Chapter 2

In 1906 she returned to England, and made her first appearance in Steinway Hall, under the distinguished patronage of Lord and Lady Strathcona, to whom she carried letters of introduction from the Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier, Prime Minister of Canada. On this occasion she was accompanied by Mr. Walter McRaye, who added greatly to the Canadian interest of the programme by his inimitable renditions of Dr. Drummond's Habitant poems.

The following year she again visited London, returning by way of the United States, where she and Mr. McRaye were engaged by the American Chautauquas for a series of recitals covering eight weeks, during which time they went as far as Boulder, Colorado. Then, after one more tour of Canada, she decided to give up public work, settle down in the city of her choice, Vancouver, British Columbia, and devote herself to literature only.

Only a woman of tremendous powers of endurance could have borne up under the hardships necessarily encountered in travelling through North-Western Canada in pioneer days as Miss Johnson did; and shortly after settling down in Vancouver the exposure and hardship she had endured began to tell upon her, and her health completely broke down. For more than a year she has been an invalid; and as she was not able to attend to the business herself, a trust was formed by some of the leading citizens of her adopted city for the purpose of collecting, and publishing for her benefit, her later works. Among these is a number of beautiful Indian legends which she has been at great pains to collect; and a splendid series of boys' stories, which were exceedingly well received when they ran recently in an American boys' magazine.

During the sixteen years Miss Johnson was travelling she had many varied and interesting experiences. She has driven up the old Battleford trail before the railroad went through, and across the Boundary country in British Columbia in the romantic days of the early pioneers; and once she took an 850-mile drive up the Cariboo trail to the gold-fields. She was always an ardent canoeist, ran many strange rivers, crossed many a lonely lake, and camped in many an unfrequented place. These venturous trips she took more from her inherent love of nature and of adventure than from any necessity of her profession.

After an illness of two years' duration Miss Johnson died in Vancouver on March 7, 1913. The heroic spirit in which she endured long months of suffering is expressed in her poem entitled "And He Said 'Fight On'" which she wrote after she was informed by her physician that her illness would prove fatal.

Time and its ally, Dark Disarmament Have compassed me about; Have massed their armies, and on battle bent My forces put to rout, But though I fight alone, and fall, and die, Talk terms of Peace? Not I.

It is eminently fitting that this daughter of Nature should have been laid to rest in no urban cemetery. According to her own request she was buried in Stanley Park, Vancouver's beautiful heritage of the forest primeval. A simple stone surrounded by rustic palings marks her grave and on this stone is carved the one word "Pauline." There she lies among ferns and wild flowers a short distance from Siwash Rock, the story of which she has recorded in the legends of her race. In time to come a pathway to her grave will be worn by lovers of Canadian poetry who will regard it as one of the most romantic of our literary shrines.

THE WHITE WAMPUM

(The following poems are from the author's first book, "The White Wampum," first published in 1895.)

OJISTOH

I am Ojistoh, I am she, the wife Of him whose name breathes bravery and life And courage to the tribe that calls him chief. I am Ojistoh, his white star, and he Is land, and lake, and sky--and soul to me.

Ah! but they hated him, those Huron braves, Him who had flung their warriors into graves, Him who had crushed them underneath his heel, Whose arm was iron, and whose heart was steel To all--save me, Ojistoh, chosen wife Of my great Mohawk, white star of his life.

Ah! but they hated him, and councilled long With subtle witchcraft how to work him wrong; How to avenge their dead, and strike him where His pride was highest, and his fame most fair. Their hearts grew weak as women at his name: They dared no war-path since my Mohawk came With ashen bow, and flinten arrow-head To pierce their craven bodies; but their dead Must be avenged. Avenged? They dared not walk In day and meet his deadly tomahawk; They dared not face his fearless scalping knife; So--Niyoh![1]--then they thought of me, his wife.

O! evil, evil face of them they sent With evil Huron speech: "Would I consent To take of wealth? be queen of all their tribe? Have wampum ermine?" Back I flung the bribe Into their teeth, and said, "While I have life Know this--Ojistoh is the Mohawk's wife."

Wah! how we struggled! But their arms were strong. They flung me on their pony's back, with thong Round ankle, wrist, and shoulder. Then upleapt The one I hated most: his eye he swept Over my misery, and sneering said, "Thus, fair Ojistoh, we avenge our dead."

