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Show 230 TilE I.ILY AND TITF. TOTEM. hair, of wl1ich, ns a Christian man, J have always mndo too much account. All of us did he assign to bbor; to tlw gatlJcz·ing of wood,and work in the mai:-:o fields, with the women. By-and-by, there came a preference for me beyond the others. 1 was brought into the king's household, and barbed his arrows, and wrougl1t upon his great macauas, and strove, among the Indians, in hewing out l1is canoes from tho cypress, first burning out the greater core with fire. lJut when harvest time came, a grcn.~ festivity was held among the savages. Bitter J'Oots were gttlhcrcd in the woods, and great vessels of the beverage which was made thereof, was placed witl1in the council or rounrl -housc of the nation. Thither did the chiefs resort and drink i and ever as they drank they danced, though the liquor wrought upon them like aguardieute with the European, ::md 1110\'ed tiJCm even as the most violent of emetic medicines. Still danced they, and still they danced for the space of three whole days.-But the lord of Calos seemed not to mingle at tl1is strange festi\·al. lie purposed rites still more strange-rites, which even now, I think upon with horror only. He had a dwelling to himsrlf in the dclCp woods, wl1ithcr }1c retired the night before the day when the great feast of the nation was to begin. Here he waited all the night, watching with reverence aud patience the burning of a strang:! fire which had been wrought of u1any curious and fragrant herbs and roots. Three of the ancient people, the p•·it:sts or J:rwas, as they style themselves, retired with him to build this fire, which, when it began to burn, placing in store a sufficient supply of aromatic fu C'l that bo might feed it still, th('y left Lim, with strange exorcisi ng, to himself. And there he kept watch throughout the night. But early with the next morning he cnnHl forth, and he sprinkled tho nsl1es of the fire upon the maize field, and he cried thrice, with a TilE ADVENTURF. OF LE BARBU. 231 loud \'oice, of Yo·ha-wah, which, I believe to mean the sacred name as known among the red-men. \Vith eneh cry, as our poor Spaniards, myself among them, were gathering tlJC green car11 from the maize stalks, the priests who followed the king of Calos, seized bodily upon three of our brethren, taking us by surprise, and putting us all- in a quaking fea1·. These three were all brought before the lord of Cnlos, who, not looking upon them n.s they lay bound a~ his feet, threw yet another vessel of sacred ashes into the air, and as these three Spaniards lay separate, with their faces looking up, I beheld the ashes !iink immedi:ttely upon the breast of him whom 1 ha\'e already named to you-tho Jonas by whom our vessel was doomed to wreck-tho cruel Don Juan de 1\'fores y Silva. Now, though the king surely looked not as he threw the ashes into the air, yet did it descend upon th:l breast of this saiJ Spaniard, as certainly as if tho eye and arm of this lord had been upon this particular person at the moment when ho tltrew. Verily 1 though 1 know not well how it should be-being counselled by Holy Church against such belief-yet., verily, l1nd tl1is lord of Calos certain powers which did seem to justify the saying among his people, that ho was a master of magic and of arts superior to those of common men. "Now, when tha lawns, or priests, beheld whero tho ashes fell, they seized incontiucnlly upon the Spaniard aforesaid. They Lore him away from us, wondering and fearing all tlw while. But those wlw remained loosed the other two who bad been bound, and they were set f•·ee with the rest , to pursue their labors in lhc corn-field. But we were not let to know the awful fate \Vhich befel the Spaniard who was taken. Verily, he saw his danger iu the moment when tl1e ashes lighted on his breast. His face was whiter than the blossom of the dogwood when it first |
