"My heart was filled with joy as I listened to his words, and I longed for the coming of Apauakas. The chief had risen as he thus spoke kindly to me, but was silent. He struggled to control his emotions, then leaning forward and gazing earnestly into my face he said slowly:
"'Young man, the white tribe has come, the prophecy is fulfilled. All over the prairie the men and women of the white tribe are building their lodges. The buffalo have fled before their presence, disease and death have spread desolation among our camps. The land of our fathers has been taken from us, the Indian race is doomed to depart before the feet of the white stranger and we dwell in the land of an enemy. Would that I had died before I had seen this hour; I had then been spared the pain and anguish that have fallen upon us.'
"As he ceased, smitten with sorrow and anger, I laid my hand upon my knife, determined to depart and slay the oppressor or drive him from the land. But the chief spoke again.
"'I am not done,' he said. 'When I think of the happy days enjoyed by my people I am silent, though the warm blood coursing through my veins makes it hard to restrain my anger. One day as we sat in our lodges nursing our sick in sadness, while the medicine-men beat their drums and prayed, there came to our camp from the lodges of the white tribe a pale-faced man. He could not speak our language, but he made signs that he wished to live with us. We suffered him to stay, and gave him a share of our scanty food.
"'Every morning and evening he knelt upon the ground and prayed. We knew not what he said, for his tongue was strange to us. He helped the men and women at their work, played with the children, and nursed the sick. He learned our language quickly, and then he began to tell us of a Great Teacher who had come to bless all people.
"'He held in his hand pieces of bark of a kind we knew not. They were fastened together and had writing on them that was not like the writing upon our lodges. These he held reverently, for he said it was "the writing sent by the Great Spirit to his children."
"'Day by day we gathered in the lodges or under the shade of the trees, and listened to the holy man as he sang sweet songs and taught them to us in our native tongue. He prayed and the sick were healed. He struck the ground, poured water upon it, and food came out of it for young and old.