The Life and Times of Kateri Tekakwitha Part 10

FROM THE OLD TO THE NEW CAUGHNAWAGA.

As they left Caughnawaga Castle, and paddled around the sharp bends of the Mohawk River, the two Indians who were conducting this stirring adventure used the utmost caution to prevent an encounter between Tekakwitha and her uncle, who might be at that very time returning from Schenectady. This they dreaded above all things. If the old chief should meet her in company with them, he would suspect their purpose at once, and the lives of the three would be in danger. They followed the course of the river current, however, as it carried them in the general direction of their journey more swiftly than they could otherwise travel. They wished to make the most of their time before the uncle could be warned of their departure from the castle. It was probably not far from the spot where the Chuctanunda Creek at Amsterdam[55] comes tumbling down the hill into the Mohawk, or in that vicinity, that she and her two companions left the canoe by the river-side and took to the woods; as in the thickets along the less frequented trail by land, it would be easier for Tekakwitha to conceal herself quickly in case of alarm, than if they were to continue the journey further by way of the river. Had they followed the latter course, they would have been obliged to take a more easterly trail across Saratoga County.[56]

As they feared, the uncle was soon on their trail; for shortly after the three mission Indians had disappeared from Caughnawaga Castle Tekakwitha's absence was noticed. It was quickly inferred that she had gone to Canada. She was not in the lodge, not in the chapel, nor with the girls at the spring. Instantly a runner was despatched to the Dutch settlement to warn the Turtle Chief of what had occurred. The news filled him with rage. Leaving his Dutch friends abruptly, he started homeward to learn if it were indeed true that his niece had vanished, and if so, speedily to follow her. On his way to the castle he pa.s.sed an Indian travelling rapidly in the opposite direction from himself, whom he scarcely noticed and did not recognize. Nevertheless this Indian was no other than Tekakwitha's brother-in-law,--the very man he wanted to capture. The unrecognized relative knew the chief as soon as he saw him, but he was too near to avoid pa.s.sing him without exciting suspicion. So, feigning an unconcern which he was far from feeling, he kept straight on, and pa.s.sed the old man safely. He then continued his journey to Schenectady. The chief, on the other hand, was in quite as great a hurry to reach the Mohawk village. Perhaps he had doubts as to the truthfulness of what he had heard. At all events, when he arrived at Caughnawaga he went directly to his own lodge, and found that Tekakwitha was indeed not there, and had not been since the departure of Hot Ashes. Immediately he gathered what information he could at the castle, "loaded his gun with three b.a.l.l.s, declaring that he would kill somebody," and started in pursuit of the fugitives. Once thoroughly roused, his unaided sagacity put him on the trail by which he might overtake them before they could reach Lake George.

In the mean time what had become of Tekakwitha? Why was her brother-in-law travelling alone? Ah! she and the good Indian of Lorette were concealed in the bushes, either near the river-bank at Amsterdam or on the high ground to the northeast of that town. Her brother-in-law had left them there, while he made a brief trip to Schenectady and back in order to buy bread. They had started from Caughnawaga Castle in haste, without provision for the journey. He soon returned to the secluded spot where his companions were waiting for him. Tekakwitha was greatly relieved to see him. When he gave them a graphic account of his narrow escape from discovery, she looked upon it as a certain proof that G.o.d was watching over them. She resolved that on reaching the Sault, as she now hoped to do, she would endeavor in every way to show her grat.i.tude to Him. Up to this time she had lived in great seclusion and subjection, and of late had suffered constant persecution and torture of spirit.

This sudden freedom, then, from all the bonds that bound her to her lodge and tribe; the intense excitement attending her sudden departure; these days of concealment in the weird and gloomy forest; this unforeseen companions.h.i.+p with strangers, who proved to be as gentle and as solicitous for her safety as if she were indeed a beloved sister; and more than all the wonderful way in which everything seemed to concur in aiding her escape,--could not fail to make a deep and lasting impression on her sensitive soul. Every spiritual and religious tendency of her nature was intensified by this new and strange experience. In leaving her home and undertaking so perilous a journey she had thrown herself without reserve into the arms of Providence, and now resting there, she was carried almost without an effort through hair-breadth escapes from dangers that no earthly consideration would ever have nerved her to face. She felt that she could not henceforth do otherwise than devote her all to Rawenniio,--_the true G.o.d_.

