a large panther in the snow near his house, aird wished my dog to help hunt it. I did not like to refuse our neighbor's re quest, yet did not like to risk my dog on so dangerous an errand without some one to look after him. So I resolved to go too. In hunt ing panthers in the snow, a dog is not needed for tracking them, because that can easily be

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done by the eye, but for chasing" and worrying

them until they take refuge in a tree.

" There were six of us in company, and two

dogs. We tracked the panther for about two

miles, our dogs keeping directly before us, ac

cording to the Indian rule in hunting. All at

once, my dog, Waw-hyuh, (the name means --

Wolf,) came to a dead halt, showed his teeth,

bristled his back, and gave a low growl. We

halted, too, for we knew that the panther was

dangerously near. Waw-hyuh's eyes pointed

toward the upturned roots of a large tree, which

had fallen across a rock in such manner as to be

kept several feet aboveground, and to furnish a

good shelter from the snow. Under this shelter

we saw two panthers, a dam and a half-grown cub.

"We called in our dogs. Mr. Stein, the white

man who had invited us to the hunt, and who

therefore took the lead, claimed the privilege of

the first shot, and gave the second to me.

"' But take good aim, right between the eyes,

or behind the shoulder,' said he. ' My panther

will not need a second shot.'

"He was mistaken, however. He gave the

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"Word to fire, and my rifle went off clear, and sent its ball to the heart of tjie cub, so that it dropped in its track; but his rifle ' hung fire/ and before the ball came out, the panther had turned its head, so that he only broke its jaw, and we had to fight it with our knives and dogs.
"But no sooner had we fired than there was a perfect commotion under the log next the rock. First, a young panther sprang out, then the old sire, almost gray with age, then two more, making six in all. There was a great hurrah among the hunters, as each one selected his game and followed Mt, calling upon the others for help, The young panthers all took to trees as quickly as possible, and were soon brought down by the guns. The old sire, taught, no doubt, by experience, made his way to a great distance, and had to be tracked for hours. At last, however, we brought him to bay, and forced him into a tree. Then we all gathered round, and by turns had a shot at him. He was toughK and hard to kill, but we succeeded at last; and when we returned home from the hunt, each had a panther-skin, and plenty of panther-meat.

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" I have only one thing mt>re to s&y," added

Kaneeka, " and that is, that Mr. Stein took good

care of my dog. When we were fighting the

panther with the broken jaw, Waw-hyuh sprang

upon it and was knocked down. He lay sense

less on the ground, under the creature's paw, and

the moment of showing signs of life would have

been his last. What to do I did not know, for

both our guns were empty, and the other hunt

ers were off, engaged in pursuit. Mr. Stein, how

ever, knowing the value of the dog, did not

hesitate. He drew his long knife, ran directly

upon the panther, and stabbed it five times in

the side, as quickly as-his hand could move,

driving his knife to the hilt, and, it seemed to

ine, to the heart. Waw-hyuh was saved, but

Mr. Stein was not wholly unhurt, for as h{s hand

approached in the second stab, the panther

struck at it, cutting with its sharp claw through

itK^h&eeensllyeeavse.iof fdhoinse

coat, with

and the skin beneath, as a razor. Mr. Stein car

ried home a bloody hand, as well as a panther-

skin, and bore the mark of the fight the rest of

his life."

CHAPTER X.
FIRE-FLIES -- MORE MUSIC, BUT NOT FROM MAN -- A VOLUNTARY FROM A MANY-VOICED CHOIR -- INTERESTING CONVERSATION.
E went early to bed that night. The moonlight was delightful, but we had no fancy for exposing ourselves again to the panthers. We sat in the tent doo/, enjoy ing the brilliant flashing of the fire-flies, which illumined the dark woods around us, by scores and hundreds at a time, and listening, till we were weary, to the mournful notes of the whippoor-will, and the merry chirping of the frogs. Going early to bed prepared us for early rising. The gray dawn gradually brightened into a glorious sunrise. J.n the mean time, there was such a concert of birds as I never before heard, or at least such as I never before noticed or
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111

t
enjoyed. It seemed as if the whole feathered

creation knew it was Sabbath morning, and >

awoke early to worship the Creator. I have [

always enjoyed the singing of birds, and all the y

more for trying to distinguish the several song

sters. This morning I recognized three kinds ^

of mocking-bird, the gray, the brown, and the !

black; three kinds of wren, all musical, and one

very sweetly voiced; three kinds of oriole, of

splendid plumage, and passable song; two kinds

of finch, pleasant singers both, one of them

known as the redbird, possessing a few notes

of surpassing sweetness. Besides these were !

many others -- the jays, the bee - martens, the

swallows, and a few robing; but, beyond them

all, in impressiveness of song, was a kind which

we had never met with till coming to that region.

Cousin Aleck said it was a species of nightin

gale, although its song was confined to the cool

^Lthe day. The woods were perfectly alive ^*^r
with them. Each uttered about nine different

strains of music, sometimes in one order, some-"

times in another; each strain alike in beginning

with a soft musical " uh!" and in ending with t

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sweet metallic twitter, but varying in the four or five intervening notes, which were so full of liquid music as to send a thrill of pleasure through the heart of the listener. Lorenzo and I spent the greater part of an hour listening to the rich voluntary with which the choir of nature opened that day's worship. While thus engaged, we were joined by Saloquah, who also had.a keen relish for music, and who helped us to appropriate to the right songsters several notes !'bf which we' had before been uncertain. About sunrise, cousin Aleck also came out, and relishedv exceedingly this natural concert. He said that he had enjoyed it, once or twice before, in the early morning, but never so greatly as now, and that in his own country there was nothing to compare with it. Indeed, I doubt, after a lapse of fifty years, in which I have seen much of this world, whether there is to be found any place on earth affording a richer concert of bird-music than the mountain region of the once,, Cherokee country.
Soon after breakfast, Kaneeka came to see us My father offered to engage in a "little Bible

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113

reading to him and his family some time in the course of the day; to which he replied, with a lurking smile:
" Yes, thankee! Some people will be here to'day to hear Bible. I tell them already."
He had dispersed his invitation by means of the fishermen the day befbre, and they had car ried it to every lodge within walking-distance of our place. Scarcely had his reply been uttered before we saw Scossit-equah come stalking, through the woods in one direction, while from another came the same old man and his wife we had noticed the Sunday before. From that time on, for an hour, the people kept dropping in, until every available seat on the logs and stumps around the preaching-stand was occupied, and many of the -congregation had to stand or take their places on the bare ground.
I will not stop to describe the services of the occasion, which were only a repetition, with interesting variations, of those of the Sabbath preceding. But there was an idea gained that day which has been so pleasant and profitable to remember, "that I record it for the benefit of
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such of my young readers as may love to study God in His works.
A conversation between my father and cousin Aleck had reverted to the beautiful display of fire-flies the evening before, and the rich music of the morning, which caused cousin Aleck to remark:
" I seldom enjoy these beauties of nature with out recalling the words, * Full many a gem,' * and wondering why there is such a waste of beauty."
"I do not understand you," returned my father. "What I mean is this," he explained: " If the Creator intended all these natural beauties for the increase of our happiness, as is usually, and I believe, rightly supposed, why should there be so much beauty wasted on places where there is no one to see it ? " "To my mind," was the answer, "there is no

* The lines alluded to in these words, are --



" Full many a gem of purest ray serene The deep, unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air."

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i

--<

more waste in this superabundance of beauty, j

than there is in the abundance of water above

what we can drink, or in the abundance of air

above what we can breathe. The truth is, God

is rich, as well as great, and He loves as much \

to show His affluence as His power--yes, and j

His ten?* too. This is my explanation."

_/

"I perfectly agree with you," said cousin

Aleck; "yet your explanation does not meet my

difficulty. The Creator never works without an

aim. We can conceive uses for air and water

beyond those of breathing and drinking; but

what use can you imagine for the rich tints of

flowers which are never seen, and for delicious

music which is never heard ? "

"Are you sure that these are not seen or"^

heard?" asked my father.

"Sure that much of it is never heard or seen

by man, and especially by appreciating*mm"

cousin Aleck answered.

"But why confine all the appreciation to

man f " returned my father. " And even if you

do, I still ask, are you sure that any one can

fully appreciate them ?"

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SAI>O-QUAH;. OR, BOY-LIFE
Cousin Aleck pondered, and my father went on.
"The Bible asks in one place, 'Doth God Care for oxen ?' and answers in another, ' Not a sparrow falls without his notice.' He seeks the happiness of all His creatures, brute as well as human. Who knows the amount of relief to Weariness in a brooding bird caused by the song of her mate, which no ear hears but her own ? Yet we can suppose the happiness produced by that song a sufficient reason for its being ordered by Providence."
" You give me new light," joyfully assented cousin Aleck, "yet not all that my difficulty demands. What would you say of those cases, of which we can readily conceive, where the beauty is never seen by any eye of man or brute -- those flowers, for instance, which are ' born to blush unseen ' -- those pearls of the ocean which glitter and dissolve with time in ' deep, unfathomed caves ' -- those glittering diamonds and those golden treasures yet uncov ered in the bowels of the earth, and never to be uncovered so long as the sun and moon endure ?"

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
"I should say," answered my fathei, "that they are intended for ether eyes than those of either man or brute. And are there none such ? The Bible tens us of angels. Surely they are as capable as,we of appreciating beauty ? and, for aught we know to the contrary, they can as readily admire the beauty of the diamond enveloped in; its homely crust, and lying in its uncovered mine, as we can when it flames in beauty in a monarch's crown."
Cousin Aleck was delighted. " The. idea never occurred to me," said he, "of these wasting beauties of earth (as I had esteemed them) being sources of pleasure to the beings of another world. But the thought meets all my difficul ties; and, more than that, its tendency is to confirm the divine authority of the Bible, which tells us of these unseen beings."
" I have one thought more to add," continued my father, " and I do it with reverence: ' He that formed the eye, shall He not SEE? He that planted the ear, shall He not HEAR?' and He that produces so much beauty, shall He not ENJOY IT? For aught we know, much of what we see

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in nature is intended not only for the pleasure they afford the creature, but for the pleasure they afford the Creator Himself."
Cousin Aleck sprang to his feet. He turned his back for a moment on my father, but I could see his hands clasped, and his eyes raised to heaven, as if he were saying:
" Glorious Creator! forgive me, that in enjoy ing Thy works I have so often forgotten Thee."
Then turning to my father, he said, with strong emQtion:
"I shall never hereafter enjoy anything in nature without thinking that the Creator is pre sent and enjoys it too."

CHAPTER XL
ROCK MOUNTAIN -- SPLENDID GLOWWORM -- OLD
MILITARY FORTIFICATION -- A THUNDER-STORM ---- SUNSET.
WENTY miles away to the southeast, a vast prominence of rock loomed in lonely grandeur above the horizon. It was the great natural curiosity of the neighborhood, of which we had often heard, and which we had resolved to visit at our first oppor tunity. That time had now come. Indeed, the fame of this great rock had extended to the Old Country, and had there excited interest through the representation of a British officer who had visited and described it^ as early as the year 1788. We set out on Tuesday, June 25, under the pilotage of Kaneeka, and although the way was
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rough and circuitous, we reached our destination in time to encamp comfortably before sunset. The country around had, at that time, barely passed into the hands of the white man, and there were few roads, and fewer houses of ac commodation. Our tent was pitched beside a spring near the mountain's base, around the north and west of which flows a pleasant stream. From this point the rock rose majestically, with an almost perpendicular face of a thousand feet. We enjoyed its rough grandeur almost as much by the soft light of the moon as we did by the red light of the setting sun.
After the setting in of night, we were much interested in another obje'ct of natural beauty, which, although not at all connected with the mountain, except by mental association, I men tion here lest it be forgotten. It was a glow worm. The ordinary glowworms of the coun try measure only about three-fourths of an inch in length, and show but one point of light as large as a pin's head, just under the tip of the abdomen. The worm which we saw this night measured at least two and a half inches, and

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AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

presented eight spots of brilliant light on each side of its body -- a pair at each articulation --making sixteen in all; so that when rolling itself up, as it always did on being disturbed, it looked like a ball of light. I have often met with it since, and have often spoken of it to men of science, but have'never known of its being described, except by unscientific "persons like myself. It is possible that those versed in insect lore (known as entomologists) may say this worm is no " glowworm " * at all, except in its glowing, but I can assure them that of all insects I have ever seen it best deserves the name.
Talcing an early breakfast the next morning, we made our way first to the eastern side of the mountain. Here the view was stupendous. A bare, hemispherical mass of solid granite rose before us to the height of two or three thousand feet, striped along its sides, as if torn by light-

* Lampyris is the scientific'jiame of those soft-skinned, wing less beetles which emit a light from the terminal plates of the abdomen. ""Possibly the worm described above may shine from diseaset as even crickets are reputed sometimes to do.

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ning, or "gullied" by the action of water during countless ages.
Our ascent was effected on the southwestern side, where the slope is comparatively easy, and where the otherwise perfect baldness of the rock Js relieved by an occasional tuft of dwarfish "cedars and stunted oaks, which find a root-hold in the crevices. These trees, elevated a quarter of a mile above the surrounding level, seem to be a favorite resort for buzzards, many of which were wheeling in graceful flight in the air around, and a greater number were perched, upon dead branches, and treetops, apparently resting from their labors, and watching from this convenient height for objects on which they might feed in the level country below.
We found the summit an irregularly flat oval, about a furlong in length. The view from it was superb. Not another mountain could be seen in any direction within a distance of twentyfive or thirty miles. The country all around seemed to be an immense level, or rather a basin, the rim of which rose on all sides to meet the blue of the sky. To the east and south ap-

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peared a few clearings, but in every other direc tion the forest was unbroken. Now, while I write, however, the country is filled with farms, and the smoke of the white man's engines and the thunder of his railroads break the repose of the then primeval nature.
Encircling the summit, at the distance o!S nearly a quarter of a mile fro'm its centre, was a remarkable wall, about breast high, built of loose, fragmentary stone, and evidently intended for a military fortification; but when erected, and by whom, we could not learn. Kaneeka, on being questioned, said that it was there when his people first came, and that they knew no more of it than we did. In some places the stones were almost all dislodged by persons who had rolled them down the steep declivity; but there were enough remaining to show that the wall had once been continuous, all around the sum mit, and that the only place of entrance was by a natural doorway under a large rock, so narrow and so low that only*one man could enter at a time by crawling on his hands and knees.
From the summit we passed a short distance 32

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down the steep sides north and east, but saw nothing there to attract attention, except a few stunted trees, and some crevices -and imperfect caverns formed by the thunder-riven rocks. In one of these caves we took shelter, about two o'clock in the afternoon, from the extreme heat of the sun, for we had brought with us all neces sary eatables and drinkables for spending the day in comfort, and we had moreover found a small supply of cool water in one of the caves, the remains, no doubt, of melted snow.
It was while thus occupying the cave upon that wild summit, and feeling like so many Robinson Crusoes, separated from all the rest of the world, that we enjoyed another scene of grandeur surpassing that of the mountain itself. It was a thunder-storm. We had despatched our cold dinner, and were reclining on the softest places we could find on the rock, waiting for such naps as people weary with labor and ex citement might expect, when we were startled by a thunder-peal. This was most unexpected, for on leaving the open air, half an hour before, the sky was beautifully clear: not a cloud was

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to be seen, except one about the size of a blanket, lazily floating toward us from the West. But half an hour can produce a vast change of a sultry afternoon, on a mountain-top, when the air is charged with moisture and electricity. The sudden crash of thunder brought us all to our feet.
" I fear this is not a very safe place in A thun der-storm," said my father, looking anxiously at the rocks torn by lightning, some of which, visible from the cave's mouth, showed signs of recent fracture.
" Safe as any other," cousin Aleck quietly re turned. " Indeed, buried as we are beneath this heavy roof of rock, we are safer than in an ordi nary house. Only let us keep within doors'*
My father smiled. " I believe you are right," said he. " For even if the bolt should fall directly above our heads, the lightning would be so dissipated by the mass of rock as to be harmless before it reached us."
We did not find i? easy, however, to keep " within*doors," as cousin Aleck advised, while so grand a scene was enacting without, and we

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all indulged ourselves, in turn, two at a time, in going to an open place where we could enjoy it. The cloud did not envelop, or even touch the mountain---we were not high enough--but it seemed to be only a short distance above. Nor were the thunder-peals more frequent, or more violent than we had often heard upon the plains; but there was an awful sense of nearness to an agent of terrific power, of which we were all the time reminded by a roar like that of a passing hurricane, or of surf beating upon art open beach. Twice, during the storm, was the mountain struck, as we could know by the sound, and by the jar, but we received no injury, nor did we even feel the influence of the electricity, although we afterward discovered a great flake of rock scaled off from a ledge not fifty feet from our place of refuge.
In the course of an hour the rain and thunder ceased, the skies became clear, and we had a delightful afternoon. We lingered until early twilight, to witness the going down of the sun, which JCaneeka assured us would be as well worth our waiting for as anything we had seen.

