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A Victor At Chungke
by
Judging by this specimen of his athletic training to feats of prowess, Colannah Gigagei might boast to the “Goweno” of South Carolina. It was not, however, merely in muscle that the young captive excelled. As Abram Varney thought of certain sterling manly traits of the highest type which this poor waif had developed here in this incongruous environment, one might suppose from the sheer force of heredity, he shook his head silently, and his eyes clouded, the pulses of Charlestown still beating in his veins. For he was wont to leave for months the treasures of his trading-house, not merely a matter of trinkets and beads, but powder, lead, and firearms, sufficient for accoutring an expedition for the “war-path,” and great store of cloths, cutlery, paints, in the charge of this valiant gamester of chungke, stanch alike against friend and foe, as safely as if its wealth were beneath his own eye. So insecure had become the Cherokee allegiance to the government that it was impossible now under its uncertain protection to retain white men from the colonies here in his employ as agents and under-traders, or, indeed, those whose interest and profits amounted to an ownership in a share of the stock. The earlier traders in neighboring towns one by one had gone, affecting a base several hundred miles nearer the white settlements. Some had shifted altogether from the tribe, and secured a post among the Chickasaws, who were indubitably loyal to the British. While their withdrawal added to Varney’s profits,–for each trader was allowed to hold at this time a license only for two Indian towns, it being before the date of the issuance of general licenses, and the custom which they had relinquished, the barter with the Cherokees for deerskins, now came from long distances, drawn as by a magnet to his trading-house at Tennessee Town,–it had resulted in his isolation, and for years he had been almost the only British subject west of the Great Smoky Mountains. He had no fear of the Cherokees, however–not even should the political sky, always somewhat overcast, become yet more lowering. He had long been accustomed to these Indians, and he felt that he had fast friends among them. His sane mercantile judgment appraised and appreciated the added opportunities of his peculiar position, which he would not lightly throw away, and the development of Otasite’s incongruous commercial values not only removed the possibility of loss during his absence, but added to his facilities in enabling him to secure the fidelity of Indians as packmen, hitherto impracticable, but now rendered to Otasite as one of the tribe. He had recognized with satisfaction, mingled with amusement, national traits in the boy, who, despite his Indian training, would not, like them, barter strings of wampum measuring “from elbow to wrist” without regard to the relative length of arm. Yet he had none of the Indian deceit and treachery. He was blunt, sincere, and bold. His alertness in computation gave Varney genuine pleasure, although they wrangled much as to his method, for he used the Cherokee numeration, and it set the trader’s mercantile teeth on edge to hear twenty called “tahre skoeh”–two tens.
“And why not?” Otasite would demand, full of faith in his own education. “The Chickasaw will say ‘pokoole toogalo‘–ten twos”–and he would smile superior. This was his world, and these his standards–the Cherokees and the Chickasaws!
He was not to be easily influenced or turned save by some spontaneous acquiescence of his own mind, and Varney found himself counting “skoeh chooke kaiere” (the old one’s hundred) before he ever induced Otasite to say instead “one thousand.”
The boy even ventured on censorship in his turn. “You say ‘Cherokees’ and ‘Chickasaws’ when you speak of the Tsullakee and the Chickasaw; why don’t you then say the English-es and the French-es?” For the plural designation of these tribes was a colonial invention.
His bulldog tenacity, his orderly instincts, his providence, so contrary to the methods of the wasteful Indian, his cheerful industry, his indomitable energy and perseverance,–all were so national that in days gone past Varney used now and again to clap him on the shoulder with a loud, careless vaunt, “British to the marrow!”