Part XIV: Picture-Writing
- In those days said Hiawatha,
- "Lo! how all things fade and perish!
- From the memory of the old men
- Pass away the great traditions,
- The achievements of the warriors,
- The adventures of the hunters,
- All the wisdom of the Medas,
- All the craft of the Wabenos,
- All the marvellous dreams and visions
- Of the Jossakeeds, the Prophets!
- "Great men die and are forgotten,
- Wise men speak; their words of wisdom
- Perish in the ears that hear them,
- Do not reach the generations
- That, as yet unborn, are waiting
- In the great, mysterious darkness
- Of the speechless days that shall be!
- "On the grave-posts of our fathers
- Are no signs, no figures painted;
- Who are in those graves we know not,
- Only know they are our fathers.
- Of what kith they are and kindred,
- From what old, ancestral Totem,
- Be it Eagle, Bear, or Beaver,
- They descended, this we know not,
- Only know they are our fathers.
- "Face to face we speak together,
- But we cannot speak when absent,
- Cannot send our voices from us
- To the friends that dwell afar off;
- Cannot send a secret message,
- But the bearer learns our secret,
- May pervert it, may betray it,
- May reveal it unto others."
- Thus said Hiawatha, walking
- In the solitary forest,
- Pondering, musing in the forest,
- On the welfare of his people.
- From his pouch he took his colors,
- Took his paints of different colors,
- On the smooth bark of a birch-tree
- Painted many shapes and figures,
- Wonderful and mystic figures,
- And each figure had a meaning,
- Each some word or thought suggested.
- Gitche Manito the Mighty,
- He, the Master of Life, was painted
- As an egg, with points projecting
- To the four winds of the heavens.
- Everywhere is the Great Spirit,
- Was the meaning of this symbol.
- Gitche Manito the Mighty,
- He the dreadful Spirit of Evil,
- As a serpent was depicted,
- As Kenabeek, the great serpent.
- Very crafty, very cunning,
- Is the creeping Spirit of Evil,
- Was the meaning of this symbol.
- Life and Death he drew as circles,
- Life was white, but Death was darkened;
- Sun and moon and stars he painted,
- Man and beast, and fish and reptile,
- Forests, mountains, lakes, and rivers.
- For the earth he drew a straight line,
- For the sky a bow above it;
- White the space between for daytime,
- Filled with little stars for night-time;
- On the left a point for sunrise,
- On the right a point for sunset,
- On the top a point for noontide,
- And for rain and cloudy weather
- Waving lines descending from it.
- Footprints pointing towards a wigwam
- Were a sign of invitation,
- Were a sign of guests assembling;
- Bloody hands with palms uplifted
- Were a symbol of destruction,
- Were a hostile sign and symbol.
- All these things did Hiawatha
- Show unto his wondering people,
- And interpreted their meaning,
- And he said: "Behold, your grave-posts
- Have no mark, no sign, nor symbol,
- Go and paint them all with figures;
- Each one with its household symbol,
- With its own ancestral Totem;
- So that those who follow after
- May distinguish them and know them."
- And they painted on the grave-posts
- On the graves yet unforgotten,
- Each his own ancestral Totem,
- Each the symbol of his household;
- Figures of the Bear and Reindeer,
- Of the Turtle, Crane, and Beaver,
- Each inverted as a token
- That the owner was departed,
- That the chief who bore the symbol
- Lay beneath in dust and ashes.
- And the Jossakeeds, the Prophets,
- The Wabenos, the Magicians,
- And the Medicine-men, the Medas,
- Painted upon bark and deer-skin
- Figures for the songs they chanted,
- For each song a separate symbol,
- Figures mystical and awful,
- Figures strange and brightly colored;
- And each figure had its meaning,
- Each some magic song suggested.
- The Great Spirit, the Creator,
- Flashing light through all the heaven;
- The Great Serpent, the Kenabeek,
- With his bloody crest erected,
- Creeping, looking into heaven;
- In the sky the sun, that listens,
- And the moon eclipsed and dying;
- Owl and eagle, crane and hen-hawk,
- And the cormorant, bird of magic;
- Headless men, that walk the heavens,
- Bodies lying pierced with arrows,
- Bloody hands of death uplifted,
- Flags on graves, and great war-captains
- Grasping both the earth and heaven!
- Such as these the shapes they painted
- On the birch-bark and the deer-skin;
- Songs of war and songs of hunting,
- Songs of medicine and of magic,
- All were written in these figures,
- For each figure had its meaning,
- Each its separate song recorded.
- Nor forgotten was the Love-Song,
- The most subtle of all medicines,
- The most potent spell of magic,
- Dangerous more than war or hunting!
- Thus the Love-Song was recorded,
- Symbol and interpretation.
- First a human figure standing,
- Painted in the brightest scarlet;
- `T Is the lover, the musician,
- And the meaning is, "My painting
- Makes me powerful over others."
- Then the figure seated, singing,
- Playing on a drum of magic,
- And the interpretation, "Listen!
- `T Is my voice you hear, my singing!"
- Then the same red figure seated
- In the shelter of a wigwam,
- And the meaning of the symbol,
- "I will come and sit beside you
- In the mystery of my passion!"
- Then two figures, man and woman,
- Standing hand in hand together
- With their hands so clasped together
- That they seemed in one united,
- And the words thus represented
- Are, "I see your heart within you,
- And your cheeks are red with blushes!"
- Next the maiden on an island,
- In the centre of an Island;
- And the song this shape suggested
- Was, "Though you were at a distance,
- Were upon some far-off island,
- Such the spell I cast upon you,
- Such the magic power of passion,
- I could straightway draw you to me!"
- Then the figure of the maiden
- Sleeping, and the lover near her,
- Whispering to her in her slumbers,
- Saying, "Though you were far from me
- In the land of Sleep and Silence,
- Still the voice of love would reach you!"
- And the last of all the figures
- Was a heart within a circle,
- Drawn within a magic circle;
- And the image had this meaning:
- "Naked lies your heart before me,
- To your naked heart I whisper!"
- Thus it was that Hiawatha,
- In his wisdom, taught the people
- All the mysteries of painting,
- All the art of Picture-Writing,
- On the smooth bark of the birch-tree,
- On the white skin of the reindeer,
- On the grave-posts of the village.
B A C K | F O R W A R D
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