| YOUNG
Ta-la-pus sat on the highest point of rock that lifted
itself on the coast at the edge of his father’s
Reserve. At his feet stretched the Straits of Georgia,
and far across the mists of the salt Pacific waters
he watched the sun rise seemingly out of the mainland
that someone had told him stretched eastward thousands
of miles, where another ocean, called the Atlantic,
washed its far-off shore, for Ta-la-pus lived on Vancouver
Island, and all his little life had been spent in wishing
and longing to set his small, moccasined feet on that
vast mainland that the old men talked of, and the young
men visited year in and year out. But never yet had
he been taken across the wide, blue Straits, for he
was only eleven years old, and he had two very big brothers
who always accompanied their father, old chief Mowitch,
on his journeyings, for they were good fishermen, and
could help in the salmon catch, and bring good chicamin
(money) home to buy supplies for the winter. Sometimes
these big brothers would tease him and say, “What
can you expect? Your name is Ta-la-pus, which means
a prairie wolf. What has a prairie wolf to do with crossing
great waters? He cannot swim, as some other animals
can. Our parents gave us better names, ‘Chetwoot,’
[Page 103] the bear, who swims well,
and ‘Lapool,’ the water fowl, whose home
is on the waters, whose feet are webbed, and who floats
even while he sleeps. No, our young brother, Ta-la-pus,
the prairie wolf, was never meant to cross the great
salt Straits.”
Then little Ta-la-pus would
creep away to his lonely rock, trying to still the ache
in his heart, and forcing back the tears from his eyes.
Prairie wolves must not cry like little girl babies—and
sometimes when his heart was sorest, a clear, dazzlingly
bright day would dawn, and far, far off he could see
the blur of the mainland coast, resting on the sea like
an enormous island. Then he would tell himself that,
no matter what his name was, some day he would cross
to that great, far country, whose snow-crowned mountain
peaks he could just see merging into the distant clouds.
Then, late in the summer, there
came one marvellous night, when his father and brothers
returned from the sock-eye salmon fishing, with news
that set the entire Indian village talking far into
the early morning. A great Squamish chief on the mainland
was going to give a Potlatch. He had been preparing
for it for weeks. He had enjoyed a very fortunate fishing
season, was a generous-hearted man, and was prepared
to spend ten thousand dollars†
in gifts and entertainment for his friends and all the
poor of the various neighboring tribes.
Chief Mowitch and all his family
were invited, and great rejoicing and anticipation were
enjoyed over their salmon suppers that night.
“You and the boys go,”
said his wife. “Perhaps you will be lucky and
bring home chicamin and blankets. The old men
say the winter will be cold. Gray geese were going south
yesterday, three weeks earlier than last year. Yes,
we will need blankets when the ollalies (berries)
are ripe in October. I shall stay at home, until the
babies are older. Yes, you and the boys go.” [Page
104]
“Yes,” responded
the chief. “It would never do for us to miss a
great Squamish Potlatch. We must go.”
Then the elder son, Chet-woot,
spoke joyously:
“And mama,‡
we may bring back great riches, and even if the cold
does come while we are away, our little brother, Ta-la-pus,
will care for you and the babies. He’ll carry
water and bring all the wood for your warmth.”
The father looked smilingly
at Ta-la-pus, but the boy’s eyes, great and dark,
and hungry for the far mainland, for the great feasts
he had heard so much of, were fastened in begging, pleading
seriousness on his father’s face. Suddenly a whim
seized the old chief’s fancy.
“Ta-la-pus,” he
said, “you look as if you would like to go too.
Do you want to take part in the Potlatch?”
Instantly Chet-woot objected.
“Papa, he could never go, he’s too young.
They may ask him to dance for them. He can’t dance.
Then perhaps they would never ask us.”
The chief scowled. He was ruler
in his own lodge, and allowed no interference from anyone.
“Besides,” continued
Chet-woot, “there would be no one to fetch wood
for mama and the babies.”
“Yes, there would be someone,”
said the chief, his eyes snapping fiercely. “You
would be here to help your mama.”
“I?” exclaimed the
young man. “But how can I, when I shall be at
the Potlatch? I go to all the Potlatches.”
