The boast of the Seminole

Front matter

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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT.

“INDIAN” STORIES WITH HISTORICAL BASES

Chapter I

Hanowa^ the Seminole scout, jumped off his horse on the outskirts of Fort Brooke and entered the cabin of his friend, Sergeant David Munro, just as the eastern sky began to redden, while the sergeant and his son, Billy, were at breakfast.

Alaka-ishayy I have come,” was his greeting, to which the white boy quickly replied, “Ho! Lagashay, yes, sit down;” for young Billy prided himself on his ability to speak the Seminole language and use the proper phrase in greeting a guest. Billy was indeed an apt pupil of his older Indian friend, who never tired of teaching the white boy new words and phrases spoken by his own people in the great swamps and forests and the wild Everglades of Florida. No matter how often the inquisitive boy asked: “ What is it? What do you call that? How do you say, ‘ He is a liar ’ ? or ‘ He is a good man ’ ? Hanowa never tired and never lost patience. For an hour at a time Billy would send a fusillade of questions at Hanowa as the three friends sat at the red camp-fire in the pine woods, or in their log cabin at Fort Brooke, on Tampa Bay. Never once had the patient Seminole answered, Wykaschay/^ be still, or, Ipuscha/^ go away.

But on this occasion Billy was not given a chance to question Hanowa, for Sergeant Munro, whose enlistment had expired a month before, had too many questions, and his heart was too full of anxiety to turn the Seminole over to Billy.

“ Ho! IjagashayT Munro repeated, aris¬ ing quickly and grasping the scout’s hand, “ I am glad you have come. You have been gone a long time, three weeks to-morrow, and I was much afraid that a white man had killed you or the soldiers had made you prisoner, for dark and evil days have fallen upon the land of your people. But my son has been a great comfort in these days.

They will not see him. Father,’ he as¬ sured me, ‘ they can never catch Hanowa. He is a Seminole. He knows the swamps, the pine woods, and the hammocks/ But, now, sit down to eat. Bacon we have plenty, and beans and corn bread. Your horse looks as if you had traveled all night.”

The sad and tired face of the Seminole brightened at the invitation of his friend. He took a chair and began to eat, while Munro sliced more bacon into the frying-pan and made a fresh pot of coffee.

Elaha, my brother,” the Seminole boasted. “No white man can see a Seminole, if the Seminole does not wish to be seen. I have traveled a day and a night, through the shehoppa, the saw-palmetto; through the pine barrens, and along the edges of the swamps and the hammocks. I have not traveled on the trails. I knew there Was great trouble in the air, because from my hiding-places in the thickets of the ham¬ mocks I saw the warriors of my people go¬ ing north. I am hungry, for I have eaten nothing but the white hearts of tololocko, the cabbage-palm, and a little com meal I carried in my bag. I could not shoot game, for I wished that no Seminole warriors and no white man should see me, and I have slept only when my horse had to rest and feed.”

And then Hanowa fell to eating in silence, as only a hungry Indian can eat, while Munro fried more bacon and set out more hot corn bread.

When Hanowa had finished eating and had quenched his thirst with several cups of black coffee, Munro could not restrain him¬ self any longer.

“ What have the eyes and ears of my brother learned, while he was away scout¬ ing to the south? Has he seen Dan Holtess with the crooked heart, and Sokala who shows him to walk in the crooked path? ” Elaka, I have tracked Holtess, and I have tracked Sokala. To the river Mayakka I have tracked them, which flows into the western sea fifty miles south of the bay called Tampa. On the Mayakka I found them. They were making a big noise with talk and with their axes. It was dark. Then I heard a big tree fall, and I heard the white man howl and shout many words. And then I knew they had cut a tree which fo-a, the bee people, had filled with honey.

I knew that the bee people had drawn their daggers that glisten with little drops of poison. I knew that they had stabbed the white man many times, and I knew why he howled and swore many bad words. And then I forgot that I was a scout, and I laughed aloud and cut my face on the saw-palmetto.”

