. doe 
Woy. 6, 1864.1 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
2838 
dress. One bore, exposed to view, a natural root of yucca, 
crowned with its cluster of root leaves, which remain green 
all winter, The rest bore in their hands wands of pifion; 
what other properties they may have had concealed about 
their persons, the reader will soon be able to conjecture. 
On their third journey around the fire they halted in the west 
and formed a close circle for the purpose of concealing their 
operations, such as we witnessed in the eighth dance, After 
a few moments spent in singing and many repetitions of 
Thohe, the circle opened, disclosing to our view,the yucca 
root planted in the sand, Again the circle closed; again the 
song, the rattle and the chorus of Thohe was heard, and when 
the circle was opened the second time the small budding 
flower-stalk (or its excellent counterfeit rather) was seen 
amid the fascicle of root leaves. A third time the dancers 
formed their ring of occultation; after the song and din had 
continued a few seconds the circle parted for the third time; 
when lo! amid the frosts of November, the great panicle of 
creamy yucca flowers which, except in the mvsteries of the 
Hosh kawn’, never bloom on the high mesas of Arizona later 
than July, ‘The previous transformations of the yucca bad 
been greeted with approving sbonts and laughter; but the 
blossoms were hailed with the greatest storms of applause. 
For the fourth and Jast time the circle closed, and when 
again it opened the blossoms had disappeared and the great 
dark-green finit hung in abundance from the pedicels. 
When this act was completed the dancers departed, leavin 
the Hésh-kawn’ behind them, Barely had they disappeare 
when the form of one personating an aged, short-sighted, 
decrepit man was seen to emerge slowly from among the crowd. 
of spectatorsin the east. He was dressed in an old and horribly 
tagged suit; his face was whitened and he bore in his hand a 
short, crooked bow anda few crooked, ill-made arrows, 
His mere appearance provoked the ‘‘stoic” audience to 
scream of Jaughter, aud his subsequent “‘low-comedy busi- 
ness,” which excelled much that | have seen on the civilized 
stage, never failed to meet with uproarious demonstration of 
applause. Slowly advancing as he enacted his part, be in 
time reached the place where the yucca stood, and in his 
imbecile totterings he at length stumbled upon the plant and 
pretended to have his flesh lacerated by the sharp leaves. He 
gave a tremendous ery of pain and wined; “This must have 
been the yucca that cut me; where canit be.” Standing 
directly over the plaut le pretended, after much vain search, 
to find if, and rejoiced with queruJous extravagance over his 
success, When he had marked the spot aud the way back 
to it with an exaggerated burlesque of the Indian methods 
doing their things, he went off to find his ‘‘old woman” and 
bring her to pick the fruit. Soon he reappeared with a great, 
strapping Indian ‘‘buck,” dressed to represent a hideous, 
absurd-looking old granny. ‘The latter acted his part 
throughout the rest of the drama with a skill fully equal to 
that of his partner. But I cannot go further in describing 
this strange performance; many things that followed may 
not be told in the Euglish tongue. 
