The Memories of Fifty Years Part 17

The little city of Natchez is built upon a bluff some three hundred feet in elevation above the Mississippi River, and immediately upon its brink. It receives its name from a tribe of Indians once resident in the country; and who were much further advanced in civilization than their more warlike neighbors, the Choctaws and the Chickasaws. The country around is hilly and beautiful, fertile and salubrious. The population was intelligent and refined, and was remarkable for having more wealth than any community outside of a large city, in the United States, of the same amount of population. The town of Natchez (for, properly speaking, it is no more) consists of some three or four thousand inhabitants, and has not increased to any considerable extent, for many years.

Beyond the river, in Louisiana, is an alluvial plain extending for fifty miles, through which meander many small streams, or bayous, as they are termed in the language of the country. Upon most of these the surface of the soil is slightly elevated above the plane of the swamp, and is remarkably fertile. Most of these were, at the commencement of the late war, in a high state of cultivation as cotton plantations. As in many other places, the river here has changed its bed by cutting off a large bend immediately opposite the town, creating what is known as Lake Concordia. This lake was formerly the bed of the river, and describes almost a complete circle of some twelve miles in diameter. On both sides of this lake beautiful plantations, with splendid improvements, presented a view from the bluff at Natchez extremely picturesque when covered with luxuriant crops of corn and cotton. The fertility of the soil is such that these crops are immensely heavy; and when the cotton-plant has matured its fruit, and the pent-up lint in the large conical b.a.l.l.s has burst them open, exposing their white treasure swelling out to meet the sun's warm rays, and the parent stock to the first frost of autumn has thrown off her foliage, and all these broad fields are one sheet of lovely white, as far as the eye can view--the scene is lovely beyond description; and when the same rich scene was presented extending along the banks of the great river, with the magnificent steamers resting at the wharf below, and others cleaving the current in proud defiance of the mighty volume of hurrying waters--the splendor and magnificence of the whole sublimated the feelings as we viewed it in wonder.

The river, the bluff, and the lake are there; but waste and desolation frown on these, and the fat earth's rich fruits are yielded no more.

Fanaticism's hot breath has breathed upon it, and war's red hand (her legitimate offspring) has stricken down the laborer; tillage has ceased, and gaunt poverty and hungry want only are left in her train.

When the great La Salle moored his little fleet at the foot of this bluff, ascended to its summit, and looked over this then forest-clad plain, did he contemplate the coming future of this beautiful discovery of his genius and enterprise? When he looked upon the blue smoke curling above the tall tree-tops along the lake, in the far distance, as it ascended from the wigwams of the Natchez, the wild denizens of this interminable forest, did his prophetic eye perceive these lovely fields, happy homes, and prosperous people, who came after him to make an Eden of this chosen spot of all the earth? and did it stretch on to contemplate the ruin and desolation which overspreads it now? How blest is man that he sees not beyond to-day!

Here he first met the Natchez, and viewed with wonder the flat heads and soft, gazelle eyes of this strange people. They welcomed his coming, and tendered him and his people a home. From them he learned the extent of the great river below, and that it was lost in the great water that was without limit and had no end. These Indians, according to their traditions, had once inhabited, as a mighty nation, the country extending from near the city of Mexico to the Rio Grande, and were subjects of the Aztec empire of Mexico. They had been persecuted and oppressed, and determined, in grand council, to abandon the country and seek a home beyond the Mizezibbee, or Parent-of-many-waters, which the word signifies.

Their exodus commenced in a body. They were many days in a.s.sembling upon the east bank of the Rio Grande; and thence commenced their long march. They abandoned their homes and the graves of their ancestors for a new one in the lovely region they found on the hills extending from the mouth of the Yazoo to Baton Rouge. Their princ.i.p.al town and seat of empire was located eleven miles below Natchez, on the banks of Second Creek, two miles from the Mississippi River. It is a delightful spot of high table-land, with a small strip of level low-land immediately upon the margin of the dimpling little stream of sweet water. Upon this flat they erected the great mound for their temple of the Sun, and the depository of the holy fire, so sacred in their wors.h.i.+p. At each point of the compa.s.s they erected smaller mounds for the residences of their chief, or child of the Sun, and his ministers of state. In the great temple upon the princ.i.p.al mound they deposited the fire of holiness, which they had borne unextinguished from the deserted temple in Mexico, and began to build their village. Parties went forth to establish other villages, and before a great while they were located in happy homes in a land of abundance. They formed treaties of amity with their powerful but peaceable neighbors, the Choctaws, and ere long with the Chickasaws and other minor tribes, east, and below them, on the river, the Tunicas, Houmas, and others; for the country abounded with little bands, insignificant and powerless.