“ Didn’t the Indian howl and swear? ” asked Billy, when Hanowa had quit laugh¬ ing.

‘‘ No,” replied the scout, “ the Seminoles never make bad talk to fo-a; it would bring bad luck. Sokala had built a little fire near the bees, and he cut with his ax, and took the white combs from fo-a. But Holtess howled more and called out that he would go and get a kettle and boil out some wax to stop the chink, chink, in the pack.”

“And what did he do then? ” asked Billy, when Hanowa was silent.

“ Then he came straight at my hidingplace, swearing all the time at the bees and at the sharp teeth of the shehoppa. I lay very still. He came nearer; it was very dark. Pretty soon I knew he would fall over me. I sprang up like lokosee, the bear. ‘ Whoof, whoof! ’ I made like a bear, and rushed into the scrub on four feet. He let go a big yell and fell down in the saw-scrub. He swore at the bear and fired his pistol after me,—two, three times. I heard the bullets sing, but I was lying flat on the ground and quickly crawled away like a snake.

“ I lay very still, until the two men had built a fire. Then I crawled slowly, very slowly to the edge of the tall scrub so I could hear them talk.”

“ What did you hear? ” asked Billy.

“ Let our friend have a little rest,” ad¬ monished Billy’s father. “ Give him a chance to catch his breath.”

The Seminole smiled. “ Billy wants to know. He will be a good scout. The white man was still mad. He could not sit still. He rubbed himself in many places. Then he swore again at the bees and at the bear, and he swore at Sokala for not letting him take a hound along; for with a hound they could have killed the bear. Then I heard Sokala talk.

“I COULD HEAR THEM TALK. ” — 12 ,

White man,’ he said, ‘ you have made much bad talk. You have made enough bad talk. Now you stop. Tell me, white man, why did you laugh when you swore at the bees? ’

“ The white man said he had not laughed; he had not felt like laughing.

‘‘ ‘ I heard somebody laugh,’ said Sokala. ‘ Who was it, if you did not laugh? Did you see the bear? ’

“ Then the white man grew mad again and said he knew bears. He had killed a hundred of them, and no fool Indian need teach him about bears.

‘ Now you stop,’ spoke up Sokala, and arose from his log. ‘ You talk more swear at me and I leave you. I leave you to¬ night.’

‘‘ Then the white man rubbed himself again, and sat down on his other leg and promised to make no more swear talk at Sokala, but he did make some more at the bees.

‘‘ I knew now,” continued Hanowa after a short pause, “ that I must not crawl up to their camp-fire to find out what was in their pack. For I knew that Sokala would sleep with one eye open, and he might shoot me and I could never come to tell you where I had been; for I knew that Sokala did not believe that the white man had seen a bear.”

When Hanowa had taken another cup of coffee, sweetened with brown sugar, Billy could not resist asking another question:

“ What would you have done, Hanowa, if they had sent a hound after you? ”

Shot him dead with my pistol, and do it quick.”

‘‘ But then the men would have come after you.”

“No, they would not. No Seminole goes near a man who is hiding in the scrub with a pistol.”

“ Now, Billy, no more questions,” Munro broke in. “ Hanowa must lie down for a long sleep. When he has slept enough we shall talk more and make our plans. Holtess and Sokala are the men w6 should go after. I believe Holtess is the man who planned the dirty deed and carried it out, and I remember now many little things no¬ body could explain when they happened.”

Chapter II

It was not long before the deep breath¬ ing of Hanowa in the loft of the cabin told that the young Seminole was making up lost sleep. The loft, with a screened window at each end, was Hanowa’s favorite sleeping-place on cool days, and this was going to be a good day for sleeping. The wind blew from the northwest, and the air had a pleas¬ ant tang as on a fine October day in the North. His head resting on a small pillow filled with Spanish moss, his lithe, supple form wrapped up in an army blanket and stretched out on a mattress also filled with Spanish moss, that was the way Hanowa liked to sleep. Long and soundly he slept, as only a tired boy, a scout, and a soldier can sleep.

