Page:Recollections of My Boyhood.djvu/100

 He was a very interesting man and I frequently whiled away my leisure hours in his company. One day I went with him to visit a fish trap some of his people had in a small stream. As we were walking along a foot path I saw a large rattlesnake crawling slowly across the path directly before us. I immediately began a search for a stick or stone, intending to kill the snake, but Lolokes-psis objected, assuring me the snake was friendly as he would soon prove. He gathered a reed stalk about two feet long, then began chanting or singing a most peculiar song, at the same time stroking the back of the snake with the wand. Back and forth, very gently, went the wand and more weird became the song, until the snake ceased to move and lay at full length as straight as a rod. The doctor then sank slowly to his knees near it, placing his right hand, palm upward, in front of the snake. Incredible as this may seem, it is nevertheless a fact, that the snake began moving slowly up the Indian's arm to his shoulder, then doubling back, lay along his arm with its head in the palm of his hand. He carried it this way a few paces. When I ventured near the snake shot out its forked tongue in a threatening manner and Lolokes-psis said to me, "Wake tenas siah," that is, "not so near." He then dropped on one knee and slowly lowered his arm until his hand rested on the ground when the snake slid down without showing any signs of anger or fear, and crawled away into the grass. Unreasonable as this account may appear, it is faithfully and truly told. Like the Moqui Indians, and some other tribes in New Mexico and Arizona, Lolokes-psis seemed to have had power to charm and render harmless the rattlesnake.

In this village near us lived the chief of the Yangolers. He was universally known as Chief Halo. His was a noble character; he awoke early to an appreciation of the great advantages enjoyed by the white man. The food afforded by the cultivation of the soil, the growing of grain and vegetables, were to him a revelation. He often expressed his gratitude for the rich gleaning the settlers' grain fields afforded his people, and for the abundant supply of vegetables given them. He was pleased when he saw us plowing up the soil of his beautiful valley. No effort had been made to treat with the natives for their land at the time we settled in the Umpqua Valley, and