These Indians revered, as more than mortal, their great chief, whom they called the child of the Sun. They had a tradition that when they were a great nation, in Mexico, they were divided into parties by feuds among their chiefs, and all their power to resist the aggressions of their enemies was lost; consequently they had fallen under the power of the Aztecs, who dominated them, and destroyed many of their people.

Upon one occasion, when a common enemy and a common suffering had made them forget their quarrels, they were a.s.sembled for council. Suddenly there appeared in their midst a white man and woman, surrounded with a halo of light coming directly from the sun. They were all silent with awe when this man spoke, and with such authority as to make every chief tremble with fear. They bowed to him with reverence, and he professing to be weary with his long journey, they conducted him with his wife to a lodge, and bade them repose and be rested. The chiefs, in the darkness of the night and in silence, a.s.sembled, while the celestial pair slept, conscious of security. After long and close council, they determined to proffer the supreme authority of the nation to this man, sent to them by the sun. When this determination had been reached, the chiefs, in a body, repaired to the house occupied by their mysterious visitors and, arousing them from sleep, they formally tendered to the man the crown and supreme authority over the chiefs, all their villages, and all their people. At first he refused, a.s.serting that he knew their hearts; they carried hatred of one another, and that they would come to hate him; then they would disobey him, and this would be death to all the Natchez. Finally yielding to the importunities and earnestly repeated protestations of a determination to obey him and follow his counsels implicitly, he agreed to accept the crown upon certain conditions. These were: first and paramount, that the Natchez should abandon their homes and country, and follow him to a new home which he would show them; and that they should live and conform strictly to the laws he would establish. The princ.i.p.al of these were: the sovereign of Natchez should always and forever be of his race, and that if he had sons and daughters, they should not be permitted to intermarry with each other, but only with the people of the Natchez.

The first-born of his sons should be his successor, and then the son of his eldest daughter, and should he have no daughter, then the son of his eldest sister, or in default of such an heir, then the eldest son of the nearest female relative of the sovereign, and so in perpetuity.

So soon as he was inaugurated chief and supreme ruler, he went out in the midst of the a.s.sembled mult.i.tude and called down in their presence fire from the sun; blessed it and made it holy. He created a guard of eight men, made them priests and gave them charge of the fire, and bid them, under pain of death, to preserve and keep alive this holy fire.

They must tend it day and night and feed it with walnut wood, and in their charge it went before the moving host to where he had promised they should find a new and better home than the one they were leaving.

Another tradition says, they were aiders of the Spaniards in the conquest of Mexico, and that these became as great persecutors of their people as the Aztecs. But from many of their traditions connected with their new home which extended back far beyond the conquest of Mexico, it is thought by historians that this tradition alludes to some other war in which they took part against their oppressors. They were remarkable for their size and symmetry of form of their men; but like all the race, they made slaves of their women, imposing every burden from the cultivation of their fields to the duties of the household--the carrying of heavy burdens and the securing of fuel for winter. These labors served to disfigure and make their women to appear prematurely aged and worn, and they seemed an inferior race when compared with the men.

