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I
On the
Mountains of the Prairie,
On the great Red Pipe-stone
Quarry,
Gitche Manito, the mighty,
He the Master
of Life, descending,
On the red crags of the quarry
Stood erect, and called the nations,
Called the
tribes of men together.
From his footprints flowed a
river,
Leaped into the light of morning,
O'er the
precipice plunging downward
Gleamed like Ishkoodah,
the comet.
And the Spirit, stooping earthward,
With his finger on the meadow
Traced a winding
pathway for it,
Saying to it, "Run in this way!"
From the red stone of the quarry
With his hand he
broke a fragment,
Moulded it into a pipe-head,
Shaped and fashioned it with figures;
From the margin
of the river
Took a long reed for a pipe-stem,
With its dark green leaves upon it;
Filled the pipe
with bark of willow,
With the bark of the red willow;
Breathed upon the neighboring forest,
Made its great
boughs chafe together,
Till in flame they burst and
kindled;
And erect upon the mountains,
Gitche
Manito, the mighty,
Smoked the calumet, the
Peace-Pipe,
As a signal to the nations.
And the
smoke rose slowly, slowly,
Through the tranquil air
of morning,
First a single line of darkness,
Then
a denser, bluer vapor,
Then a snow-white cloud
unfolding,
Like the tree-tops of the forest,
Ever
rising, rising, rising,
Till it touched the top of
heaven,
Till it broke against the heaven,
And
rolled outward all around it.
From the Vale of
Tawasentha,
From the Valley of Wyoming,
From the
groves of Tuscaloosa,
From the far-off Rocky
Mountains,
From the Northern lakes and rivers
All
the tribes beheld the signal,
Saw the distant smoke
ascending,
The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe.
And the
Prophets of the nations
Said: "Behold it, the
Pukwana!
By the signal of the Peace-Pipe,
Bending like a wand of willow,
Waving like a hand
that beckons,
Gitche Manito, the mighty,
Calls
the tribes of men together,
Calls the warriors to
his council!"
Down the rivers, o'er the prairies,
Came the warriors of the nations,
Came the Delawares
and Mohawks,
Came the Choctaws and Camanches,
Came the Shoshonies and Blackfeet,
Came the Pawnees
and Omahas,
Came the Mandans and Dacotahs,
Came
the Hurons and Ojibways,
All the warriors drawn
together
By the signal of the Peace-Pipe,
To the
Mountains of the Prairie,
To the great Red
Pipe-stone Quarry,
And they stood there on the
meadow,
With their weapons and their war-gear,
Painted like the leaves of Autumn,
Painted like the
sky of morning,
Wildly glaring at each other;
In
their faces stem defiance,
In their hearts the feuds
of ages,
The hereditary hatred,
The ancestral
thirst of vengeance.
Gitche Manito, the mighty,
The creator of the nations,
Looked upon them with
compassion,
With paternal love and pity;
Looked
upon their wrath and wrangling
But as quarrels among
children,
But as feuds and fights of children!
Over them he stretched his right hand,
To subdue
their stubborn natures,
To allay their thirst and
fever,
By the shadow of his right hand;
Spake to
them with voice majestic
As the sound of far-off
waters,
Falling into deep abysses,
Warning,
chiding, spake in this wise :
"O my children! my poor
children!
Listen to the words of wisdom,
Listen
to the words of warning,
From the lips of the Great
Spirit,
From the Master of Life, who made you!
"I
have given you lands to hunt in,
I have given you
streams to fish in,
I have given you bear and bison,
I have given you roe and reindeer,
I have given
you brant and beaver,
Filled the marshes full of
wild-fowl,
Filled the rivers full of fishes:
Why
then are you not contented?
Why then will you hunt
each other?
"I am weary of your quarrels,
Weary
of your wars and bloodshed,
Weary of your prayers
for vengeance,
Of your wranglings and dissensions;
All your strength is in your union,
All your
danger is in discord;
Therefore be at peace
henceforward,
And as brothers live together.
"I
will send a Prophet to you,
A Deliverer of the
nations,
Who shall guide you and shall teach you,
Who shall toil and suffer with you.
If you
listen to his counsels,
You will multiply and
prosper;
If his warnings pass unheeded,
You will
fade away and perish!
"Bathe now in the stream before
you,
Wash the war-paint from your faces,
Wash
the blood-stains from your fingers,
Bury your
war-clubs and your weapons,
Break the red stone from
this quarry,
Mould and make it into Peace-Pipes,
Take the reeds that grow beside you,
Deck them with
your brightest feathers,
Smoke the calumet together,
And as brothers live henceforward!"
Then upon the
ground the warriors
Threw their cloaks and shirts of
deer-skin,
Threw their weapons and their war-gear,
Leaped into the rushing river,
Washed the
war-paint from their faces.
Clear above them flowed
the water,
Clear and limpid from the footprints
Of the Master of Life descending;
Dark below them
flowed the water,
Soiled and stained with streaks of
crimson,
As if blood were mingled with it!
From
the river came the warriors,
Clean and washed from
all their war-paint;
On the banks their clubs they
buried,
Buried all their warlike weapons.
Gitche
Manito, the mighty,
The Great Spirit, the creator,
Smiled upon his helpless children!
And in silence
all the warriors
Broke the red stone of the quarry,
Smoothed and formed it into Peace-Pipes,
Broke
the long reeds by the river,
Decked them with their
brightest feathers,
And departed each one homeward,
While the Master of Life, ascending,
Through the
opening of cloud-curtains,
Through the doorways of
the heaven,
Vanished from before their faces,
In
the smoke that rolled around him,
The Pukwana of the
Peace-Pipe!
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