And we two rode, rode as a sea wind-chased, I, bound with buckskin to his hated waist, He, sneering, laughing, jeering, while he lashed The horse to foam, as on and on we dashed. Plunging through creek and river, bush and trail, On, on we galloped like a northern gale. At last, his distant Huron fires aflame We saw, and nearer, nearer still we came.

I, bound behind him in the captive's place, Scarcely could see the outline of his face. I smiled, and laid my cheek against his back: "Loose thou my hands," I said. "This pace let slack. Forget we now that thou and I are foes. I like thee well, and wish to clasp thee close; I like the courage of thine eye and brow; I like thee better than my Mohawk now."

He cut the cords; we ceased our maddened haste I wound my arms about his tawny waist; My hand crept up the buckskin of his belt; His knife hilt in my burning palm I felt; One hand caressed his cheek, the other drew The weapon softly--"I love you, love you," I whispered, "love you as my life." And--buried in his back his scalping knife.

Ha! how I rode, rode as a sea wind-chased, Mad with sudden freedom, mad with haste, Back to my Mohawk and my home. I lashed That horse to foam, as on and on I dashed. Plunging thro' creek and river, bush and trail, On, on I galloped like a northern gale. And then my distant Mohawk's fires aflame I saw, as nearer, nearer still I came, My hands all wet, stained with a life's red dye, But pure my soul, pure as those stars on high-- "My Mohawk's pure white star, Ojistoh, still am I."

[1] God, in the Mohawk language.

AS RED MEN DIE

Captive! Is there a hell to him like this? A taunt more galling than the Huron's hiss? He--proud and scornful, he--who laughed at law, He--scion of the deadly Iroquois, He--the bloodthirsty, he--the Mohawk chief, He--who despises pain and sneers at grief, Here in the hated Huron's vicious clutch, That even captive he disdains to touch!

Captive! But _never_ conquered; Mohawk brave Stoops not to be to _any_ man a slave; Least, to the puny tribe his soul abhors, The tribe whose wigwams sprinkle Simcoe's shores. With scowling brow he stands and courage high, Watching with haughty and defiant eye His captors, as they council o'er his fate, Or strive his boldness to intimidate. Then fling they unto him the choice;

"Wilt thou Walk o'er the bed of fire that waits thee now-- Walk with uncovered feet upon the coals, Until thou reach the ghostly Land of Souls, And, with thy Mohawk death-song please our ear? Or wilt thou with the women rest thee here?" His eyes flash like an eagle's, and his hands Clench at the insult. Like a god he stands. "Prepare the fire!" he scornfully demands.

He knoweth not that this same jeering band Will bite the dust--will lick the Mohawk's hand; Will kneel and cower at the Mohawk's feet; Will shrink when Mohawk war drums wildly beat.

His death will be avenged with hideous hate By Iroquois, swift to annihilate His vile detested captors, that now flaunt Their war clubs in his face with sneer and taunt, Not thinking, soon that reeking, red, and raw, Their scalps will deck the belts of Iroquois.

The path of coals outstretches, white with heat, A forest fir's length--ready for his feet. Unflinching as a rock he steps along The burning mass, and sings his wild war song; Sings, as he sang when once he used to roam Throughout the forests of his southern home, Where, down the Genesee, the water roars, Where gentle Mohawk purls between its shores, Songs, that of exploit and of prowess tell; Songs of the Iroquois invincible.

Up the long trail of fire he boasting goes, Dancing a war dance to defy his foes. His flesh is scorched, his muscles burn and shrink, But still he dances to death's awful brink.

The eagle plume that crests his haughty head Will _never_ droop until his heart be dead. Slower and slower yet his footstep swings, Wilder and wilder still his death-song rings, Fiercer and fiercer thro' the forest bounds His voice that leaps to Happier Hunting Grounds. One savage yell--

Then loyal to his race, He bends to death--but _never_ to disgrace.

THE PILOT OF THE PLAINS

"False," they said, "thy Pale-face lover, from the land of waking morn; Rise and wed thy Redskin wooer, nobler warrior ne'er was born; Cease thy watching, cease thy dreaming, Show the white thine Indian scorn."