The laws imposed by their chief of the sun were strictly obeyed. They compelled the telling of truth on all occasions; never to kill, but in self-defence; never to steal, and to preserve inviolate the marriage-vow. The marriage ceremony was poetic and impressive. No girl ever dreamed of disobeying her parents in the choice of a husband; nor was elopement ever heard of among them; nor did the young man presume to thrust himself upon a family to whom, or to any member of whom, he was not acceptable. But when the marriage was agreeable to the families of both parties and was consequently determined upon, the head of the family of the bride went with her and her whole family to the house of the bridegroom, who there stood with all his family around him, when the old man of the bridegroom's family welcomed them, by asking: "Is it thou?" "Yes," answered the other ancient. "Sit down," continued the other. Immediately all were seated, and a profound silence for many minutes ensued. Then the eldest man of the party bid the groom and bride to stand up, when he addressed them in a speech in which he recapitulated all the duties of man and wife; informed them of the obligations they were a.s.suming, and then concluded with a lecture of advice as to their future lives.

When this ceremony was concluded, the father of the bridegroom handed to his son the present he was to make to the family of the bride. Then the father of bride stepped up to the side of his daughter, when the groom said to the bride: "Wilt thou have me for thy husband?" The bride answered: "With all my heart; love me as I will love thee; for thou art my only love for all my life." Then holding the gift above her head, the groom said: "I love thee; therefore I take thee for my wife, and this is the present with which I buy thee," and then he handed the present to her parents. Upon his head he wore a tuft of feathers, and in his hand a bow, emblematic of authority and protection. The bride held in one hand a green twig of the laurel-tree, and in the other an ear of corn--the twig indicated she would preserve her fame ever fair and sweet as the laurel leaf; the corn was to represent her capacity to grow it and prepare it for his food, and to fulfil all the duties of a faithful wife. These ceremonies completed, the bride dropped the ear of corn which she held in her right hand, and tendered that hand to the bridegroom, who took it and said: "I am thy husband." She replied: "I am thy wife." The bridegroom then went round and gave his hand to every member of the family of his wife. He then took his bride by the arm and led her around and she took the right hand of all the family of the bridegroom. This done, he walked with her to his bed, and said: "This is our bed, keep it undefiled."

There obtained among these primitive beings a most curious and most disgusting custom. The young marriageable females were permitted to prost.i.tute themselves for gain, in order to provide a marriage portion; and she who could thus enrich herself was the most distinguished and the most sought. But after marriage, she was compelled to purity, both by their laws and by public sentiment; and in all the intercourse of the French with them, no instance of infidelity was ever known in a wife.

The great sun was indeed their Lycurgus. If before his advent among them they had any laws, these had become obsolete, and his edicts adopted universally. Their traditions represent him as living to extreme old age, seeing his descendants of the fourth generation. These were all little suns, and const.i.tuted the n.o.bility of their nation, which extended at one time to the country above, as far as St. Louis and across to the Wabash. These traditions were carefully kept. Every two years there were selected from the most intelligent boys of the nation ten, to whom these traditions were carefully taught by the depositories of them who had kept them best for the greatest time. They were careful to exact that no word or fact should be withheld, and this lesson was daily taught until the boy was a man, and every legend a familiar memory. These he was compelled to repeat daily lest the memory should rust, and for this purpose they went forth to all the villages repeating all of these legends to all the people.

There were others selected in like manner to whom the laws were taught as the traditions, and in like manner these were taught the people. In every community there was a little sun to administer these laws, and every complaint was submitted to him, and great ceremony was observed at every trial, especially criminal trials. The judge, or little sun, purified himself in the forest, imploring the enlightenment of the Good Spirit, and purging away the influence of bad spirits by his purification; and when he felt himself a fitted tabernacle of pure justice, he came forward and rendered his judgment in the presence of all the villagers of his jurisdiction, whose attention was compulsory.

It was one of the laws established in the beginning of the reign of the Great Sun, that his posterity should not marry _inter se_, but only with the common people of the nation. This custom was expelling the pure blood of royalty more and more every generation, and long after the arrival of the Natchez upon the Mississippi, the great and little suns were apparently of the pure blood of the red man. Their traditions, however, preserved the history of every cross, and when Lasalle found these at Natchez and the White Apple village, nearly every one could boast of relations.h.i.+p to the Great Sun. At that time they had diminished to an insignificant power, and were overawed by their more numerous and more powerful neighbors, the Choctaws and Muscagees or Alabamas. Their legends recorded this constant decline, but a.s.signed no reason for it. They could now not bring more than two thousand warriors into the field. Gayarie says not more than six hundred; but those contemporaneous with planting the colony of Orleans say, some two thousand, some more, and some estimate them as low as the number stated in that admirable history of Louisiana whose author is so uniformly correct. And here let me acknowledge my obligations to that accomplished historian, and no less accomplished gentleman, for most of the facts here stated, and if I have used his own language in portraying them to a great extent, it was because it was so pure and beautiful I could not resist it, the excuse the Brazilian gave for stealing the diamond.

