The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1903-01-04


ern horizon rosy glow. fading to the
west and deepening to the east. marked
the unseen dip OF the midnight sun. The
cleaning and the dawn were SO COM
mingled that there was no night-simply
wedding of day with day, scarcely
perceptible blending of two circles Of the
Gun. A kildee timidly chirped night;
the full, rich throat OF robin proclaimed
good-morrow. From an island on the
breast of the Yukon a. colony of wild
fowl voiced its interminable wrongs
while a loon laughed mockingly back
across a still stretch of river.
In the foreground, against the bank OF
q lazy eddy birch-bark canoes were lined
two and three deep. In the muddy cur
rent of the river the salmon-run was on
In the background, from the tangle OF
skin tents. rose the voices of the fisher
folk. Bucks skylarked with bucks or
fiirted with the maidens, while the older
squaws gossiped as they braided rope
from the green roots CT trailing vines. AT
their feet the naked progeny played and
squabbled, or rolled in the muck with
the tawny wolf dogs.
To enc side of the encampment, and
conspicuorsly apart from it. stood a sec
ond camp of two tents. 1t was white
mans camp. IN case OF offense, it COM
manded the Indian quarters a hundred
yards away: OF defense. rise to the
ground and the cleared intervening space
and last, of defeat, the swift slope of a
score of yards to the canoes below. From
enc OF the tents came the petulent cry
CT a sick child and the grooming song o.
q mother In the open, over the smould-
cring embers of n fire, two men held
talk.
'Eh / love the church like a good son
Bieni So great a love that my days h?s e
been spent in fleeing away, from her and
my nights in dreaming dreams of reckon
ing Look you," The half-breed's voice
rose to an angry sparl. Il am Red
River born. Ny father was Whites
white as you. But you are Yankee, and
he was British bred and a gentleman's
son. And my mother was the daughter
OF q chief, and I was a man. Ay, ard
one had to look the second time to see
what manner of blood ran in my veins,
for lived with the whites and was one
of them. and my fathers heart beat in
me. 1t happened there was a maiden
white-who looked on me with kind eyes.
Her father had much land and many
horses also he was a big man among
his people. and his blood was the blood of
the French. He said the girl knew not
her own mind and talked oyermuch with
and became wroth.
but she knew her mind. for we came
quick before the priest. But quicker had
come her father with lying words, so that
the priest stifened his neck and would
- = Y,
the other. AS at the beginning it was
tho church which would not bless my
birth. so now it was the church which
refused me marriage and put the blood
of men upon my hands. Bien. Thus have
I cause to love the church. So I struck
the priest on his woman's mouth, and we
took swift horses, the girl and /. to Fort
Pierre, where was a minister OF good
heart But hot on our trail was her
father and brothers and other men he
had gathered him. And We fought ou-
horses on the run. till I emptied three
saddles, and the rest drew off and went
on to Fort Pierre. Then we took east.
the girl and /, and We lived one with
the other, and we were not married.
So in the end she bore me child. a
woman child, and died Then I went
among my mothers people, that it might
nurse at warm breast and live. But my
hands were wet with the blood Of men,
look you, because of the church, wet with
the blood of men. And the Riders CT
the North came for me, put my mothers
brother, who was then chief in his own
right, hid me and gave me the horses
and good. And we went away, my woman
child and l, even to the Hudson coun-
try, where white men were few and the
questions they asked not many. And ]
worked for the company as a hunter. as
a guide. as driver of dogs, till my wo-
man-child was become q woman, tall
and slender and fair to the eye.
You know the winter, long and lonely, |
breeding evil thoughts and bad deeds. The |
Chief Factor was hard man, and bold. |
And he was not such that a woman J
would delight in looking upon. But he
cast eyes upon my woman-child WHO was |
TO become woman Mother of Godi He |
sent me away on a long trip with the |
dogs-you understand, he was hard |
man and without heart. She was most |
white and her soul was white. and. |
we'll she died.
1T was bitter cold the night of my re- !
turn, and l had been away months. The
Indians and breeds looked on me in ST.
lence. and l felt the fear of knew
rot what, but / said nothing till the |
dogs were fed and had eaten as a man
with work before him should. Then I
spoke up, demanding the word and they
shrank from me; but the story came
out word for word, and act for act, aac
they marveled that should be so quiet.
When they had done l went TO the
Factors house. calmer than aow in the
telling Of 1t. He had fed &c the house
of the priest Thither l followed. But
when l was come to that place. the priest
stood in my way, aud spoke soft words. l
asked by the right OF a fathers wrath
that he give me past, but he said only
over his body. and bcsought with me to
pray. Look you, it was the church, al
ways the church; for l passed over his
body and sent the Factor to meet my
woman-child before his god. which is
bad god.
Then was there hue and cry, foT word
was sent to the station below. and l came
away. Through the Land of the Great
Slave, down the valley of the Macken-
Zie to the never-opening ice, over the
white Rockies, past the great curve of