Lincoln County leader. [volume] (Toledo, Lincoln County, Or.) 1893-1987, 1904-06-24

WIN eAANN nv
loud wailing, no burning. OF the
five survivors Of the horrible
massacre, Sikra was the only one I'M
scathed. When the first ray of day
light thinned the blackness around her
sufficiently to give --er her bearings,
she crept out of her covert, back to the
scene. The white men were gone, but
their work had been well done. The
grasses were dabbled with blood, the
pools were clotted and red, there were
still faint groans from the dying and
hooking grins on the upturned faces
of the dead.
In the midst Of the mangled bodies,
Black Wing lay dead. Sikra was only
a squaw; she did not know how to
swoon n drip tears, but the sun was
high before she moved a muscle or
drew a deep breath. When, at last,
however, b trudged over the sand,
slipped into her canoe, and padded
slowly down the bay there was not one
hideous detail Of the massacre Of In
dian Island not scared deep into her
soul.
The government was held RESPONSE
bic for the massacre by outsiders, and
the overt acts of hostility on the part
of some Of the chiefs was cited as the
cause by those more closely initiated.
The perpetrators, perhaps citizens of
Eureka, although suspected, were new
er charged with the crime, but as time
went on 1t was generally conceded to
be the work of private individuals,
who had their w object in view.
AS time went on and the Indians
were herded onto the Hoopa Reserva-
ton, the story Of the massacre was
buried beneath other debris of its kind
-treachery on the part of the redskin
and bad faith of the whites-until the
stronger race had gotten all the power
into its hands, and driven the Indian,
his wrongs and his rights, out of the
path Of progress.
But the lapse of time that accom-
plished this condition did not wipe out
the injustice Of Black Wings death
from Sikra's memory. Grown haggard
and old in the interim, she had not lost
one detail Of the Island scene from her
mind. The boy she bore a few months
after the massacre was nursed and
Graded in the hope of revenge. His
lullabies were the death-groans of the
wounded warriors and the wailings of
the women and children who fell in
the struggle. His first lisping words
were a vow of vengeance for Black
Wings blood. He knew the grewsome
story glibly before he vas old enough
to understand it, and by the time he
was able to grasp the meaning of his
early training, Revenge was written
large in the very fiber of -.s being.
"He is like Black Wing" Sikra said,
as each year his straight, young limbs
grew longer, his 1.-the young frame
stronger, and she saw a hope of her
life's object being realized. Mrs. Howe,
who lived in the big white house, often
asked, when the old squaw came to do
the weekly washing: why don't you
make the boy work, SikraT' But she
Strengthened her old, bent back, and
grunted: "Well-a l not raise him for
that"
Meantime the boy fished up and
down the streams, content to bask in
the sunshine, or roamed through the
forests and mountain solitudes, idle
but thinking, always brooding, plot
ting, thinking.
you will spoil the boy, Sikra, If you
do not make him work." the kind wom-
an of the white house said again, one
afternoon, while a pile Of snowy linen
grew under the knotted hands of the
old laundress. "Idleness will get him
into mischief" she added, as the stall
wart figure Of the young buck swung
along the roadside. stopped at the
driveway, and sauntered up to the
back porch. where his mother was
working. No n else could have said