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Buckskin, both white and buff, bears' claws in strings, bundles of medicinal herbs, sweet-grass baskets fragrant as an Eastern tale, birch-bark boxes embroidered with stained quills of the porcupines, bows of hickory and arrows of maple, queer half-boots of stiff sealskin from the very shores of the Hudson Bay, belts of beadwork, yellow and green, for the Corn Dance, even a costume or so of buckskin complete for ceremonial all these the fortunate child would find were he to take the rainy-day privilege in this, the most wonderful attic in all the world.
There is no produce of the coast which has not been used to express gratitude, and 'to help the hospital along. Codfish is a common fee. Sealskins, venison, wild ducks, beadwork, embroidered skinwork, feathers, firewood nothing is too bizarre to offer." "Do they never pay money?" "Yes, sometimes. Of late years, a little more each year.
I then gave Nnanaji, who had been constantly throwing out hints that I ought to give him a gun as he was a great sportsman, a lappet of beadwork to keep his tongue quiet, and he in return sent me a bullock and sundry pots of pombe, which, in addition to the daily allowance sent by Rumanika, made all my people drunk, and so affected Baraka that one of the women also drunk having given him some sharp abuse, he beat her in so violent a manner that the whole drunken camp set upon him, and turned the place into a pandemonium.
As for Wonota, she said: "I used to sit beside my grandmother and work like this. Yes, Chief Totantora taught me to shoot and paddle a canoe, and to do many other things out-of-doors. But my grandmother was the head woman of our tribe, and her beadwork and dyed porcupine-quill work was the finest you ever saw, Ruth Fielding. I was sorry to leave my war-bag with Dakota Joe.
They had the right to trade beadwork or another dollar for it any time they liked. Our subscription list looked like a Sioux directory with such names as Julia Lame Walking Eagle, Maggie Shoots at Head, Afraid of His Horses, Paul Owns the Fire, and his son, Owns the Fire. Our daily visitors were the rank and file of the tribe, although famous old warriors and medicine men came now and then.
The teaching took place in the big living-room of the ranch house, a room with a great stone fireplace, the stone for which had been carted down from the mountains; with walls decorated with Indian trophies tomahawks, bows and arrows, stone pipes and hatchets, knives and with beadwork, snowshoes, and many other interesting things.
"Jeff Tuttle, you dashed old long-horn!" exclaimed Cousin Egbert. "Good old Sour-dough!" exploded the other. "Ain't this just like old home week!" "I thought mebbe you wouldn't know me with all my beadwork and my new war-bonnet on," continued Cousin Egbert. "Know you, why, you knock-kneed old Siwash, I could pick out your hide in a tanyard!" "Well, well, well!" replied Cousin Egbert.
However, thus far he thinks only sixteen of my wounds are fatal. I don't mind the others. Upon regaining my right mind, I said: "It is an awful savage tribe of Indians that do the beadwork and moccasins for Niagara Falls, doctor. Where are they from?" "Limerick, my son." "MORAL STATISTICIAN." I don't want any of your statistics; I took your whole batch and lit my pipe with it.
Presently came our rifleman, Jack Mount, bearing our saddle-bags; and we stripped and washed us clean, and put on fresh linen and our best uniforms of soft doeskin, which differed from the others only in that they were clean and new, and that the thrums were gayer and the Iroquois beadwork more flamboyant. "If I but had my hair in a snug club, and well powdered," sighed Boyd, lacing his shirt.
And now the far stretch of the years loomed up: boys again, trapping foxes, learning to shoot the arrow which finally found its mark in the buffalo calf; capturing and taming the wild horse; the first war party; the first scalp, and its consequent honour among the tribe; the first coup counted; the eagle that was shot to get the coveted feather that to all men should be a pledge of victory; then the love for an Indian maiden, the ponies and furs and beadwork willingly given in exchange for this new love; the making of a new home.
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