"
A feathered headsman of one of the tribes gave back with dignity and
spoke.
"It is well said by the Great Chief of the Pale Faces," he answered;
"these in truth are not the words of a man with a double tongue."
So they sought their quarters for the night, and suspense hung breathless
over the village.
There were many callers at the stone house that evening,--Spanish
officers, Creole gentlemen, an English Canadian trader or two. With my
elbow on the sill of the open window I watched them awhile, listening
with a boy's eagerness to what they had to say of the day's doings. They
disputed amongst themselves in various degrees of English as to the
manner of treating the red man,--now gesticulating, now threatening, now
seizing a rolled parchment treaty from the table. Clark sat alone, a
little apart, silent save a word now and then in a low tone to Monsieur
Gratiot or Captain Bowman. Here was an odd assortment of the races which
had overrun the new world. At intervals some disputant would pause in
his talk to kill a mosquito or fight away a moth or a June-bug, but
presently the argument reached such a pitch that the mosquitoes fed
undisturbed.
"You have done much, sir," said the Spanish commandant of St. Louis, "but
the savage, he will never be content without present. He will never be
won without present.
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