Their probable route to Lake George was through what is now the towns.h.i.+p of Galway in Saratoga County, and thence up the valley of the Kayaderosseras Creek, skirting the eastern side of the long mountain-ridge that carries Lake Desolation high on its back. Through this region one can travel almost in a straight line of open country from Amsterdam on the Mohawk to Jessup's Landing on the Hudson. There the river is fordable, just above Palmer's Falls and below the old scow-ferry. A well-worn trail followed the eastern bank of the river from there to Luzerne, and then turned northeast, through a beautiful valley, to the mountainous sh.o.r.es of Lake George. Somewhere on this direct route across the country, Tekakwitha's uncle overtook one of the two Indians who were escorting her to Canada. Apparently this Indian was engaged in hunting. Just as the chief approached, the hunter took aim as if at a bird and fired his gun. This was a preconcerted signal to his companion, who was some distance in advance, to conceal the Indian girl.

It was so understood. In an instant Tekakwitha was hidden in a clump of thick undergrowth. Her ready-witted companion threw himself on the ground near her, took out his pipe, lit it, and lazily watched the curling smoke as he puffed it from his mouth. Tekakwitha's uncle, coming upon the second Indian in this att.i.tude, was completely disconcerted.

Where then was his niece? a.s.suredly not in company with these men. They were fully absorbed in their own affairs, and scarcely noticed his approach. She might be even then at work in the corn-fields down by the Mohawk, or saying her prayers in the woods behind the castle. In either case he would not have found her in the lodge. He had acted foolishly, and followed an idle rumor without sufficient thought. He would not expose his folly further by questioning these men about her. Having reached this determination, he turned without a word as to what was uppermost in his mind, and silently retraced his steps to the Mohawk Valley.

As for Tekakwitha, she felt as sure just then of Rawenniio's direct protection and care, as if she had seen the Great Spirit himself standing in front of her hiding-place and concealing her from the suspicious eyes of her uncle. How else could the wise old chief have been so easily misled by such simple means? With a light heart she resumed her journey. Their worst danger was pa.s.sed. When they reached the sh.o.r.e of Lake George, a little search among the bushes brought to light the canoe which her companions had left there on their journey southward with Hot Ashes. Once fairly launched, they felt secure; and as they paddled up the lake, hugging the westward or leeward side, where canoes find the smoothest water, they woke its echoes with the chanting of Iroquois hymns. Thus did the daughter, a voluntary exile from her home in the Mohawk Valley, retrace the path over land and water travelled years before by her captive Algonquin mother. In her ears had sounded not sacred hymns, but only the wild music of the war-song and the plaintive strains of the Indian love-song. In those days of war and bloodshed the Christian hymn of the Iroquois had not yet been sung. The Mohawk mission had been but recently founded. The blood of the martyred Jogues still lay fresh on the ground, and the soul of the Lily had not yet come into existence.

During this long journey the many thoughts of Tekakwitha must have gone back to the dreary lodge on the banks of the Cayudutta, where her usual daily tasks were neglected, and where her baffled, deserted uncle now sat disconsolate by the hearth-fire. If these thoughts brought a pang to her warm heart, she could console herself with the remembrance that the blessing of her dead mother would not fail to follow her on the journey.

As the three Christians left behind them "the tail of the lake"

(Andiatorocte), and paddled past Ticonderoga, they did not pay the customary tribute to _the little people under the water_. Their heathen tribesmen might, if they chose, cast their tobacco into the lake to gain the good-will of the sprites who were said to prepare the well-shaped arrow-flints with which the sh.o.r.e just there is strewn;[57] for when the surface of the lake was rough they thought the little people were angry. But Tekakwitha and her companions had renounced these superst.i.tions of their race. They knew that G.o.d alone was ruler of wind and wave. On no account could they be induced to pay homage to any such mischievous sprites of the lake. They asked Rawenniio instead to forgive the people, and to turn their thoughts away from all such foolish wors.h.i.+p. "Her journey," says Chauchetiere, "was a continual prayer, and the joy that she felt in approaching Montreal could not be expressed.

