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The ridge was miles long and free to any one who chose to work it, but most people preferred to buy the finished points and blades. There was a good trade, too, in turtle-backs." The Tallega poked about in the loose earth at the top of the mound and brought up a round, flattish flint about the size of a man's hand, that showed disk-shaped flakings arranged like the marking of a turtle-shell.
That was a Mingo," he pointed to the Iroquois who had called himself an Onondaga, disappearing down the forest tunnel. They saw him a moment, with arrow laid to bow, the sunlight making tawny splotches on his dark body, as on the trunk of a pine tree, and then they lost him. "We were planters and builders," said the Tallega, "and they were fighters, so they took our lands from us.
'If I were a Lenape, said I, 'and thought that the Councils of the Tallegewi threatened my people, I would know what those Councils were if I made myself a worm in the roof-tree to overhear it. "'Aye, he said, 'but you are only a Tallega. "He was like that with us, proud and humble by turns.
"They might think that," agreed the Tallega, "if all they know comes from what they find by digging. They were for every purpose that buildings are used for, but we always thought it a good omen if we could start a Town Mound with the bones of some one we had loved and respected.
Out of his pouch the Tallega drew the eagle-shaped ceremonial pipe of red pipestone, and when he had fitted it to the feathered stem, blew a salutatory whiff of smoke to the Great Spirit. "Thus we did, and later in the Council House there were ceremonies and exchange of messages. It was there, when all seemed finished, that I saw the arrow play and heard the question.
"The middle one of Three Towns was walled, a circling wall of earth half man high, and on top of that, a stockade of planted posts and wattles. It was the custom in war-times to bring the women and the corn into the walled towns from the open villages. But there had been peace so long in Tallega that our stockade was in great need of rebuilding, and so were the corn bins.
Ongyatasse was hurried off with a hunting-party to Maumee, and I was sent to my mother's brother at Flint Ridge to learn stone-working. "Not that I objected," said the Tallega. "I have the arrow-maker's hand." He showed the children his thumb set close to the wrist, the long fingers and the deep-cupped palm with the callus running down the middle.
But at daylight the gatherers of the dead saw something moving from under the mist that hid the opposite bank of the river. We waited, arrow on bowstring, not knowing if it were one of our own coming back to us or a Lenape asking for parley. But as it drew near we saw it was a cropped head, and he towed a dead Tallega by the hair.
"I suppose I must remember it like this," said the Tallega, "because this is the way I saw it when I came back, an old man, after the fall of Cahokia. But when this mound was built there were towns here, busy and crowded. The forest came close up on one side, and along the lake front, field touched field for a day's journey. My town was the middle one of three of the Eagle Clan.
A Pipe-Bearer's life was always safe where he was recognized, though when there is war one is very likely to let fly an arrow at anything moving in the trails. That reminds me..." The Tallega put back his feathered robe carefully as he leaned upon his elbow, and the children snuggled into a little depression at the top of the mound where the fire-hole had been, to listen.
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