Part 27 (1/2)

But even if he had known all, Multnomah would have sacrificed her His plans h her heart be crushed

Now followed the _potlatch_,--the giving of gifts At a signal from the war-chief, his slaves appeared, laden with presents Large heaps of rich furs and skins were laid on the ground near the chiefs The finest of bows and arroith gaily decorated quivers and store of bow-strings, were brought Untold treasure of _hiagua_ shells, on Indians, was poured out upon the ground, and lay glistening in the sun in bright-colored masses To the Indians they represented vast and splendid wealth Multnoifts displayed were the spoil of nty

And now they were all given away The chief kept back nothing, except some cases of oriental fabrics that had been saved from the wreck when Wallulah's mother was cast upon the shore Well would it have been for hiiven too; for, little as they dreamed it, the fate of the Willamettes lay sealed up in those unopened cases of silk and daain the slaves of Multnomah added their burdens to the heaps, and went back forthe crowd His riches seeht The chief stood up, and, opening his hands to the, said,--

”There is all that was Multnomah's; it is yours; your hands are full now and ravely and went a froua_ shells, that which he desired There was no unsee the in these gifts, but provisions--dried meats and berries, and bread of _ca theathered And unlike the ry anihter of a chief stood looking disdainfully on the food and those who snatched at it

Such giving of gifts, or _potlatches_, are still known aan, one occasionally hears of so away all his possessions, and gaining nothing but a reputation for disdain of wealth, a reputation which only Indian stoicism would crave

Multnomah's object was not that so much as to make, before the dispersal of the tribes, a last and most favorable impression

When the presents were all divided, the chiefs resumed their places to hear the last speech of Multnomah,--the speech that closed the council

It was a nity, subtility, and command The prophecy of Tohoe wrested into an omen propitious to the Willa as he wished thely did the over personality of Multnomah penetrate and sway their lesser natures He particularly dwelt on the idea that they were all knit together now and were as one race Yet through the s of the result of any revolt against his authority based on what plotting dreae,--a half-expressed leam of a sword half drawn fro that ere another spring the young ainst the Shoshones and co the hatred of the chiefs against the coreat council

In a little while the caes were being taken down, the mats that covered them rolled up and packed on the backs of horses; all was bustle and tumult Troop after troop crossed the river and took the trail toward the upper Columbia

But when the bands passed from under the personal influence of Multnos that had just happened; they said to each other that the Great Spirit had forsaken the Willaain it would be to plunder and to slay Multnomah had stayed the tide but for a moment The fall of the ancient _tonificance to the restless tributaries, and already the confederacy of the Wauna was cru like a rope of sand Those tribes would meet no more in peace on the island of council

CHAPTER III

AT THE CASCADES

Wails on the wind, fades out the sunset quite, And in ht

PHILIP BOURKE MARSTON

The main body of Snoqualmie's followers crossed to the north bank of the Colu up the river toward the inland prairies But Snoquale of the Gods There were three canoes in their train

Snoqualmie and Wallulah occupied the first; the other tere laden with the rich things that had once e so beautiful It stood all bare and deserted now, the splendor stripped froh bark walls even as love and hope had been reft from the heart of its mistress Tapestries, divans, carpets, mirrors, were heaped in the canoes like spoil torn from the enemy

The farewell between Wallulah and her father had been sorrowful It was remembered afterward, by those itnesses of it, that the war-chief had shown a tenderness unusual with hihter, and that she had clung to him, pale and tearful, as if he were her last hope on earth

When Snoqualmie took her hand to lead her away, she shuddered, withdrew her fingers from his clasp, and walked alone to the canoe

He entered after her: the canoe-lided away fro on a heap of furs, her elbows sunk in the on her hand, her eyes turned back toward her island horew ever broader, and the trail the canoe left behind it sparkled in a thousand silvery ripples The island, with its green prairies and its stately woods, receded fast She felt as she looked back as if everything was slipping away from her Lonely as her life had been before Cecil came into it, she had still had her e; and they seemed infinitely sweet and precious now as she recalled theain! And those intervieith Cecil How love and grief shook the little figure as she thought! How loathingly she shrunk from the presence of the barbarian at her side! And all the time the island receded farther and farther in the distance, and the canoe glided forward like a ery of the inland desert