With regard to these people, their mode of life was that of most of the other tribes. They lived princ.i.p.ally by the chase; their only cultivation was the Indian corn, pumpkins, and a species of wild beans or peas, perfectly black, until their intercourse with the French, and then they only added a few of the coa.r.s.er vegetables. From whom they derived the pumpkin is not known.

Their wars were not more frequent or more destructive than those of their neighbors; and their general habits were the same. Still they were going on to decay, and they contemplated with stolid calmness their coming extinction. They felt it a destiny not to be averted or avoided by anything they could do, and were content with the excuse of folly for all its errors and sins. _It is the will of G.o.d, or the Great Spirit, as the Indian phrases it._ They were more enlightened than their neighbors, as historians have stated, because, I suppose, they were more superst.i.tious. They bowed to fate, the attribute of superst.i.tion everywhere, and made no effort at relief from the causes of decay.

Their religion, like all the aborigines of the continent, consisted in the wors.h.i.+p of the Great Spirit typified in the sun, to whom was addressed their prayers and all their devotion. The sacred fire was the emblem on earth; their Great Sun had brought it from the sun and given it as holy to them to be forever preserved and propitiated by watching and prayer. In every village and settlement they erected mounds upon which the temple of the sun was built, and where was deposited the sacred fire. Mounds, too, were built for burying-places, and in these are now to be found in great abundance the flat heads and other bones of this remarkable people.

They had a tradition that an evil spirit was always tempting them to violate the laws, and the regulations of their religious belief. That at one time he had so nearly extinguished the holy fire in their temples, and the love of the sun in their hearts, that the Great Spirit came and fought with them against him, until finally he was conquered and chained in a deep cave, whence he still continued to send out little devils to tempt and torment their people. It was these who brought disease and death; these who tempted to lie, steal, and kill; disobedience in their wives when they refused to perform their duties or became bellicose, as wives sometimes will, of every people on earth.

It was a trite saying, shut up the cave in your heart and smother or put out the bad spirit. It was a belief that these imps or little devils found much more easy access to the caves in the hearts of women than into those of men, and that they encouraged them to come and nestle there. Is the belief alone the Indian's? There are some within my knowledge whose experience at home might readily yield belief to this faith of the savage.

Their traditions, too, told them of the great waters coming over all the land, and destroying all the inhabitants except those who had boats; and that the latter were carried away by the waters and left by them on all the land that was permitted again to come above the waters; and that by that means people were planted everywhere. These traditions are quite as rational as most of the speculations as to how the earth was populated, especially that which we learn in the cradle, of Adam and Eve's mission.

It was death, by their law, to permit the holy fire to become extinguished in the temples. To prevent such a calamity, it was preserved in two temples at different points; when accidentally extinguished in one, it was to be obtained from the other; but not peacefully. The keepers must resist and blood must be spilt in order to obtain it. Soon after they became acquainted with the French, the fire was extinguished in the great temple at the White Apple village by the lazy watcher. Knowing his fate, he stealthily lighted it from profane fire. Great misfortunes following this, and shortly thereafter the loss of the holy fire in the other temple near the Grindstone ford, on the Bayou Pierre, in Claiborne County, Mississippi, they sought after the legal and holy manner to procure fire from the White Apple village. Yet the calamities continued. The watch who had suffered the fire to fail in the first temple, conscience smitten, confessed his sin and paid its penalty.