Billy of his own accord took care of Hanowa’s horse. First he took him to water and then he tied him in the shed. The fine black animal whinnied as Billy left him.

“ Don’t worry, Sopa,” said Billy, turning around. “ I’ll be back.” Very soon he returned with a big armful of hay and a bag of oats, which he had begged of the hostler in the mule barn at Fort Brooke.

“ Now, Sopa, you are going to have a feast of real hay and oats. This is the first of December, and the wild grass is all hard and dead and no good, but here is some real feed for a horse.”

And Sopa did have a feast, and when he had finished, he grunted and lay down, and like his master fell asleep, but a horse never sleeps as soundly as a man.

It was Billy who had named the horse, Sopa, which is the Seminole word for blue. Billy did not like the Seminole word for black, and he claimed that he could see a bluish sheen reflected from Sopa’s glossy, coat when the sun was shining on him. Billy had long coveted this horse for his own and had often tried to buy him, and once he had offered to trade his own horse and a cow for him, but Hanowa had smiled at the offer, saying: Wauca, no good. I can catch

waucas in the woods; plenty of them wild.

“No, Tewahnee, my boy,” he had ex¬ plained, “ I raised Sopa, when I lived at the big sugar mill south of St. Augustine. I cannot sell him or trade him. He is the best horse in Florida. He can travel fast and long without food and rest. He never runs away when I sleep, he knows where I want to go, and he does not talk to horses going by, when I am hiding in the scrub. His an¬ cestors came to our country a long time ago with De Soto, a great chief of the Spanalkays. That is what the big white master, Bulow, of the sugar mill told me. I do not know if it is true.’’

While Billy was tending Sopa and plan¬ ning how, some day, he would offer Hanowa a shining new gun for the horse, Billy’s father sat in the cabin by himself and let his mind run over the events of the last month. For fifteen years he had faithfully served his country, at first as a private, and for the last five years as a sergeant, loved by his men and trusted and honored by every officer under whom he had served.

But now a terrible thing had happened. His good name had been blackened and dis¬ honored. He had been relieved from ordi¬ nary military duties and had served as orderly and trusted man at headquarters, and at the quartermaster’s office. He had been given a key to the building and was a trusted bookkeeper and treasurer. On a dark, windy night, about six weeks before, he had gone to the office about nine o’clock to get some papers on which he wanted to work at his quarters. He had talked to the sentry as he entered, but when he left the building the sentry was at the farther end of his beat, about three hundred paces away.

That same night the building had been entered by somebody who must have had a key. The hinges and padlock of the strong box had been forced, and a tin box contain¬ ing $1021 in gold and silver coins had been stolen. One gold piece and a Mexican sil¬ ver dollar were found next day in a closet where Munro used to hang his overcoat and cap. A few days later the empty tin box was found buried on the edge of Munro’s sweet-potato patch. Close by in the scrub palmetto was found a freshly dug hole care¬ fully filled up, but containing no money. Neither of the two sentries on duty during the night of the theft had heard any noise or seen anybody enter or leave the building, except as already told.

In view of the excellent record of Munro, no formal charges had been preferred against him. He had voluntarily appeared before a Military Court of Inquiry and had frankly answered all questions. The pro¬ ceedings of the court being entirely friendly and informal, Munro had asked these ques¬ tions :

“ Do you think, gentlemen, that I would have let the sentry see me enter the building, if I had intended to steal the money?

‘‘ Do you think I would have lost two coins in my closet?

“ Would I have buried the tin box in my potato patch and dug a blind hole close by? ”

The members of the court laughed and said they did not believe Sergeant Munro capable of such a bungling job; and they rendered a unanimous verdict that the money had been stolen by a person or by persons unknown. A week later Sergeant Munro was given an honorable discharge, for which he had made a formal application some time previously.

