Cogewea, the Half-Blood quotes

a “breed”!—the socially ostracized of two races. Her eyes of the deepest jet, sparkled, when under excitement, like the ruby’s fire. Hair of the same hue was as lustrous as the raven’s wing, falling when loose, in great billowy folds, enveloping her entire form.

Her voice was low and musical, with a laugh to madden the gods.

Cogewea’s mother had died when she was but a small child, and her father, Bertram McDonnald, had followed the gold rush to Alaska, leaving her and two sisters to be cared for by the old Indian grandmother.

Unlike other children, the repeated warnings that Sne-nah would catch her, had no effect. Contrary to all precedent, the little “breed” defied this dreaded devourer of children by extending her rambles farther and still farther into the luring wilderness.

Like some creature born of the wild, neither fancied nor actual dangers deterred her from her set course.

At last, notwithstanding her antipathy to the culture of the pale face, the aged squaw was constrained to listen to the pleadings of the good Sisters, and at the age of twelve the little “woods-savage” and her two sisters were placed in the convent school.

She had struggled hard to equip herself for a useful career, but seemingly there was but one trail for her—that of mediocrity and obscurity.

Regarded with suspicion by the Indian; shunned by the Caucasian; where was there any place for the despised breed!

The girl’s reveries were broken as the range riders burst into view over a distant swell.

“Cooking and rope-throwing!” she continued musingly. “What a combination! The connections are manifest, but what of results? A few somebody’s wild broncs corralled; the sizzle and odor of the branding iron amid the smother of alkali dust. But it is all in the game!

Life is a gamble, a chance, a mere guess.

Cast a line and reel in a splendid rainbow trout or a slippery eel. Whirl a lariat and bring up a lordly racer already branded or a scrub cayuse unclaimed. I wonder,” she concluded dramatically, “what is on the range for me?”

But what is there gained by kicking? Our trail, set and marked before our advent in life, ends with a leap into the shadowy Unknown. Accept everything as inevitable and with a brave heart.

Smile, even though there appears nothing for which to live.

Why attempt to lift the mask of existence? Surely, in time we will realize and know.

“Goodbye! Take a few hours off and let things drift till I return.

Plenty of time! The whole universe is chock full of time; with all eternity awaiting us just over the Border.

”

Cogewea would not for the world let the boys know that she was afraid. It just happened that she was never thrown in their presence and that was why she boasted about her good horsemanship, as all range riders do.

Boasting is a recognized weakness of the range.

Cogewea’s intentions were to go to the little town and get the ranch mail and return home without delay. When she reached Polson, she did not stop to visit but remounted and rode southward.

“There you go again, Jim! I have often told you to quit your lying! That is your main fault and I’m not going to hesitate telling you of it.

You are certainly entitled to the championship as the best liar this side of the Halls of Congress.

”

“Don’t Jim! Please don’t spoil everything by being foolish! I love you as a big brother and let it go at that.

Men are such irrational beings! It seems that a girl cannot be their ‘pal’ but that they take it she is hat and belt in love with them.

I hate men like that! I like those who know and understand.”

Cogewea never looked upon this trophy without a pang of regret. The fixed glassy eyes haunted her, as a ghost of the past. With her people had vanished this monarch of the plains.

The war-whoop and the thunder of the herd were alike hushed in the silence of the last sleep⁠—and only the wind sighing a parting requiem.

It was evening, and Cogewea sat at the table toying with a pencil, her writing material untouched. She was alone and her childhood days came before her like a dream-picture. How the years had flown!

Of this singular girl of mountain and plain, men might think that her heart was of the stony cast. But not so! Hers was mortal. Although a dusky maiden of a stern race, she had the feminine longing to be loved and cared for.

The inward throb can not always be determined by the degree of visible emotions; nor the coming downpour be gauged by the appearance of the storm cloud.

Cogewea was aroused from her reverie by the sound of approaching hoof-beats. The steed was reined in at the gate and she was greeted by Jim’s cheery:

“

Yes, we are between two fires, the Red and the White.

Our Caucasian brothers criticize us as a shiftless class, while the Indians disown us as abandoning our own race. We are maligned and traduced as no one but we of the despised ‘breeds’ can know.