They now had only profane fire, and the whole nation was in the agonies of despair. The cause of all their calamities was now no longer a secret. They extinguished the profane fire, and in prayer, fasting, and continued oblations, they propitiated the sun to send them fire that was holy, to protect and preserve them. It was the folly of ignorance and superst.i.tion, and availed nothing; but, like all prayer, was considered a pious duty, though nothing was ever known to result therefrom, and nature moved steadily and undeviatingly forward in obedience to the fixed, immutable, and eternal laws affirmed by the all-wise Creator.

There was gloom upon every brow and despair in every heart. The curse p.r.o.nounced by the first Great Sun had come--destruction and death to all the Natchez--because of the extinction of the holy fire. At length a tree was stricken by lightning near the White Apple village temple, and set on fire. The men of the temple saw the answer to their prayers in this, and hastened to re-kindle the holy flame from this fire, so miraculously sent them from heaven. It was to them a miracle, because, though perfectly in obedience to natural laws, they did not comprehend them, and like unto all people under similar circ.u.mstances, all in nature is a miracle which they do not understand, and cannot satisfactorily explain. But there was no efficiency found in this, and the trouble went forward.

The French had come among them, and taught them the value and corrupting influence of money. Boats had ascended and descended the Great River, and communication, through this channel, had been established with Canada. They were grasping, by degrees, the lands, building forts and peopling the country. They had introduced the black man, and the wiser of the Natchez saw in the future the doom of their race. They saw the feuds fomented between the numerous tribes along the coast of the Mississippi by the French, and the destruction of these by b.l.o.o.d.y wars. They saw, too, to offend the French was sure to bring destruction upon the offending party. Their neighbors were made, through French influence, to fall upon and destroy them. The Chickasaws and Choctaws--great nations, having mult.i.tudes of warriors--were under the dominion of these pale-faced intruders, and they feared they might be turned upon them in an unsuspecting hour.

There was among the Natchez a mighty chief and warrior. He was of great stature and fame, being seven feet high and powerfully proportioned. He had a large beard, and was called the chief of the Beard, because he was the only man of all the tribe who had this facial ornament or inc.u.mbrance. He was a mighty warrior and was wise in counsel. He believed he saw great evil to the Natchez in the increase of the French and the extension of French power. He knew, and told his people, this was the foreboding of the extinction of the holy fire. He went forth with the chief of the Walnut Hills, named Alahoplechia, and the chief of the White Clay, Oyelape, among their neighbors of other tribes, the Chicasaws and Choctaws, preaching a crusade against the French; urging them to unite with the Natchez, the h.o.m.ochittas, and the Alabamas, and to attack and destroy the last man of the French settlements at Mobile, Boloxy, s.h.i.+p Island, and New Orleans, as they were mischievous intruders from across the Salt Lake, whence they were yearly bringing their people to rob them of their homes and appropriate them.

There had come to them red men from the Wabash and Muskingum, who bore to them the sad news of the encroachments of the pale-faces upon their people and their hunting-grounds. "Soon," said the bearded chief, who was the leading spirit of the mission, "these white faces will meet along the Great River. They will forget the arrow of truth and the tomahawk of justice. They will only know power and oppression. Then they will be mighty as the hurricane when the Great Sun hides his face in wrath and the tempest tears the forest. Who can resist him then? The holy fire has been sent again from heaven, from the Great Spirit, our G.o.d, the Great Sun. It tells us to save our people from this fearful destruction which comes with the white man. These pale-faces are cunning; they must not know of our union. We must not counsel long, or they will learn our intentions. We must strike at once. The Choctaws must strike at Mobile. At the same moment, h.o.m.ochittas, Boloxies, and Homas, you must strike at Boloxi. The Chickasaws and the Natchez will fall upon New Orleans and Rosalie." (The latter is the Indian name for what is now Natchez.) His advice was startling, but unheeded. In order to precipitate a war, on his return with the chiefs who accompanied him and two warriors, they murdered a trading-party of French, at the hills where is now Warrenton, in Warren County, Mississippi.

