The Indian Dance
In the afternoon Mr. Johnson informed me that the Indians were preparing to dance, for my particular amusement. I was, of course, most thankful and delighted. Almost in the same moment, I heard their yells and shrieks resounding along the shore, mingled with the measured monotonous drum. We had taken our place on an elevated platform behind the house—a kind of little lawn on the hill-side;—the precipitous rocks, clothed with trees and bushes, rose high like a wall above us: the glorious sunshine of a cloudless summer’s day was over our heads—the dazzling blue lake and its islands at our feet. Soft and elysian in its beauty was all around. And when these wild and more than half-naked figures came up, leaping, whooping, drumming, shrieking, hideously painted, and flourishing clubs, tomahawks, javelins, it was like a masque of fiends breaking into paradise! The rabble of Comus might have boasted themselves comely in comparison, even though no self-deluding potion had bleared their eyes and intellect. It was a grotesque and horrible phantasmagoria. Of their style of clothing, I say nothing—for, as it is wisely said, nothing can come of nothing:—only if “all symbols be clothes,” according to a great modern philosopher—my Indian friends were as little symbolical as you can dare to imagine:—passons par là. If the blankets and leggings were thrown aside, all the resources of the Indian toilette, all their store of feathers, and bears’ claws, hawks’ bells, vermilion, soot, and verdigris, were brought into requisition as decoration: and no two were alike. One man wore three or four heads of hair, composed of the manes and tails of animals; another wore a pair of deers’ horns; another was coiffé with the skins and feathers of a crane or some such bird—its long bill projecting from his forehead; another had the shell of a small turtle suspended from his back, and dangling behind; another used the skin of a polecat for the same purpose. One had painted his right leg with red bars, and his left leg with green lines: parti-coloured eyes and faces, green noses, and blue chins, or vice versâ, were general. I observed that in this grotesque deformity, in the care with which every thing like symmetry or harmony in form or colours was avoided, there was something evidently studied and artistical. The orchestra was composed of two drums and two rattles, and a chorus of voices. The song was without melody—a perpetual repetition of three or four notes, melancholy, harsh, and monotonous. A flag was stuck in the ground, and round this they began their dance—if dance it could be called,—the movements consisting of the alternate raising of one foot, then the other, and swinging the body to and fro. Every now and then they paused, and sent forth that dreadful, prolonged, tremulous yell, which re-echoed from the cliffs, and pierced my ears and thrilled along my nerves. The whole exhibition was of that finished barbarism, that it was at least complete in its way, and for a time I looked on with curiosity and interest. But that innate loathing which dwells within me for all that is discordant and deformed, rendered it anything but pleasant to witness. It grated horribly upon all my perceptions. In the midst, one of those odd and unaccountable transitions of thought caused, by some mental or physical re-action—the law which brings extremes in contrast together—came across me. I was reminded that even on this very day last year I was seated in a box at the opera, looking at Carlotta Grisi and Perrot dancing, or rather flying through the galoppe in “Benyowsky.” The oddity of this sudden association made me laugh, which being interpreted into the expression of my highest approbation, they became every moment more horribly ferocious and animated; redoubled the vigour of their detestably awkward movements and the shrillness of their savage yells, till I began involuntarily to look about for some means of escape—but this would have been absolutely rude, and I restrained myself.
I should not forget to mention that the figures of most of the men were superb; more agile and elegant, however, than muscular, more fitted for the chase than for labour, with small and well-formed hands and feet. When the dance was ended, a young warrior, leaving the group, sat himself down on a little knoll to rest. His spear lay across his knees, and he reposed his head upon his hand. He was not painted, except with a little vermilion on his chest, and on his head he wore only the wing of the osprey. He sat there, a model for a sculptor. The perfection of his form, the graceful abandonment of his attitude, reminded me of a young Mercury, or of Thorwaldsen’s “Shepherd Boy.” I went up to speak to him, and thanked him for his exertions in the dance, which indeed had been conspicuous; and then, for want of something else to say, I asked him if he had a wife and children? The whole expression of his face suddenly changed, and with an air as tenderly coy as that of a young girl listening to the first whisper of a lover, he looked down and answered softly, “Kah-ween!”—No, indeed! Feeling that I had for the first time embarrassed an Indian, I withdrew, really as much out of countenance as the youth himself. I did not ask him his name, for that were a violation of the Indian form of good breeding, but I learn that he is called the Pouncing Hawk. West’s comparison of the Apollo Belvedere to a young Mohawk warrior has more of likelihood and reasonableness than I ever believed or acknowledged before.
A keg of tobacco and a barrel of flour were given to them, and they dispersed as they came, drumming, and yelling and leaping, and flourishing their clubs and war hatchets.
In the evening we paddled in a canoe over to the opposite island, with the intention of landing and looking at the site of an intended missionary settlement for the Indians. But no sooner did the keel of our canoe touch the woody shore than we were enveloped in a cloud of mosquitoes. It was in vain to think of dislodging the enemy, and after one or two attempts we were fairly beaten back. Mackinaw, as seen from hence, has exactly the form its name implies, that of a large turtle sleeping on the water. I believe Mackinaw is merely the abbreviation of Michilimackinac, the great turtle. It was a mass of purple shadow; and just at one extremity the sun plunged into the lake, leaving its reflection on the water, like the skirts of a robe of fire, floating. This too vanished, and we returned in the soft calm twilight, singing as we went.
July 29.
Where was I? Where did I leave off four days ago? O—at Mackinaw! that fairy island, which I shall never see again, and which I should have dearly liked to filch from the Americans, and carry home to you in my dressing-box, or, perdie, in my toothpick case; but, good lack, to see the ups and downs of this (new) world. I take up my tale a hundred miles from it; but before I tell you where I am now, I must take you over the ground, or rather over the water, in a proper and journal-like style.