Stories of American Life and AdventureEggleston, Edward
History
Stories of American Life and Adventure
Eggleston, Edward
Readers -- History; United States -- History -- Juvenile literature
The Frenchman who was called Fearless now undertook to have the man
who had killed the other soldier punished, for the dead soldier had
been his friend. But it was necessary that he should not let the
Indians know who had told about it. Fearless stripped off a great
quantity of bark of the pawpaw tree. He thought he would play a trick
like that of the medicine man, and make the Indians believe that a
spirit was talking to them. He did everything very secretly. By
fastening pieces of the pawpaw bark together with pitch, he managed to
make a very large speaking trumpet, which would carry the voice a long
distance.
When he had finished this trumpet, he left the camp one very dark
night. He carried with him his gun, some food, and a gourd full of
water. He had also a bearskin of which to make a bed, and a buffalo
robe to cover himself with. With these things he hid himself on a
hill. This hill was near the Indian camp. From the top of it Fearless
could make his voice heard for three miles round by the aid of his
great pawpaw trumpet.
He shouted through this great bark trumpet what seemed to be words in
an unknown language, such as the Indian medicine man used. The
frightful noise sounded through the woods. It did not seem to come
from anywhere. The Indians thought that these cries came down from the
sky. The Indian women were thrown into a great fright, and even the
warriors and chiefs were alarmed. They said that the Master of Life
was angry with their tribe, and that this horrible voice showed that
something bad was going to happen to them.
[Illustration]
The day after the voice was heard, the old men of the tribe came to
consult Bossu about this strange noise. Bossu told them that the white
soldier who had been killed could not rest. He said that every night
his voice was heard, though nothing could be seen. He said that the
voice cried out in a melancholy tone, "I am the white soldier that
went with the French captain. I was killed by a man of the tribe of
the Kanoatinos. Frenchmen, revenge my death."
The Indians now saw that it was of no use for them to tell any more
lies about the death of the white man. They believed that the
soldier's ghost had told the Frenchmen all about it. They confessed
the murder, but they explained that the white soldier had provoked it
when he was drunk, by bad treatment of the Indian who killed him.
Captain Bossu was not willing to take their excuses. He told them,
that, if the soldier had done wrong, he ought to have been brought to
his own captain to be punished. He said, "If one of my soldiers should
kill one of your Indians, I would put him to death. You must do the
same with the Indian who killed my soldier."
The oldest of the chiefs now commanded one of his men to go and seize
the guilty man, bind him, and bring him in to be put to death, in
order that the ghost of the French soldier might no longer trouble
them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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