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And ,so we found. A few thin clouds streaked the western sky, scarcely diminishing the splendor of the sun, but at the same time catch ing and diffusing into a sea of glory the light which would otherwise have been lost. The rich coloring of these clouds, beyond all earthly power to imitate, or even to describe, so greatly charmed us that we had at last to tear ourselves from them with a.kind of violence.
Our twilight was very short, for we, as well as the sun, descended; and ere we reached our tent, the light of the moon was a welcome help to our footsteps. We found everything safe, although Scipio, who had been left in charge, had an important revelation to make, of trouble front a suspicious-coking visitor.

CHAPTER XII,
SCIPIO'S STORY--KANEEKA'S EXPLANATION -- THE PONY CLUB.
CIPIO said that about the middle of the forenoon, a dark - skinned white man, with bushy, black ,hair and whiskers, rode up to the camp, and seeing him alone, asked him who he was, and what he was doing. Not liking the man's looks, and fearing that he might attempt Some violence, Scipio said that he took the liberty of making up a little story: That his master was a great hunter from the seaboard, who had come with several friends to look at the mountain country, that they were now in the woods not far off, with their guns and dogs, and that he was every moment ex pecting them back. "How many are there in the company?" asked the man.
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" 129

" Fourteen, sir, and five dogs, one of them a great big bulldog''
" And which way did they go ? " " That way, sir," Scipio answered, pointing in a direction opposite to that we had taken. The man seemed amused. "You lie, boy, and you know it," he said. " There are but six in all, three men> and three boys, and they all went up the mountain. So you see I know all about you." "Wuh fuh" (wherefore, or what for) "then you ax me ? " Scipio returned, a little nettled. The man made no reply, but looked around. "These are fine horses," he said, as if partly talking to himself. / "Yes, sir; all good}horses," Scipio assented. " Well, now, boy," the other continued, in a coaxing tone, "what will you take in silver or gold to help me run them off? " " I wun't tek nothin', sir." "Why not?" " Because one of 'erri^s my own horse." The man started, and stared at him, then asked, "Which?"
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Scipio pointed to Old Gray, the best-looking of the set.
" You are a rich boy," said the stranger, in a half merry tone; " a rich boy, to own a better horse than your master."
Scipio found himself caught in his own trap; he therefore tried no further, but responded, " Even ef no horse is mine, I would not run 'em off, and leave my master afoot in dis-yuh wild woods."
" You are a good boy," said the man, mock ing. " But as we are here all alone, what is to prevent my knocking you in the head, and taking the horses, whether you will or no ? "
Scipio s"aid that, up to this time, he had been frightened; but this last speech made him mad. He answered:
" You may knock me in de head if you like," but, in saying so, he sprang into the tent, seized the gun that he called his, and when he reap peared at the tent door the muzzle of the gun came first.
The man did not seem in the least daunted; on the contrary, he laughed; but he spoke in a

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quicker tone than before, saying, " Don't shoot I good boy; don't shoot! Lower your muzzle. I won't knock you in the head."
Scipio replied by keeping the muzzle of the gun full on the man's breast, and saying in as resolute a manner as he could:
" I put nine buckshot in yuh yesterday, and you may have 'em all, if you choose."
"But I don't choose, good boy! I don't choose," he said, wheeling his horse; and as he rode away he looked back, saying, " Goodby, good boy: be sure and never leave your master afoot. D'ye hear?"
Serious as the affair seemed, we could not , resist several hearty laughs at the scene de picted; and the whole story so perfectly coin cided with what we knew of Scipio's character, that we did not doubt its correctness. But how were we to interpret the intruder's language and conduct? On appealing to Kaneeka, he in formed us that, on the frontier of several of the States, he did not know how many, there was a gang of thieves, who practised all kinds of rob bery, especially horse-stealing, on an enormous

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scale. He said they managed their affairs so well as to be able to know each other in the dark, by secret signs, even when they had never before met, -- that the work was so divided among them that it was the chief business of some to do the stealing, of others to receive and hide, of others to convey the stolen property away, and of all to help one another in a time of need. He concluded by saying he had no doubt that Scipio1s acquaintance was one of this gang, and that we should probably hear from them again.
These several accounts, first by Scipio, then by Kaneeka, were given while we were taking our supper by the light of a pine-knot fire; and it was not many minutes afterward when we heard a'halloo from the woods. My father and cousin Aleck went to the outer edge of the illuminated circle around our fire, and asked:
" Who's there ? and what is wanted ? " The answer came back, " Two lost men, who want to be put in their way." The moment Scipio heard the voice, he came to my father, and said, in a low tone:

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" Mossa, dah de same ,man waw talk wi' me to-day."
" Keep out of his*4 sight then, and seem not to know him," my father said.
The tramp of horses and the crackling of underbrush announced the approach of horse men through the woods; and soon afterward there emerged from the darkness two men, each bestriding a horse that walked slowly, and hung its head, as if ready to sink from fatigue, and having behind him a pair of well-stuffed saddle bags.
" We had just give up for the night, stranger, when we saw your fire," said the elder of the two, a smooth-faced man, with light complexion and sandy hair. " We have been lost in the wild woods ever since twelve o'clock."
" I am sorry for your misfortune* How can we help you ? " asked my father.
" No ways better 'n by letting us have some feed for our horses, and a place in your camp. We '11 pay you ten prices rither 'n stay in the woods among the wolves and painters," answered the man.

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My father scrutinized him a moment, and all the more closely from having heard a "Eh -- eh!" of surprise from Scipio, who was concealed , near him in the shadow of a tree.
" No doubt we can let you have a little corn for your horses. Here, Scipio!" he called, as if to one at a distance, "come with me to the wagon," and they two went off alone.
" Is this the man who talked with you to day ? " he then asked, in a low tone.
." Ef me eye shut, mossa, -I say yes. Ef me eye open, I say no. De same voice, mossa -- de berry same voice, and eye too; but a nurrah man's skin and hair."
"Enough," said my father, who instructed him briefly what part he wished him to act, and then they came forward with the corn. Scipio brought an armful of ears, put them down, and, seemingly without suspicion of the new-comers, returned to the tent.
" Here is the corn, stranger, to which you are ^welcome," said my father. " I am sorry I canhot say the same of offering you a place in our

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camp; but this is a wild country, and we do not know you."
" Oh, as for knowing us, I can sopn make that straight," said the other. " We are from Jack son County, and are bound for Tennessee. This young man, Bob Hickman, is going thar to take him a wife, and I am a-going thar to tie the knot for him."
" Indeed ? So you profess to be a preacher ? " my father interrupted.
"I do that same, and here's my showing for, it," said the man, handing forward a paper certifying that John Stone was "a worthy brother, in fellowship with (some) Association." The paper was written in a fair round hand, and was signed, "Jessy Merser, Presiding Elder," thus furnishing two evidences of its being a forgery, one in the spelling of the intended name, Jesse Mercer, and the other in the title affixed as presiding officer, which should have been Moderator.
" Your name seems, from this paper, to be John Stone," remarked my father.

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" That's what I 'm called at home," answered the other.
" And you are a preacher of what persuasion ? " my father asked.
" Of the Meth----- uh --- uh! -- of the BAPTIST Church," the man replied, with strong emphasis, after his partial mistake.
" In my part of the country we should count you rather an uncommon sort of preacher," said my father; " for- if my ears did not deceive me, I heard something like an oath as you came up."
" Oh! I 'm a Hardshell, of the TWO-SEED per suasion; and we are allowed to swear a little sometimes, and to drink a little, too," said the other. " So you must excuse me."
"Not easily, with what was intended to be Mr. Mercer's signature and certificate, for he is everywhere regarded as a good man," my father indignantly returned.
" Bob," said the senior, " this here man rither doubts my calling. Have n't you some paper, or something else about you, to show him what you are ? "

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137

" Yes," said Bob; " I have a paper with my name in it, Robert Hickman."
With this he assumed a pompous air, and took from his pocket-book a paper, which'he said was as good as a bank-note. It was in these words:

" One day after date I promise to pay to Robert Hickburn ($125.00) one hundred and twenty-five dollars, for value received.
" HUGH MONTGOMERY. "March 20, 1822."

"What Montgomery is that?" asked my father.
"Why, Squire Montgomery, that lives near Jackson Court-house; the leading man of the county," answered Hickman, alias Hick<fom.
"And how long has Squire Montgomery known you?" my father asked.
"All my life, and afore I knowed myself," replied the young man.
" Then he ought to have known your name better than to write it Hickburn, when you have twice pronounced it Hickman," said my father.

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"Moreover, I happen to know Squire Mont gomery very well, and to have in my pocket at this moment a letter from him. And I know that this note is a forgery. Scipio," he called aloud, "good boy! bring out that pitcher of water!"
At the words "good boy," the senior started " Caught in my own steel trap!" he exclaimed, wheeling at the same time his horse, that, freshened by the spur, pricked up his ears, and looked as if he were just from the stable.
Scipio, at the call, came running out, gun in hand, and Kaneeka and Saloquah with him, also armed.
"Don't shoot, 'good boy!' don't shoot!" said the elder, laughing, as the two scoundrels galloped away under the pressure of spur, hiding themselves, as they went, behind the cover of a thicket.
But he spoke too late; for Scipio, without orders, but incensed at the renewed insult, pulled trigger, and we heard from one of the fugitives a curse, as he said:
"He has hit me!"

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139

Before Scipio's gun was heard, my father had called out L
"Come back, Mr. Stone. Don't leave this money-note behind, and this certificate of your being a preacher. Come back! you will need them!"
But the call was in vain. The horses' feet thundered along the road until the sound died away in the distance.
That was our first and only contact with the afterward famous "Pony Club."
33

CHAPTER XIII.
PLEASANT DISAPPOINTMENT -- NOVEL CORN-SHELLER -- BUCKET-TRACK--JACK OF ALL TRADES.
E left our encampment at the foot of the mountain, the scene of contact with our Pony-Club visitors, early the next morning. It was our intention to reach home in the afternoon, but in this we were pleasantly disappointed. I say pleasantly, for the reason that the cause of our failure was the means of our making the acquaintance of a singular character, whom, to this day, I remem ber with interest. " We must prepare to pitch camp as soon as we can find a suitable place," said my father to Kaneeka, about ten o'clock that forenoon. " We are going to have a big rain, and we had better not be in it, if we can keep out of it." The
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141

whole western sky had become black with clouds that portended an unusual fall, and that very soon.
" No use to pitch camp," Kaneeka answered. " White man house not far off. Can get there before rain catch us."
We pushed forward, and reached the house in full time, with a few minutes to spare. Those few minutes sufficed to show that the dweller there was something of a character. Learning that he was at his corn-crib shelling corn, Scipio was despatched with money to purchase a small feed for our horses, and to ask permission for our company to use the shelter of his roof. Scipro returned with the desired permission, with his arms full of horse-feed, and with an ex pression of curious wonder on his face.
" Mossa," said he, addressing my father, " you ebber yerry anybody shell corn in augerhole?"
" Hear of anybody shelling corn in an augerhole?" repeated my father with surprise. "No; and where did you ever hear of it ? "
"AVell, mossa," Scipio returned, "please go

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yonder, and see how dah man mek de corn
fly.".
Scipio was a sensible boy, and understood his place as servant too well to make any suggestion of the kind without being sure of approval. This we knew, and therefore without hesitation we all set out to see the curiosity. The man had observed Scipio's look of wonder, and was no doubt prepared for our visit. He received us with a smile of welcome.
" You have come to see my corn - shelter/' said he. With that he deposited an ear of corn in its place, and in an instant the cob lay on the floor, stripped of its grains.
His whole apparatus consisted of a bench and a mallet. The bench, a short, thick board or slab, firmly supported, had a two-inch hole bored in its middle, in which the ear of corn was set, small end downward, and driven through by the mallet. The grains flew violently in every direction, but they were arrested by a wall of clapboards close around.
" The cheapest corn-sheller I ever heard of!" exclaimed my father.

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' " When I go home, I remember it, and make one too," said Kaneeka; which resolution, I may here say, he carried into full and successful exe cution.
From the crib we adjourned to the house, the man going with us, evidently pleased with our ^appreciation of his simple contrivance. Lorenzo asked for water, in which desire we all united, and this brought us acquainted with another device, equally efficacious with the first, though more costly, as well as more complicated.
" My spring is at the foot of a hill, so steep and hard to climb," said the man, "that after coming here, I built my wife a bucket-track from the. yard to the spring, for bringing up water'by cord and windlass, as if from a well. You jail seem so pleased with the corn-sheller that I think you will also be with the bucket-track, for I believe we count it the greatest convenience on the lot Come with me, and you can see it work while you get your water."
He took us to his back yard, overlooking a long rocky descent of a hundred paces or more. In the yard was a windlass, on which was a cord

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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

the size of a large twine. From the windlass to the spring extended a single rail of wide palingstuff, supported on posts and short arms several feet above ground. On this rail ran a tiny car with two wheels, one before the other, each flanged on both sides, (as a railroad wheel is on one side,) so that they could not run off the track. From a bar joining the axles of these wheels, extended a rod with a hook, on which hung the bucket, kept by its own weight directly under the rail. The car and bucket, on being' allowed to go, ran swiftly down the inclined plane, dipped into the spring, and was drawn back, full of cool water, in about a minute.
With this device we were more than pleased --7 we were delighttd. I, for one, treasured it in memory, and many years afterward put it into execution at my own mountain home. It is in operation yet; we use it every day, and there is no convenience on the lot more missed than it is, when, by some untoward accident, (as was the case the other day, when crushed by a fall ing tree,) it is temporarily disordered.
While we were at the windlass, Scipio had

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145

f been busy with the horses, and by the time that

v his thirst, as well as ours, was assuaged, the

heavy roar and driving mist of the storm,

/warned us to seek shelter. The rdin was heavy

and long continued, with much thunder, light

ning, and wind. It was fortunate for us that we

were protected by a roof and walls of wood, for

our canvas could scarcely have saved us from a

drenching.

In the house we found as much to interest us

a,s in the yard and corn-crib. Our host's name

was Phelps. He was about thirty years of age,

below the middle stature, strongly built, with

complexion, and jet-black-hair. He first

us to his wife, a modest, feeble-look-

"1

^

''"- .\ - "

*'

ing woman, some five or six years younger than

himself, and seated us on some oddly con

structed chairs, which he acknowledged were

made by himself, as were also the tables, and

bedsteads, and everything else we could see,

even to the knives and forks, and spoons, and

cups displayed upon a dresser or sideboard.*

* This account of Phelps is no fiction. The picture is drawn from life, and if he is now living in his distant home in Michi
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The cups and spoons were made of horn, neatly fashioned and carved, being the work, he said, of rainy days. The knives and forks were of steel, rather clumsy, but highly-tempered, and well hilted with buckhorn.
After remaining a while in his sitting-room, so called, he conducted us to his workshop, a long room shedded off at the rear of the house, where we saw a work-bench and carpenter's tools, a turning lathe, and a small forge for working iron, with* a variety of tools to suit. Struck with a peculiarity in most of these tools, we inquired of him, and were informed that, with the exception of the anvil and one hammer, which he had purchased, almost everything we saw there was the work of his own hands, even to the files and rasps, screws and screw-plates. He said that, being naturally fond of tools, and of variety, he had been in the habit, from boy hood, of watching how things were done, and of trying to do the Same, and the result was that he had learned to do almost everything.

gan, to, which he afterward removed, he will recognize it. His old friend greets him!