The night’s enterfuinment fitly ended with the fire dance, 
which was the most picturesque and startling of ail. Some 
time before the dancers entered we heard strangs sounds 
mingled with the blowing of the buffalo horn. The sounds 
were much like the call of the sandhill crane, and may, per- 
haps, be properly called “trumpeting,” and they were made 
by the dancers constantly during the exercises. The noises 
continued to grow louder and come nearer, until we heard 
them at the opening in the east, and in a moment after, ten 
men, having no more clothing on than the performers in the 
first dance, entered Every man bore a long, thick bundle 
of shredded cedar bark in each hand except the leader, who 
carried four smaller fagots of the same muterial, Four times 
they all danced around the fire, waving their bundles of bark 
toward the flame, then they halted in the east; the leader 
advanced toward the central fire, lit one of his little fagots, 
and trumpeting loudly, threw it over the fence of the corral 
to the east. He performed a similar act.at the south, the 
west, and the north, but before the northern brand was 
thrown, he lit with it the fagots of his comrades. As each 
brand disappeared over the fence, some of the spectators 
blew into their hands, and made a motion as if tossing some 
substance after the departing flame, 
When the fazots were all lit, the whole hand began a wild 
race around the fire. At first they kept close together and 
spat upon one another some substance of supposed medicinal 
virtue. Soon they scattered and ran apparently without 
concert, the rapid racing causing the brands to throw oui 
long brilliant streamers of flame over the naked hands and 
arms of the dancers. They then proceeded to apply the 
brands to their own nude bodies, and the bodies of their 
comrades in front of them—no man ever once turning 
around, At times the dancer struck the victim vigorous 
blows with his flaming wand; again he seized the flame as 
if it were a sponge, and, keeping close to the one pursued, 
rubbed the back of the latter for seyeral moments as if he 
were bathing him In the mean time the sufferer would 
catch up with some one in front of him and, in turn, bathe 
him in flame. At times when a dancer found no one in 
front of him, he proceeded to “sponge” his own back and 
might keep this up while making two or three circuits 
around the fire, or until he overtook some one ulse. At each 
application of the biaze the loud trumpeting was heard, and 
it often seemed as if a flock of a hundred cranes were wing- 
ing their way overhead, southward through the darkness. 
_Ifa brand became extinguished it was lit again in the central 
fire; but when it was so far consumed as to be no longer 
held conveniently in the hand, the dancer drojped it and 
rushed trumpeting out of the corral. Thus one by one they 
all departed, and the spectators stepped into the arena, 
picked up fascicles of the fallen fragments of bark, lit them 
and bathed their hands in the flames as a charm against the 
evil effects of fire. 
Did these dancers, next day, hide sore and blistered backs 
under their serapes? I think not, How then did they 
escape the effects of the fame? Did the medicine they spat 
upon one another saye them? Idoubtit. Does the cedar 
bark ignite at a low temyperature, and is the coating of white 
earth with which their bodies were covered an excellent non- 
conductor? Such | believe to be the case. However, the 
thought that their bodies might have been thus ingeniously 
protected, lessened little, if any, the effect produced on the 
spectator, I bav2 beheld many fire scenes on the stage, 
many acts of fire-eating and. fire-handling by civilized jug- 
glers, and many fire dances by other Indian tribes, but noth- 
Ing quite Comparable to this. The scenic accessories were 
unique. Demons scourging lost souls with the eternal fire 
could scarcely be pictured to look more awful, 
A few unimportant closing ceremonies, and the labors of 
the night were done. The Indians began to stream ont of 
the corral and we followed them with eyes sore from the 
bitter smoke and loss of sleep. When we stepped out of the 
= eee 
Cee nn ne eee een nee ———eeeSS Ee  ———— 8 
glare and heat of the corral a frosty autumn morning and a | of vest, he was the personification of a consuming egotism. 
cloudless sky greeted us. 
the horizon; a faint hint of dawn was in the east, 
southern sky. 
A VOYAGE BETWEEN 
. BY D. D, BANTA, 
Ys 
THE LAKES. 
Antonio—* * What does else want credit, come to me, 
And Til be sworn ‘tis true. Travelers ne’er did lie, 
Though fools at home condemn them, —Tenrpest. 