“So much more reason that
you stay home this once and care for your mama and baby
sisters, and you shall stay. Lapool and little
Ta-la-pus will go with me. It is time the boy saw something
of the other tribes. Yes, I’ll take Lapool and
Ta-la-pus, and there is no change to my word when it
is once spoken.”
Chet-woot sat like one stunned,
but an Indian son [Page 105] knows
better than to argue with his father. But the great,
dark eyes of little Ta-la-pus glowed like embers of
fire, his young heart leaped joyously. At last, at last,
he was to set foot in the country of his dreams—the
far, blue, mountain-circled mainland.
All that week his mother worked
day and night on a fine new native costume for him to
wear on the great occasion. There were trousers of buckskin
fringed down each side, a shirt of buckskin, beaded
and beautified by shell ornaments, a necklace of the
bones of a rare fish, strung together like little beads
on deer sinew, earrings of pink and green pearl from
the inner part of the shells of a bivalve, neat moccasins,
and solid silver, carven bracelets.
She was working on a headdress,
consisting of a single red fox-tail and eagle feathers,
when he came and stood beside her.
“Mama,” he said,
“there is a prairie wolf skin you cover the babies
with while they sleep. Would you let me have it this
once, if they would not be cold without it?”
“They will never be cold,”
she smiled, “for I can use an extra blanket over
them. I only use it because I started to when you were
the only baby I had, and it was your name, so I covered
you with it at night.”
“And I want to cover myself
with it now,” he explained, “its head as
my headdress, its front paws about my neck, its thick
fur and tail trailing behind me as I dance.”
“So you are going to dance,
my little Ta-la-pus?” she answered proudly. “But
how is that, when you do not yet know our great tribal
dances?”
“I have made one of my
own, and a song, too,” he said, shyly.
She caught him to her, smoothing
the hair back from his dark forehead. “That is
right,” she half whispered, for she felt he did
not want anyone but herself to know [Page 106]
his boyish secret. “Always make things for yourself,
don’t depend on others, try what you can do alone.
Yes, you may take the skin of the prairie wolf. I will
give it to you for all time—it is yours.”
That night his father also laid
in his hands a gift. It was a soft, pliable belt, woven
of the white, peeled roots of the cedar, dyed brilliantly,
and worked into a magnificent design.
“Your great-grandmother
made it,” said the chief. “Wear it on your
first journey into the larger world than this island,
and do nothing in all your life that would make her
regret, were she alive, to see it round your waist.”
So little Ta-la-pus set forth
with his father and brother, well equipped for the great
Potlatch, and the meeting of many from half a score
of tribes.
They crossed the Straits on
a white man’s steamer, a wonderful sight to Ta-la-pus,
who had never been aboard any larger boat than his father’s
fishing smack and their own high-bowed, gracefully-curved
canoe. In and out among the islands of the great gulf
the steamer wound, bringing them nearer, ever nearer
to the mainland. Misty and shadowy, Vancouver Island
dropped astern, until at last they steamed into harbor,
where a crowd of happy-faced Squamish Indians greeted
them, stowed them away in canoes, paddled a bit up coast,
the sighted the great, glancing fires that were lighting
up the grey of oncoming night—fires of celebration
and welcome to all the scores of guests who were to
partake of the lavish hospitality of the great Squamish
chief.
As he stepped from the great
canoe, Ta-la-pus thought he felt a strange thrill pass
through the soles of his feet. They had touched the
mainland of the vast continent of North America for
the first time; his feet seemed to become sensitive,
soft, furry, cushioned like those of a wild animal.
Then, all at once, a strange inspiration seized him.
Why not try to make his footsteps “pad”
[Page 107] like the noiseless paws
of a prairie wolf? “pad” in the little dance
he had invented, instead of “shuffling”
in his moccasins, as all the grown men did? He made
up his mind that when he was alone in his tent he would
practise it, but just now the great Squamish chief was
coming towards them with outstretched greeting hands,
and presently he was patting little Ta-la-pus on the
shoulder, and saying, “Oh, ho, my good Tillicum
Mowitch, I am glad you have brought this boy. I have
a son of the same size. They will play together, and
perhaps this Tenas Tyee (Little Chief) will dance for
me some night.”
“My brother does not dance
our tribal dances,” began Lapool, but Ta-la-pus
spoke up bravely.