We are maligned and traduced as no one but we of the despised ‘breeds’ can know. If permitted, I would prefer living the white man’s way to that of the reservation Indian, but he hampers me.

I appreciate my meagre education, but I will never disown my mother’s blood.

Why should I do so? Though my skin is of the tawny hue, I am not ashamed. The Great Spirit willed it so, and His ways are immutable and not to be censured.

On a farm they hire tame white men an’ sunny schoolteachers. On a ranch they have wil’ Injuns an’ wil’er range riders; all a wearin’ big hats an’ silver spurs; an’ a totin’ of a six-shooter or two, with maybe notches in th’ han’els.

It’s sho’ th’ life all right, with mos’ly b’ar steak an’ coyote dessert.

”

“Why John!” she exclaimed with well feigned surprise. “You talk just as if I were an irresponsible; a mere infant. I notice that I am as tall as my honored brother-in-law; and so far as growing up is concerned, I don’t believe in becoming old.

Only once are we young. Bask in the morning sun while the dew still sparkles, is my philosophy.

”

“

Yes! that is right, too; but frivolity and business can not be ridden with the same saddle.

You should have procured someone who knows something about breaking broncs. Why! that fellow will commit suicide rangling those wild horses. I simply leave the entire deal in your hands. Should he happen to kill himself, you will be held responsible.”

“Say, Jim! I’ll ride the Star in the squaw race,” exclaimed the girl in elation. “I’m part Injun and can participate in that as well as in the ladies’ race. They can’t stop me from riding in both races, can they?

If there’s any difference between a squaw and a lady, I want to know it. I am going to pose as both for this day.

”

A married man may dance with a maiden for friendship, and the young man may dance with a married woman for friendship. This is a ceremony of friendly good will; where all the distant tribes may meet in harmony; a peace to be regarded well.

All may dance, but it must not be mockery. It must be from the heart which should always be true.

La-siah has shown you his mind.”

“Birds and squirrels are good company.

The wild creatures are primitive and are closer the creative Spirit than we imagine.

I love them! But if they do not interest you, why don’t you talk to Stemteemä? Both of you have time to throw away. Go visit in her teepee.”

And, that a ‘hero’ should be depicted as hating his own mother for the flesh and heart that she gave his miserable frame. What a figure to be held up for laudation by either novelist or historian!

No man, whether First American, Caucasian or of any other race, could be so beastly inhuman in real life; so low and ungratefully base as to want to hide his own mother.

The lower animals respond to this instinct, and can people suppose that the Indian, who is of the heroic, has not the manhood accredited to even the most commercialized of nations?

Occasionally a local champion is found who is big enough and strong enough to defy popular sentiment and fight for us, but it is self-sacrifice. He loses social standing with his own race.

We may be too sensitive about our blood, but I often don my war bonnet and go scalp hunting.

”

But you wait and watch!” exclaimed the girl with animation. “The day will dawn when the desolate, exiled breed will come into his own; when our vaunting ‘superior’ will appreciate our worth.

Fate cannot always be against those who strive for self-elevation.

But oh! it is hard when the foot of the strong is ever on your neck. Of the hundred million composing this great Christian Nation, how few are our actual friends; working friends.

But you wait and watch!” exclaimed the girl with animation. “The day will dawn when the desolate, exiled breed will come into his own; when our vaunting ‘superior’ will appreciate our worth. Fate cannot always be against those who strive for self-elevation.

But oh! it is hard when the foot of the strong is ever on your neck.

Of the hundred million composing this great Christian Nation, how few are our actual friends; working friends. Those we have are mostly in the far East and consequently cannot know of the multitudinous wrongs which we are compelled to suffer.

“The Indian is a peculiarly mysterious race; differing from all others,” broke in Cogewea. “

We breed are half and half⁠—American and Caucasian⁠—and in a separate corral.

We are despised by both of our relatives. The white people call us ‘Injuns’ and a ‘good-for-nothing’ outfit; a ‘shiftless,’ vile class of commonalty. Our Red brothers say that we are ‘stuck-up’;

“Is the door-flap fastened that the pale face must beg like a Blackfeet slave prisoner for entrance?

