The Bridge of the Gods: A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition.Balch, Frederic Homer
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The Bridge of the Gods: A Romance of Indian Oregon. 19th Edition.
Balch, Frederic Homer
Indians of North America -- Fiction; Oregon -- Fiction
"Come," he says kindly, "our horses are saddled; we take the trail up
the Wauna to-night, I and my friends. We will fly from this fated
valley ere the wrath of the Great Spirit falls upon it. Beyond the
mountains I will seek a new home with the Spokanes or the Okanogans.
Come; my home shall be your home, because you cared for him that is
gone."
She shook her head and pointed to the grave.
"My heart is there; my life is buried with him. I cannot go."
Again he urged her.
"No, no," she replied, with Indian stubbornness; "I cannot leave him.
Was I not like his mother? How can I go and leave him for others? The
roots of the old tree grow not in new soil. If it is pulled up it
dies."
"Come with me," said the savage, with a gentleness born of his new
faith. "Be _my_ mother. We will talk of him; you shall tell me of him
and his God. Come, the horses wait."
Again she shook her head; then fell forward on the grave, her arms
thrown out, as if to clasp it in her embrace. He tried to lift her;
her head fell back, and she lay relaxed and motionless in his arms.
Another grave was made by Cecil's; and the little band rode through
the mountain pass that night, toward the country of the Okanogans,
without her.
And that same night, an English exploring vessel far out at sea sailed
southward, leaving behind the unknown shores of Oregon,--her crew
never dreaming how near they had been to finding the lost wanderer,
Cecil Grey.
CHAPTER II.
THE MARRIAGE AND THE BREAKING UP.
Remembering love and all the dead delight,
And all that time was sweet with for a space.
SWINBURNE.
After Cecil had been borne from the council-grove, the Indians,
rousing themselves from the spell of the strange scene they had just
witnessed, looked around for Tohomish the seer. He was gone. No one
could remember seeing him go, yet he was missing from his accustomed
place, and never was he seen or heard of more. Upon his fate, lost in
the common ruin that engulfed his race, the legend casts no ray of
light. It is certain that the fall of the Bridge, with which his life
was interwoven, had a disastrous effect upon him, and as he said, that
the strength of his life was broken. It is probable that the
orator-seer, feeling within himself that his power was gone, crept
away into the forest to die. Perhaps, had they searched for him, they
would have found him lying lifeless upon the leaves in some dense
thicket or at the foot of some lonely crag.
Whatever his fate, the Indians never looked upon his face again.
Multnomah made no comment on the death of Cecil, or on the prophecy of
Tohomish, so much at variance with his own interpretation of the fall
of the Bridge. Whatever he had to say was evidently held in reserve
for the closing talk with which he would soon dismiss the council.
"You shall see Multnomah's daughter given to Snoqualmie, and then
Multnomah will open his hand and make you rich."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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