Until he had received his honorable dis¬ charge, Munro had not felt at all sure that he would not have to face a regular court martial on the charge of having stolen Gov¬ ernment money. That easy, informal friendliness of the board of inquiry might have been a ruse. The case had never been a laughing matter to him. If a new com¬ mandant were sent to Fort Brooke he might now have him tried before a civil court.

“ I wish they had tried me in court mar¬ tial,” he said to himself. “ The military courts get through with a case and seldom make a mistake, and everybody in court would have been my friend. In a civil court of the Territory of Florida I might be under bond or in jail for months awaiting trial. I should have to hire a lawyer, and who can tell how my case would look to the jury? I wish I had asked for a formal trial by court martial. The court would have had to find me innocent. Then I would be through with the case and could have followed my wife and the children to New York State, as Billy and I had planned, and lived happily on our little farm.

For years, Martha and I had planned that on Christmas Eve, 1836, we would meet all our school-day friends on the old family homestead near Newburgh on the Hudson.

“ And where and what am I now? I am a man living under a cloud. Never shall I forget the year and the Christmas of 1836. Billy will not feel like singing ‘ Holy Night ’ on Christmas Eve as he did last year,—^his mother and the two little brothers a thousand miles away, and his father ac¬ cused of being a thief! Under a cloud, I am living in bleeding Florida, which man’s folly, mostly white man’s greed and folly, has changed from a natural Paradise to a realm of the Prince of Evil. No angel will bring a message of peace this Christmas Eve to either white man, black man, or red man. That terrible Seminole war has been raging a year and is getting worse every month. I did not tell Hanowa what happened on the Withlacoochee about two weeks ago. He would not be sleeping now if I had told him.”

Chapter III

It was late in the afternoon when Hanowa woke up and dropped down from the loft.

Elaha/' he asked, “ shall we talk? ”

“Let us talk,” replied Munro. “ I have much to tell you, but you should talk first, because you have been on a long journey.”

“ It has been a long journey,” Hanowa began. “ I traveled north, and I traveled south, and then I rode north again. After the white captains had said that my brother had not taken the yellow money, you told me to find the man who had taken it. I went and sat down under a tree near the bay and I saw a white man and a Seminole trying to buy a sailboat from the captain of all the ships in the bay; but the captain would not sell them a boat. I lay down as if I were going to sleep.

“ ‘ Who is that Indian? ’ asked the cap¬ tain.

He is my man,’ replied the white man.

‘ I have bought him/ And he showed the captain a paper, but I think the paper was a lie.

“ The captain looked at the paper and said, ‘ All right! But you clear out of here. I have no boat to sell. They all belong to the Government.’

‘‘ The white man wore a beard and looked like a man whom the soldiers call Cracker. When he started to walk away, I remem¬ bered that I had seen him before, because he walks like an Indian with his toes point¬ ing in. Three years ago he worked for the general at Fort Brooke. The general had him show the soldiers how to build houses, where to make their gardens, and the gen¬ eral gave him a tube that stood on three legs. He also gave him a long chain and a pole painted white and red, and he had him show the soldiers where to cut trees and build bridges on the road that leads north to the ford of the river, Withlacoochee, on the road to St. Augustine. The general also had him make shoes for the mules and horses, and fix the iron hoops on the wheels of the big wagons.”

“ It is Holtess/' Munro broke in, ‘‘ Dan Holtess. The general sent him away be¬ cause he had a bad influence on the soldiers. He played cards with them for money and had them all broke. The men claimed that he cheated them by playing with marked cards, but they could never prove anything on him. All the officers, except Captain Hanisch, were glad to see Holtess go. Holt¬ ess had done some repair work in the quar¬ ters of Captain Hanisch, and a week later the captain’s wife discovered that her wed¬ ding ring was gone. Thus far no evidence had been discovered as to the whereabouts of the ring. When Holtess was sent from the post, the captain concluded that his wife would never see her ring again, and she didn’t. The captain had to order a dupli¬ cate from New York.”

