In The Boyhood of Lincoln Part 39

"Do the same, and follow me."

The horse seemed maddened again. It flew toward the fire as if drawn by a spell, and plunged into it like a bather into the sea. Waubeno tried to deaden the fire in the whole circle. Round and round the island he rode, in the tide of the advancing flames. The people understood his method now, and the men secured new hides and attached them to horses, and followed him. He led them, crying and waving his hands. Round and round he led them, round and round, and where they rode the white smoke changed into black smoke and the fire died.

The people secured raw hides by killing the poor cattle, and came out to the verge of the fiery sea and checked the progress of the flames in places. In the midst of the excitement a roll of thunder was heard in the sky.

"'Tis the trumpet of doom," said the old Millerite.

The people heard it with terror, and yet with hope. It might be an approaching shower. If it were, they were saved.

The fire in front of them was checked. Not the great sea, but the current that was rolling toward the island grove. The fire at the north was rus.h.i.+ng forward, but it moved backward toward the place slowly. The women began to soak blankets and clothing in water, and so prepared to help the men fight the flames. An hour pa.s.sed. In the midst of the crisis the riding men, the hurrying women, the encircling fire, the billows of smoke, a flame came zigzagging down from the sky. The people stood still. Had the last day indeed come?

Then followed a crash of thunder that shook the earth. The people fell upon their knees. The sky darkened, and great drops of rain began to fall.

Waubeno had checked the current of the flame that would have destroyed the settlement in an hour, and had taught the men how to arrest an advancing tide of flame. The people began to have hope. All was now activity on the part of the people. Smoke filled the sky.

"There is a cloud above the smoke," said many. "G.o.d will save us all."

Waubeno came flying back again to the grove.

"It thunders," he cried. "The Rain-G.o.d is coming. If I can keep back the fire an hour, the Rain-G.o.d will come. Hides! hides! Quick, more hides! Ho! ho!"

New hides were provided, and he swept forth again.

The island grove was now like a vast oven. The air was stifling. The animals laid down and rolled their tongues from their mouths. But the fire in front did not advance. It seemed deadened. The river of flame forked and ran in other directions, but it was stayed in front of the grove, houses, corn-fields, and stacks, and it was the hand that had set flames that had broken its force in the road to the settlements.

There were sudden dashes of rain, and the smoke turned into blackness everywhere. Another flash of lightning smote the gloom, followed by a rattling of thunder that seemed as if the spirit of the storm was driving his chariot through the air. Then it poured as though a lake was coming down. In an hour the fire was dead. The cloud parted, the slanting sun came out, revealing a prairie as black as ink.

The people fled to the shelter of the houses and sheds at the approach of the rain. The animals crowded under the trees, and the birds hid in the boughs. After the rain-burst the people gathered together again, and each one asked:

"Where is the Indian boy?"

He was not among them.

Had he perished?

A red sunset flamed over the prairies and the birds filled the tree-tops with the gladness of song. It seemed to all as if the earth and sky had come back again.

In the glare of the sunset-fire a horse and rider were seen slowly approaching the island grove.

"It is Waubeno," said one to the other. "The horse is disabled."

The people went out to meet the Indian boy. The horse was burned and blind, and staggered as he came on. And the rider! He had drawn the flames into his vitals; he had been internally burned, and was dying.

He reeled from his blind horse, and fell before the people. Jasper laid his hand upon him.

"Father, I have drunk the cup of fire. I have kept my promise. I am about to die. The birds are happy. They are singing the death-song of Waubeno."

His flesh quivered as he lay there, and Jasper bent over him in pity.

"Waubeno, do you suffer?"

"The stars do not complain, white brother. The clouded sun does not complain. The winds complain, and the waters, and women and children.

Waubeno does not complain."

A spasm shook his frame. It pa.s.sed.

"White brother, go beyond the Mississippi and teach my people. You do pity them. This was once their paradise. They loved it. They struggled.

Go to them with the Book of G.o.d."

"Waubeno, I will go."

"The sun sets over the Mississippi. 'Tis sunset there. You will go to the land of the sunset?"

"Yes, Waubeno. I feel in my heart the call to go. I love and pity your people."

"Pour water upon me; I am burning. I shall go when the moon comes up, when the moon comes up into the shady sky. My father suffered, but he did not complain. Waubeno does not complain. Don't pity me. Pity my poor people. I love my people. Teach my people, and cover me forever with a blanket of the earth."

He lay on the cool gra.s.s under the trees for several hours in terrible agony, and the people watched by his side.

"When the moon rises," he said, "I shall go. I shall never see the Red Man's Paradise again. Tell me when the moon rises. I am going to sleep now."

The great moon rose at last, its disk hanging like a wheel of dead gold on the verge of the horizon in the smoky air.

"Waubeno," said Jasper, "the moon is rising."

He opened his eyes, and said:

"We kindled the fire for our fathers' sake, and I smote it for him who protected Main-Pogue. What was his name, father? Say it to me."

"Lincoln."

"Yes, Lincoln. He had come for revenge, but he did what was right. He forgave. I forgive everybody. I drank the fire for Lincoln's sake."

The moon burned along the sky; the stars came out; and at midnight all was still. Waubeno lay dead under the trees, and the people with timid steps vanished hither and thither into the cabins and sheds.

They killed the poor blind horse in the morning, and laid Waubeno to rest in a blanket, in a grave under the trees.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LINCOLN FAMILY RECORD,

Written by Abraham Lincoln in his Father's Bible.

_From original in possession of C. F. Gunther, Esq., Chicago._]

CHAPTER XXIV.

"OUR LINCOLN IS THE MAN."