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Updated: May 20, 2025
Father De Smet looked up. There, standing right in front of them in the tow-path, was a German soldier! "Halt!" shouted the soldier. But Netteke was now just as much bent upon going as she had been before upon standing still. She paid no attention whatever to the command, but walked stolidly along the tow-path directly toward the soldier. "Halt!" cried the soldier again.
Mother De Smet leaned over the boatrail and spoke to the two men who were standing on the dock. "You'd better believe we'll not give up," she said. "We don't know the meaning of the word." "Well," said the merchant sadly, "maybe you don't, but there are others who do. It takes a stout heart to have faith that God hasn't forgotten Belgium these days."
Father De Smet was now obliged to confront the problem of what to do with his own family, for, since Antwerp was now in the hands of the enemy, he could no longer earn his living in the old way.
Fancy Æschylus working up that story with the Furies for a chorus and Nemesis appearing at intervals to nerve the old hero! And Rose the Renegade, who became the chief of a powerful tribe of Indians! And Father de Smet, one of the noblest figures in history, carrying the gospel into the wilderness! And Le Barge, the famous pilot, whose biography reads like a romance!
In some of those we had gone at a very good clip, and several times we had lost our rudder. I remembered how the steamboats used to be obliged to throw out cables and slowly wind themselves up with the power of the "steam nigger." I also remembered the words of Father de Smet: "There are many rapids, ten of which are very difficult to ascend and very dangerous to go down."
But Netteke had done her balking for the day, and, having been refreshed by her luncheon of green grass, she was ready to move on. The river had now quite a current, which helped them, and while the soldiers were still having their joke with Father De Smet the boat moved quietly out of sight.
"Son," he said sternly, "don't ever let me hear you say such a thing again. There are spiders, and rats, and balky mules, and Germans, and it doesn't do a bit of good to waste words fussing because they are here. The thing to do is to deal with them!" Father De Smet was so much in earnest that he boomed these words out in quite a loud voice. Joseph seized his hand. "Hush!" he whispered.
Pierre, meantime, amused himself by filling up the chinks in the logs with fresh mud, a commodity of which there was no lack, and others of the neighbors, incited by these extraordinary efforts, washed the dirt from seats, floor, and windows, and brought furs with which to make presentable the floor about the pulpit. Father de Smet worked harder than any of them.
Angus McDonald and his Indian Family. Canadian Voyageurs. Father Joseph. Hardships of the Early Missionaries. The Coeurs d'Alêne and their Superstitions. The Catholic Ladder. Sisters of Notre Dame. Skill of the Missionaries in instructing the Indians. Father de Smet and the Blackfeet. A Native Dance. Spokanes. Exclusiveness of the Coeurs d'Alêne. Battle of Four Lakes.
They were more susceptible to civilization and improvement than most of the other Indians. Father De Smet was enthusiastic in his enjoyment of the forests and the mountains; speaking often of the "skyward palaces and holy towers" among the hills, "the immortal pine," the "rock-hung flower," the "fantastic grace of the winding rivers."
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