Thus they taunted her, declaring, "He remembers naught of thee: Likely some white maid he wooeth, far beyond the inland sea." But she answered ever kindly, "He will come again to me,"

Till the dusk of Indian summer crept athwart the western skies; But a deeper dusk was burning in her dark and dreaming eyes, As she scanned the rolling prairie, Where the foothills fall, and rise.

Till the autumn came and vanished, till the season of the rains, Till the western world lay fettered in midwinter's crystal chains, Still she listened for his coming, Still she watched the distant plains.

Then a night with nor'land tempest, nor'land snows a-swirling fast, Out upon the pathless prairie came the Pale-face through the blast, Calling, calling, "Yakonwita, I am coming, love, at last."

Hovered night above, about him, dark its wings and cold and dread; Never unto trail or tepee were his straying footsteps led; Till benumbed, he sank, and pillowed On the drifting snows his head,

Saying, "O! my Yakonwita call me, call me, be my guide To the lodge beyond the prairie--for I vowed ere winter died I would come again, beloved; I would claim my Indian bride."

"Yakonwita, Yakonwita!" Oh, the dreariness that strains Through the voice that calling, quivers, till a whisper but remains, "Yakonwita, Yakonwita, I am lost upon the plains."

But the Silent Spirit hushed him, lulled him as he cried anew, "Save me, save me! O! beloved, I am Pale but I am true. Yakonwita, Yakonwita, I am dying, love, for you."

Leagues afar, across the prairie, she had risen from her bed, Roused her kinsmen from their slumber: "He has come to-night," she said. "I can hear him calling, calling; But his voice is as the dead.

"Listen!" and they sate all silent, while the tempest louder grew, And a spirit-voice called faintly, "I am dying, love, for you." Then they wailed, "O! Yakonwita. He was Pale, but he was true."

Wrapped she then her ermine round her, stepped without the tepee door, Saying, "I must follow, follow, though he call for evermore, Yakonwita, Yakonwita;" And they never saw her more.

Late at night, say Indian hunters, when the starlight clouds or wanes, Far away they see a maiden, misty as the autumn rains, Guiding with her lamp of moonlight Hunters lost upon the plains.

THE CATTLE THIEF

They were coming across the prairie, they were galloping hard and fast; For the eyes of those desperate riders had sighted their man at last-- Sighted him off to Eastward, where the Cree encampment lay, Where the cotton woods fringed the river, miles and miles away. Mistake him? Never! Mistake him? the famous Eagle Chief! That terror to all the settlers, that desperate Cattle Thief-- That monstrous, fearless Indian, who lorded it over the plain, Who thieved and raided, and scouted, who rode like a hurricane! But they've tracked him across the prairie; they've followed him hard and fast; For those desperate English settlers have sighted their man at last.

Up they wheeled to the tepees, all their British blood aflame, Bent on bullets and bloodshed, bent on bringing down their game; But they searched in vain for the Cattle Thief: that lion had left his lair, And they cursed like a troop of demons--for the women alone were there. "The sneaking Indian coward," they hissed; "he hides while yet he can; He'll come in the night for cattle, but he's scared to face a _man_." "Never!" and up from the cotton woods rang the voice of Eagle Chief; And right out into the open stepped, unarmed, the Cattle Thief. Was that the game they had coveted? Scarce fifty years had rolled Over that fleshless, hungry frame, starved to the bone and old; Over that wrinkled, tawny skin, unfed by the warmth of blood. Over those hungry, hollow eyes that glared for the sight of food.