None ever knocks at the teepee door. The Indian home is also the home of the peaceful stranger; nor is an enemy, when once within its walls, to be molested.

”

“Let everyone choose their own path” and live true to their own concepts; for somewhere and somehow all traits converge to but one common channel. Life, as pertaining to this existence, is a mere chance, a potential gamble. Mingled sunshine and shadow—mostly shadow.

Birdsong and wailing⁠—mostly wailing.

The finale: A leap into the dark! Impressive obsequies—provided you have left the price—and the bouquets you missed on the way.

“My grandmother,” spoke Cogewea after due silence, “do not mistrust me. I have not wronged in dealings with this Shoyahpee. I do not forget your counseling of other suns.

I will always remember and I may stumble, but I shall never fall.

”

“No! Jim! never! You must give that up. Dismiss it from your mind. I cannot love you in the light I should want to love a husband.

Too many homes are ruined; too many lives are blighted because of the lack of love at the fireside.

It is the only element which will prevent husband and wife from drifting apart. Love is essential to the perfection of every life and when denied at home, will be sought elsewhere.

It is the only element which will prevent husband and wife from drifting apart. Love is essential to the perfection of every life and when denied at home, will be sought elsewhere.

I will never marry a man unless I love him and he is of my own kind. Money will never buy me.

I’d rather die unmarried than sell myself for the glitter of gold—the gold which is so rare among my own people.”

that the deer and all game be plentiful the coming season and that the red salmon again swarm up the Swa-netk-qah. I am old and I am wondering why the salmon no longer come as when I was a child.

The stream then throbbed with the big fish.

“We have been told that it is wrong to pray to the Great Spirit as we were taught. But since we adopted prayers to the white man’s God-spirit, we have died from pestilences which he brought. Even the buffalo are no more;

“I have told you of the first pale face to come to our village and tribal grounds. The land is now all turned to the production of the white man’s food, which we must also use.

But we old people prefer our natural food; that which the earth gave us without scarring its bosom.

The deer and other game; the fish, the berries and the roots were always here; placed here for us.

exclaimed the girl in unfeigned surprise, “didn’t you see that she was in earnest? Sincerity was manifest in the telling. There are plenty of facts that are never alluded to by the recording historian. Are oral impartations of mind-stored truths to be reckoned as naught?

A fact, like the life germ of a seed, is no less a fact from having been stored for a time.

”

Snows before the Indian ever heard of the white man’s God, he firmly believed that there was a higher order—a Great Spirit—somewhere in, or towards the sky mystery. The sun and the moon, he adored as the lodges of the Supreme.

The stars were gleaming rays of hope; and throughout all nature there was a recognized governing wisdom, most reverently and devotedly worshipped.

Among the tribes there was no quarreling about creeds. Was it right to totally uproot tenets of such philosophy?”

“All philosophies,” explained Cogewea in piquant tones, “are true which trend to a betterment of earthly conditions; to a mental and moral advancement of its devotees. The term false religion is a misnomer.

A useful life has no dread of the future.

Our faith has never suffered from commercialism. What of yours? What of the salaried followers of Christ? Do you see any scourging of moneychangers from the Temple? The ambiguity of pew-rentals should be guarded against by the ‘called’ of God.

Woe! and degradation has been our heritage of the invaders’ civilization; the invader who taught that our God was a myth. His teachings and example have failed to fit us for his heaven, while they have unfitted us for our own Happy Hunting Grounds.

I am wondering if there will be any place for us in the hereafter. As a half-blood, I suppose that I will be left entirely out in the cold.

”

“It is because I prefer the Indian!” was the passionate reply. “

I have no more occasion to feel debased on account of my native blood, than pride for my heritage of foreign shame.

”

Trouble and affliction; dependency and thraldom has been your benefaction, filled with the mutterings of Sinai, and the belchings of Kilwea.

Our star has gone down in the grisly swirl of flame and blood; its ray supplanted by the hideous leer of the specter of extermination.

When you show me a solitary treaty made with us by the Government which has not wantonly been violated; when you cite an Indian war where you have not been the flagrant aggressor;

On she sped, across the big flat like a falcon loosed from bars; this free girl of the outdoors.