“Thank you, O Great Tyee
(Chief), I shall dance when you ask me.”
His father and brother both
stared at him in amazement. Then Chief Mowitch laughed,
and said, “If he says he will dance, he will do
it. He never promises what he cannot do, but I did not
know he could do the steps. Ah! he is a little hoolool
(mouse), this boy of mine; he keeps very quiet,
and does not boast what he can do.”
Little Ta-la-pus was wonderfully
encouraged by his father’s notice of him and his
words of praise. Never before had he seemed so close
to manhood, for, being the youngest boy of the family,
he had but little companionship with any at home except
his mother and the little sisters that now seemed so
far behind him in their island home. All that evening
the old chiefs and the stalwart young braves were gravely
shaking hands with his father, his brother Lapool, and
himself, welcoming them to the great festival and saying
pleasant things about peace and brotherhood prevailing
between the various tribes instead of war and bloodshed,
as in the olden times. It was late when the great supper
of boiled salmon was over, and the immense bonfires
began to blaze on the shore where the falling tides
of the Pacific left the beaches dry and pebbly. The
young men stretched themselves on the cool [Page
108] sands, and the old men lighted their peace
pipes, and talked of the days when they hunted the mountain
sheep and black bear on these very heights overlooking
the sea. Ta-la-pus listened to everything. He could
learn so much from the older men, and hour by hour he
gained confidence. No more he thought of his dance with
fear and shyness, for all these people were kindly and
hospitable even to a boy of eleven. At midnight there
was another feast, this time of clams, and luscious
crabs, with much steaming black tea. Then came the great
Squamish chief, saying more welcoming words, and inviting
his guests to begin their tribal dances. Ta-la-pus never
forgot the brilliant sight that he looked on for the
next few hours. Scores of young men and women went through
the most graceful figures of beautiful dances, their
shell ornaments jingling merrily in perfect time to
each twist and turn of their bodies. The wild music
from the beat of Indian drums and shell “rattles”
arose weirdly, half sadly, drifting up the mountain
heights, until it lost itself in the “timber line”
of giant firs that crested the summits. The red blaze
from the camp fires flitted and flickered across the
supple figures that circled around, in and out between
the three hundred canoes beached on the sands, and the
smoke tipped tents and log lodges beyond the reach of
tide water. Above it all a million stars shone down
from the cloudless heavens of a perfect British Columbian
night. After a while little Ta-la-pus fell asleep, and
when he awoke, dawn was just breaking. Someone had covered
him with a beautiful, white, new blanket, and as his
young eyes opened they looked straight into the kindly
face of the great Squamish chief.
“We are all aweary, ‘Tenas
Tyee’ (Little Chief),” he said. The dancers
are tired, and we shall all sleep until the sun reaches
midday, but my guests cry for one more dance before
sunrise. Will you dance for us, oh, little Ta-la-pus?”
The boy sprang up, every muscle
and sinew and nerve [Page 109] on the
alert. The moment of his triumph or failure had come.
“You have made me, even
a boy like me, very welcome, O Great Tyee,” he
said, standing erect as an arrow, with his slender,
dark chin raised manfully. “I have eaten of your
kloshe muck-a-muck (very good food), and it
has made my heart and my feet very skookum
(strong). I shall do my best to dance and please you.”
The boy was already dressed in the brilliant buckskin
costume his mother had spent so many hours in making,
and his precious wolfskin was flung over his arm. The
great Squamish chief now took him by the hand and led
him towards the blazing fires round which the tired
dancers, the old men and women, sat in huge circles
where the chill of dawn could not penetrate.
“One more dance, then
we sleep,” said the chief to the great circle
of spectators. “This Tenas Tyee will do his best
to amuse us.”
Then Ta-la-pus felt the chief’s
hand unclasp, and he realized that he was standing absolutely
alone before a great crowd of strangers, and that every
eye was upon him.
“Oh, my brother,”
he whispered, smoothing the prairie wolf skin, “help
me to be like you, help me to be worthy of your name.”
Then he pulled the wolf’s head over his own, twisted
the fore legs about his throat, and stepped into the
great circle of sand between the crouching multitude
and the fires.