He turned, like a hunted lion: "I know not fear," said he; And the words outleapt from his shrunken lips in the language of the Cree. "I'll fight you, white-skins, one by one, till I kill you _all_," he said; But the threat was scarcely uttered, ere a dozen balls of lead Whizzed through the air about him like a shower of metal rain, And the gaunt old Indian Cattle Thief dropped dead on the open plain. And that band of cursing settlers gave one triumphant yell, And rushed like a pack of demons on the body that writhed and fell. "Cut the fiend up into inches, throw his carcass on the plain; Let the wolves eat the cursed Indian, he'd have treated us the same." A dozen hands responded, a dozen knives gleamed high, But the first stroke was arrested by a woman's strange, wild cry. And out into the open, with a courage past belief, She dashed, and spread her blanket o'er the corpse of the Cattle Thief; And the words outleapt from her shrunken lips in the language of the Cree, "If you mean to touch that body, you must cut your way through _me_." And that band of cursing settlers dropped backward one by one, For they knew that an Indian woman roused, was a woman to let alone. And then she raved in a frenzy that they scarcely understood, Raved of the wrongs she had suffered since her earliest babyhood: "Stand back, stand back, you white-skins, touch that dead man to your shame; You have stolen my father's spirit, but his body I only claim. You have killed him, but you shall not dare to touch him now he's dead. You have cursed, and called him a Cattle Thief, though you robbed him first of bread-- Robbed him and robbed my people--look there, at that shrunken face, Starved with a hollow hunger, we owe to you and your race. What have you left to us of land, what have you left of game, What have you brought but evil, and curses since you came? How have you paid us for our game? how paid us for our land? By a _book_, to save our souls from the sins _you_ brought in your other hand. Go back with your new religion, we never have understood Your robbing an Indian's _body_, and mocking his _soul_ with food. Go back with your new religion, and find--if find you can-- The _honest_ man you have ever made from out a _starving_ man. You say your cattle are not ours, your meat is not our meat; When _you_ pay for the land you live in, _we'll_ pay for the meat we eat. Give back our land and our country, give back our herds of game; Give back the furs and the forests that were ours before you came; Give back the peace and the plenty. Then come with your new belief, And blame, if you dare, the hunger that _drove_ him to be a thief."

A CRY FROM AN INDIAN WIFE

My forest brave, my Red-skin love, farewell; We may not meet to-morrow; who can tell What mighty ills befall our little band, Or what you'll suffer from the white man's hand? Here is your knife! I thought 'twas sheathed for aye. No roaming bison calls for it to-day; No hide of prairie cattle will it maim; The plains are bare, it seeks a nobler game: 'Twill drink the life-blood of a soldier host. Go; rise and strike, no matter what the cost. Yet stay. Revolt not at the Union Jack, Nor raise Thy hand against this stripling pack Of white-faced warriors, marching West to quell Our fallen tribe that rises to rebel. They all are young and beautiful and good; Curse to the war that drinks their harmless blood. Curse to the fate that brought them from the East To be our chiefs--to make our nation least That breathes the air of this vast continent. Still their new rule and council is well meant. They but forget we Indians owned the land From ocean unto ocean; that they stand Upon a soil that centuries agone Was our sole kingdom and our right alone. They never think how they would feel to-day, If some great nation came from far away, Wresting their country from their hapless braves, Giving what they gave us--but wars and graves. Then go and strike for liberty and life, And bring back honour to your Indian wife. Your wife? Ah, what of that, who cares for me? Who pities my poor love and agony? What white-robed priest prays for your safety here, As prayer is said for every volunteer That swells the ranks that Canada sends out? Who prays for vict'ry for the Indian scout? Who prays for our poor nation lying low? None--therefore take your tomahawk and go. My heart may break and burn into its core, But I am strong to bid you go to war. Yet stay, my heart is not the only one That grieves the loss of husband and of son; Think of the mothers o'er the inland seas; Think of the pale-faced maiden on her knees; One pleads her God to guard some sweet-faced child That marches on toward the North-West wild. The other prays to shield her love from harm, To strengthen his young, proud uplifted arm. Ah, how her white face quivers thus to think, _Your_ tomahawk his life's best blood will drink. She never thinks of my wild aching breast, Nor prays for your dark face and eagle crest Endangered by a thousand rifle balls, My heart the target if my warrior falls. O! coward self I hesitate no more; Go forth, and win the glories of the war. Go forth, nor bend to greed of white men's hands, By right, by birth we Indians own these lands, Though starved, crushed, plundered, lies our nation low... Perhaps the white man's God has willed it so.

DAWENDINE

There's a spirit on the river, there's a ghost upon the shore, They are chanting, they are singing through the starlight evermore, As they steal amid the silence, And the shadows of the shore.

You can hear them when the Northern candles light the Northern sky, Those pale, uncertain candle flames, that shiver, dart and die, Those dead men's icy finger tips, Athwart the Northern sky.