The wild blood of a wilder ancestry was calling, and the wine of youth was strong.

Soon, Cogewea had passed from sight and her convoy plodded gingerly on. Aggrieved, he was tempted to turn back. Had she not wilfully ran away from him? But upon reflection, he determined to continue on to the tryst.

Aside from the fierce wolf-dog, the llama of far off South America was the only quadruped of the New World that could be utilized in this respect, even had it been known to her people and its importation possible.

Charity and common sense had not marked the white man’s dealings with the various tribes.

Skilled in the art of white washing, brooded the girl, the Indian Bureau was an octopus, with life extracting tentacles reaching into every Indian reservation of the Union. A vampire!

“Aw, quit kidding! This is a time for sociability. Leave that cayuse with Wanawish, and come on my grandstand.

Help take care of this scenery. It is a bit more than one pair of optics can do with justice.

”

she questioned. “These are my prairies, my mountains, my Eden. I could live here always! I shall hate to leave them when the final summons comes. Wherever I go, I recall every outline of those embattled ranges, nor can the vision close at the grave.

When away, I grow lonesome, as a child for its mother.

I become heartsick for a sight of those snow-shrouded peaks, so rich in legendary lore.”

“Isn’t it grand?” she questioned. “

These are my prairies, my mountains, my Eden.

I could live here always! I shall hate to leave them when the final summons comes. Wherever I go, I recall every outline of those embattled ranges, nor can the vision close at the grave.

“I believe you mean well,” was the impatient reply, “and a few whites do try to uplift my race. They purpose right, but they do not understand the Indian mind; never will, it would seem.

Had a tribesman gone to your European homes with the ultimatum: ‘Desert your heavy houses; come into the open and adopt our mode of life,’ I am sure you Caucasians would have regarded him as an unreasonably brainless arrogant.

Preposterous as such analogy may be, it adequately expresses the native conception of foreign intolerance. But I suppose that what is, was to be, and we must accept the inevitable.”

This characteristic at times urges me on. I like to contend for that which I deem to be my rights.

I must go on the war path and have my say or I’ll bust!

Savey?”

“But it seems that every time I come to this butte of hidden mysteries, sympathy for my trampled race—the once dignified native American—throbs my very being.

When I remain here till nightfall, I can hear the death chant and wailing of the spirit-Indians whose bones are being disturbed by the homesteader’s plow.

I can see the teepeed villages melting before the blaze of conquest and the shattered nations sweeping desolately towards the ocean-laved portals of the sunset.”

“Ya‑a‑s!” drolled the Silent One. “He’s like them there P’ilisters, what Paul tol’ ’bout. Swat him on one jaw an’ he turns ‘tothern for yo’.’

I hater take candy from er scrapless kid; I hater scratch er bronc what has no buck.

”

“What if I am slightly educated!” came the retort with a tinge of resentment. “

The true American courses my veins and never will I cast aside my ancestral traditions.

I was born to them!”

“I would not sell myself!” was the scornful reply. “

Money cannot bring happiness. Too often its heritage is one of unfathomed misery.

”

He carried a gun and had killed a deer. He spoke with a soft voice, but the tongue was strange. His words she could not understand, but the signs he made were pleasing.

His eyes were afire with greed, but the young is ever blind.

The buttons on his capo, blazed as the sun. She brought him to the lodge of the aunt, where he left the deer as a gift and then went away.

“ ‘When I went with my white man, I felt as if I were dying. Leaving my people was harder than had I let him go back alone to his kind. Only for my children did I go. I was heartsick!

Every tree, every little bush spoke to me; every stone called to me as I passed the nooks where I had first met the Shoyahpee.

The birds sang in tones of sadness and the water’s fret was wailing. But I clung to my little ones and followed my hated husband from sundown to sundown; camping on the trail. I watched closely and learned the country as we passed.

I had long known that he was keeping me only to care for our children and not that he had love for me. I was told by the other pale face, that he had a white squaw far away, who bore him no papooses.

I had been lured from my own kind by this stranger with the voice of the wood-bird, but whose tongue, like that of the serpent, was forked and false.

“ ‘The two men kept stirring all night and it was nearly coming day before I dared move. The great dog still lay guarding me. My little papoose awoke at times, but I hushed him by taking him to breast and covering his head.