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"This knife," said he, showing us a wellworn pocket-knife, the blade of which, highly tempered, very keen, and stamped Phelps, was set in a handle of hard wood--"This knife, you see, did not come from any merchant. I made it myself, years ago. And my wife there has a pair of scissors that cost me a world of work before I could learn the art of making it, but they do better service than any pair to be had in the city of Augusta."
We could not help admiring the man's versa tility of genius, and letting him see that we did so. Cousin Aleck said:
"You don't stick to the old proverb, 'A Jack of all trades, and good at none.'"
" What do you mean ? " asked Phelps. " Why^ that you are a Jack of all trades, and, so far as we can see, good at them all." " Only a botch at most of them," he answered, with a blush. "Is there anything else you work at?" asked my father. Phelps hesitated, but his wife said, laughing: " There is nothing, mister, on this broad earth,

14$

SAL-O-QUAH.

that he has seen other people do, but he has tried it, and generally succeeded. That pair of shoes you see on his feet this minute, he made for himself, while he sat by my bedside to nurse me during my sickness; and that vest he made at the same time, though he ought to have, waited and let me make it for him. He can take a clock or watch all to pieces, clean it, and put it together again the same as a born-andbred watchmaker. I never saw or heard of such a man," she added, her eyes lighting up jwith love and enthusiasm as she looked upon his manly figure and almost bashful face.
These facts so greatly interested us, that, as the storm raged without, and gave no promise of abatement, my father and cousin Aleck beg ged him to relate his history, which he did, and of which I will record a portion, partly for its wild interest, and partly for its useful informa tion.

CHAPTER XIV.
STORY -- STEAMBOAT EXPLOSION -- A TOM AHAWKED CALF -- THE BEAR AND THE TWO STEEL-TRAPS -- A WHIRLWIND, AND DEVICE FOR
ESCAPE.
NE of you spoke of me, just now, as a strongly built man," said Mr. Phelps,
perhaps I am, compared with ; yet I am said to be the weakest of my family during the three last generations. I came South because I was not strong enough to stay in Vermont. The doctors said I had consumption. I suppose I should have died, if I had staid there ; but I have been near losing my life so often since, that I have frequently thought of the turn given by an odd genius of our parts to a famous saying of Shakspeare :
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SAZrO-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

'There's a divinity that shapes our ends rough, Hew them as we may.' *

I certainly have had a pretty rough time of it. Yet, as I look back, and see the hand of God in my many escapes, I cannot help thanking him for all, the evil as .well as the good; for without the evil I should not have known the good.
"My first experience began almost in sight of my native mountains. In descending the Hudson River in a steamboat, our boiler burst. We had few steamboats in those days, and, of course, few accidents; yet enough to teach all who gave attention, that it was certain death to breathe scalding steam, and also that the hottest steam is the least visible. At the time of the accident, I was standing on the quarter-deck, talking with an interesting young man in fine health, whose acquaintance I had just made. The weather was cool, and I had my cloak on my arm. The steam from the boiler shot toward us like smoke from a cannon, and struck us both down upon the deck. In an instant I knew what

* " There's a divinity that shapes our ends,

Rough-hew them as we may."

..

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151

had happened, and adopted the only means of escape in my power. I held my breath until I had wrapped my head and face closely in my cloak, and then breathed as little as possible. Five minutes afterward, when I uncovered and looked around, I saw my young friend lying beside me, gasping in the agonies of death. He had breathed the scalding air, and by that means died of a sudden ' consumption' of his lungs. I had avoided that air by means of my cloak, and the consumption under which I had been so long laboring has not killed me yet.
" In coming South, I first hired myself to a farmer as a field laborer, that I might follow the plough, and inhale the air of the freshly turned earth. My health rapidly improved. The farmer and his wife were a plain, honest couple, who did all their own work. They lived much more foughly than I Had been used to; yet I felt quite at home with them, and would have staid longer than I did, had it not been for a circumstance which I cannot remember to this day without discomfort The farmer's house was not far from the borders of the Creek Indians, who had

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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

taken up the hatchet since I came to the neigh borhood, and were wielding it with terrible effect. Every day we heard fresh news of mur ders, plunderings, and scalping. One evening, on my return from work, there was no milk for supper -- the farmer's wife was afraid to go to the cow-pen -- so I undertook to milk for her. The night was uncommonly dark. The only object I could see, while in the pen, was the white face of the calf that kept its nose close to me, trying to get a share of its mother's milk. All at once I heard a tap! and the calf fell motionless on the ground; then came an "Ugh!" as if some one grunted in surprHlz. I rose to a standing posture, asking myself aloud, " What does this mean!" when I heard the footfall of somebody, or of something moving softly away. I went immediately to the house, got a coal of fire, such as could be hidden from sight, and came with the farmer to see what was the matter. There lay the calf on the ground, stone dead, with a hole in its forehead, made by a tomahawk. An Indian had evidently been there, and probably mistaking the white head

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of the calf for the cap of the woman, had struck the blow, expecting to kill and scalp her.
" From this dangerous neighborhood I went to the seaboard, where I earned a living, and at the same time enjoyed myself in shooting ducks and game for market. My fondness for wild sport, however, brought me, after a time, into a very unpleasant predicament. The bears were so destructive in a certain settlement, and so skilful too in evading the hunter, that a large reward was offered for their scalps. Both the sport and the money suited my inclination, so I set myself to hunt them. I soon discovered that they came out of a river-swamp on a log, and passed through a thick canebrake to the open Country. Immediately at the end of the log; their trail divided, with a wall of large strong cane between. The place was so difficult of approach, that I resolved, instead of hunting them with the gun, to take them by steel traps. I set a trap in each trail, fastened by a chain to a' stake deeply driven into the mud. The traps were only a few feet apart, and both chains were fastened to the same stake. On my first visit,

154 * SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
the trap nearest to me was lying just as I had left it. I leaned my gun against a support, and struggled through the wall of cane to get sight of the -other trap. Just as my hand moved the last cane, and before I could look through the opening, there came from below a most un earthly roar, and an enormous old bear, the father, no doubt, of the whole band of depreda tors, rose upon his hind legs and rushed at me with open mouth. I confess that I got back through the canes much faster than I had gone forward. But in leaping toward my gun, I stum bled and fell, face down, with my neck wedged tight between two sloping canes. In the act of falling I felt my leg seized half-way up the boot, and held with a grip like a vice.
"'Gone -- gone! The bear has got me!' I said to myself, as I lay there helpless, expecting the next moment to feel my bones crushed, and my leg torn to ribbons. But I was neither bitten nor torn -- only held fast with an awful pinch, and I could hear the bear growling and pulling at the canes, as if trying to pass through.
"I gradually released my neck from confine-

,

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
ment, and, on turning around, discovered that I was not caught by the bear, but by my own steel trap, into which I had stepped, and that the bear was gradually breaking its way to me through the canes. I was not then hopelessly lost if I could only reach my gun ; but if I could not, it would be all over with me in a few minutes; for the bear and I were chained to the same stake, and he was furiously snapping the large canes, one by one, around which his chain had wrapped. I struggled frantically toward my gun, with the horrible steel trap biting my leg, and that furious old bear gnashing his teeth, and gaining upon me with every struggle. The ^^::^a- just beyond reach, for my chain, like the bear's, was shortened by a tangle. I could easily give myself length by cutting one or two canes within two feet of the bear's paws ; but I was afraid that going near would make him struggle so violently as to break the confine ment which kept him from rne.^, I prepared, therefore, to try and disengage mf leg from the trap. The work was very pain/ul, for, in turning the shank to place my free foot upon the spring,
34

156

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

the teeth bruised deeply into my flesh. I suc ceeded, however, before the bear reached me, seized my gun, poured both loads into his ear, and then started for home. After a few minutes' walk my excitement subsided. I went back, took the bear's scalp and paws as evidence of my claim to the reward offered, shouldered my traps, and never went back to the place again.
" That scrape rather disgusted me with hunter's life. I left the seaboard, went to the hill coun try, and engaged in school - teaching. In this business I continued several years, succeeding very well, and making more money, in this respectable way, than I had made by any of my other modes of life. One day, however, I lost my school and school-house together, and barely escaped being one in a mass of twenty-six dead bodies. I had as pleasant a school as any teacher could desire, made up of twenty-five bright and well-behaved scholars, the children of the best people of the neighborhood. The school-house was a new one, built expressly for me. It was a neat log house, with a stick chim ney plastered with clay; and the clay was taken

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157

from a hole dug under the floor. I am par ticular in mentioning this, because that hole saved our lives.
" One hot afternoon in August, the sky suddenly became almost too dark for study, and we heard at a distance a ^ terrible roaring. A boy who had been out came running in to say that he coulS see pine-trees flying in the air. I knew in an instant what was coming, and also knew that no time must be wasted. So I lifted one of the puncheons of the floor, and made all the scholars - huddle together in the hole below, while I went out to look at the approaching storm. It was a dreadful sight. Great trees were caught by ?th?ir tops, as an Indian would catch a child by the hair, torn bodily from the ground, lifted into the air, and then allowed to drop. Others were carried above the treetops, and shot like arrows a mile or more away. A huge black column, of mixed cloud, dust, leaves, and every thing else movable, reached from earth to heaven, and moved steadily forwafd. I watched until I was certain that the medge of the column would pass over us, and wolild probably reach

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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

us in less than two minutes. The school-house was in the midst of an old field, cleared of all trees, except saplings. We had, therefore, nothing to dread, except the falling of the house upon us, or, maybe, the dropping of a tree, or of something else lifted by the wind>JS I hurried in, gathered up the books, slates, hats, and bonnets scattered about the room, pitched them into the hole, and jumped in among the children just as the first dash of wind was felt. I had scarcely settled myself in my cramped seat, before there was a crash overhead* and all was dark as night. The storm passed over in a minute or two. Soon as the roar had ceased, and a little light began to peep through the chinks, I pushed the smallest *boy up between the logs, where he was able, after a great deal of labor, to remove some of the clapboards, and to struggle out. He then enlarged the hole, and was joined by another boy, and soon we all crept Out into the open air. By the blessing of kind Providence, not one of us was hurt. The parents of the children came hurrying to the ground in great excitement after the storm, and

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159

were so rejoiced at their children's escape from

death, that they offered to rebuild the school-

house, and double my salary, if I would con

tinue. But I declined to stay. In fact, I thought

I heard the voice of Providence saying, 'You

have done your part helre. Now go.'

"By this time I had made money enough to

buy a small farm. Then this dear, good woman

consented to be my wife,, So we joined our

little property together, and have been living in

comfort and quietude ever since. I hope my

'roughness' is all over now -- at least I have

seen none of it since she has taken charge of

me'; though, after my past experience, I ought

not to be afraid of anything that that same kind

cfc may send." -

,

CHAPTER XV.
DESTINY -- "MISCHIEF-WORK" AND "MURDERBLOOD"-- THE WOUNDED DOG --HASTY SUM MONS-- WARRANT BY WORD OF MOUTH -- THE PERROT FAMILY -- " GARON."
HERE are some people who seem des tined to come together, whether they will or no. We so found it with our good friends, the Phelpses, and with our not good friends, the members of the Pony Club. The storm, which had stopped us about eleven o'clock, ceased between two and three, but the country was deluged, and the unbridged water courses were impassable for hours. It was then certain that we could not reach our journey's end till long after nightfall, and there would be a river to ford after dark; so we quietly decided to stay where we were until morning.
160

SAL-O-QUAH.

161

We pitched our tent in the woods outside the

gate, and just before dark went to the house

and bade the family farewell. The moon, how

ever, shone with such brightness, that Mr. Phelps

was-tempted to make us a visit and inquire if we

needed anything. He remained till bedtime.

The sun had not peeped at us long over the

treetops, before we had struck tent and put

ourselves in motion. About four, miles' travel

brought us to a cross-road, beyond which at a

short distance was one of the small streams

whose over-fulness the afternoon before had for

bidden our journey. It was still turbid and

fuller than usual. Between the cross-roads and

this,branch, persons had encamped during the

night, and had left the smoking brands of a

fire. While pur horses were drinking, Kaneeka

stopped to light his pipe at this fire, then hal

looed to us to come back and join him. When

we arrived, his face wore a troubled expression:

" I 'fraid some mischief-work been don^lere,"

said he.

^

We looked in the direction indicated by his

eye, without perceiving anythingfeunusual, though VOL. III.--L.

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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

we observed that Saloquah's face immediately lost its cheerful expression, and that his eyes wandered wistfully over the ground.
" What do you see, Kaneeka ? " my father in quired.
"Blood!" he answered; "murder-blood, I 'fraid."
Between the fire and the track of the wagon were two dark blotches of blood, imperfectly con cealed by earth scraped upon them.
"The people who encamped here last night must have killed a pig," suggested my father, wishing to relieve, if possible, the horror of the occasion.
"People don't kill pig in bed" returned Ka neeka, pointing as he spoke to the sleeping-place of the encampers; " and this hair not pig hair" he added, drawing from the disturbed soil a yellow ringlet, all clotted with blood; " nor this either," he continued, picking out from the other bloody place several short hairs of mixed black and gray.
The evidence was strong that two persons had been killed at that spot a few hours before. But

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
where were the bodies? They must be either concealed in some place near at hand, or carried off in the wagon.
A fullet examination of the ground revealed the following facts: That a wagon, drawn by two horses, had come from the west, by the cross road which we had passed; had stopped here after the rain; staid all night, and left about day light ; that the party consisted of at least three persons, an elderly white man, a small white female, proba|ffye a havl^r^pfe-town girl, (we so judged by the foot-prints and the hair,) and a man wear ing a coarse heavy shoe; that the wagon, after leaving camp, first crossed the branch, then, making a circuit in the woods beyond, recrossed it, and, instead of continuing the journey east ward, returned the way it camex
"More blood \fresh blood!" shouted Saloquah from some bushes a few steps from the fire.
We hurried to the spot. Kaneeka stooped down, looked keenly upon the ground, turned his eyes upon the surrounding shrubs, and said:

164

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

, not man-blood. There the track, and there again."
With our closest scrutiny we could see nothing of the track which the practised eyes of our friends so easily discerned; we could only see blood on the ground and on the leaves and twigs. This we followed until it brought us to a thicklyleaved vine, where lay a" large and beautiful dog with a ghastly wound in his head, made by a sharp axe or hatchet. He was not dead, though the wound seemed mortal, and he whined mourn fully as we came up. His wound was still bleed ing, and Lorenzo and I, remembering that los*s of blood is said to produce thirst, ran to the deserted camp, where we had seen a gourd, and brought in it some water from the branch. He lapped it eagerly, until every drop was gone, .and looked up for more. We brought him another supply, which also he drank, then licked our hands, looked gratefully into our faces, and lay down to rest.
During this little episode with the dog, Saloquah had galloped away with a message to Mr. Phelps, requesting him to inform his neighbors

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

j6$

of what had eccurred, and join us as soon as possible; after which my father and cousin Aleck, under the shrewd guidance of Kaneeka, gave themselves up^p further examination. They went to the creek. A few steps below the ford were to be seen foot-prints of the man with heavy shoes deeply dented in the steep bank, as if he had walked in the bed of the creek to con ceal his tflck. We could plainly trace his feotsteps between the "water and the hillside, where were several e|H>ty beds of stones that had been lifted and carried off. His trails from the hill side all converged to the same spot, overlooking axleep eddy of the stream. : "We find the dead people in here," said Kaneeka, pointing to this eddy. > A short pole, used as a feeler, revealed a soft, yielding substance at the bottom, like that of a human body weighted down with stone.
"We will let everything remain just as it is until, Mr.Thelps and the neighbors come," said my father; "their testimony will be needed at the inquest, if one should be held."
The examination of the creek, hillsides, and

166

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

eddy had occupied the greater part of an hour, and while we sat there talking, the clatter of a ,pony's hoofs announced the return of Saloquah. He said that Mr. Phelps would come as soon as possible.
We were not kept long waiting. Summoned by an energetic message, and marked with the usual promptness of border men, Mr. Phelps and his neighbors arrived sooner than we ex pected. They were conducted over the ground, shown all that we had seen, then brought to the creek, where they proceeded to examine for themselves. To our horror they drew from the water two bodies -- one of a very respectablelooking man, about fifty years of age, and the other of a sweet-faced, curly-headed girl, about twelve years old, both in the usual night cos tume of campers-out, and both evidently brought to an untimely end by the blow of a sharp-edged axe on the head. Horrid as was the sight, it was a partial relief to think that they had come to their end in the unconsciousness of sleep, and thus been spared the most dreadful part of a murdered person's experience.

