The massacre by
the white men follows, and Red Cloud, dying,
recognizes the white men as brother acorn-planters,
the possessors of the superior life-formula
of which he had always been a protagonist.

In the Epilogue, or Apotheosis, occur the
celebration of the death of war and the triumph
of the acorn-planters.

PROLOGUE

Time. _In the morning of the world._

Scene. _A forest hillside where great trees stand with wide
spaces between. A stream flows from a spring that bursts
out of the hillside. It is a place of lush ferns and brakes,
also, of thickets of such shrubs as inhabit a redwood forest
floor. At the left, in the open level space at the foot of the
hillside, extending out of sight among the trees, is visible a
portion of a Nishinam Indian camp. It is a temporary
camp for the night. Small cooking fires smoulder. Standing
about are withe-woven baskets for the carrying of supplies
and dunnage. Spears and bows and quivers of arrows lie
about. Boys drag in dry branches for firewood. Young
women fill gourds with water from the stream and proceed
about their camp tasks. A number of older women are
pounding acorns in stone mortars with stone pestles. An
old man and a Shaman, or priest, look expectantly up the
hillside. All wear moccasins and are skin-clad, primitive,
in their garmenting. Neither iron nor woven cloth occurs
in the weapons and gear._

{Shaman}
_(Looking up hillside.)_
Red Cloud is late.

{Old Man}
_(After inspection of hillside.)_
He has chased the deer far. He is patient.
In the chase he is patient like an old man.

{Shaman}
His feet are as fleet as the deer's.

{Old Man}
_(Nodding.)_
And he is more patient than the deer.

{Shaman}
_(Assertively, as if inculcating a lesson.)_
He is a mighty chief.

{Old Man}
_(Nodding.)_
His father was a mighty chief. He is like to
his father.

{Shaman}
_(More assertively.)_
He is his father. It is so spoken. He is
his father's father. He is the first man, the
first Red Cloud, ever born, and born again, to
chiefship of his people.

{Old Man}
It is so spoken.

{Shaman}
His father was the Coyote. His mother was
the Moon. And he was the first man.

{O