Behold then our young savage, twenty-one years of age, who escapes holy and pure, and who triumphs over the impurity, the infidelity, and the vice which have corrupted all the Iroquois! Behold the Genevieve of Canada, behold the treasure of the Sault, who is at hand, and who has sanctified the path from Montreal to the Mohawk, by which other predestined souls have pa.s.sed after her!" When she found herself far from her own country, and realized that she had nothing more to fear on the part of her uncle, she gave herself entirely to G.o.d, to do in the future whatever would please him best. She arrived in the autumn of the year 1677,[58] the desire that she had to get there as soon as possible was the reason for not stopping on the way. On her arrival, she put the letters that Father de Lamberville had written into the hands of the Fathers, who, having read them, were delighted to have acquired a treasure; for these were the words of the letter: "I send you a treasure; guard it well." Her face told more than the letters. Her joy was unspeakable on finding herself in the land of light, freed from the sorrows of spirit which she had endured from not being able to serve G.o.d as she wished to serve him, freed too from the persecutions which were inflicted upon her in her country and in her cabin.

She was received at once into the lodge of Anastasia Tegonhatsihongo, her mother's old friend, with whom her sister and her sister's husband already dwelt.

From the time of her arrival at the new Caughnawaga, Chauchetiere and Cholenec, the two biographers of Kateri Tekakwitha, were both close and observant witnesses of her life. They were also present at her death.

Henceforth, then, we will let them speak often and at length, telling in their own way of the rapid unfolding of spiritual life which took place in this untaught child of Nature. Transplanted from the heart of a heathen wilderness into a settlement of fervent souls,--for such from all accounts was the mission village at the Sault,--the Lily of the Mohawks caught up with keenest relish the inspiration in the air about her. She was lifted with marvellous rapidity to a height of holiness that drew all eyes in Canada towards her. It was there in the land of her adoption that she won the t.i.tle of "La Bonne Catherine." Those who have patience to read on to the end of her biography will see how the brief life of this Indian girl was indeed radiant with love of the true G.o.d.

The letter which she bore with her from the Mohawk Valley, written by Father de Lamberville, who had baptized her, and which was addressed to Father Cholenec, to whose flock she was henceforth to belong, is given in full by Martin, as follows:--

"Catherine Tegakouita va demeurer au Sault. Veuillez-vous charger, je vous en prie, de sa direction. Vous connaitrez bientot le tresor que nous vous donnons. Gardez le donc bien!

Qu'entre vos mains il profite a la gloire de Dieu, et au salut d'une ame qui lui est a.s.surement bien chere."[59]

FOOTNOTES:

[55] Amsterdam is the point at which the Mohawk so bends its course to the southeast that any further advance by the river would have taken the fugitives away from rather than towards their destination. To have left the river sooner would have carried them over a rough and difficult country.

[56] See "Indian Trails in Saratoga County," Appendix, Note D.

[57] This custom is mentioned in the Jesuit "Relations."

[58] Chauchetiere says 1678, but this is evidently a mistake. The date given by Cholenec is 1677.

[59] "Catherine Tegakwita goes to dwell at the Sault. I pray you to take the charge of her direction. You will soon know the treasure that we give you. Guard it, then, well! May it profit in your hands to the glory of G.o.d, and to the salvation of a soul that is a.s.suredly very dear to Him."

CHAPTER XVII.

AT THE SAULT ST. LOUIS.

From the time of her arrival in Canada, in the autumn of the year 1677, Tekakwitha was invariably called by her baptismal name of Katherine, or Kateri; and that the reader may better understand her new life at the Sault with its surroundings, we will endeavor to draw a picture of it, gathering the details from all available sources.

In the cabin of Anastasia Tegonhatsihongo, Kateri already feels at home.