“Wisdom comes with the passing of the snows.

My head has been frosted by the breath of time. The nestling knows not the wide trails of the air.

Winged danger abounds where the hawk is abroad. The Shoyahpee women may cling to their ways. The Nation they bear speaks loudly of wrong.”

Devoted to his horse, he rode without whip or spur; and he invariably made his couch alongside of Twilight, as the great black was known. The boys declared that the Canary even shared his blanket with his dumb companion, when the nights were chilly.

Of his past life, the Canary was never known to speak; a prerogative courteously recognized in range etiquette.

Ofttimes he appeared distraught, to live over again some pathetic episode of other days. On these occasions, oblivious of his surroundings and gazing southwards, he ever sang a low, sad, childlike refrain:

But men leading the life of the range, are philosophically inclined to accept its vicissitudes along with its measurements of joy. The yesterdays, with whatever of grief and pleasure, as a trail never again to be traversed, is well forgotten.

Present duty, and the lure of the future, is Nature’s balm for the wounded spirit.

The boys were going home!

mused Bill after remaining in deep thought for some time. “Now if I’d a hit that there pore feller’s skull an’ a busted it, I’d a been hung to a tree an’ two good men, best in th’ country, a been gone for nothin’.

Guess I’ll have to jug my temper. Don’t pay havin’ it get ’way with a feller.

”

“I don’t think that he is any ipsoot kapswallie,” she laughed amusedly. “

But I will be on my guard, for I prefer giving my heart away rather than have someone sneak in and take it simply because he happens to find the latch string on the outside.

”

“

The best rider of the Flathead hunts no trouble. Neither does he run should it hunt him.

A brother is sometimes more dangerous than a lover. As a brother, I’d be a howlin’ bad actor if feelin’ called on to protect my dependent sister from a low crawlin’ puch-qeeh. Ol’ Jim would sure be locoed.”

“And sold! at thirty-eight dollars to the unidentified gentleman partner of the buckskin negligee. Here, take your property and pay the Deacon afterwards.

We trust you because we do not know you.

”

“If you were not of my own kind, I would not talk. Although the white blood has made fairer your skin, I like you and I trust you. I will tell you this story of other snows.

Troubles of the long past should be buried, but I will speak.

”

We thought that the Great Spirit was angry with us, because we had neglected worshipping Him in the way of the pale faces. It might be that He had sent the strangers to punish us in some fearful way. I was scared!

But I was a big Chief, and it is not for the chief to show fear, not even in death.

A chief must not flinch at pain or fright.

“Hardly! A visit to the cities is far preferable during the winter months.

When spring comes with its bird-carols and renewed life, I want to be in the open where God and the sunshine are in evidence.

If there is ever a season for the smothered stuffy city, it is winter; when the reek and slime is hidden by a charitable blanket of snow.

“

The wrongs of centuries stand between us!

The arrogance of a strong race in its questionable conquest of a weaker, though a heroically patriotic nation, has been all too manifest. This spirit of self-superiority is still with you in your every dealing with us.

“

Jealousy is not born of love!

” was the passionate reply. “It is a child of selfishness and distrust; a reflection on the character of the object of your presumed affections, a declaration on your part that you do not have faith, that you do not trust.

was the passionate reply. “It is a child of selfishness and distrust; a reflection on the character of the object of your presumed affections, a declaration on your part that you do not have faith, that you do not trust.

Love is confiding, divine and elevating; but like a sensitive plant, it must be cherished.

Jealousy is poison! a serpent monster, destructive alike to love, happiness and home. Love can no more survive the blighting breath of jealousy than could Pliny the sulphurous fumes of Vesuvius. You want to get that venom out of your system.”

“

Do not mention wealth! It weighs naught in the balances of actual love.

If I thought you were really sincere—that you would never tire of me, never discard me because of my Indian blood—then I might talk to you differently. I hardly understand why you want to postpone any honeymoon trip.”

I can not bear that in time he will grow tired of you and cast you aside for some pale faced squaw as the many have done in the past. Your fate would be that of my princess aunt!

A spirit weeps when a budding flower is crushed.

