HE BEGAN HIS MYSTIC DANCES 204

"HELD BY UNSEEN HANDS BUT SINKING" 222

"AND EACH FIGURE HAD A MEANING" 236

"HURLED THE PINE CONES DOWN UPON HIM" 278

"WESTWARD, WESTWARD HIAWATHA
SAILED INTO THE FIERY SUNSET" 310

THE STORY OF HIAWATHA

I

THE PEACE-PIPE

LONG ago, when our cities were pleasant woodlands and the white man was
far beyond the seas, the great Manito, God of all the Indians, descended
to the earth. From the red crags of the Great Red Pipestone Quarry he
gazed upon the country that he ruled, and a silver river gushed from his
footprints and turned to gold as it met the morning sun. The Great
Manito stooped to gather some of the red stone of the quarry, and molded
it with giant fingers into a mighty pipe-bowl; he plucked a reed from
the river bank for a pipe-stem, filled the pipe with the bark of the
willow, breathed upon the forest until the great boughs chafed together
into flame, and there alone upon the mountains he smoked the pipe of
peace. The smoke rose high and slowly in the air. Far above the tops of
the tallest pine-trees it rose in a thin blue line, so that all the
nations might see and hasten at the summons of the Great Manito; and the
smoke as it rose grew thicker and purer and whiter, rolling and
unfolding in the air until it glistened like a great white fleecy cloud
that touched the top of heaven. The Indians saw it from the Valley of
Wyoming, and from Tuscaloosa and the far-off Rocky Mountains, and their
prophets said: "Come and obey the summons of the Great Manito, who calls
the tribes of men to council!"

Over the prairies, down the rivers, through the forests, from north and
south and east and west, the red men hastened to approach the
smoke-cloud. There were Delawares and Dacotahs and Choctaws and
Comanches and Pawnees and Blackfeet and Shoshonies,--all the tribes of
Indians in the world, and one and all they gathered at the Pipestone
Quarry, where the Great Manito stood and waited for them. And the Great
Manito saw that they glared at one another angrily, and he stretched his
right hand over them and said:

"My children, I have given you a happy land, where you may fish and
hunt. I have filled the rivers with the trout and sturgeon. There are
wild fowl in the lakes and marshes; there are bears in the forest and
bison on the prairie. Now listen to my warning, for I am weary of your
e