It is a hospitable lodge; for there her adopted sister also dwells, busy with the care of her family. The new-comer is quite free to follow her own inclination, and spends day after day at the feet of the zealous and well-instructed Anastasia. This good woman takes great delight in teaching her all she herself knows of the beliefs and ways of the Christians. In the glow of the autumn days Kateri sits and listens with rapt attention to every word that drops from the lips of Anastasia. The hands of both are busily employed on moccasin or skirt, or close-woven mat of rushes; and the minds of both are keenly active in the realm of spiritual and religious thought. When they glance out at the broad St.

Lawrence, they see before them the tossing rapids, foaming round the wooded Island of the Herons. They themselves are high above the moving waters, but not far away. The bank at the mission village is steep and gra.s.sy. Kateri's sister has need to watch her children closely, for if they play too near the falling ground by the river, a careless lurch might quickly send a dark-skinned little Jean Baptiste or newly christened Joseph rolling down to the water's edge. A slender islet partly breaks the swash of the eddying waters against the mainland. On the bank of the river, overlooking the islet, stands a tall cross which can be seen from every side. Kateri saw its outstretched arms showing above the bark roofs when she first arrived. St. Francois Xavier du Sault (in 1677) is close to the mouth of the river Portage,[60] a small but deep-bedded stream, which protects the village on its western side.

This high ground in the angle of the Portage and St. Lawrence rivers was chosen for the people of the mission when they removed from the meadow-lands at La Prairie. A score or more of Indian cabins have been built on the new site; it is in one of these recently erected lodges that Kateri sits listening to the words of Anastasia. This is the very year in which Cholenec, the Jesuit Father, who lives in the priest's house near the chapel, writes to his superior that there are twenty-two of these cabins. Most of them, it must be remembered, are the long-houses of the Iroquois, containing several families. They are more comfortable than the lodges abandoned at La Prairie. The fields they are cultivating this year are not so damp, and the corn grows better here by the Portage. Anastasia tells Kateri that the temporary chapel of wood which they use now will soon give place to a splendid stone church, sixty feet long, as fine as any in that part of Canada. The foundations are already laid, and the work goes steadily on. The French colonists, across the river and beyond the Sault, are also making plans to build a grand parish church at Montreal. So far the only places of wors.h.i.+p at Ville Marie are the chapels of the Hotel Dieu and the fort, and the small stone church of Our Lady of Bon Secours, just erected. Montreal has been in existence for thirty-five years, and has about a thousand inhabitants. At the Sault there are between two and three hundred permanent Indian residents and three Jesuit Fathers; but other missionaries and many travelling Indians are accustomed to stop there in pa.s.sing. The people at the Sault are famous for their hospitality, and so anxious to make converts to Christianity that they put everything they possess at the disposal of their guests. They have even been known to give up their freshly made corn-fields to new-comers, to induce them to dwell at the Praying Castle. They willingly take upon themselves the work of a second planting to supply their own households. Give the Indian a sufficient motive for hard work, and how completely the charge of idleness against his race falls to the ground!

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Father Cholenec writes (1677) that there are four captains or chiefs, two Iroquois and two Huron, who govern the village at the Sault. He has "reason to hope, though," he says, "that they will soon have four Iroquois captains." Of one of these, Hot Ashes, we already know something. This friend of Kateri Tekakwitha is not only a governing chief, but famous also as a dogique, or catechist. The dogique Paul is another of these chiefs, chosen among the very first, and famous for his eloquence. Hot Ashes having separated from Kateri and his two companions at Caughnawaga on the Mohawk, and given her the use of his canoe, has now gone on to preach Christianity among the Oneidas, and has not yet returned. In the mean time Anastasia has many questions to ask Kateri about her recent long journey and about this same great chief.

