m hurling through the fir forest--like the
distant rising of an Indian war-song; it swept up those mighty
archways until the gray dome above me faded, and in its place
the stars came out to look down, not on these paleface kneeling
worshippers, but on a band of stalwart, sinewy, copper-coloured
devotees, my own people in my own land, who also assembled to do
honour to the Manitou of all nations.

The deep-throated organ and the boy's voices were gone; I heard
instead the melancholy incantations of our own pagan religionists.
The beautiful dignity of our great sacrificial rites seemed to
settle about me, to enwrap me in its garment of solemnity and
primitive stateliness.

Beat of the Drum.

The atmosphere pulsed with the beat of the Indian drum, the
eerie penetrations of the turtle rattle that set the time of the
dancers' feet. Dance? It is not a dance, that marvellously slow,
serpentine-like figure with the soft swish, swish of moccasined
feet, and the faint jingling of elks'-teeth bracelets, keeping
rhythm with every footfall. It is not a dance, but an invocation
of motion. Why may we not worship with the graceful movement of
our feet? The paleface worships by moving his lips and tongue;
the difference is but slight.

The altar-lights of St. Paul's glowed for me no more. In their
place flared the camp fires of the Onondaga "long-house," and the
resinous scent of the burning pine drifted across the fetid London
air. I saw the tall, copper-skinned fire-keeper of the Iroquois
council enter, the circle of light flung fitfully against the black
surrounding woods. I have seen their white bishops, but none so
regal, so august as he. His garb of fringed buckskin and ermine was
no more grotesque than the vestments worn by the white preachers in
high places; he did not carry a book or a shining golden symbol,
but from his splendid shoulders was suspended a pure white lifeless
dog.

Into the red flame the strong hands gently lowered it, scores of
reverent, blanketed figures stood silent, awed, for it is the
highest, holiest festival of the year. Then the wild, strange chant
arose--the great pagan ritual was being intoned by the fire-keeper,
his weird, monotonous tones voicing this formula:

"The Great Spirit desires no human sacrifice, but we, His children,
must give to Him that which is nearest our hearts and nearest our
lives. Only the spotless and stainless can enter into His presence,
only that which is purified b