Stealthily he began to pick
his way in the full red flare from the flames. He heard
many voices whispering, “Tenas,” “Tenas,”
meaning “He is little, he is young,” but
his step only grew more stealthy, until he “padded”
into a strange, silent trot in exact imitation of a
prairie wolf. As he swung the second time round the
fires, his young voice arose, in a thin, wild, wonderful
barking tone, so weird and wolf-like that half the spectators
leaped up to their knees, or feet, the better to watch
and listen. [Page 110] Another moment,
and he was putting his chant into words.
“They
call me Ta-la-pus, the prairie-wolf,
And wild and free am I.
I cannot swim like Eh-ko-lie, the whale,
Nor like the eagle, Chack-chack,
can I fly.
“I
cannot talk as does the great Ty-ee,
Nor like the o-tel-agh**
shine in the sky.
I am but Ta-la-pus, the prairie-wolf,
And wild and free am I.”
With
every word, every step, he became more like the wolf
he was describing. Across his chanting and his “padding”
in the sand came murmurs from the crowd. He could hear
“Tenas, tenas,” “To-ke-tie Tenas”
(pretty boy), “Skookum-tanse,” (good strong
dance). Then at last, “Ow,” “Ow,”
meaning “Our young brother.” On and on went
Ta-la-pus. The wolf feeling crept into his legs, his
soft young feet, his clutching fingers, his wonderful
dark eyes that now gleamed red and lustrous in the firelight.
He was as one inspired, giving a beautiful and marvellous
portrait of the wild vagabonds of the plains. For fully
ten minutes he circled and sang, then suddenly crouched
on his haunches, then, lifting his head, he turned to
the east, his young throat voiced one long, strange
note, wolf-like he howled to the rising sun, which at
that moment looked over the crest of mountains, its
first golden shaft falling full upon his face.
His
chant and his strange wolf-dance were ended. Then one
loud clamor arose from the crowd. “Tenas Tyee,”
“Tenas Tyee,” they shouted, and Ta-la-pus
knew that he had not failed. But the great Squamish
chief was beside him.
“Tillicums,”††
he said, facing the crowd, “this boy has danced
no tribal dance learned from his people or his [Page
111] parents. This is his own dance, which
he has made to deserve his name. He shall get the first
gifts of our great Potlatch. Go,” he added, to
one of the young men, “bring ten dollars of the
white man’s chicamin (money), and ten
new blankets as white as that snow on the mountain top.”
The
crowd was delighted. They approved the boy and rejoiced
to see the real Potlatch was begun. When the blankets
were piled up beside him they reached to the top of
Ta-la-pus’ head. Then the chief put ten dollars
in the boy’s hand with the simple words, “I
am glad to give it. You won it well, my Tenas Tyee.”
That
was the beginning of a great week of games, feasting
and tribal dances, but not a night passed but the participants
called for the wild “wolf-dance” of the
little boy from the island. When the Potlatch was over,
old Chief Mowitch and Lapool and Ta-la-pus returned
to Vancouver Island, but no more the boy sat alone on
the isolated rock, watching the mainland through a mist
of yearning. He had set foot in the wider world, he
had won his name, and now honored it, instead of hating
it, as in the old days when his brothers taunted him,
for the great Squamish chief, in bidding good-bye to
him, had said:
“Little
Ta-la-pus, remember a name means much to a man. You
despised your name, but you have made it great and honorable
by your own act, your own courage. Keep that name honorable,
little Ta-la-pus; it will be worth far more to you than
many blankets or much of the white man’s chicamin.”
[Page 112]
*
“Potlatch” is a Chinook word meaning “a
gift.” Among the Indian tribes of British Columbia
it is used as the accepted name of a great feast, which
some Indian, who is exceedingly well off, gives to scores
of guests. He entertains them for days, sometimes for
weeks, together, presenting them with innumerable blankets
and much money, for it is part of the Indian code of
honor that, when one has great possessions, he must
divide them with his less fortunate tribesmen. The gifts
of money usually take the form of ten-dollar bank notes,
and are bestowed broadcast upon any man, woman or child
who pleases the host by either dancing the tribal dances
very beautifully, or else originates an attractive dance
of their own. [back]
† Fact. This amount
has frequently been given away. [back]
‡ The Chinook for
father and mother is “papa” and “mama,”
adopted from the English language. [back]
** Sun. [back]
†† Friends,
my people. [back]
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