You can hear the ringing war-cry of a long-forgotten brave Echo through the midnight forest, echo o'er the midnight wave, And the Northern lanterns tremble At the war-cry of that brave.

And you hear a voice responding, but in soft and tender song; It is Dawendine's spirit singing, singing all night long; And the whisper of the night wind Bears afar her Spirit song.

And the wailing pine trees murmur with their voice attuned to hers, Murmur when they 'rouse from slumber as the night wind through them stirs; And you listen to their legend, And their voices blend with hers.

There was feud and there was bloodshed near the river by the hill; And Dawendine listened, while her very heart stood still: Would her kinsman or her lover Be the victim by the hill?

Who would be the great unconquered? who come boasting how he dealt Death? and show his rival's scalplock fresh and bleeding at his belt. Who would say, "O Dawendine! Look upon the death I dealt?"

And she listens, listens, listens--till a war-cry rends the night, Cry of her victorious lover, monarch he of all the height; And his triumph wakes the horrors, Kills the silence of the night.

Heart of her! it throbs so madly, then lies freezing in her breast, For the icy hand of death has chilled the brother she loved best; And her lover dealt the death-blow; And her heart dies in her breast.

And she hears her mother saying, "Take thy belt of wampum white; Go unto yon evil savage while he glories on the height; Sing and sue for peace between us: At his feet lay wampum white.

"Lest thy kinsmen all may perish, all thy brothers and thy sire Fall before his mighty hatred as the forest falls to fire; Take thy wampum pale and peaceful, Save thy brothers, save thy sire."

And the girl arises softly, softly slips toward the shore; Loves she well the murdered brother, loves his hated foeman more, Loves, and longs to give the wampum; And she meets him on the shore.

"Peace," she sings, "O mighty victor, Peace! I bring thee wampum white. Sheathe thy knife whose blade has tasted my young kinsman's blood to-night Ere it drink to slake its thirsting, I have brought thee wampum white."

Answers he, "O Dawendine! I will let thy kinsmen be, I accept thy belt of wampum; but my hate demands for me That they give their fairest treasure, Ere I let thy kinsmen be.

"Dawendine, for thy singing, for thy suing, war shall cease; For thy name, which speaks of dawning, _Thou_ shalt be the dawn of peace; For thine eyes whose purple shadows tell of dawn, My hate shall cease.

"Dawendine, Child of Dawning, hateful are thy kin to me; Red my fingers with their heart blood, but my heart is red for thee: Dawendine, Child of Dawning, Wilt thou fail or follow me?"

And her kinsmen still are waiting her returning from the night, Waiting, waiting for her coming with her belt of wampum white; But forgetting all, she follows, Where he leads through day or night.

There's a spirit on the river, there's a ghost upon the shore, And they sing of love and loving through the starlight evermore, As they steal amid the silence, And the shadows of the shore.

WOLVERINE

"Yes, sir, it's quite a story, though you won't believe it's true, But such things happened often when I lived beyond the Soo." And the trapper tilted back his chair and filled his pipe anew.

"I ain't thought of it neither fer this many 'n many a day, Although it used to haunt me in the years that's slid away, The years I spent a-trappin' for the good old Hudson's Bay.

"Wild? You bet, 'twas wild then, an' few an' far between The squatters' shacks, for whites was scarce as furs when things is green, An' only reds an' 'Hudson's' men was all the folk I seen.

"No. Them old Indyans ain't so bad, not if you treat 'em square. Why, I lived in amongst 'em all the winters I was there, An' I never lost a copper, an' I never lost a hair.

"But I'd have lost my life the time that you've heard tell about; I don't think I'd be settin' here, but dead beyond a doubt, If that there Indyan 'Wolverine' jest hadn't helped me out.

"'Twas freshet time, 'way back, as long as sixty-six or eight, An' I was comin' to the Post that year a kind of late, For beaver had been plentiful, and trappin' had been great.

"One day I had been settin' traps along a bit of wood, An' night was catchin' up to me jest faster 'an it should, When all at once I heard a sound that curdled up my blood.

"It was the howl of famished wolves--I didn't stop to think But jest lit out across for home as quick as you could wink, But when I reached the river's edge I brought up at the brink.