The next morning, when the travelers arose, a fog veiled 
the shores of Manistique Lake, but by the time they were 
ready to strike their tent the ri ing sun had dissipated the 
yapors, and from out the glassy waters the green islands rose 
more beautiful than ever. After their boat was laden they 
walked up and down the rocky shore many minutes, dwell. 
ing upon the various points of beauty within the range of 
their vision, 
During the promenade they discussed the question of visit- 
ing White Fish Lake, and setiled it in the negative. Across 
four miles of blue water rose the ridge of green woods which 
hid that lake whose praise was in every one’s mouth who had 
Iooked upon it, But the Greek Professor was alone in his 
tent, and the travelers reluctantly decided to postpone their 
visit to it till a more conyenient season. And so they kept 
the Wawa up the north shore, but they made no hurried 
voyage. Whenever the notion took them to throw outa 
hook or run ashore they did it, and so when on this sun- 
shiny morving the Judge thought he might hook a fish by 
making a cast of a spoon with his rod, he at once adjusted 
the rod and flung the spoon as far as he could and then 
reeled it in. Now he had a Kentucky reel of which he was 
quite careful, and on making one of his sweeping casts the 
handle flew off, and striking the water, went round and 
round in a spiraltike curve, until it landed at the bottom 
with four and a half feet of water above it. If Brother 
Scott laughed or even smiled then the Judge did not either 
hear or see, but the latter was so astonished and grieved at 
the mishap, that he probably would not have heard nor seen 
neither. The Judge did not smite his breast and cry, “Woe 
is me!” nor did he swear, unless an emphatic ‘‘darn it!” be 
that. -Nor did he stand still and look after the truant handle 
longer than was necessary for him to make sure that he 
could see the bright head of the screw in the end of it gleam. 
ing on the bottom like astar, Nor did the Judge ask any 
advice. Brother Scott was not called upon for an opinion as 
to the best way to fish for reel handles in four and a half 
feet of water, and the historian cannot aver that he had any 
opinion at that time. All that can be said is, that the Judge 
hauled off his clothes without ceremony and lowered him- 
self over the stern of the boat into the cold water, while 
Brother Scott turned his head away for modesty’s sake—or 
to laugh, the historian knows not which. 
With a thousand tremors and an infinity of rigors, and one 
prolonged ‘‘U-u-u-g-g-h-h!” the Judge struck bottom, and 
after fixing his eyes on the gleaining star, he made one tre- 
mendous dive. The Japping water closed over his broad 
back, but fora moment only. Up he came with a jump and 
a snort, spouting water like a porpoise and clinging to a 
handful of mud, He had missed the star at the foot. And 
Brother Scott again looked the other way. 
And now the Judge made a second dive, but by this time 
his ardor was greatly cooled, and it is by no means certain 
that he touched bottom at all. At any rate, after clawing 
somewhat frantically al his face and regaining his breath 
through a series of puffs and snorts, he was in a proper 
frame of mind to give the ‘‘darned thing” up. ‘‘It has both- 
ered me a good deal one time or another,” said he as he held 
to the side of the boat and looked yearningly at his dry and 
warm clothes, ‘‘and I can readily get another;’ and then he 
crawled up and put on his clothes. And Brother Scott once 
more looked the other way. 
‘It’s a pity,” said Brother Scott, about the time the Judge 
was clothed, ‘‘to lose that handle, and Il think I caught it;” 
and with that he thrust down a paddle bruised into tiny 
splinters on the end, and cautiously insinuating it under the 
handle lifted it into the boat. ‘The water will do you uo 
harm,” remarked Brother Scott shortly after, in a pious-like 
tone, but as he was a preacher and a Baptist. one at that, the 
Judge did not quite understand his meaning, and the matter 
was never mentioned more between them. 