At this point Billy appeared. He was as hungry as an Indian, he said, for he had cleaned with a currycomb and brush all three horses, Sopa, and his own, and his father’s. He had bought—^he did not say where—a bushel of oats and a lot of real hay. He had also caught a mess of fish in the Hillsboro River, and he made ready to cook them for supper.

“Look, Father,” he remarked. “Three fine trout, one for each of us.”

“ Your trout are bass, my son,” observed Munro, “ but everybody in Florida and Georgia calls them trout. You may get sup¬ per, Billy, while Hanowa and I take a short walk.”

“ Don’t be late,” said Billy. “ In half an hour the grub will be on the table. I can eat two fish, if you aren’t here.”

After supper the Seminole continued his story. Holtess and his companion, whom he had soon recognized as Sokala, the son of a Seminole and a black woman, failing to ob¬ tain a boat had started north on horseback toward the Withlacoochee. Hanowa had followed them, intending to watch for a chance to find out what their packs con¬ tained, On the third day out he had learned from some Seminole women that, on the day before, the two men had made a swing around through the pine woods and that they were again going south toward Fort Brooke and Tampa Bay.

‘‘ The white man is trying to leave Flor¬ ida,” Hanowa reasoned, “ and he is afraid of the white soldiers who are holding the country east of the Withlacoochee along the road to St. Augustine.”

“ Why don’t the Indians kill the white man? ” Hanowa asked of a Seminole woman. “ The Seminoles are at war with the white men.”

“ The bearded white man has a paper with the marks of the chiefs Osceola and Mickenopah, saying that he is a friend of the Semi¬ noles,” the woman told him, “ and he gives sugar to the children and strips of red cloth to the women.”

‘‘ How did you find them again? ” asked Billy.

“ It took me a long time, ten days or more; but it is too long a story,” Hanowa replied.

And then he related that, at the bee camp, he had heard the two men talk of getting a big Indian canoe made of a large cedar log, on which they would travel down the west coast to Key West and find a ship.

“ And now I have only one more thing to tell to my friends,” continued Hanowa.

‘‘ Please tell it/’ Bill snapped in.

‘‘ Keep still, Billy,” Munro reprimanded the impulsive boy. “ And you might as well close your mouth, Billy. You don’t hear any more with your mouth open.”

“ I forgot myself,” Billy replied laughing. “ Please go on, Hanowa. What is it you have not told us? ”

‘‘ Before I left the Mayakka I rode to a camp of my friends. I found only old men, women, and children; the warriors had all gone north to the Withlacoochee. I told them of the white man that swore at the bees. I told them that a boat with soldiers would come down from Fort Brooke to catch Sokala and the white man, when they are pad¬ dling their canoe to Key West. The chief of the soldiers at Fort Brooke wants the white man and he has told the soldiers to bring him in dead, if they cannot catch him alive. Dan Holtess and Sokala know that the soldiers will do what their chief tells them to do.

“ When I left the camp, my uncle, Tal¬ lahassee, with some boys started to visit the white man’s camp to tell him of the soldiers that will be looking for him where the Mayakka flows into the sea. But my uncle will not tell him how he learned that a boat with soldiers is coming to the mouth of the Mayakka. I am done.”

Iste lockse, Hanowa,” Billy exclaimed. ‘‘ That’s a lie; it isn’t true! ”

ElaJiaj you must make it true,” Hanowa replied with a perfectly grave face. “ To-morrow you must go and ask the white chief to send the soldiers in a boat to the mouth of the Mayakka.”

When in the morning Munro made this request. Major Belton, the commandant, looked at him with unconcealed surprise.

“ What in thunder do you expect of me. Sergeant? ” he exploded. “ You know, that at this time, I cannot spare a boat-load of soldiers to chase one lone scoundrel over the Gulf of Mexico. Just give him rope, and he will hang himself some day.”