How was he received in the Mohawk villages? What did the old men think of him, and how was this one or that one of her friends or relatives disposed towards the Christians at the Sault? Then, too, she has more personal inquiries to make; for she wishes to find out who have been Kateri's intimate friends, and how she has conducted herself on certain trying occasions. Keenly the shrewd old matron watches the young face to see if she answers her frankly, and to read, if possible, her inmost thoughts and wishes. She has taken a strong interest in the girl. She recognizes in her many a trait and feature of her gentle Algonquin mother; and if at times, as Kateri recalls the scenes of her past life and the indignities she has suffered, a flash of Mohawk spirit gleams in her eye, Tegonhatsihongo loves her none the less for it. "She has her father's courage and endurance; she will make a n.o.ble Christian," is the matron's thought; and she spares no pains to give Kateri the benefit of her carefully garnered little store of Christian knowledge. She claims a mother's confidence from the girl, and in return treats her like a daughter. But there is, after all, a sternness, a severity about the Christianity of this Mohawk woman which, though it gives power and efficacy to her exhortations and instructions to the other young people at the Sault, who respect and reverence her, is perhaps in Kateri's case to be regretted. Anastasia is accustomed to dwell so much and at such length on the heinousness of sin and its terrible consequences, here and hereafter, that Kateri from being constantly near her, though more spiritual and pure-hearted already than any of her companions, soon begins to inflict upon herself severe penances to atone for what she considers great wickedness on her part. This wickedness consists chiefly in having adorned herself in past years with beads, trinkets, and Indian ornaments, which she did oftener to please her aunts than to gratify her own vanity.

One day soon after her arrival, Anastasia noticed that Kateri had wampum beads around her neck and in her hair; and the elder woman questioned her to find out if she really cared for these things. It cost Kateri nothing to lay them aside the moment she thought that it might be pleasing to "the true G.o.d" if she did so. Her only motto henceforward was, "Who will teach me what is most pleasing to G.o.d, that I may do it?"

It was love for Rawenniio, and a desire to prepare herself as soon as possible for her first communion, that kept Kateri so close to the side of her instructress. Says Chauchetiere,--

"She learned more in a week than the others did in several years. She never lost a moment, either in the cabin, in the fields, or in the woods. She was always to be seen, rosary in hand, with her dear instructress, going or coming with her bundle of firewood. She never left Anastasia, because she learned more from her when they two were alone, gathering f.a.gots in the woods, than in any other way. Her actions made Anastasia say of her that she never lost sight of G.o.d. Their talk was about the life and doings of good Christians; and as soon as she heard it said that the Christians did such and such things, she tried to put what she heard into practice. She was like a holy bee, seeking to gather honey from all sorts of flowers. She had few companions, even of her own s.e.x, because she wished no other ties than those that would bring her nearer to a perfect life, in which respect her prudence was admirable.

She separated herself from a certain person with whom she had a.s.sociated, because she noticed that she had a false pride; but she accomplished the separation without appearing to despise the person she left."

When Anastasia spoke to Kateri of the necessity of avoiding slander,--a vice to which the squaws were much addicted,--Kateri asked her what that meant. It is not surprising that she did not know what evil speaking was, for she was never known to say a word against any one, not even against those who calumniated her. One day her amiability was put to the proof. A young man pa.s.sed through the cabin where she sat with Anastasia, and roughly pulled aside her blanket with these words: "They say this one has sore eyes; let's see." Kateri flushed deeply, but made no retort. She gathered her blanket about her, and continued the conversation with her friend.

She learned from Anastasia the order of religious exercises at the Praying Castle, and never failed in regular attendance at the chapel.

She became the most fervent spirit in that devout community; indeed the lives of the Indian converts at the Sault seem to have been more like the lives of the early Christians and martyrs, in fervor and heroic devotion, than any that history has elsewhere recorded. At the first dawn of day, after having said their private morning prayers in the cabins, they were accustomed to a.s.semble at the chapel, to visit the Blessed Sacrament. If there happened to be a Ma.s.s at that hour, they stayed to hear it, and then returned to their cabins. At sunrise the regular daily Ma.s.s of the Indians was said. At this they all a.s.sisted, chanting Iroquois hymns and other prayers, including the Creed and the Ten Commandments. These sacred songs were intoned by the dogique, or catechist, and sung by alternate choirs of men and women. The Indians never tired of singing, and the hymns prepared for them in their own language were full of instruction. In this way they learned in a very short time the laws of Christian morality and the mysteries of the Faith.

