TAY-BUN-ANE-JE-GAY. 279 



After a pause he looked at Gibbs in a way that the Gov- 

 ernor of North Carolina might have done at that historic 

 meeting with the Governor of South Carolina, and mere- 

 ly remarked: "Pungee 'scutah wabo?" 



" What's that he says?" asked Gibbs. 



He asked you for some whiskey, and he thinks you 

 promised him some in exchange for the bread. I begin 

 to think so myself, since I compare your pronunciation 

 of Ojibway with his and mine. There are some very 

 nice shades of inflection in Ojibway which make a word 

 mean several things. You have told me how revengeful 

 an Indian is, and you have mortally offended this man, 

 and unless you give him what you have promised it may 

 go hard with you and, in fact, with all our party, for we 

 are only six." 



"What will I do? I haven't any whiskey, and there's 

 none in camp." 



"He won't believe that. He has seen a ten-gallon 

 keg of molasses, but you don't suppose for a moment he 

 believes it to be molasses? The kegs he has seen with 

 white men have always contained whiskey. I don't 

 know how you can square it with him. You've got 

 yourself into this scrape, but I'll help you out if I can." 



I told our guest that Gibbs had not understood, "go- 

 win kendun," but that instead of whiskey he meant to 

 offer tobacco. That was satisfactory it had to be and 

 Gibbs gave up a whole plug of Navy, and there was peace 

 in the land. Gibbs felt that I had successfully arbitrated 

 the case and averted a calamity. What our guest 

 thought was impossible to tell, but Henry and I enjoyed 

 the thing by ourselves, and afterward Henry guyed Gibbs 

 about it at every chance. 



We had left civilization early in a Presidential cam- 

 paign. The Democratic party had nominated James 