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167

Mr. Phelps and his coadjutors were intelligent as well as energetic men, and they resolved promptly upon their course of action. Two of them, accompanied by Kaneeka, all armed, were to pursue the track,of the wagon, and, if possible, apprehend: tnl^murderer* The third, who was a magistrate, was to take charge of the bodies, and see them-decently buried in such way that, if, iii that wild country there could be gathered a jury of inquest,, the bodies could be disinterred for examina-t.i/JoBnt , a' nd if not, they could be given up to the tUn of friends and relatives, should sach be discovered. Our company, consisting ^^lal^.e^cqgt,JKafieeka^, were to continue on the
neighbors came and helped

Before the pursuers left, we had satisfied our selves thai the family name of the unfortunate parties was Perrot, of which the senior's was Jean, and the girl's Elise, On the dog's neck was a brass collar, with the inscription, " GARON, property of ELISE PERROT, Abbeville, S. C." We conjectured from the names, and various little concomitants, that the family were emigrants'

l68

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

from France, and had been here too short a time to conform to American usages, or to know the dangers of a new and wild country.
In the act of leaving, Mr. Phelps turned to the magistrate, and said:
" We are going off as citizens to do our duty in this case; but for my own part, I should like to have some showing of law. /You have no paper on which to write a warrant, but cannot you give us one by word of mouth ? "
The magistrate looked a little puzzled, but soon replied:
" I have been in office only a few days, and do not recollect the form to be used, but the substance is this: ' I, William Simpson, Magis trate, appoint you, Samuel Phelps, and you, James Davis, citizens, with the help of Kaneeka, a Cherokee sub-chief, a posse to pursue, dis cover, and arrest the driver of the wagon whose" tracks are here left, or any other person or per sons who in your judgment may have been par takers in this murder; and in so doing, you are authorized to use all necessary means.
"' Given under my hand and seal, (supposed,)

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169

this 2/th day of June, one thousand eight hun dred and twenty-two.
"' WILLIAM SIMPSON, J.' P.'"
"Just the thing for an off-hand warrant," sajd Mr. Phelps, wii^ a laugh.
" One thing more," said the magistrate. " I appoint you, Samuel Phelps, commander of this posse, with powers of a bailiff."
" Enough," said Phelps, as the squad galloped away.
Saloquah yfcked eagerly after them, as if he would like to DC of the party, but he said nothing, and remained with u.
^ln: the course of another hour, the magistrate, came in, took charge of
, and gave iis leave to depart. Gargon, the dog, had greatly revived under our care, and now gave promise of- life. Lorenzo and I were permitted to take him with us, and to keep him until demanded by rightful authority. And I may here say that he was never demanded. He remained with me as long as he lived, a loving companion, and a faithful guard; and when at last he died of old age, he was succeeded in

I/O

SAL-O-QUAH.

office by one of his descendants, the nearest like him that could be had, i} he succeeded by a.nother, who is in my service now, and whose voice kept my yard so lively last night by his answers to barking dogs that I had to go out and silence him by a switch. We reached Kaneeka's that afternoon.

t"CHAPTER XVI. KANEEKA'S REPORT OF THE PURSUIT -- USE OF A
MIRROR -- DESPERADO -- SKILFUL LYING--EX TEMPORE STRAIT-JACKET.

T was evening of the next day ere Ka-

neeka returned from the pursuit. He

reported that with their utmost efforts

they had not been able to overtake the wagon

until near sunset, not so much from its rapid

driving as from the expertness of the driver in

throwing pursuers off his track.

He said that when they came at last in sight,

Mr. Phelps went ahead to reconnoitre, leaving

the others to follow at a distance, until he gave

them a signal. Kaneeka described with great

admiration one of Mr. Phelps' devices for observ

ing, without seeming to do so, what was behind

35

'7i

172

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

him, by means of a small looking-glass sunk in a case of wood.
The driver of the wagon was a powerfully built negro, whose face indicated both craft and daring. A moment's survey proved that he was a desperate fellow, and would probably resist capture even to death. As Mr. Phelps ap proached from behind, he was singing vocifer ously a religious song, but stopped it as he passed, and offered his salutation with so little discomposure as to excite a momentary doubt whether he could have been concerned in the terrible tragedy of the morning. The doubt, however, was soon dispelled; for Mr. Phelps, who rode ahead and watched him with his mirror, saw him repeatedly and uneasily looking back through a hole in the canvas cover of his wagon, whenever he supposed himself unob served ; and as soon as the clatter of hoofs was heard behind, caused by the coming up of Ptaneeka and Davis at the signal agreed upon -- which was Phelps' taking off his hat and wiping his face -- the negro was seen to grasp a double-barrelled gun, examine has-

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

173

tily its locks, then conceal it again in the wagon;
"Who is that person ahead?" asked Mr. Davis of the negro, as he rode abreast of him
on the right, 'wJh0iple Kaneeka came up at the same time on the leffF
\ -''Don't kfipw, sah. Never saw him befo'," answered :fjjfiegro, very blandly, and with per fect composure.
" You are inquiring about me, I suppose. My name is Phelps. What do you wish ? " returned the captain of the squad, wheeling his horse so as to face the new-gomers, at the same time drawing up his gun ready for use. The moment he did so, the others also brought up their guns, and thus the negro was placed between three armed men, and perfectly at their mercy. "We are pursuing the driver of this wagon," answered Mr. Davis, "and wish you to stay with us while we stop him and ask a few questions."
" I 'II answer anything you ask, ef you 'II only let me keep on drivin'," said the negro, in a pleading and rather impatient tone. " For the man who owns the wagon hired me to-day to

174

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

drive for him, and charged me to meet him at sundown at Mr. Roberts'. But I 'm been so flustered about keepin' the right road, that it's most sundown now, and I 'm ten miles off 'om the place. So please let me drive while you talk."
" Who does the wagon belong to ? " " Mr. John Wiggins, that lives in the Nation." * " Where were you this morning at sun-up ? " " At my master's, currying his horses." " And who is your master ? " " Madison Wiley, that lives at Cherokee Grossroads." "Then you were not with the wagon early this morning ? " "No, sah; only sence twelve o'clock, when Mr. Wiggins hired me." " Why did he hire you to drive, instead of driving himself? " " He said he wanted to see a man off 'om the big road, who owes him some money. So he hired a horse from my master to ride through

* So the Creeks also were called by those who lived near their border.

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
the woods, and I am to meet him at Mr. Roberts' at sundown, where he is to take his wagon, and I am to ride back my master's horse."
The story Was so plain and plausible that the white men, satisfied i,t could not be an invention, were 'about to leave him and' hurry on to Mr. Roberts' to gj5iet Wiggins, when Kaneeka's eye was caug^^by a red tinge on the negro's shirt, as of blood jpartially washed out. He whispered the fact to Phelps, and added:
" Measure his shoe! Here," taking from his bosom a notched stick; " I got measure of track he made yonder." ^f^et^os have thip measure of your foot," said
llie negro promptly put out his bare foot. "I want the measure of your shoe," Mr. Phelps Said, peremptorily. "Never wear shoe, 'cept on Sundays," the negro sulkily returned. " Perhaps we can find a pair for you in the wagon," said Mr. Davisi The negro reluctantly reached back and drew forth a pair of buff-colored shoes, quite wet, as

176

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

if recently washed, but having on them the stains of blood.
" I killed a pig for my master," said the negro, disconcerted for the first time, " and the blood got on my shoes, and my clothes too."
"I thought you told us just now that you never wore shoes except on Sundays," inter posed Mr. Davis.
" No more'n I don't," said the negro, suddenly recovering confidence; "for them shoes ain't mine. They are Mr. Wiggins'. I lef' mine at home."
The shoes were compared with the measure brought by Kaneeka, and they answered exactly to the notches, length for length, and breadth for breadth.
"My man," said Mr. Phelps, perplexed to decide whether the negro was telling the truth, or whether he was the most expert liar he had ever met, " we will not stop you longer. We will go with you to Mr. Roberts', to meet the owner of the wagon, whose name you say is Wiggins. But, first, you must give up that gun we see in the wagon, and then go on with us

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

177

very quietly, and make no attempt to escape,

unless you have a fancy for being shot."

The negro submitted with excellent grace,

though his face assumed for a moment a fierce

expression, as he held firmly to the gun, and

gave it up only when he saw two other guns

pointed at his bosom, saying, as he released his

hold:

$F

" Everything in this wagon is Mr. Wiggins',

and I am bound to give 'em all safe to him at

Mr. Roberts'."

They pushed on together, and reached the

iiouse a little before dark, when Mr. Roberts

out and asked if a Mr. Wiggins was

*?5:*^;-^W :A V"":--;/" -: V

' ' '

"Whatl John Wiggins, of the Nation? that,

horse-stealing scampi" he inquired, and being

answered affirmatively, continued: "No, sir-r!

no leader of the Pony Club, nor member of it

either, enters that door with my consent. I have

lost too much by them already."

He was asked if a covered two-horse wagon

had passed his house the day before.

" It put up with me last night," he answered, VOL. m.--M

178

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

with a look of uneasiness. " I hope no harm has happened to the old man and his curlyheaded daughter."
He then gave an accurate description of the parties, including the negro driver; said that the old man informed him he was known at home as " Monsher Perro;" that he lived in Abbeville, South Carolina; that he had been on a visit to a married daughter in Alabama, with his youngest child, " Mamzel Aleze;" and that he had stopped in " the Nation " with John Wiggins, from whom he obtained his negro driver.
He seemed painfully shocked when informed of the horrid facts, and did not hesitate to utter dark suspicions as to the'complicity in them of Wiggins himself. The wagon, horses, and driver he instantly identified.
"Will you not help us now to make our prisoner secure for the night?" asked Mr. Phelps. "A light, supple cord might do for tying his hands, or a chain, with two padlocks, for hampering his feet."
Mr. Roberts went into the house and brought

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

179

from it several yards of cord, saying that chains and padlocks were rather scarce in a new country.
"This cord is strong enough to hold an ox," said Mr, Phelps, examining it, " but too stiff to hold a man like this. He would work and worry' his hagtflf through it in spite of you. I can make him far more secure by means of a large needle and thread."
Again Mr. Roberts went into the house, and having brought what was desired, Mr. Phelps said:
"I perceive that his clothes are made of homeancl I propose to use them in making for
.:/a "strait-jacket which, shall confine him from head to foot."
He, first of all, made the prisoner put on his coat, the sleeves of which were long and full; then with a small string he tied his thumbs and little fingers together, so that the hands lay back to back behind him.
"This alone would suffice for an ordinary man," said Mr. Phelps, " but as this fellow seems

i8o

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

to be an extra - ordinary scoundrel, I will now proceed with the strait-jacket."
So saying, he buttoned the negro's coat in front, and in addition sewed its lapping parts together at the buttons; then drawing down the sleeves, or rather unrolling the cuffs, so that each could meet the other, he sewed their ends together over the hands, thus making one long sleeve for the two arms, instead of one for each. That being donq, he sewed the elbows of the sleeves closely and strongly down to the coat, and concluded by saying:
" Here is a strait-jacket made out of a man's own coat, easy to wear, yet strong enough for a maniac. I '11 warrant he does n't get out of it without help. There is one thing more I will do, but we must first conduct him where he is to spend the night."
Mr. Phelps then went with Mr. Roberts into the house, selected a room in which captors, captive, and baggage might be safely kept together, brought in the prisoner, seated him comfortably for the night, and proceeded to the last act necessary for securing him, which con-

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181

sisted in sewing together the legs of his panta loons, and then tying him fast to his chair.
" Strong and cunning as he may be, I think he is safe now," said he.

CHAPTER XVII.
SECRET SIGNS--PONY CLUB AGAIN -- HOT PUR SUIT-- "HALT! HALT!"--THE TRIAL--DYING
CONFESSIONS -- YELLOW - JACKETS -- LORENZO'S
SCARE -- PREPARING TO TRAVEL -- VISIT TO SCOSSIT-EQUAH-- HOMINY MORTAR AND PESTLE -- CONNAHAYNEE -- SEE-QUO-YAH AGAIN,
HE captors took turn during the night in guarding the prisoner, and each had his tale of wonder to tell the next morning of the negro's craft. During each man's watch he had seized the most favorable opportunity to attempt, unobserved, to burst his bonds, and then tried in subdued voice, while the others were breathing hard in sleep, to move first his pity, then his cupidity, offering one thousand, two thousand, and even three thou sand dollars, for the privilege of escape. Several
182 *

SAL-0-QUAH.

183

, times also during each watch he was heard to utter, in a peculiar wailing tone the cry, " Oh, me!" and, "Oh, Juba-h!"
Soon as possible after daylight the company were in motion, having the prisoner securely laid on straw thrown into the wagon, and con cealed by the canvas cover. This last was the prudential suggestion of Mr. Roberts, who said:
" There is no calculating on the Pony Club, as to who, or where they are. This negro cer tainly belongs to the gang. If he can let any of them know that he is in trouble, you will certainly be waylaid. Remember that they speak by signs, as well as by words."
Thanking him for this kindly warning, they set off, and travelled about two hours without any noticeable occurrence, when they met a horseman, whose coat collar was marked with a splotch of red clay. He civilly saluted Mr. Phelps, who rode a few steps in advance of the company, and drew rein, as if expecting words in return; but receiving only a nod, he seemed surprised, looked inquiringly at the splotch of red clay on the front of the wagon cover, and

SAL-O-QUAH ; OR, BOY-LIFE
accosted Mr. Davis, who was driver, wit^ the words :
" Stranger, will you please tell me the time of
"Time* of day!" echoed Mr. Davis, rather contemptuously. " If you 'd only turned your eyes to the sun, you 'd a-seen that it is just about one hour from sun-up."
"Oh! ah! no matter," the man said, and passed on, directing a keen look of inquiry into the wagon, whence had come more than one, " Oh, Juba-h ! " followed by the cry,
" This rope hurt my arms. Oh, me ! " After passing, he was observed to stop, take a second look at the company, then hurry off at a rapid pace. "I fear that man means mischief," said Mr. Phelps. " I 'fraid so too," responded Kaneeka. " Then we must push on as fast as possible, and keep close watch behind," said Mr. Phelps, giving Kaneeka his little mirror, and instructing him to linger in the rear, and keep a sharp look out, while he himself watched in front.

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185

The stranger had evidently mistaken them at first, and was afterward moved by some strong and sudden impulse. They could account for this only by supposing that there was a signifi cance in the splotches of clay, and that the negro's peculiar cry was a secret sign of dis tress.
Nothing suspicious occurred until about twelve o'clock, when they were only six or seven miles from their journey's end. The country around, and all the way before them, was wild and un inhabited. Kaneeka came in a gallop to Mr. Phelps to say that from the top of a hill he had seen four horsemen riding rapidly over the crest of another hill about two miles away. Mr. Phelps's lips pressed close together.
" Give the horses the lash, Davis!" said he. " We must distance those fellows if the wagon gets knocked to pieces. We can throw the negro across one of the horses, you know."
Away they went at a gallop, Kaneeka keeping watch still in the rear, and reporting only once, having seen the pursuers, then about a mile and a half distant. A few minutes after this, to their

186- SAIX>-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
great relief, they met a number of men return ing in a body from the burial of the unfortunate family. Of course they had no arms, but three guns in the hands of eight men are more than a match for four guns in the hands of four.
Mr. Phelps still kept command, and his plan was well and quickly laid. He ordered the
X.
wagon to be driven into the bushes, and each man to furnish himself with a stick made to look as near as possible like a gun by blacken ing the muzzle-end with powder, and to lie hid on the roadside until the enemy were halted.
They were not kept many minutes in waiting. Scarcely was each at his post before the clatter of hoofs was heard, and four desperate-looking fellows, all be-whiskered and disguised, came dashing up the road. They drew rein at the place where the wagon turned into the woods, and their leader's face lighted up with pleasure at the prospect of a speedy recapture of their comrade. At that moment, Mr. Phelps, sup ported by two men on each side, apparently armed, called out:
" Stand! Halt where you are!"

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

18?