When Hanowa heard the results of the interview with the commandant there was a smile on his serious face and a strange light in his dark eyes.

The white chief,” he spoke gravely, “ is a great man, and we cannot make him send the soldiers. By this time Tallahassee has told the white man at the bee camp that the soldiers are coming after him, and he will keep off the big salt water. You see, JElaha, if Holtess and Sokala had started for Cuba, we should never catch them. So I had to tell Tallahassee that the soldiers were com¬ ing in a boat to the Mayakka.’’

Chapter IV

Since the outbreak of the Seminole war a year before, in 1835, Billy had strict orders not to go more than a mile from the fort. He had to tell his father where he was going, and a time was set when he had to be back.

“I feel sure none of my many Seminole friends would harm you,” Munro had told the lad, “ and I know that Osceola has com¬ manded his warriors not to harm women and children, but I also know, only too well, that no Indian chief exercises any real control over his warriors. When they are out of his sight, they do pretty much as they please, and the temptation to take a scalp without much danger to themselves is often irresist¬ ible, especially to the young bucks.”

When nearly a year before, the day of Christmas Eve, Major Dade’s command consisting of eight officers and about a hun¬ dred men started on their fateful march from Fort Brooke to Fort King, a distance of one hundred and thirty miles northeast, Billy was wild to join the command as a drummer boy.

“ I can play the drum, Father,” he ar¬ gued. “ Major Dade said only yesterday I could play it as well as the regular drummer. Please, Father, go and ask him to let me go with the soldiers to Fort King.

“ Private Andrews says he will look after me. You said yourself last week that you were not afraid if I was out fishing with him. You know he would bring me back safe. Please, Father, do let me go.”

“ Billy, the soldiers are not going on a fishing trip,” Munro tried to impress the lad. “ They are marching on a campaign against the Seminoles, and Private! Andrews will have all he can do to take care of himself. It is a most unrighteous war, but it is the duty of the soldiers to go and do their best.

“ Most of Florida is still a wild country. Why should the Indians be compelled to settle west of the Mississippi, where they do not want to go? What could I tell your mother if I found you dead and scalped? ”

“ The soldiers are not going to fight,” argued Bill, “ they are just going to march to Fort King.”

‘‘ Soldiers have no choice about the time and place of a battle. When they are at¬ tacked, they have to defend themselves. No, Billy, I could not let you go, even if I joined the troops myself.”

“ Would you go, if Major Dade requested you? ” asked Bill.

“ I certainly would. But even then you would have to stay at Fort Brooke.”

It was a hard decision for Bill. He and Private Andrews had it all planned. The men did not expect any fighting, because they believed that the Indians did not even know that the troops were going to move. The command would undoubtedly camp a night at the ford of the Withlacoochee, and that river was just full of fish. Ever since Bill had crossed the river on his trip to St. Augustine, he had wanted to put in a day fishing on this beautiful stream.

Bill was in a bad mood when he saw the soldiers and his friend Andrews march out of the fort the day before Christmas, and the soldiers who had to remain behind under Major Belton were not any happier than BUI. The fort seemed deserted now, for only enough men were left to guard the place against an attack and protect the stores and other Government property.

Bill cut a few sprays of holly for Christ¬ mas decorations. In the evening he opened a Christmas parcel his mother had managed to get to Fort Brooke a week ahead of time. He and his father had a fine wild turkey roasted for their Christmas dinner, stuffed with dried apples and raisins, as Bill liked it. And the boy did full justice to the bird, and his spirits revived a little when, in the evening, he and his father sat in front of a ruddy pine log fire, while Munro told of his own boyhood spent in New York State, where the winter weather, the ice, and the snow, were always just right at Christmas time, and Bill almost wished that he had gone with his mother to New York. When Munro began to praise the southern winter climate, where you can hunt turkeys and quails and alligators and go fishing without first cutting holes in the ice, Billy looked glum and gave a half-growling answer.