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386 Written lor Burke’s Weekly. To a Father Bereaved. task is done: so let the sun Through all its summer-cycle, run. The seed is in the ground: resign The rest'to better care than thine. That watulyj** ere Eden’s glory And sprfiti' l :s A his last mound with dew. . Guiding the cloudlet from the deep, He biddeth His beloved, Sleep! In foretaste, ere thy labors cease, Os yonder great white harvest, Peace. i— —•» Written for Burke’s Weekly SAL-O-QUAH ; OK, r Boy-Life Among the Indians 3Y REV. F. R. GOULDING, Author of “Young Marooner'sf “ Marooncr's Islandetc. CHAPTER XLI. YELLOW-JACKETS LORENZO’S SCARE PREPARING TO TRAVEL —VISIT TO SCOS SIT-EQUAH —HOMINY MORTAR AND PES TLE —CONNAHAYNEE —S EE-QUO-I.AH AGAIN. M - ANEEKA’S account of the /fjjrD pursuit and capture of the murderer has been given con tinuously in the preceding chapter, in order to present the story whole and entire, although in so doing we outrun several little incidents that occurred be fore his- return. These incidents are very trivial in themselves, but they are so fresh in memory and rise so constant ly to mind that I pin them down here to get rid of them. Scossit-efuah had come that morning on some business with Kaneeka, and had brought as a present to us an earth en jar of wild honey, beautifully white and delightfully fragrant. We enjoyed it much. There is, however, an old proverb, more true in former days than at present, yet painfully true in respect to our honey—“ No rose without a thorn;” for scarcely had the honey been shared among us before we were surrounded with yellow-jackets,* that hovered greedily over the jar, plunged into our saucers, alighted on our fin gers, and persistently followed the hon ey to our very lips. We bore with them patiently as possible, knowing that wasps and even hornets will seldom use their stings unless first assailed. But their numbers and insolence were such that it was useless to think of keeping the peace if we kept at the same time our honey. All of us were stung, some of us several times, and so painfully that we resolved at once upon a war of extermination, by every means we could * A small species of wasp, prettily belted with black and yellow. BURKE’S WEEKLY FOR BOYS AND GIRLS. devise. While we were thus engaged, Saloquah came in and said : “ Must be big nest of them close by. I go find it.” We insisted that he should first par take with us in the pleasure of the hon ey, and in the danger of being stung. The last of these he professed to disre gard, saying: “ Yellow-jacket never sting me, or if sting, I don’t care.” Vain boast! for in the act of carrying the first mouthful to his lips a yellow jacket, concealed under the honey comb, was carried there too, and gave him such a sting that he started with the pain, and said : “Ugh! hurt like a hornet!” Before leaving the tent, his stung lip looked more like a fat sausage than the well-turned labial he was accustomed to wear. “ Pay him for this!” said he, in pre tended wrath, pushing out his swollen lip so as to make it appear awfully big. “Kill the whole nest of them to pay for this sting. Come let us go. I show you how to find the nest.” He first went to the house and brought thence a sparrow’s skin, from which he plucked a small feather, stuck it in the abdomen of a yellow-jacket, and turned it loose. The poor wretch, conscious, no doubt, of having received its death wound, made directly for its home to die amid its kin. Saloquah followed, as far as he could see the feather, then treated another yellow-jacket the same way. We were soon broaglit to a de cayed stump, at the foot of which there was a small hole with a swarm of these insects coming out or going in, and hov ering above. “ Must have fire now,” said he, giv ing his hatchet to Lorenzo and myself, and adding: “You get some light wood.” He ran to the house, brought back a live coal, and in the course of a few minutes there was a bright flame as cending from a fire so near the hole that every yellow-jacket that attempted to come out or go in fell wingless to the ground. There, in great numbers, they crawled about in helpless rage. The fire was kept up as long as there were any to be seen flying. On returning to the tent and reporting the success of our foray, Cousin Aleck said : “ I suppose it was nothing but just in you, Saloquah, to murder that poor yellow-jacket by sticking a feather into its body ; but in bee-hunting there is a better-looking plan, by tying a small feather or thistle down to its leg, or at taching it to the bees back by means of a little honey.” “ Look better for bee ,” returned Sal oquah very meekly ; “ but,” he added, with a laugh, pushing out his swollen under lip, “ my plan good enough for yellow-jacket.” At midday, a circumstance of rather unusual character occurred to Lorenzo. Not feeling well, he had gone to his mother’s room to lie down, and after a refreshing nap was suddenly aroused by a peculiar sputtering sound at the head of his bed. On looking up he saw a head with horns, and two great staring eyes, surmounting a long hooked nose. As his eyes had been turned to it back wards from