The scoundrels were taken all aback. For a moment their leader hesitated, as if doubtful whether or not to make fight, even against this unexpected odds, but the voice of " Halt--halt!" hom^oth sides of the road, and the protruding of dangerous-looking muzzles from the bushes, determined him.
" Back, men ! Back! " he shouted; and as they turned and scampered away, a shout equally loud from Mr. Phelps came:
" Let them have it, men! But," he added, in a low tone, " don't shoot so as to hit."
The rest of the story in brief is this: The negro was brought before the proper officer, by whose order he was searched, and $3000 in bank bills found upon his person. He was lodged in a safe jail, where, however, there was more than one attempt made to rescue him. In due time he was tried for murder in the first degree, con~ demned, and finally executed. So long as there was hope of deliverance, he " lied like a trooper," whenever questioned about his crime. But when his case became hopeless, he made great profes sions of penitence, and at last would sing and
36

188

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

pray aloud, and sometimes even exhort. Few persons thought him sincere. When he came to be executed, he confessed everything, and even implicated in some of his crimes parties who held respectable positions in society.
The family of Perrot was almost extinguished by this act of murder. His only son, an inter esting young man, just of age, was so horrified at the details brought out on the trial that he never recovered. A month's time saw him in the grave. The widowed wife and mother gave up her solitary house in South Carolina, and went to live with her daughter in Alabama; soon after which she also sickened and died.
The name Garjon, which had been given to the dog, I changed to Perrot, which has been retained by his descendants ever since; and, so far as I know, the family name, with this excep tion, now exists nowhere in America.

Kaneeka's account of the pursuit and capture of the murderer has been given continuously in the preceding narrative, in order to present the Story whole and entire,, although in so doing we have outrun several little incidents that occurred

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

189

' before his return. These incidents are trivial in themselves, but they are so fresh in memory, and rise so constantly to mind, that I pin them down here to get rid of them.
Scossit^-equah had come that morning on some business with Kaneeka, and brought as a present to us an earthen jar of wild honey, beautifully white, and delightfully fragrant. We enjoyed it much. There is, however, an old proverb, more true in former days than at pres ent, yet painfully true in respect to our honey -- " No rose without a thorn; " for scarcely had the honey been shared among us before we were surrounded with yellow-jackets,* that hovered greedily over the jar, plunged into our saucers, alighted on our fingers, and persistently followed the honey to our very lips. We bore with theni patiently as possible, knowing that wasps, and even hornets, will seldom1 use their stings, unless first assailed. But their numbers and insolence were such that it was useless to think of keep ing the peace, if we kept at the same time our

* A small species of wasp, prettily belted with black and yellow.

190

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

honey. All of us were stung, some of us several times, and so painfully that we resolved at once upon a war of extermination, by every means we could devise. While thus engaged, Saloquah came in, and said:
" Must be big nest of them close by. I go find it."
We insisted that he should first partake with us in the pleasure of the honey, and in the danger of being stung. The last of these he professed to disregard, saying:
"Yellow-jacket never sting me; or if sting, I don't care."
Vain boast! for in the act of carrying the first mouthful to his lips, one of these insects, con cealed under the honey-comb, was carried there too, and gave him such a sting that he started with the pain, and said:
" Ugh! hurt like a hornet!" Before leaving the tent, his stung lip looked more like a fat sausage than the well-turned labial he was accustomed to show. " Pay him for this!" said he, in pretended wrath, pushing out his swollen lip so as to make it appear awfully big. " Kill the whole nest of

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19!

them to pay. Come, let us go. I show you how to find the nest."
He first went to the house and brought thence a sparrow's skin, from which he plucked a small feather, stuck it in the abdomen of a yellow\ jacket, and turned it loose. The poor wretch. conscious, no doubt, of having received its deathwound, made directly for its home to die amid its kin. Saloquah followed, as far as he could see the feather, then treated another yellowjacket the same way. We were.soon brought to a decayed stump, at the foot of which there was a small hole, with a swarm of these insects coming out^ or going in, and hovering above.
" Must have fire now>" said he, giving his hatchet to Lorenzo and myself, and adding: '' You get some light-wood."
He ran to the house, brought back a live coal, and in the course of a few minutes there was a bright flame ascending from a fire so near the hole that every yellow-jacket that attempted to come out, or go in, fell wingless to the ground. There, in great numbers, they crawled about in helpless rage. The fire was kept up as long as

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there were any to be seen flying. On returning to the tent, and reporting the success of our foray, cousin Aleck said:
" I suppose it was nothing but just in you, Saloquah, to murder that poor yellow-jacket by sticking a feather into its body; .but in bee-hunt ing tere is a better-looking plan, by tying a small feather or thistle-down to its leg, or attaching it to the bee's back by means of a little honey."
" Look better for bee" returned Saloquah, very meekly; " but," he added, with a laugh, pushing out his swollen under-lip, "my plan good enough for yellow-jacket".
At midday, a circumstance of rather unusual character occurred to Lorenzo. Not feeling well,, he had gone to his mother's room to lie down, and, after a refreshing nap, was suddenly aroused by a peculiar sputtering sound at the head of his bed. On looking up, he was horri fied to see above him a head with horns, and two great staring eyes, surmounting a long hooked nose. As his eyes had been turned un naturally to it from his pillow, he was not able

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at first to judge of its size or distance, and fancied it something big as a panther, and fierce enough to destroy him.
Lorenzo was a brave boy, and seldom knew fear, but this he said, was one of the times when he felt the hair rise on his head. He sprang up with a bound, and was about to rush from the room when he saw that his visitor was only an enormous horned owl, perchpd on the head-board of the bed. He turned back on discovering this, and tried to drive it out by " shoo"-ing at it. Instead of going, however, the intruder only ruffled its feathers and began spitting and sput tering as before. Looking around now for a stick with which to kill it, and finding none, he came to the door and hallooed to me:
" Johnny, come here! Come quick! I '11 show you a sight."
I answered the call with alacrityr and found that the owl, not at all disposed to give up,its :omfortable quarters, nor even content with its former perch, had flown farther into the room, and taken its place upon the shelf where my aunt's maid kept her clothes. We placed our-
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selves between it and the window, prepared with stitks to kill it as it flew past; then tried to start it from its roost. But there it remained, making the same noises and motions as before, until Lorenzo approached near enough to kill it by a deliberate blow upon its neck.
It was a magnificent bird for one of its illomened tribe, richly marked with stripes of black and brown, and measuring nearly three feet from tip to tip of its wings. What could have prompted it to this strange freak I can not conjecture even to this day. I describe the scene just as it occurred, and leave it without further remark.
Our time had passed so pleasantly and so rapidly at Kaneeka's, amid the ever-varying scenes of this wild country, that it was with mingled feelings of regret and pleasure we heard our seniors speak that day of terminating our sojourn, and going early next week forty or fifty miles into the interior, to visit a celebrated cave, and the country surrounding.
The time fixed for our departure was Monday, only two days distant, and we began at once to

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make preparation; but the plan was partly inter rupted by the occurrence of an event rather rare at that time in Cherokee history, and too im portant as a feature in Indian life for us to neglect. It was a. public election. Like all other public acts of that simple - minded people, its execution was marked with great promptness. A council of chiefs and leading men had been held during our visit to the " Rock Mountain," who decided that a new chief must be elected for this neighborhood, to fill the place of one who had recently emigrated to Arkansas, and ' the day of the next full moon was set apart fpr the purpose. That was Monday, July ist, and Scossit-equah's business that morning had been to inform Kaneeka of the fact, and through Him' to invite our attendance. The day was the same we had set for our departure; but, of course, on such an occasion, we preferred to alter our plans.
Next morning early we mounted our horses and went on a farewell visit to Scossity's, intend ing also to call on See-quo-yah, if there was reason to suppose we should be welcome.

196 SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
On arriving at Scossit-equah's door we fdund it closed, but there was no skinned pole leaning against it, as on a former occasion; on the con trary, there was the smoke of a recent cookingfire ascending from a spot a few steps off, and Kaneeka remarked, in view of these signs:
" Scossity say, Take seat; he be here soon." We "hitched" our horses by making their bridles fast to one another -- for there were no bushes, nor small trees near at hand--and found seats for ourselves on logs and large stones out side the door. While our seniors were engaged in conversation, we boys made the circuit of the premises, but discovered nothing except a mortar and pestle, for beating hominy, and a scaffold of small sticks, with ashes lying below, which Saloquah informed us was a place for "jerking" venison, or drying it by the combined influence of sun and smoke. The mortar was a block about two feet high, slightly scooped, and having in its centre a hole about two inches wide, and three inches deep. The pestle was the counterpart of an ordinary maul for splitting logs, of which the small end was nicely rounded,

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and had the marks of being the part used for

pounding. The corn, softened by parboiling,

was introduced into this cavity a little at a time,

beaten then to a cream-like paste, then returned

to the pot, and boiled with beans. Thus pre

pared, it was called connahaynee, and was the

standing dish of the nation. It was usually kept

in a large earthen jar, ready for use, and was

thence dipped and drunk like thick gruel. The

flavor was sometimes varied by the admixture

of meat.

*

We had not been seated many minutes after

. this exploring expedition before Kaneeka raised

his head, looked in a certain direction, and ex

changed a significant glance with Saloquah;

immediately after which Scossity appeared,

striding through the woods from an unexpected

quarter. Our two red friends had caught the

sound of approaching footsteps, and been as

sured they were Scossit-equah's, before any of

us had intimation of there being another human

being in the neighborhood. He had been to

So-tih's mother, according to promise, to carry

her some corn and venison, and was much

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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFS

gratified to see the crowd of visitors at his door. v
"Come -- come!" he eagerly said, in the little English he could command; " come in! come in!"
We boys told him, soon after his return, that we had been looking at his hominy mortar. He smiled, and leading us to his earthen jar, now nearly empty, he dipped from it a ladleful, and said:
" Here connahaynee. Eat!"" We tasted it -- for although his people were not usually cleanly either in their food or foodvessels, he was an exception to the rule, and there was nothing repulsive in what he offered. We did not, however, relish the acid twang it had acquired by age. Our minds were much more set on trying the mortar and pestle than enjoying the viand produced by it; and per ceiving this, he brought out a clean cow's-horn full of corn already softened, and motioned to us to beat it. We did so, while he looked on with pleasure, and on finishing our work, he said:

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"Good--good! I eat, I say connahaynee unaika," which scarcely intelligible language Kaneeka explained to mean:
"Very good. When I eat it, I will call it white man's hominy."
It was with an expression on his face of almost pain that he heard of our intended departure, and he at once asked if there was anything that he could do for us. My father -replied:
" Not unless you go with us. That pot of honey you brought yesterday was a great treat. But what can we do for you ? "
" Bible! Bible!" he eagerly answered. " Do yau mean, you wish us to read the Bible to you?" "Read Bible to you," he answered,in affirma tive tone, repeating my father's exact words. We sat under the shade of a prettily spread ing dogwood near his door, and took turns in, reading the Bible, while, verse by verse, Kaneeka interpreted. For an hour, that illiterate but earnest man, lately a fierce savage, now a lamb like disciple of Christ, listened with unflagging attention to the reading of the Scriptures; and

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,

when we concluded, he lifted his eyes reverently

upward and uttered a few words in Cherokee,

which Kaneeka informed us was the sentence:

" God is love! " *

To his great delight, another Bible-reading

was appointed for the next day at Kaneeka's

" preach-place;" and with this in prospect we

left him, and returned home without attempting

a call on See-quo-yah. Indeed, we were informed

that he was more than ever absorbed in his effort

to " make paper talk Cherokee," and very im

patient of interruption, his whole mind being

occupied with the study of various uncouth

marks, scratched with a nail into pieces of bark.

My father and cousin Aleck were so much

interested* in his persistent efforts, that before

leaving the neighborhood, they sent him, by the

hand of Scossit-equah, what writing-paper they

* As a sample of the language, I give the sentence in Chero kee, phonographed for the English ear, from i John iv. 16, as it is found in a Testament in Guess' character, now before me: " Oo-nay-lah-nung-hee a-dah-kay-tsu-dee kay-sung doo-do-ung " ~ of which words the first means God, the Ruler and Disposer; and the second means Love ; each having five syllables.

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could spare, and a lead pencil, with the message that they wished him success. Whether* he used these assistances, we never could learn. It is most probable that, with his dislike of the white man, and with his dbgged independence, he re fused all aid from a foreign source.

CHAPTER XVIII.
ECONOMIZING FOOD, A LESSON FROM THE RICHEST
' BEING IN THE UNIVERSE--CHEROKEE ELECTION-
DAY, AND METHOD OF ELECTION.
OTWITHSTANDING the rain which fell copiously during the night, and which continued to fall through the morning, the woods around Kaneeka's " preachplace" were alive at ten o'clock, with a larger number of Indians than we had ever seen there before. This increase of number was no doubt due to the lively zeal of Kaneeka and Scossitequah -- so contagious is simple earnestness in almost everything. My father and cousin Aleck felt much encouraged, nor could we boys, though at a thoughtless age, feel indifferent when we saw the eagerness of this heathen people to
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hear the tidings brought to them by the Book of books.
Nothing of special interest occurred that day, except a talk of cousin Aleck with us boys. The occasion was trivial, as is the case often times with the gravest events of life, but trivial only as is the dropping into the ground of an acorn, which is to grow and wave for centuries after our marble tombstones have mouldered. Certain it is that this little talk has more or less influenced almost every day of my life since, and it makes me smile as I write, to remember that part of it was impressed upon us by sparrows and ants.
It /was soon after dinner. A tiny puddle of rain-water, clear as crystal, had collected in ah equally transparent cup of turpentine that had oozed from the base of a large pine. The combination was strikingly beautiful; but what interested us not less was an iridescent scum upon the surface that sparkled with the brightest colors of the rainbow. After watching it for a time, and wishing to vary the phenomenon, we had pushed down into the mass a piece of bread and butter, and were watching to see if any effect
37

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followed the incongruous combination of grease, turpentine, and water. Without knowing it, we were studying chemistry, and cousin Aleck, who would gladly have aided us in it if he had known what we were about, but who only saw what seemed to him an act of wanton waste, passed near us, and said:
" What, boys! destroying food ? " , " We had finished eating. We do not need it," was our reply. "But perhaps somebody, 01* something else does," he continued. " Who, or what can it be ? " we inquired, lookJng at our well-fed dogs, for we knew that Scipio was at that moment enjoying a bountiful repast we had brought him from our table, and there were no poor Indians in sight. " Nobody, nothing near at hand, that I know of," he answered. "Only as I saw that nice piece of bread and butter ruined by being mixed with turpentine, I had a painful recollection of an old Jewish saying, ' Great will be the punish ment of those who waste food, destroy seed, and refuse to obey the law.' "

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To this we had no reply. We therefore looked meekly upon the ground. Indeed, the quotation opened to our minds a new field of thought: that waste was not only bad economy, measur able by dollars and cents, but a sin, obnoxious to the Divine displeasure. Cousin Aleck seemed to catch intuitively our train of thought, for we had not uttered a word, and inquired :
"Do you recollect, boys, the story of our Saviour feeding five thousand people in the desert, with five loaves and two fishes ? "
We answered that we remembered it well. " How did he obtain the food ? " " From a boy among the multitude." "Yes, the five loaves and the two fishes that he began with, but how did He obtain the quantity sufficient to feed so large a multi tude?" " He created it as it was distributed." "Do you not suppose that the Power which could thus feed five thousand, could as easily have fed ten times, or a hundred times the number ? " "We do."

