Adventures of the Ojibbeway and Ioway Indians in England, France, and Belgium; Vol. 2 (of 2): being Notes of Eight Years' Travels and Residence in Europe with his North American Indian CollectionCatlin, George
History
Adventures of the Ojibbeway and Ioway Indians in England, France, and Belgium; Vol. 2 (of 2): being Notes of Eight Years' Travels and Residence in Europe with his North American Indian Collection
Catlin, George
England -- Description and travel; France -- Description and travel; Indians of North America
The amusements were proceeding this evening, as on former occasions,
when a sudden excitement was raised in the following manner. In the
midst of one of their noisy dances, the War-chief threw himself, with a
violent jump and a yell of the shrill war-whoop, to the corner of the
platform, where he landed on his feet in a half-crouching position,
with his eyes, and one of his forefingers, fixed upon something that
attracted his whole attention in a distant part of the crowd. The
dance stopped--the eyes of all the Indians, and of course those of
most of the crowd, were attracted to the same point; the eyes of the
old War-chief were standing open, and in a full blaze upon the object
before him, which nobody could well imagine, from his expression, to be
anything less exciting than a huge panther, or a grizly bear, in the
act of springing upon him. After staring awhile, and then shifting his
weight upon the other leg, and taking a moment to wink, for the relief
of his eyes, he resumed the intensity of his gaze upon the object
before him in the crowd, and was indulging during a minute or two in a
dead silence, for the events of twenty or thirty years to run through
his mind, when he slowly straightened up to a more confident position,
with his eyes relaxed, but still fixed upon their object, when, in an
emphatic and ejaculatory tone, he pronounced the bewildering word of
_Bobasheela!_ and repeated it, _Bobasheela?_ "Yes, I'm _Bobasheela_,
my good old fellow! I knew your voice as soon as you spoke (though
you don't understand English yet)." _Chee-au-mung-ta-wangish-kee,
Bobasheela._ "My friends, will you allow me to move along towards
that good old fellow? he knows me;" at which the old chief (not of a
_hundred_, but) of _many_ battles, gave a yell, and a leap from the
platform, and took his faithful friend _Bobasheela_ in his arms, and
after a lapse of thirty years, had the pleasure of warming his cheek
against that of one of his oldest and dearest friends--one whose heart,
we have since found, had been tried and trusted, and as often requited,
in the midst of the dense and distant wildernesses of the banks of
the Mississippi and Missouri. Whilst this extraordinary interview was
proceeding, all ideas of the dance were for the time lost sight
of, and whilst these veterans were rapidly and mutually reciting the
evidences of their bygone days of attachment, there came a simultaneous
demand from all parts of the room, for an interpretation of their
conversation, which I gave as far as I could understand it, and as far
as it had then progressed, thus:--The old Sachem, in leading off his
favourite war-dance, suddenly fixed his eye upon a face in the crowd,
which he instantly recognized, and gazing upon it a moment, decided
that it was the well-known face of an old friend, with whom he had
spent many happy days of his early life on the banks of the Mississippi
and Missouri rivers in America. The old chief, by appealing to this
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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