This murder was communicated to the French who, under Bienville, were sent by Cordelac, then Governor of Louisiana, to take revenge, by waging war upon the Natchez. Bienville was hated by Cordelac, because he had refused the hand of his daughter, formally tendered him by her father. He only gave the young and sagacious commander a small force with which to wage this war--such an one as would have been overwhelmed at once had he attempted open field movements. Knowing this, he proceeded to an island opposite the village of the Tunicas, where he entrenched himself and invited a conference. Three spies were sent by the Natchez to reconnoitre; but they were baffled by Bienville with superior cunning. They were sent back as not the equals of Bienville, and with a message to the Great Sun that he must come with his chiefs, that he desired to establish trading-posts among them, and would only treat with the first in authority. They came with a consciousness that the French were ignorant of these murders, and were immediately arrested and ironed. Bienville told them at once of the murder, and of his determination to have the murderers and to punish them. He had the Great Sun, the Stung Serpent, and the Little Sun. The latter was sent to bring the heads of the murderers, and he returned with three heads; but Bienville, after examining these, told the chiefs they had treacherously deceived him, and that those were not the heads of the murderers. After a night's consultation they concluded it was impossible to deceive him, and in the morning confessed the whole truth, proposing to send Stung Serpent to bring the real murderers. But knowing the wily character of this chief and his influence with his tribe, he was not permitted to go. The young Sun was dispatched, and succeeded in bringing the chief of the Beard and the chief of the Walnut Hills, with the two warriors; but Oyelape had fled and could not be had. He had probed to the truth of the French expedition; and being guilty, cunningly and wisely made his escape.

The death sentence was pa.s.sed upon these, and the two warriors were shot at once; but the two chiefs were reserved for execution to another day. Upon the sentence being communicated to them they commenced to chant the death-song of their people, which they continued to do throughout all the time, night and day, until led forth for execution.

The Great Sun, Stung Serpent, his brother, and all the other Indians were brought out to witness the execution. When the two condemned chiefs were brought forward, these witnesses of their death sang the death-song; but the chief of the Beard looked sternly at them, and defiantly at the executioners; and taking his position, turned to his people and, addressing them, said:

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. A child is born to them of the race of their Suns. A boy is born with a beard on his chin. The prodigy still works on from generation to generation.' So sang the warriors of my tribe when I sprang from my mother's womb, and the shrill cry of the eagle, in the heavens, was heard in joyful response.

Hardly fifteen summers had pa.s.sed over my head when my beard had grown long and glossy. I looked around, and saw I was the only red man that had this awful mark on his face, and I interrogated my mother and she said:

"'Son of the chiefs of the Beard, Thou shall know the mystery In which thy curious eye wishes to pry, When thy beard from black becomes red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez! A hunter is born to them--a hunter of the race of the Suns. Ask of the bears, of the buffaloes, of the tigers, and of the swift-footed deer, whose arrows they fear most! They tremble and cower when the footstep of the hunter with the beard on his chin is heard on the heath. But I was born with brains in my head as well as a beard on my chin, and I pondered on my mother's words. One day, when a panther which I slaughtered had torn my breast, I painted my beard with my own blood, and I stood smiling before her. She said nothing; but her eye gleamed with wild delight, and she took me to the temple when, standing by the sacred fire, she thus sang to me:

"'Son of the chiefs of the Beard, Thou shall know the mystery, Since, true to thy nature, with thine own blood Thy black beard thou hast turned to red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez; for a mighty chief, worthy of the race of their Suns, has been born to them in thee, my son--a n.o.ble chief with a beard on his chin. Listen to the explanation of this prodigy. In days of old a Natchez maid of the race of their Suns was on a visit to the Mobelians. There she soon loved the youthful chief of that nation, and her wedding-day was nigh, when there came from the big Salt Lake on the south a host of bearded men, who sacked the town, slew the red chief with their thunder, and one of those accursed evil spirits used violence to the maid when her lover's corpse was hardly cold in death. She found in sorrow her way back to the Natchez hills, where she became a mother, and lo! the boy had a beard on his chin, and when he grew old enough to understand his mother's words she whispered in his ear:

"'Son of the chiefs of the Beard, Born from a b.l.o.o.d.y day, b.l.o.o.d.y be thy hand, and b.l.o.o.d.y be thy life Until thy black beard with blood becomes red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. In my first ancestor a long line of the first of hunters, chiefs, and warriors of the race of their Suns had been born to them with beards on their chins. What chase was ever unsuccessful over which they presided? When they spoke in the council of the wise men of the nation, did it not always turn out that their advice, whether adopted or rejected, was the best in the end? In what battle were they ever defeated? When were they known to be worn out with fatigue--with hards.h.i.+p, hunger or thirst, heat or cold, either on land or water? Who ever could stem as they the rus.h.i.+ng current of the Father of rivers? Who can count the number of scalps which they brought from distant expeditions? Their names have always been famous in the wigwams of all the red nations. They have struck terror into the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of the boldest enemies of the Natchez; and mothers, when their sons paint their bodies in the colors of war, say to them:

"'Fight where, and with whom you please; But beware, oh! beware of the chiefs of the Beard.

Give way to them as you would to death, Or their black beards with your blood will be red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. When the first chief of the Beard first trimmed the sacred fire in the temple, a voice was heard which said: 'As long as there lives a chief of the race of the Suns with a beard on his chin, no evil can happen to the Natchez nation; but if the white race should ever resume the blood which it gave in a b.l.o.o.d.y day, woe, three times woe, to the Natchez! Of them nothing will remain but the shadow of a name.' Thus spake the invisible prophet. Years rolled on, years thick on years, and none of the accursed white-faces were seen; but they appeared at last, wrapped up in their pale skins like shrouds of the dead, and the father of my father, whom tradition had taught to guard against the predicted danger, slew two of the hated strangers, and my father, in his turn, killed four.

"'Praise be to the chiefs of the Beard, Who knew how to avenge their old ancestral injury, When with the sweet blood of a white foe Their black beards they proudly dyed red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. When I saw the glorious light of day there was born to them a great warrior of the race of their Suns--a warrior and a chief with a beard on his chin. The pledge of protection, of safety, and of glory stood embodied in me. When I shouted my first war-whoop the owl hooted and smelt the ghosts of my enemies, the wolves howled, and the carrion vultures shrieked with joy; for they knew their food was coming, and I fed them with Chickasaws'

flesh and with Choctaws' flesh until they were gorged with the flesh of the red man. A kind master and purveyor I was to them--the poor, dumb creatures that I loved. But lately I have given them more dainty food.

I boast of having done better than my father. Five Frenchmen have I killed, and my only regret in dying is, that it will prevent me from killing more.

"'Ha! ha! ha! that was game worthy of the chief of the Beard!

How lightly he danced. Ho! ho! ho!

How gladly he shouted. Ha! ha! ha!

Each time with French blood his beard became red."

"Sorrow in the hearts of the Natchez! The great hunter is no more. The wise chief is going to meet his fathers. The indomitable warrior will no more raise his hatchet in defence of the children of the Sun. O burning shame! He was betrayed by his brother-chiefs, who sold his blood. If they had followed his advice they would have united with the Choctaws, Chickasaws, and all the other red nations, and they would have slain all the French dogs that came prowling and stealing over the beautiful face of our country. But there was too much of the woman in their cowardly hearts. Well and good! Let the will of fate be accomplished. The white race will soon resume the blood which it gave, and then the glory and the very existence of the Natchez nation will have departed forever with the chief of the Beard; for I am the last of my race, and my blood flows in no other human veins. O Natchez, Natchez! remember the prophet's voice! I am content to die; for I leave no one behind me but the doomed, while I go to revel with my brave ancestors.

"'They will recognize their son in the chief of the Beard; They will welcome him to their glorious homestead When they see so many scalps at his girdle, And his black beard with French blood painted red.'"

He stood up in proud defiance before the admiring French; his n.o.ble form expanded to its full proportions, hatred in his heart and triumph in his eyes. Facing his foes, he viewed the platoon selected to deal him his death, and lifted his eyes and hands to the sun. The officer gave the command, the platoon fired as one man, and the great chief of the Beard pa.s.sed away.