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"Then why do you suppose he said to his disciples, after the multitude had eaten,' Gather up the-fragments, that nothing be lost?' "
We answered that we had never reflected on the subject.
He added: "I will tell you what 7 think. The reason was twofold: First, to reward the boy's generosity, or faith, as it might be, by re turning to him twelve baskets full of food in place of the handful he had given up; and, secondly, to teach us by example that the rich est Being in the universe Himself practises economy, and would have us do the same. But I think I can give you a practical illustration of His way of economizing. Scipio!" he called aloud, " have you done your dinner ? "
Scipio wiped his full mouth, and looked down into an empty plate, unable for an instant to give answer. But the act was sufficient.
"Scipio," said cousin Aleck, "I wish you would take what bones and pieces of bread are left to yon tree," pointing to one near Kaneeka's house, " and there give them to the dogs."
Scipio did as was desired. The dogs ate and

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left the place. Soon there came along a hen and chickens, which cousin Aleck had spied before giving his order. She uttered a joyful cluck, and her brood ran to her. For several minutes they feasted upon the scraps left by the dogs. We smiled, for we at once perceived the nature of the illustration intended.
" Hold on, boys! We are not half done yet," said cousin Aleck.
The hen, with her well-fed brood, had not withdrawn many steps, before a red-headed woodpecker, and after it a crested sparrow came, picked up each a crumb, and flew away. The sparrow returned more than once.
" Come, boys! To see the rest of this show we must draw nearer," said cousin Aleck, moving forward.
Several yellow-jackets, a large blue fly, and a number of house-flies had alighted on the hard bones left by the dogs, and were sucking a luxurious repast from their oily surfaces.
"Let us examine more closely still," said cousin AJeck.
We came and found, at a place where one of

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the dogs had gnawed his bone, a multitude of ants of several species, some feasting on the marrow hidden away in crevices beyond the reach of flies and yellow-jackets, and others tugging off some of the smaller fragments to their homes. ( "We need not stop even yet," said cousin Aleck, "though this scene probably closes all that can be discerned by the naked eye, and at the present time. But were you to come here after a few hours with a suitable microscope, you would find every bone, and leaf, and pebble, on which the food had rested, giving token of still minuter forms of life; and later still, after these animalculae have eaten their fill, and spent their little day in enjoyment, these same remains will swarm with minute vegetable growth, and will then dissolve gradually into the soil, and become food for larger plants. Now, boys, in view of these facts, I should like to know who it is that in all the universe is the most perfect econo mist?" I Lorenzo took off his hat and reverently
\ answered, " GOD."

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209

" You are right," rejoined cousin Aleck, im pressed with this act of practical worship on Lorenzo's part, and also taking off his hat; " the richest of beings is also the most frugal and prudent. He cares for all His creatures, and would have* us do the same. Let us endeavor to*be more fully 'the children of our Father which is in heaven,' by following his example; and let us remember that the lesson taught us 1 to-day is, Never waste food?
The election next day took place at the coun cil-house of the neighborhood--the same place we had visited at the time of So-tih's rescue from unjust execution. When we arrived, several knots of the neighbors were already assembled, and with them two or three sub-chiefs of the adjoining districts. Among them was our old friend Saw-nee, riding his dished-faced pony, and attired as usual in his old-time Indian cos tume of turban and feathers, fringed huntingshirt and leggings, with a bow at his back, and arrows projecting from a scarf thrown over his shoulders. Gradually the people came in from
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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

every imaginable quarter through the pathless woods, until the time appointed.
The hour of noon was almost as exactly marked by the consciousness of these children of nature as by the machinery of our watches. The people were then called to one place. A leading man, one of the best orators of the dis trict, arose and proposed a name that I did not hear, or have forgotten. For a time there was a profound silence. Another orator then arose and proposed the name of Kaneeka. As he did so, there was a low buzz of applause, almost in violation of usual Indian decorum, and the name of So-tih was to be heard, showing that Kaneeka's intervention in that case was not for gotten. Again silence reigned. No other name being proposed, each orator took his nominee by the hand and led him out of the crowd to a viny thicket beyond sight and hearing. The orators returned, and each made a harangue, setting forth the peculiar virtues and character istics of his candidate. They then took positions facing each other, a few steps apart, and called upon the people to range themselves in a line

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211

to the right or left of him whose candidate they preferred. Five minutes sufficed for this simple, but satisfactory process of voting; and I have oftentimes thought that the interests of the white man might be subserved by taking in this matter a lesson from the Cherokees. As soon as all the voters were in line, each orator proceeded to count, and with a loud voice announced the number; after which they went to the place of concealment, brought forward their candidates, and in the hearing of the people proclaimed the result of the election. Kaneeka was chosen by a large majority. The other chiefs approached, gavs Aim;: the right hand, and publicly pro nounced him a chief. The people then gradually and quietly dispersed; and Kaneeka, after being detained for an hour in council with the other chiefs, by whom he was no doubt initiated into the duties and mysteries of his office, returned home with us.

CHAPTER XIX.
SCIPIO -- INDIAN DOCTORING -- A FELLOW-TRAVEL LER ON FOOT -- CHEROKEE HOTEL -- SLEEPING ACCOMMODATIONS -- MEETING OF TWO RARE CHARACTERS -- VANDEVER'S STORY.
CIPIO, poor fellow,' was exceedingly disappointed when he learned that my father's plans did not include him in the number intended for Etowah and the cave. His chin rested on his breast, and the tears came into his eyes. Quash, to comfort him, said : " You fool ! wufifuh you want to git into dah dark hole under ground. You git into hole under ground fast enough w'en you dead." " But I ent dead yet," answered Scipio. "And moe'n dat, de hole you talk 'bout ent big like dis yuh one dey gwine to, and people don't see it, nudder, after dey git in it. ft^as Johnny ! "
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213

he pleaded, " Mas 'Renzo! do beg mossa let me go too. I feel like I cry all de time you gone. Tell him w'en you all gone on Rock Mountain, and lef me in camp all day by myself, I did n't mine it a bit; but I bin set my heart to see dis yuh big hole in the ground."
We laughed and promised jto do our best for him. "Do -- do -- do!" he begged, and away we went. Our intercession was instantly suc cessful, and Scipio was so overjoyed that his cap left his head and went up into the air high enough to lodge in a tree, and his feet came slapping together as he took a leap from the ground, exclaiming:
" Tankee, mossa! tankee -- tankee!" We set out in fine spirits, my father bestriding Old Gray, cousin Aleck on one of the carriagehorses, Kaneeka and we three boys on our ponies, and Scipio on another carriage-horse, but with out a saddle. Our dogs and guns, of course, went too. Following our narrow trail a few miles, for there was no road, we came to a cool-looking creek, beside which a spring of water gushed

214

SAL-O-QUAHJ OR, BOY-LIFE

from the hillside, and within hail, on the other side, was an Indian hut. From the hut came two men, fantastically dressed, bearing a litter or hand-barrow made of two poles and a blanket, on which lay a sick man. The two bearers were conjurors, or medicine-men, who were about to try on their patient the efficacy of their great remedy; and we remained long enough to witness the operation, and its result. They immersed him in the cool bed of the spring, enlarged to receive his whole person, and made him drink as much as he could of the water. That was the operation, accompanied with certain grunts and grotesque motions by way of charm. The result was that the man died while we were looking on.
I will here take occasion to say, for the benefit of such as indulge an undue confidence in the red man's remedies, that although some of the medicines discovered by Indians are unquestion ably good, yet, as a general rule, their hygienic appliances are the veriest quackeries imaginable. For instance, their theory in the cure of fever, whether from malaria, measles, small-pox, or

any other cause, was by cooling down. To effect this they immersed the patient in the coldest water possible., leaving only his nose out, and made him drink large draughts at the same time, saying:
" Cpld water inside, cold water outside, fever have no chance."
Nevertheless, it had chance enough to kill the man we saw, and also to kill almost all the small-pox and measles patients treated in this way. A respected friend of mine, who had been for twenty years a missionary among the Cherokees, informed me not long since that he knew of an Indian doctor who prescribed for the cure of a young woman, sick of a violent disorder of the stomach and bowels, two large collards* boiled with two pounds of bacon, and taken at one dose. Fortunately, the woman did not die, but it was probably because she had too much sense to take the medicine.
We had not travelled far beyond this scene of fatal doctoring before we saw ahead of us an Indian on foot, moving in the same direction
* A coarse variety of the cabbage tribe that does cot head.

216 , SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
with ourselves. He was loaded with a wellfilled wallet, and a gun with its accoutrements, yet he moved with such ease and swiftness as to call forth our admiration, and to give us a long ride before we overtook him. My father and cousin Aleck often called attention to him, won dering who he could be, and how he managed to keep ahead of us so long. I observed Kineeka and Saloquah more than once exchange smiles with each other on hearing these remarks. And what was our surprise, on overtaking the pedestrian, to find that he was no other than our old friend Scossit-equah.
"Glad to see you, Scpssity," said my father, on coming up. " But where are you going ? "
" To Etowah, to see big hole," he answered. " I did not know that you had any intention of doing so," my father said. " No," Scossit-equah replied; " you leave me, but I not leave you." We learned that he had come prepared to travel on his own expense, asking only the privilege of being in our company. He was gladly welcomed, and useful indeed did he prove

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before the jaunt was over. As for speed of travelling, the only difficulty was in our keeping up with him, especially in the hilly country, though sometimes on level ground we outstrip ped him.
None of us ever forgot our first night's accom modation on that road; at least Lorenzo and I did-^not, for we laughed over it niany a time afterward. My father had inquired of Kaneeka what " stations " we might expect to find on the way, and had been answered so emphatically, " Chattaka - neeta first. He good. His name mean chicken, and he have chicken much to eat. Much people stop with him," that we felt quite safe in looking to that as our first stop ping-place. Indeed, there was no other to be had in many miles.
The sun had scarcely descended within an hour's reach of the horizon when we were in formed that the station was almost in sight, and we looked out eagerly to catch our first glimpse of a popular Indian hotel. A dense growth of dogwood and black-jack, about fifteen feet high, completely hid the house from view until we

2i8 SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE.
were just at the gate, when we saw Chattakaneeta, a one-legged, dark-skinned Indian, sitting on a long, low bench, together with his fat wife, and four grown-up daughters, all full-blooded Cherokees, while three half-grown lads were stalking about the yard. The house, very low in its walls, and very sharp in its roof, was eighteen feet long, by sixteen broad, with a large stone chimney at one end, but without sheds or other rooms. We looked around to see where all this family of nine persons, with the addition of eight travellers, could possibly find sleeping accommodations, but could see nothing in the shape of a house, except a corncrib adjoining a horse-shed, in a yard enclosed by a twelve-rail fence.
" Where are we all to sleep?" whispered cousin Aleck to Kaneeka.
" There," answered Kaneeka, pointing to the house.
"What! men, women, and boys, all in that little room?"
"Plenty big," Kaneeka answered. "Some times ten--ten -- ten people," holding up his

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2ig

spread fingers three times, "twenty people -- thirty people stop here the same night."
" I should like to know how we are to be stowed away," cousin Aleck continued, begin ning to look decidedly nervous.
"See to-night," Kaneeka answered, in the same quiet tone.
The first indication of good cheer we had -- and a fair sign it is usually esteemed by travel lers-- was that our horses were plentifully fed on say-loo, and say-loo-waw-yah, as the Cherokees call corn and fodder. The boys then knocked down a pair of fat pullets by welldirected blows across^ their necks, soon after which we inhaled the smell of fried bacon from the big chimney; arid really, when we came to table -- for there was a table, spread with a clean cloth too, under a prettyx dogwood-tree near the door -- we had a supper far exceeding the first promise of the house; proving that Mrs. Chattaka-neeta and the Misses Chattaka-neeta had received lessons in cookery from other than Indian teachers.
But how and where were we all to sleep? was a 38

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question still uppermost in the minds of all, especially of cousin Aleck, and greatly was the difficulty enhanced by the arrival, before dark, of five more travellers, making in all twenty-two persons.
Bedtime came soon after dark. The young Masters Chattaka-neeta began to yawn. At a signal from their father, each took a deerskin from a large pile in one corner, spread it at the foot of a shady dogwood, turned away his face from the moon, now just rising, and past the full, and there slept, as Jacob did at Bethel, with a stone for a pillow. . Our host then called us travellers into the house, pointed to one-half the room nearest the door, where deerskins covered the dirt floor like a continuous carpet, ,and said:
" There you sleep;" and turning to a corner near the chimney, where already lay his well-fed wife, flanked by her dusky daughters, added: "Here we sleep."
We took the places assigned us, each about two feet by six, on the floor, and, as the night was cool for the season, we slept, not only with-

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221

out stifling, but almost without turning on our so-called beds.
*
Our breakfast, next morning, was better than the supper, and when the time came for settling our bill, the charge for our company of eight persons, and eight horses, was in all two dollars, or at the rate of twenty-five cents for each man and horse counted as one.*
We had occasion to remember that night's history on another account also -- a conver sation between two rare characters, begun just as we were going to bed, and, much to the an noyance of one or two who wished to sleep, continued far into the night.
A sharp-faced and weather-beaten little man, having heard one of the last comers addressed as Smith, and saying something, in reply, of " Ivy-log Mountain," called aloud:
" I say, stranger! You answer to the name of Smith ? "

* This very moderate charge for a night's lodging prevailed at that time through much of the Blue-Ridge region of North Carolina, and of Eastern Tennessee, where corn was plenty, and where money was so scarce that, as a farmer said, "A silver half-dollar shone as big as a full moon."

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SAL-O-QUAH; 'OR, BOY-LIFE

"I do."

"From Ivy-log?" " From Ivy-log." "Then I reckon you're the man I want to see --the Yankee squatter there that people call Screw-so Smith." "I calculate I'm the man you mean," said Mr. Smith, in a rather displeased tone; "but you've already made three mistakes in what you've said. I'm no squatter; I'm a citizen, settling down wherever I please. I 'm no Yan kee ; but a Green - Mountain man, and don't answer to any such title. And my name is not screw-so, but Crusoe. My mother named me for that great traveller among the Injins, Robinson Crusoe, who fed for twenty years on wild goats, and had an Injin waiting-man named Friday.'' " Beg your pardon, Mr. What's-name. Hope no offence. But I was on my way up to Ivy-log to see you." "And what may be your name?" asked Smith. "Vandever," said the other, "Adam Vandever. Did ye ever hear tell of him ? "

AMONG THE'CHEROKEES.

223

" Of Adam Vandever, the hunter ? Indeed I have, and so has every other wild thing in these parts. Come, Vandever, hand me your paw. There is no man living I have wanted more to meet thai* you."
They came together with a haw-haw of pleas ure, and gripped each other's hands like two bears;.,. '
"litofcden dowri to the settlements to sell my peltries," said Vandever, " and was coming your way to see if there was any room near Ivylog for another hunter."
" Room ? Plenty of room! Why, deer and cooiiS are almost as thick there as rattlesnalces. Come on, boy! But why do you leave Talulah?"
"Oh, the settlement thar is gittin' too thick for me and my wife. We feel as if we are watched all the time. Thur's a man named Giles, who has squatted in ten miles o' me on one side, and a man named Taylor, with a family o' eight boys, that's settled in fifteen miles on t'other, and I hear of more a-coming. I- feel

224

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

scrouged. I kin hardly git, my breath. I must

move."

-

"Well, come up my way," said Smith. "I'll

see to it that you have plenty of room, and

deers and coons, and bears and panthers to

suit."

They then went on to give each other some

account of their lives and adventures, of which

I, have a vivid recollectioh, but will record only

a brief sample.

Vandever said: "I was .born and raised in

South Calliny. For the last twenty years I Ve

been a hunter. I kill all sorts o' varmints, live

on their meat, and sell their hides. Soon as

frost comes in the fall, I leave my wife and chil

dren with plenty of hog and hominy, load up

my old Tar-and-Feathers -- the mule you saw

me riding -- with what I need for winter work,

and push for my hunting ground, where I stay

till cOrn-hoeing time next spring, when 1 1 carry

to market my skins and dried meat, and carry

home sugar and coffee, and other store things,

sich as I know my folks want to have.

" My hunting turns me out pretty well. Up

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225

to the present time so my wife says, who has done the notching down I have taken the hides off 'om more'n three thousand deer, four hundred bar, and one hundred and fifty painters. As for beavers and otters, and foxes and coons, and sich-like game, not to say nuthin' of rabbits and minks and muskrats, I can't tell the number, for we've kept no account of them; only I kin say I Ve killed more of *em than you could shake a stick at in a month o' Sundays.
"It stands to reason, that, by and large,* I have seen some'o' the rough side o' this world, as well as some o' the smooth; and have had ;in^E^a^Me to tell my wife and children in the ttmtner- imeV when we sat together of a moon light night under the tree by my door. I've been bit by- wolves, scratched by painters, hug ged by bars, run over by deers, pisened by rattle snakes, stung by scorripins, shot at by Injins, washed away by freshets, lifted up by w'irlywinds, and cheated to death by store-keepers and traders; but I 'm alive through it all, and feel

* This provincialism is the equivalent in meaning to "In the lump," "On the average," or " Taking all things together."
VOL. HI* P

226

SAL-6-$UAIf J

strong enough to live a thousand years, if it wurn't agin natur to do so. o-' " You asked me, jes now, if I was never scared. I answer, yes; bad enough to know that the "feelin* aint comfortable. Once I was jogging along on old Tar-and-Feathers, when all of a sudden there come along one of them winds that pull up trees by the foot, and shoot them through the ar like Injin arrows; people call 'em w'irly-winds. Well, it pulled up a tree just ahead o' me, and tuk up me and my mule, and carried us and the tree sailing .together through the ar for a quarter of a mile, arid then let us down on another hillside, jest as easy as you would let down a baby into a cradle.
" That's one o'> the times I was scared. I thought--umph! wasn't there an old Bible man once, that went to heaven in one of these w'irlywinds? Well, I thought I too was going right off, without a chance to tell Sally and the chil dren good-by, or to give 'em the peltries I had tuk; so as it Was agin my consent to be goin' up that, way, I give old Tar-and-Feathers some unmerciful digs in the ribs, to make him come

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

4 22?

down. Powerful scared as I was, I could hardly

keep from laughin' to see how he pawed and

strained on the bit to get back to the arth. I

believe he was as bad scared as I was.