his pillow, he was not able at first to judge of its size or distance, and fancied it something big as a pan ther, and fierce enough to destroy him. Lorenzo was a brave boy, and seldom knew fear, but this was one of the times, he said, when he felt the hair rise on his head. He sprang up with a bound, and was about to rush from the room when he saw that his visitor was only an enormous horned owl, perched on the head-board of the bed. He turned back on discovering this, and tried to drive it out by “shoo”-ing at it. In stead of going, however, the intruder only ruffled its feathers and began spit ting and sputtering as before. Looking around now for a stick with which to kill it, and finding none, he came to the door and hallooed to me: “ Johnny, come here! Come quick! I’ll show you a sight.” I answered the call with alacrity, and found that the owl, not at all disposed to give up its comfortable quarteis, nor even content with its former perch, had flown farther into the room, and taken its place upon the shelf where my aunt’s maid kept her clothes. We placed our selves between it and the window, pre pared with sticks to kill it as it flew past; then tried to start it from its roost. But there it remained, making the same noises and motions as before, until Lorenzo approached near enough to kill it by a deliberate blow upon its neck. It was a magnificent bird for one of its ill-omened tribe, richly marked with stripes of black and brown, and meas uring nearly three feet from the tip of its wings. What could have prompted it to this strange freak I cannot conjec ture even to this day. I describe the scene just as it occurred, and leave it without further remark. Our time had passed so pleasantly and so rapidly at Ivaneeka’s, amid the ever-varying scenes of this wild Indian country, that it was with mingled feel ings of regret and pleasure we heard our seniors speak that day of termina ting our sojourn, and going early next week forty or fifty miles into the interi or, to visit a celebrated cave and the country surrounding. The time fixed for our departure was Monday, only two days distant, and we began at once to make preparation ; but the plan was partly interrupted by the occurrence of an event rather rare at that time in Cherokee history, and too important as a feature in Indian life for us to neglect, It was a public election. Like all other public acts of that sim ple-minded people, its execution was marked with great promptness. A coun- cil of chiefs and leading men had been held during our visit to the “ Rock Mountain,” who decided that anew chiet must be elected for this neighbor hood, to fill the place of one who had recently emigrated to Arkansas, and the day of the next full moon was set apart for the purpose. That was Monday, July Ist, and Scossit-equah’s business that morning was to inform Kaneeka of the fact, and through him to invite our attendance. The day was the same we had set for our departure ; but, of course, on such an occasion, we prefer red to alter our plans. Next morning early we mounted our horses and went on a farewell visit to Scossity’s, intending also to call on See quo-lah, if there was reason to suppose we should be welcome. On arriving at Scossit-equah’s door we found it closed, but there was no shinned pole leaning against it, as on a former occasion ; on the contrary, there was the smoke of a recent cooking-fire ascending from a spot a few steps off, and Kaneeka remarked, in view of these signs : “ Scossity say, Take seat; lie’ll bo here soon.” We “ hitched ” our horses by making their bridles fast to one-another—for there were no bushes nor small trees near at hand—and found seats for our selves on logs and large stones outside the door. While our seniors were en gaged in conversation, we boys made the circuit of the premises, but discov ered nothing except a mortar and pes tle, for beating hominy, and a scaffold of small sticks, with ashes lying below, which Saloquah informed us was a place for “jerking” venison, or drying it by the combined influence of sun and smoke. The mortar was a block about two feet high, slightly scooped, and hav ing in its centre a hole about two inches wide and three inches deep. The pes tle was the counterpart of an ordinary maul for splitting logs, of which the small end was nicely rounded, and had the marks of being the part used for pounding. The corn, softened by par boiling, was introduced into this cavity a little at a time, beaten then to a cream like paste, then returned to the pot and boiled with beans. Thus prepared, it was called Connahaynee , and was the standing dish of the nation. It was usually kept in a large earthen jar, ready for use, and was thence dipped and drunk like thick gruel. The flavor was sometimes varied by the admixture of meat. We had not been seated many min utes after this exploring expedition be fore Kaneeka raised his head, looked in a certain direction and exchanged a significant glance with Saloquah; im mediately after which Scossity appear ed, striding through the woods from an unexpected quarter. Our two red friends had caught the sound of ap proaching footsteps, and been assured