A brief spell at the paddles brought them abreast of a 
clearing containing two residences in close proximity to 
each other. Landing at their log they met with a man who 
said he was going across the lake a hunting, and that the 
occupants of the houses were at that instant setting out to 
attend the funeral of a neighbor who had dicd in spite of 
his healthful surroundings. They learned from the same 
source that a professor with his students were encamped on 
Round Lake, whither they were going, and also that on the 
first headland they would come to, a hunter had his camp, 
and that just beyond it was the Widow Barker's place. They 
had heard the names of all the residents alone the north 
shore of the Jake before, and the Widow Barker’s name had 
suggested to Brother Scott the possibilities of a romance, 
‘No one cares tosce her, I presume,” said Brother Scott, 
“but I think it desirable, in case any one should attempt a 
romance of the Manistique, to have a picture of a house, so 
that if pictures were put in, the ‘Widow Barker’s Cottage’ 
could be one of them,” With this thought uppermost the 
hupter’s cainp was passed without stopping, and the head- 
Jand turned and Widow Barker’s landing made. There they 
met the hunter himself, who was repairing his boat, and a 
glance told them that he was no ordinary jrunter. His guns 
—a rifle and a shotgun—shone like new, his clothes were 
neat, whole and vwell-fitting, and bis canoe, the product of 
his own skill, was as neat a vessel as was ever fashioned 
from 4 log. With his knees on a Mackinaw blanket that 
covered the bottom of his boat like a rushion, and a paddie 
in his gloved hand he soon left the Wawa far in the rear. 
But before that was done the Widow Barker’s cottage was 
photographed, It was a mean-looking affair, coustructed of 
poles, and yet located us it was on the hillside with a tangled 
mass of logs and brush lying all criss-cross in the foreground, 
and 2 dark wall of living trees fora background, it had 
much of the picturesque about it. While the camera was 
being focussed, two of the inmates of the cabin came to the 
door, and one, # heavy-bodicd young man clad in black, 
struck an attitude and stood for his picture. And such an 
attitude! With his head thrown back, his abdominal region 
bulging out, and his arms akimbo with thumbs in armholes 
The morning star was high aH 
ut 
although the last human votary of the Fire God had departed 
a celestial dancer still sped on his eternal round and held his 
blazing torch aloft—the great comet of Crull gleamed in the } 
The picture taken, which afterward proved to be badly 
fogged and a failure, the yoyagers pursued their way, but 
they had not gone far when the Judge said: 
| wonder where that preacher came from?” 
“Preacher!” exclaimed Brother Scott, “What preacher?” 
“Why, the pompous one whose picture we got with the 
Barker cottage.” 
“Q, he’s no preacher! Didn’t you know? Why, he’s a 
young lawyer who’s lately come in.” 
“How do you know that?” asked the Judge, misled by 
Brother Scott’s earnest manner into the belief that he knew 
whereof he affirmed. 
“How dol know? Why I could see it in his self-conceited 
strut and assinine ways.” 
Much more was said by the two, each maintaining his 
side with such reasons as occurred at the moment, some of 
which were anything but complimentary to the green bag or 
the cloth; but as neither seemed disposed to yield, it was 
finally agreed to cut across the mouth of a bay and intercept 
the dilletanti hunter and leave the matter to him. The bay 
was accordingly crossed and the hunter intercepted and the 
question at issue stated. 
“Him?” queried the hunter; ‘‘O, he’s asort of a jack at all 
trades. He preaches occasionally, pettifogs a little, doctors 
some and J believe has taught school.” 
“We thought so,” said the Judge, softly, and once more 
the travelers and the hunter, who paddled his canoe in 
gloves, bid each other adieu. 
“Say,” cried Brother Scott after some minutes’ silence, “It 
was the schoolmaster in him, wasn’t it?” 
“Yes, or the doctor.” replied the Judge. And then there 
was silence again, but not for long. Brother Scott, of a 
highly sensitive nature and easily affected by his surround- 
ings, began humming a tune which finally broke into the © 
following college song, and which he rendered with a 
bvisterousness that would have done credit to a hilarious 
junior; 
The bulldog on the bank, 
And the bullfrog in the pool, 
And the bulldog ealled the bullfrog 
A blamed old water fool. 
And the bulldog stooped to catch him, 
But a snapper bit his paw 
And the pollywog died alaughing 
To see him wag his jaw. 
It was not far from noon when the voyagers landed at the 
portage, and after inspecting some of the numerous springs 
of water thaf flow or seap out of the bank at that place, they 
hauled their bout and camp stuff up to the shade of a beech 
tree on the hillside, and there swung the kettle und made 
tea. 