:

"That's one time, and I kin tell of another,

It was on top of a steep mountain. A painter

had raised its doleful cry not far off) and I was

dodgin* among the rocks, trying to get a shot at

it. All at once, while standing on the edge of

a large round rock, half as big as this room, I

felt the rock move under me. It was on a steep

hillside, where the rains had washed away its

bed, and my weight was enough to tilt it Jest

before it begun to move, I had thrown my arm

over the limb of a tree to balance me as I peeped

down and around after the painter; so when the

rock tilted and went down, I had nuthin' to do

but to hold on. Away it went, smashing the

trees in its way for a quarter of a mile, and

making a cloud of dust as thick as a thunder-

head. Soon as it was out of the way, I dropped

from the tree into the bed it had left, and then

watched it on its way' down.

" These are two times when I was scared; and I

228

SAL-O-QUAH.

kin say that I was at the battle of Caleeby, under General jett Thomas, when the Ingins crope through our lines and attacked us before day light, and come near taking the scalp of every mother's son of us; and was at the battle of Autosse, too, when I killed twenty Ingins with my own rifle, and when, of course, I stood a chance of being killed myself; but as for being scared, I 'd ruther stand twenty battles than one w'irly-wind, or another rolling rock on a moun tain-side."

CHAPTER XX.
WOLF-TRAP---CHERt>KEE WEDDING AND FUNERAL --ETOWAH RIVER -- MR. MILLER'S -- TA-KAHTO-KUH.
U'R journey that day was wild and full of variety. A few minutes' ride showed us Scossit-equah near the roadside, in
company with the eldest of Chattaka-neeta's sons.
" Gone to wolf-trap," said Saloquah. " Caught a wolf close by road."
" May we go see it ?" Lorenzo and I eagerly inquired, first of our Indian friends, then of my father.
" Go, go, if you want. No harm to go," Kaneeka answered.
We all went. The wolf, caught by its foreleg in a steel trap, was a formidable-looking beast,
229

230

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

not large, but exceedingly fierce; and, being frantic with pain and fear, its teeth snapped together whenever approached, like the jaws of the trap in which it was caught. Kaneeka in formed us that a steel trap set for wolves is never baited, but is concealed in their accustomed path, usually beside a small log, which they always cross in a trot, setting the foot so exactly in the same place as to leave a mark. We watched for some time its wild motions, and when we ex pressed ourselves satisfied, Scossit-equah with one blow of his tomahawk relieved it of further pain.
Our pony-trail carried us by a council ground, where a large company had assembled in holi day costume. It was 'a wedding occasion, con ducted according to ancient Cherokee usage, and we came up just in time to witness the closing ceremonies. The groom, attended by several of his companions, had been feasted in a lodge on one side of the council-house, and the bride, similarly attended, had been feasted in one on the other. Toward the close of the feast the men and women took their places in the council-

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

23!

house on apposite sides, with a space between. When we came up, the attendants were conduct ing the groom and bride to the council-room. There they were placed standing, as far apart as possible. The groom's mother approached him and put into his hands *a blanket and a venison ham, and the bride's mother, in like manner, put into her hands a blanket and an ear of corn. The parties then slowly approached, and, on meeting, put their blankets together, and ex changed the articles carried; thus symbolizing the promise that they would henceforth occupy the same home, and that the man should provide meat, and the woman should provide corn. The presiding chief then pronounced " the blankets joined," or, in English, the parties married, and the assembly was dismissed.
Not many miles beyond this marriage scene was one of an opposite character--a funeral; so closely are deaths and weddings associated in actual life, as well as in the columns of the news papers. The body, attired in its best apparel for making its entry into " the hunting grounds of the blessed," was borne by two on a. kind of

232

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

litter, or hand-barrow: a hole, two feet deep, was dug by attending friends with sharp sticks; the body, neatly coffined in bark stripped from a neighboring tree, was laid in Jts shallow bed, and then covered with the excavated earth, on which was heaped a layer ofstones to protect it from the incursion of wolves. It was then left, with the understanding that whosoever passed by in time to come, should increase the mound by the addition of a stone or pebble cast upon it.
Long before sunset we reached the Etowah River, down which we travelled for several miles. This was a beautiful stream, clear as spring water, having its banks overhung with trees and vines of graceful form and luxuriant propprtions. An enormous grape-vine measured nearly a foot in diameter, and a sycamore required six of us with joined hands to encircle it.
The house destined for our second night's accommodation occupied a rounded knob jut ting like a promontory from the hills, and over looking a rich river-bottom which waved far and near with crops of corn. The contrast between this well-proportioned building of two stories

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233

and ten rooms, with a promise of real beds and privacy, and that of the night before, with its one room crowded with men, women, and children, strewed upon deerskins on a dirt floor, was in .the highest degree pleading. AH through the spacious yards we could see poultry of divers kintJs, some pf which were already preparing for an'.early roast ia the Jbranches of trees, while from the wtyods Ijeyond 'camevthe grunt of pigs ^and the low of cattle.
Mr. Miller, our host, as we afterward learned, was a wealthy half-breed, whose father had sent him in his boyhood to Massachusetts, where he had gained first a fair education, and subse quently a fair-skinned wife, by whom he was blessed, not only with increased refinement of character, but with a large family of lady-like daughters, and two sons. The evening of our arrival the young people^ of the house had in vited the young people of their own standing in the country around to meet them in a party of pleasure; and when we rode up to the gate, the open piazza was gay with young company, and musical with their voices. We .observed that,

234

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

with one exception, all present there were of mixed blood, and some of them nearly white. The exception was an elderly Indian, attired in ancient costume, and his travel-worn pony hitched at the gate indicated that he, like our selves, had just arrived. Mr. Miller had notyet come in from his fields, but well-trained negro servants took in charge our horses, introduced us into the piazza, and attended to our wants. The young people, principally females, and some of them quite pretty, waited, until we had as cended the steps, when, with a look of pleasure directed toward cousin Aleck and us boys, they retired to a room within."
The moment that Kaneeka and Scossit-equah came near enough to distinguish the old man's features, they gave a grunt of surprise, exchanged with each other a few words in Cherokee, and went up to him with marks of respect. He rose to his feet to receive them, revealing a figure rather below the common height; but I can truly say that seldom, if ever, have I met a person who so greatly impressed me at first sight with native urbanity and graceful dignity as that dark-

skinned Indian. No one could look upon his broad forehead, flashing eye, and expressive face, without feeling that he was a born chief. But his urbanity was not exercised toward all alike. To us whites he did not, deign'so much as a look, and whatever consciousness of our pres ence he acknowledged was accompanied with the indications of a haughty repugnance.
Mr. Miller, who soon rode up, from a distance recognized his visitor, threw his bridle rein pver a hook, walked rapidly into the piazza, and, pass ing us with a polite bow, went directly to him and gave a cordial greeting. Their brief con versation, conducted in Cherokee, in a low tone, seemed to be of a grave and confidential char acter, for Mr. Miller, seeing us comfortably seated, and requesting us to call on his servants for any thing we should need before his return, withdrew with him to a private room.
During their absence, Kaneeka informed us that the name of the new-comer was Ta-kah-tokuh; that he was a head-chief of the Nation West, having removed to Arkansas only a few years before; that he belonged by descent to the
39

236

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

almost royal family of priests, in which capacity he had sometimes officiated; and that he was so highly esteemed for many distinguished virtues, as to be called " the beloved man;" but that his national love had made him, like See-quo-yah, an intense hater of the whites who had intruded upon their territory and ruined his people.
The conference had not been in progress many minutes before Kaneeka, who had made himself known as a sub-chief, was invited to take part. Of course we knew nothing of the subject, for an Indian's deliberations on matters of public interest, as we conjectured Ihese to be, are all conducted " under ground," or in perfect secrecy. We learned afterward, however, that his object in visiting the Nation East was to persuade all his people to remove to Arkansas, there to unite with other friendly tribes in a great confedera tion, which should be strong enough to. demand of the United States that the Mississippi River should be made the boundary forever between' the white and the red races. For this purpose he visited many of the tribes, and never ceased his efforts until, on his way to Washington City

to meet commissioners appointed* to treat of Indian matters, he was stricken down by death, and with him failed all of his far-reaching plans. These facts, though learned long afterward, I mention here as depicting the man.
When the chiefs, after a short conference, had returned to the piazza, we observed a marked change in Ta-kah-to-kuh. He not only relaxed from his haughty and repulsive manner, but even made advances toward forming an ac quaintance.
This change was produced by Kaneeka's in forming him that my father and cousin Aleck were not Americans, but the subjects of King George. His^yefeshcd at the intelligence. King George! why, it was under his banner that Ta-kah-to-kuh had first gone upon the war-path against the rebelling colonies forty years before, and had again taken up the tomahawk ten years since in the war of 1812. His heart warmed toward these " brothers of the Red-Coats," and it was not many minutes after his return to the piazza before he and my father and cousin, the subjects of King George, were engaged, by the help of

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
Mr. Miller and Kaneeka as interpreters, in free and animated conversation.
, An excellent supper, spread before the light of day was gone, refreshed us much; after which cousin Aleck and we boys received a polite invi tation to join the company of the young people. True, we were roughly clad, and had not come with changes of clothing, except such as were suitable for entering a cave; yet, as the invita tion was cordially given, and gracefully urged, we made no difficulty about accepting it, and were well rewarded for so doing. The young people showed their politeness by soon making us feel perfectly at our ease.
Lorenzo and I were at once appropriated by the youngest sister, about sixteen years of age, a rich brunette, whose high cheek-bones showed the peculiar contour of the Indian. Her Cherokee name was Wa-la-hue, (Humming-bird,) and her Christian name Julia. She gave us an amusing account of her boarding-school ex perience at a New-England Seminary.
Cousin Aleck enjoyed the attentions of Miss Harriet, or, as she preferred to be called by her

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

239

Cherokee name, Ku-ma-ma, meaning Butterfly. She was about twenty years of age, the most intelligent and attractive of the Miller sisterhood, and interested us all by her sparkling conversa tion and ready wit. I remember a remark of hers, which, although of a very grave and im pressive character, went to show the lively turn .of-h&r mind. Cousin Aleck was so deeply im bued with religious sentiment, that he could not be long in any one's company without showing it. Miss Ku-ma-ma was also of a decidedly re ligious turn. They had been discussing the great central doctrine of the gospel, and had dwelt with so much animation upon the character and work of Jesus Christ, that by one consent the whole company ceased conversation to listen to them. Cousin Aleck had conjoined the three facts that "Jesus Christ is the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his person;" that he " ever went about doing good," and that we, his professed disciples, should feel it our chief duty to imitate his example. Miss Ku-ma-ma seemed for a while lost in thought then sprang to her feet, exclaiming:

240

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

" I see it now ? I see it! Jesus Christ came into this world to illustrate the Father; and sends us into the world to Uhtstrate himself"
She had thus condensed into a breath what had taken him several sentences to elaborate. He was delighted. She still pondered, however, and after a moment's thought, added:
" We ought to be the brightness of his glory, as he was the brightness of the Father's. The only Bible which most people read is the Chris tian's life."
When my father heard of these things, he remarked:
" That young woman ought to be the wife of a missionary."
The conversation in the piazza between the seniors was as animated and interesting as ours in the drawing-room. Ta-kah-to-kuh gave a glowing description of Arkansas, the Indian's home, and invited my father and his company to visit them whenever convenient. Mr. Miller gave a short sketch of the origin and history of the Cherokee Nation, so far as known, and also

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

241

of their religious tenets and traditions. All of this was duly reported to us, though 1 cannot now stop the progress of the story to give it record.

m.--

CHAPTER XXI.
VISIT TO THE CAVE -- ITS TWO ENTRANCES-- PAN THER WITHIN, AND WHAT WAS DONE -- PREPA RATIONS FOR ENTERING----THE ANTE-ROOM----GAL LERIES--"THE SYLVAN TEMPLE"--BAT CHAM BER-- SOMETHING ON FIRE -- UNPLEASANT PRE DICAMENT-- CHEERLESS RETREAT--EFFORTS TO HELP OURSELVES -- EMERGING AT LAST -- THE MILLERS AGAIN -- TO-KAH-TO-KUH, AND A PROS PECT -T- CONCLUSION.
'HE sun was more than two hours high when we left Mr. Miller's the next morning for the cave. The excite
ment of the party had kept us from sleep. A few miles' ride through a forest without under growth, except a carpet of grass and wild flowers, and,crossing a river whose clear waters spread over a pebbly bottom, brought us to our desti nation.
242

SAL-O-QUAH.

343

The cave was on the side of a high hill, or small mountain, in a wild and barren country. After securing our horses, and gathering a sup ply of rich pine for torches, we took our seats in the cool shade at the cave's mouth, resting our selves, and admiring its grand entrance, large enough to admit the sliding into it of a moderatesized church, and descending at an angle of about 45 degrees -- farther than our sight could reach.
While there seated, Scossit-equah went up the hill to examine another entrance, small and per pendicular, which he said we might have occa sion to use. After a short absence he came back, and reported that he had discovered on the pole let down the little entrance for the purpose of climbing, the prints'of a panther's claws, and that the panther was then in the cave. Cousin Aleck, who, like most of his countrymen, was by no means deficient in courage, but with whom if was a standing rule never to go needlessly into dangjer, looked uneasily at my father, and said, turning his eyes toward us:
" This fact will, of course, cause some altera-

244

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

tion in our plans. We must take with us the means of defence."
Seossity's impassive face gave tokens of in ternal merriment. He and Kaneeka had seemed elated with the intelligence.
" I tell you what do," said he, in Cherokee, when he saw that we all partook, more or less, of cousin Aleck's uneasiness. He then pro posed that he and Kaneeka should enter the cave and kill the panther, or else drive it through the small entrance, where we should kill it as it came out. This plan suited us ex actly, for, unused as we were to these rough denizens of the forest, we had no fancy for gain ing our first experience in panther-fighting by daring the fierce beast in its own dark den. Be fore entering the cave, Kaneeka planned for us our mode of warfare, and informed us how to guard against danger, as well as how to make our shots effective. The panther is a cowardly beast, he said, that will always run rather than fight; but, like all other cowards, it,will fight desperately when cornered.
Our guns, already loaded for deer, needed no

AMONG THE CHEROKKES.

24$

alteration in their charges. We took our sta tions around the small entrance, within half gun-shot, while the assailants, supplied with rifle, hunting - knife, torches, and lightwood, passed down the steep declivity, at the main entrance, and disappeared. We offered them the choice of our double-barreled shot-guns, as giving the command of two shots, instead of one; but Kaneeka answered :
" No : rifle never miss. If panther not kill, we can fight with knife."
For half an hour we had no tidings from them. Then it came to us- in a confused rumble, evidently that of the rifle, but whether of one or of both we could not determine; for, like the reverberation of thunder in the clouds,, the sound was so echoed and prolonged among the winding galleries of the cave as to make a con tinuous roll. After that we heard a faint halloo. We held our breath to listen as well as to look. The top of the pole began to be agitated. Then there came from it a grating sound, like deep and heavy scratching. Presently the panther appeared, with staring eyes and panting breath.

246

SAL-O-QUAH J OR, BOY-LIFE

It leaned feebly forward, and endeavored -tat'

crawl away. We could distinguish two wounds,

one in its forehead, the other in its shoulder,

both probably mortal. Our guns were levelled,

ready to fire, when my father called aloud:

" Hold! it may die without another shot. But

be ready all, until I give the word."

The sound of his voice instantly restored the

creature's strength, It looked fiercely around,

and, seeing itself enclosed in a circle of enemies,

sprang nimbly down the hill.