The missionaries at the Sault were accustomed to hold frequent conferences on religion. Objections to doctrine were raised by one of the audience, and answered either by the priest or dogique. Instead of referring to books, which the Indians could not read or understand, sets of pictures were shown to them, such as had been used successfully in France to instruct the ignorant peasantry of Bas Breton. These proved exceedingly useful among the unlettered Indians, and they soon learned to carry on conferences among themselves in the absence of the missionary. Many converts from paganism were made in this way; and being already well instructed by the dogiques, they had only to be brought to the Fathers to be baptized.

The method of the Jesuit missionaries when devoting themselves to the redmen, was to begin their instruction in religion at once. To use the words of Shea,--

"They did not seek to teach the Indians to read and write as an indispensable prelude to Christianity. That they left for times when greater peace might render it feasible, when long self-control should make the children less averse to the task.

The utter failure of their Huron seminary at Quebec, as well as of all the attempts made by others at the instance of the French Court, showed that to wait till the Indians were a reading people would be to postpone their conversion forever; and, in fact, we see Eliot's Indian Bible outlive the pagan tribes for whom it was prepared."

The people of the Sault, though unable to read or write, were well and thoroughly instructed Christians; and on more than one occasion the white men were put to shame by the greater integrity, morality, and piety of these fervent converts. The public sentiment was so strong there in favor of temperance that on one occasion when a drunkard appeared in their village, he was by common consent stabled with the pigs, and the next day was chased out of the settlement.

After the morning Ma.s.s, when the men and women went off to work in the fields or cabins, the children were gathered into the chapel and instructed orally.

Many of the Indians objected to having their children taught to read and write, on the ground that it left them no time to become expert at hunting, and to gain other acquirements more useful to them; but it must not be inferred, therefore, that the children had no schooling. On the contrary, their parents were well pleased to have them a.s.sembled at regular hours and taught many things by the blackgowns, though without giving up to it the greater part of the day. Besides this, there was a zealous young Indian in the village, named Joseph Rontagorha, who gathered the children about him in the evenings to catechise them and to teach them singing. A pathetic story is told by Father Cholenec of one of Joseph's pupils,--a little child who was dying. He would not be satisfied till they had called together his young friends to sing the Iroquois hymns they had been learning. The dying child joined his voice with theirs, till his strength failed him. He breathed his soul away to Heaven on the solemn strains of his favorite hymn. The sweet voices of the awe-stricken children died away into a silence which was broken only by their sobs, when they realized that the voice of their companion would join with theirs no more.

The Bishop of Quebec, Monseigneur Laval, had journeyed up the St.

Lawrence and visited the mission of St. Francois Xavier shortly before Kateri's arrival, and while the village was still at La Prairie. He had been received at the landing there with rustic pomp, and the dogique Paul made an eloquent address of welcome. The bishop administered confirmation to a hundred of the Indians on that occasion, and made a stay of several days among them. He was greatly edified by what he saw; and the Indians, on their part, were deeply impressed by ceremonies they then witnessed for the first time.

Again in 1685 they were visited by the newly appointed bishop Monseigneur de Saint-Valier.

While Kateri lived among them, however, no episcopal visitation is recorded; probably none occurred. Though she did not receive confirmation, she had more spiritual advantages than she had hoped for.

She was much pleased to find that many of the pagan festivals which were observed each year in the Mohawk country were discontinued by her tribesmen at the Sault. Her superior intellect as well as her love of purity had caused her to avoid taking part in the dissolute and superst.i.tious rites which accompanied many of these Iroquois feasts.

Only two of the old national festivals were retained at the Sault. These were the Planting Festival and the joyous Harvest Festival, at the gathering and husking of the corn. But even these were hallowed and sanctified by the prevailing spirit of religion. The seed was brought to the missionaries to be blessed for sowing, and the first fruits of the harvest were laid upon the altar.