It was reputed to be eighty rods across the portage, and 
the travelers expected to find the carry tiresome and uninter- 
esting to the last degree, butin so far us the Jast qualifier was 
concerned, they were bappily disappointed. A high, forcst- 
covered ridge intersected by vumcrous depressions running 
from the center northward or southward—the drains of an 
ancient and more aqueous condition of the region—lay 
between the two lakes, and a picturesque Sylvan path led 
across. But what was more to the interest of the poitagers 
on that day, the professor and students of whom they had 
before heard, bad organized themselyes into an army of 
offense and defense, which was posted along the path await- 
ing in feverish anxiety the approach of the deer that Mr. 
Roat, who lived on the north shore of Round Lake, aud 
znother, had gone forth to scare up and drive that way. The 
Military Professor, as he was henceforth known to the 
heroes of this journey, had placed his forces in such order as 
to ambush the path from lake to lake. An elderly and mild- 
mannered professor guarded the left wing, over against Man- 
istique; a couple of students held the center, while the Mili- 
tary Professor, a selfconfident and warlike gentleman, held 
the right wing. The Judge and Brother Scott had hardly 
set forth on their journey across the ridge, when a tremen- 
dous firing took place at the cenler, which was in their front. 
Before they reached that place the firing was resumed at the 
Tight, and it was known that the Militury Professor was hay- 
ing a hot time of it. On reaching the center, they lowered 
their load and joined with the student who did the shooting, 
in looking at the ground where the deer stood and ran, that 
he shot at. The student proved to be a young theologian, 
and was a marvel of mudesty. From his story hastily told, 
it seemed that a deer—whether buck or doe it bad never 
occured to him to look—had suddenly appeared to him in a 
gentle lope about thirty-five yards distant, “I ‘mah’d’ at it,” 
he said, ‘‘and it stopped and I shot. Jt then wheeled and 
circled around and | shot again. I ought to have hit it but 
I didn’t!” He then led our travelers over the ground, pointed 
out the place he was standing, and asserted over and over 
that he ‘fought to haye killed it,” and to their astonishment, 
the meanwhile protesting that he had not touched it and 
offering no excuse for his miss, This was so unusual that 
the travelers looked with a sort of wonder on the young man, 
The rule in the woods is to claim everything. No common 
man ever admits that he misses when he shoots at a deer if 
he can help it, and if he can’t do that, he is fertile in the in- 
vention of good reasons showing why he ought to haye 
missed, But here was a young man who was alone when he 
shot at his deer and could have invented any excuse he chose 
without any danger of being found out, and yet who ingenu- 
ously declared he had missed and had no excuse to offer, 
By this time the elderly professor from the left wing and 
another student, and Mr. Roat and his man were at the 
center, and the force, accompanicd by the Judge and Brother 
Scott, set out for the Military Professor’s position. ‘Il am 
sure the professor bas killed it,” said the ingenuous young 
man, ‘for he was very confident that if he could get within 
eighty yards of one, he would fetch if.” 
In a few minutes they found the Military Professor, He 
was standing on a log sweeping the horizon with his gaze 
as far as the forest would permit. He lad killed his deer, 
there was no mistake as to that, he said in substance; but 
for the life of him he could not tind it. Indeed he wasn’t 
quite sure of where he stood when he shol, and he had uo 
idea whatever of the location of the deer. He cotild not say 
whether it was standing or ruoning, whetber it was a buck 
or doe, or whether there was oue or more, and when told 
that he hed fired three shots he shook his head doubtingly. 
He knew he had shot once, but recollected no more. But 
he had killed it—given it a death shot, and there could be 
no mistake about il, he reiterated. ‘Where did you hit it?” 
asked Mr. Roat. 
“Tn the neck. I saw the blood spurting from its neck as 
it run from me.” 
“Dang it, that can’t be,” bluntly said the man who had 