"let him have your rifle, Saloquah! Your

gun, Aleck! yours, Lorenzo! " were orders fol

lowing in quick succession, at the close of which

the panther fell. We hastened toward it.

" Not too close!" my father said, in a warn

ing voice; " the panther is a long-lived beast,

and will fight-when you think he is dead."

We stood at a safe distance, with ready guns,

watching its spasmed motions till all was still,

and by this time our friends from within had

joined us.

"Fat. Good meat. Only tough," said Scos-

sity, in Cherokee.

-^

" You are welcome to it all," we answered. " My gun tumbled him. I wonder if I might not have the skin," timidly suggested Lorenzo. " No doubt, by paying our red friends for their share of the peltry," answered my father. It was unanimously agreed that he should ;have it, and our red friends, instead of demand ing pay for the skin, offered.to take it off for .him, and help him cure it This little adventure occupied more than an hour of our' time, and brought us up so near the middle of the day that we agreed to take lunch before entering the cave. There was no water nearer than a mile, but our canteens had been filled at a spring we passed, and our kind friends, the young ladies, had added a quart or two of rich milk, put up in a neatly prepared skin; be sides which there was a bottle of wine, manu factured by the hands of Miss Ku-ma-ma the year before, from wild grapes gathered in the river bottom. Thus fortified, we prepared to enter " that big hole in the ground," as Scipio called it. Dividing among ourselves the splintered pine intended for

248

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

torches, we passed carefully down a steep de scent of about one hundred short paces, when we arrived at a level floor, dimly lighted from the entrance.
"Many Ingin dance on this floor. Scossit, too, in old times," said Kaneeka.
Pausing here until our eyes were accustomed to the twilight, we looked around. Dim, dusky walls, rough enough for a home of the Titans, were barely visible in the distance, while the far ther extremity gloomed into darkness, and the roof was wholly beyond sight.
This impressive first view occupied us pleas antly for some minutes, when our flint and steel were called into requisition. A bright spark buried itself in the amadou, or German tinder; a sulphur match t brought into contact wi^h it gave us a blue light, then a white one; and soon the soft twilight was exchanged for the red glare of half a dozen brilliant torches.
The increase of light, however, did not greatly increase our satisfaction. We could see only a little farther. The vaulted roof was yet beyond sight, but, for a stone-throw high, we could see

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249

great jagged rocks projecting from the walls, and among them a large dark hole, as if it were the entrance to a series of upper chambers.
That doorway, beyond reach, and a very humble one on the level of our floor, were the only passways from this grand ante-room, ex cept that through which we had entered. We bowed our heads to pass the little door, bade farewell for a time to the daylight, and, de pending upon our torches during the remainder of our exploration, plunged into the darkness beyond.
Our narrow passage soon expanded into an ample chamber, where we climbed a hill so high as to convince us that we were on a level with our first entrance from the open air; but we were now in the hollow heart of the mountain, with unmeasured masses of rock above us.
Not to speak of galleries to the right and to the left, and of openings under foot, leading to chambers below, I will say that we came at last to a large hall, where stalactites of every size and length hung like stony icicles from the ceil ing, and where many of them, meeting with

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
equally large stalagmites on the floor, formed themselves into grotesque shapesl sometimes of pillars and arches and colonnades; sometimes of an altar surrounded with the statues of nymphs in waiting^ sometimes of the trunks of trees, in the midst of which were elephants, and other clumsily-shaped beasts. This hall coasin Aleck named THE SYLVAN TEMPLE. Near this, nay, in the midst of that stony forest, we heard the tinkle of water. It dripped from the roof, forming concretions by deposit of its earthy matter, then went purling along the floor in a little rivulet that found its way, no doubt, to the river, a mile distant. Indeed, Kaneeka told us that the story was extant of an Indian who, having been bewildered in the cave, had finally emerged somewhere at the riverside, but that all knowledge of the passage that he followed, and of the place where he came out, was lost. He informed us, also, of the current belief of his people that the cave had never been half ex plored, but that its chambers and galleries prob ably extended for many miles.
We followed various windings, entered many

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.

chambers, and were beginning to feel weary,

when Kaneeka proposed, as a curiosity, to show

us the Bat Chamber. It was the favorite winter

resort, he said, of all the bats of the Cherokee

country -- at least so supposed, because, in the

winter-time, there were none to be found any

where else, and they were to be had here by the

wagon-load.

This apartment was very difficult of entrance,

requiring us to crawl on our hands and knees;

_

*

and I cannot say that our labor was rewarded,

for the room was low, dark, and dirty, and per-,

vaded with an odor that did not compare favor

ably with roses. Summer though it was, a few

dozen bats were to be seen clinging to the roof

by means of their tiny hind claws, with folded

wing and pendent head. They raised quite a

squeak and chatter as we entered, turned toward

us their ugly little heads, and watched us with

their shining, black eyes. In the winter-time

they hang close as they can pack, each serving

as bed and blanket to its neighbor; and, having

congregated here for generations, and many of

them dying of old age and disease, they have 4

252

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE

created, beneath their roosting-place, quite a hillock, how many feet deep I know not, of what may justly be termed bat guano. We did not remain here long; indeed, we were driven out by a dreadful necessity, to describe which re quires me to go back a little in my story.
At the mouth of the cave, before entering, my father had divided into three parcels his firemaking apparatus, consisting each of sulphur matches, tinder, and a flint, all wrapped together in a piece of paper; one of these parcels being intended for himself, another for cousin Aleck, and the third for Kaneeka, who was not at the moment present.
Now it might be supposed that, well provided as we were with torch-wood and the means of producing fire, there was no danger of our being left in the dark, and ordinarily there would not have been. But when people go into out-of-theway places and engage in out-of-the-way em ployments, it is well for them to be even more than triply guarded against danger.
My father's matches were carried in a little side-pocket, which, however safe in his ordinary

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253

posture, was so loose as to endanger their being lost when stooping. He there/ore frequently felt, to assure himself that they were in place. Just before entering the Bat Chamber, he dis covered that they were missing. This, however, gave him no uneasiness, for he knew that this was the last chamber to be visited, and that the matches had been divided, for safety, into three parcels, to be taken in charge by three different persons. Toward the close of our short stay in that hole, cousin Aleck, with one of the two torches, was stooping to examine a singular mass upon the floor, of what seemed to be a new species of fungus, very .spongy in structure and very dry. While he was bending over it in examination, a bat, disturbed from its place, struck Scipio in the face, who, with an "Eh! eh !" of fear, started, and stumbled over him with such force as to prostrate him upon the fungus mass with the, torch below him. He sprang to his feet, but not until his torch had been extin guished, and his linen coat set on fire. He made several attempts to brush out the fire, but, fearing that it would extend to his other cloth-

SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
ing, he slipped off his coat, threw it on the floor, and stamped upon it. Before succeeding, how ever, there was a slight whir-r! followed by the smell of burning sulphur.
" There go my matches in that pocket! " said he.
The flames were quenched, but the coat was a ruin, unfit for further service. We all spent a moment sympathizing with him in his misfor tune, as was natural and proper; but the delay came near being fatal, for whether from the diffusion of the sulphurous fumes, or from some other cause, every bat in the room seemed to become at the same moment frantic. They left their places on the wall, flew simultane ously at our only remaining light, and in a mo ment we were in darkness. Saloquah, who car ried the torch, gave it a long and rapid sweep through the air, by which means it was rekin dled, only to be as quickly extinguished. He gave it another wave, but the torch refused to blaze.
"Quick!" said he; "a match, before the sparks are dead."

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But the answer came from each of us in turn, "No match--none."
"What! Kaneeka/' exclaimed my father, " have you none? "
"None," he answered. "Did not bring matches."
^ Where is the parcel I laid for you at thecave's mouth ? " my father anxiously inquired.
" Never hear of it," Kaneeka answered. They had been laid aside for him, but, in the excitement abqut the panther, had been over looked. Here now was a predicament, direful indeed, with which to close our otherwise pleasant visit to the cave. A grunt from Scossit-equah, whose quick mind comprehended the danger of our position, was so expressive of concern as to bring from Lorenzo a scream of terror. It was plain that if we could not command a light, we should be compelled to the almost impossible task of groping our way through the darkness, or to the necessity of remaining there without food until some one came to relieve us. Before many words were interchanged, another

x$& SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
feature in the case was developed, which left us no choice but to move at once. Mixed with the smell of burning brimstone came the smell of something else. There was a smoke, and we could even perceive on the ground a red glare. The mass of dry fungus had taken fire -- for all spongy growth of the kind, puff-balls and all, partake more or less of the nature of tinder, is easily inflamed, and with difficulty extin guished. Now, this unexpected gift of fire in our circumstances might at first view be regarded as a God-send; but there was another fact in con nection which made us shudder. The burning tinder lay at the foot of a little hill of powdery material, thoroughly impregnated with saltpetre. We could not calculate how rapidly it might burn, and how soon it might stifle us. Our only safe course was to leave the chamber with out delay.
"Can you, can either of you, find the way out ? " my father, in anxious tones, inquired of Kaneeka and Scossit-equah.
" Don't know," they answered. " Will try." By Kaneeka's direction we formed ourselves

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257

into single file, each taking hold of the person ahead of him.
"Scossity lead. I come last," said Kaneeka. The narrow entrance was soon found by groping, and we returned through it, as we came, on our hands and knees. In passing the mass of burning fungus, Scossity scraped up a hand ful, wrapped it hi the skirt of his deerskin coat, and kept it burning as we moved. Immediately after emerging into a more spa cious gallery, our Indian guides stopped and at tempted to rekindle the torches. Preparing a handful of fine shavings from the light-wood, by means of a knife, the tindery fungus was enclosed in it, and held between the two hands, while it was swung by a long waving motion through the air. It rapidly brightened, and there was a shout of joy as the finely divided shavings burst into a flame. " Quick, now! some splinters to light." Alas! before this could be done, our horrid little tormentors, driven, as we had been, from the smoking room, and more frantic now than ever, poured themselves upon our feeble flame,
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SAL-O-QUAH; OR, BOY-LIFE
and a second time left us in darkness. My father gave a groan of anguish, for he, next to our In dian friends, appreciated the perilousness of our position. Their only utterance was a grunt.
Scossit-equah put together once more the smoking tinder and shavings, and waved them to and fro, as before, having his deerskin hunt ing-shirt ready to protect the light against the bats. The combustibles brightened a little, enough to give hope, but no more; the tindery part had been mostly consumed in the first effort.
Now, what was. to be done ? Scossity and Kaneeka said they could pilot us part of the way out, because, in the momentary flash of light, they had recognized enough of the surroundings to know in what direction to set their faces; but only a part of the way, because the passages were very winding, and the cave's mouth was a full quarter of a mile distant. It was decided that we should go so far as seemed safe; then stop, if necessary, and there, out-of the reach of our tormentors, as we might hope to be, try to re-kindle our torches.

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We moved, as before, in single file, Scossity in the lead, pausing every little while to search, right and left, in the intense darkness, for the walls, from which he was recalled to his posi tion by the sound of our voices. Of course our progress was almost at'snail's pace. At last we reached a spot where both our guides confessed themselves at fault; and there we stopped to de vise some means for reproducing light. We had knives, which might be used as steels for strik ing fire, and I had in my pocket a little primingflask of gunpowder, from which we could manu facture out of our clothing something inflamma ble as tinder. But our flints were lost, and all the rocks and stones of the cave were limestone, too soft to produce a spark.
Under these circumstances, Scossit-equah at tempted to produce fire by the friction of two pieces of our torchwood, saying beforehand that he did not expect to succeed, because the pine was gummy, and because, in the two woods to be used, one should be hard and the other com paratively soft. He selected a piece of pine, soft and free as possible from resin, flattened it, and

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SAL-0-Q0AHJ OR, BOY-LIFE

cut a groove with his knife; then selecting another piece, the hardest he could find, he sharpened one end so as to enter the groove, and then rubbed it rapidly back and forth. The wood was thus made very hot; but, after trying for half an hour, he gave it up, saying :
" Must try something else." Cousin Aleck next proposed friction with a string; and as no one could start a piece of twine, or anything answering to it, he manufac tured a short strong cord from narrow strips of a linen handkerchief twisted hard together. The friction-stick he made from a piece of pine trimmed down to the thickness of one's little finger, wrapped it with a turn of the string, which he made fast at one end and drew tightly at the other; then drew the stick rapidly back and forth. Not many minutes elapsed before a spark appeared, playing along the frayed and heated fibres of the cord, and then went out This degree of success encouraged him to try again, with the addition now of a little gun powder rubbed into the string, to ; give it the character of tinder. No doubt he would have

succeeded but for the breaking of the string, worn by much rubbing; and before a new string could be twisted, another experiment was tried.
Lorenzo recollected that in an unused and forgotten pocket he had put a small fragment of stone picked up a few days before. It was very small, not much larger than his thumb-nail, but exceedingly hard, being a combination of jasper and chalcedony, and on being tried with a knife, gave out a beautiful shower of sparks. A hand kerchief, with some bruised gunpowder twisted into one of its folds, was spread and sprinkled with powder, over which the shower of sparks was renewed. There was a sudden flash. The gunpowder in the fold of the handkerchief burned with sufficient heat to set on fire the enclosing linen, which was then waved into a flame, and our torches once more illumined the darkness.
I need not say that we remained in the cave ao longer than was necessary to get comfortably out of it--even Scipio had enough of "that big hole in the ground." When we reached the open air, we found the shades of evening gath-

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ered thick around. Our starving horses neighed impatiently to leave that hungry place. Mr. Miller's, where we had engaged lodgings for the riight, was more than an hour's ride distant, with a broad river to ford. The panther, too, was to be cared for, or rather its skin, for.that had not yet been removed from the body.
But with all these inducements to immediate and vigorous action, we cast ourselves with one consent upon the earth, and panted from sheer exhaustion. Cousin Aleck learnedly informed us that this disagreeable sensation was the ef fect, not so much of excitement and effort, as it was of breathing the air of the cave, where the absorption of the nitrogen in forming those im mense beds of saltpetre had'left the air charged .with an excess of oxygen, by which we had been exhilarated and made to live too fast, and ex changing which for the ordinary air outside had caused us to feel as wine-drinkers do after the stimulus of their wine is over. We eagerly de voured the remains of our midday luncheon, and felt the benefit of that bottle of wine which Miss Ku-ma-ma, who gave it, had advised us to

AMONG THE CHEROKEES.
reserve until we came out of the cave. It was fully a half-hour before we could muster energy enough to attempt anything.
Kaneeka's unfortunate parcel of matches was recovered at the very spot where it had been placed that morning. The carcass of the panther was slung across the crupper of Old Gray, who resisted long and resolutely having anything to do with so ugly a beast, but who, after much coaxing and gentling, at last reluctantly con sented. We mounted our horses, and pushed with all speed for our lodging-place, where we arived just as the family, uneasy on our account, and sitting up later than usual, were about to withdraw for the night. The supper prepared in expectation of our coming was spread before us, and though cold in temperature, was warmed by an earnest appetite and hearty acceptance, and was made still more relishable by the so ciety of the young ladies, who followed us from the piazza to hear the end of our story. Miss Ku-ma-ma's expressive eyes shot fire at the story of the panther, and softened with sympa thy at hearing of our trials in the darkness.

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Mr. Miller) who said he had made up his mind

to go to our rescue if we did not come before

morning, informed us of a party of Indians who,

meeting with a similar misfortune a few years

before, had remained in the cave three days,

and, when discovered by their friends, were sit

ting with their backs against the wall and their

heads between their knees, waiting for death.

My father's purpose in this excursion to

Etowah being one of business as well as of

pleasure, he tarried a day to confer with Mr.

Miller, and to look at certain lands, limestones,.

and marbles in the neighborhood, of which he

desired to obtain a more definite knowledge.

This delay brought us once more into contact

with Ta-kah-to-kuh, who gave us another press

ing invitation to visit his people in the West,

informing us, to our surprise, that not only did

he expect to leave for Arkansas in the course

of a few weeks, but that, so far as he could see,

Kaneeka would have to go with him. The re

sult of this casual interview cannot now be

recorded -- it would require another volume to

do so.

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Suffice it to say that the next day, Friday, the fifth day of July, we set out for Kaneeka's; and that a few days afterward, my father, having made satisfactory arrangements for us during the summer and early autumn, returned to his own home.