”

“I have consulted the spirits and I have seen in a dream that the morning of the sunlit trail my Cogewea would choose, is short and shadowy. But its evening reaches far into the wintry night of desolation, where the vision is vague.

I behold the flowers withered by a midsummer frost and the grasses scorched as by fire.

The song of the wood-bird trills on my ear with sadness and the murmur of the waters are fraught with grief. The young doe, torn by the blood appeased cougar, flees helpless and forlorn. O my grandchild!

“

The wind changes its course and the hunter must regulate his steps accordingly. The star which guides the night traveler over a strange trail must ever remain unmoved.

The mind of the Stemteemä is formed!”

He crawls in the grass with poison fangs! He lurks by the bubbling spring to strike with blight the heart of the confiding Indian maiden! He hides in the darkness to catch her unaware! He is a trapper of women!

The eagle loves the fawn because its flesh is tender! His plumage may be beautiful, but beware of the rending talons and beak!

If you marry in your own class, the mixed blood, I will gladly bless you with the Great Indian Spirit. I will divide with you my money which I am to receive from the Big White Chief for the forests belonging to my ancestors.

Perhaps she should resist this man? There still broke on her ear the snapping of the ill-omened rock at the sweat house; and the Stemteemä’s vision of the young doe was ever passing before her eyes. But not for long was she undecided.

The blood of youth is warm and love is blindly confiding.

Her answer came low and cautious, as if fearful of lurking danger.

“

The dough is my own and I think that I have the right to do with it as I please!

” was the spirited retort. “I happen to know something about your ‘preferred stock’ and—”

He may be a savage,” she continued spiritedly, “but he has a great big heart and that is a whole lot more than a goodly part of this highly civilized nation can boast.

Too many of the so-called white men are afflicted with the worst of black-heart.

”

“Your ears were closed to my words of warning,” she began, in low earnest tones. “That the snows have left my hair withered, does not bespeak a tottering mind or that the vision is less clear.

The white man’s books I know not, but the wisdom of the spirits has been given me.

Walking where there is light, I stumble not in the dark. I understand the good and the bad as traced on the face of every man. Words are written on the brow, in the eye and the heart speaks in actions. Mistakes are of youth;

The white man’s books I know not, but the wisdom of the spirits has been given me. Walking where there is light, I stumble not in the dark. I understand the good and the bad as traced on the face of every man.

Words are written on the brow, in the eye and the heart speaks in actions.

Mistakes are of youth; judgment comes with the snows.

Walking where there is light, I stumble not in the dark. I understand the good and the bad as traced on the face of every man. Words are written on the brow, in the eye and the heart speaks in actions.

Mistakes are of youth; judgment comes with the snows.

“I warned you of this Shoyahpee, but you laughed at my words. You left them by the trail as things to be forgotten and lost. But they can not die! That which is true lives forever, but that which is false has no foundation.

“Your ears were closed to my words of warning,” she began, in low earnest tones. “

That the snows have left my hair withered, does not bespeak a tottering mind or that the vision is less clear.

The white man’s books I know not, but the wisdom of the spirits has been given me. Walking where there is light, I stumble not in the dark. I understand the good and the bad as traced on the face of every man.

“I warned you of this Shoyahpee, but you laughed at my words. You left them by the trail as things to be forgotten and lost. But they can not die!

That which is true lives forever, but that which is false has no foundation.

The pale face has at last been found out. He has never meant right by my grandchild! He only seeks the money which she has not.

while the buttercups flowered in radiance. The wild rose peeped coquettishly from its bud, and the tender grass clothed plain and upland with shimmering green.

The ermine cloak of winter, pursued by the melting breeze, retreated still farther into the higher altitudes of the majestic Rockies.

Earth was taking on new life and the joy of living seemed with all—save one whose heart was emptiness—whose face was but a reflection of her former self.

“It was all right!” Cogewea rejoined smiling, although her eyes were swimming in tears. “I don’t know that I care! The curse of the Shoyahpee seems to go with everything that he touches.

We despised breeds are in a zone of our own and when we break from the corral erected about us we meet up with trouble.

I only wish that the fence could not be scaled by the soulless creatures who have ever preyed upon us.”