Chapter 8
Ogimaa Mikwam-migwan
A coal-black raven flew above the hunter and his prey, calling out an alarm. The huge bear did not heed the bird’s warning.
Namakagon’s blood pounded in his ears as the bear, much larger than he had previously thought, came closer and closer. A slight breeze on his face assured him the bear would not catch his scent. But it did catch the smell of the venison suet he had set for bait. The bear looked in every direction, but poor eyesight prevented it from seeing the motionless hunter who knelt behind the balsam blind a short distance away.
Chief Namakagon's bow was now fully drawn. When the bear reached the point directly below the suet, it stopped. The hunter's heart was pounding harder and harder now, but he could not shoot. The angle was wrong. He might only wound the great animal if the arrow hit the shoulder bone rather than entering the chest. He waited in silence at full draw, arms trembling.
The bear sniffed the air, looked up, and saw the suet above him. He stood on his hind legs, his belly and great black chest facing the chief, not ten steps away. The hunter put more tension on the bowstring, took final aim, and relaxed the fingers of his strong right hand.
Just as the enormous bear plucked the tallow from the branch, the arrow flashed through the crisp, morning air and pierced the bear’s hide. The sharp, steel arrowhead snapped a rib, and then cut through the bear’s great heart. He grunted a loud ooof as he spun around and bounded aimlessly off the trail.
Namakagon’s eyes opened wide as he watched the giant makwaa charge straight at him. The bow fell from his hand as he reached for his knife, but before he could pull it to defend himself, the great bear crashed through his balsam blind and bounded across him, smashing him to the ground below its huge front paws.
The bear never saw the hunter, who was now looking up from under a tangle of balsam branches, wet with bear blood. He watched the bear run through the tall pines, taking long strides as it flashed between the huge trees. When almost out of sight, the enormous animal crashed to the ground.
Namakagon stood. He picked up his bow and quiver, and looked back to the trail where his arrow had met the bear’s black chest. The suet lay on the ground. He left it there for some unknown animal that shared these woods with his bear. He stretched his sore muscles, before silently approaching the dead bear. Namakagon opened his tobacco pouch, sprinkled some across the bear, and chanted a prayer of thanks to the bear, to the woods, to the earth, and to Gitchee Manitou.
As always, the satisfaction of this successful hunt was mixed with a great, hollow, personal sadness. One of nature’s beautiful creatures would no longer walk through the forest. Instead, it would make way for another of its kind. It would grant nourishment and provisions to the hunter and live long in stories told near future campfires. A great animal when alive, the makwaa would remain great in memory.
By late afternoon Namakagon had skinned out and quartered the bear. He wrapped the hindquarters in the large skin and tied it onto a simple travois he fashioned by lashing together some nearby maple saplings. The front quarters and rib cage were hung from an overhanging pine limb. The ravens would find the meat before he could return, but maybe they would spend their time on the pile of innards rather than the meat in the tree.
The last, lingering smoke from his campfire was blowing to the west as the chief pulled his canoe onto the beach. His dogs greeted him and his cargo excitedly.
Namakagon looked at the rising smoke and the thick clouds gathering in the eastern sky. The weather was turning. He pulled his canoe under several tall white pines in anticipation of a storm. There it would sit until spring, overturned and protected by the limbs of the pines.
“You have been a good partner for another season,” he said to the birch and spruce canoe. “The lake will freeze over soon. I will wake you in the spring.”
Three more green logs on the fire would finish smoking the venison. He carried the bearskin and hindquarters up to his lodge after tending the fire.
That night, the east wind strengthened. Snowflakes appeared. By morning’s light, the forest floor was blanketed with a foot of snow. And it continued to fall. As he cut the smoked venison from its place above the cold campfire, he looked across the lake. The dense snowfall masked the opposite shore, not a quarter mile away. Namakagon returned to his lodge to wait out the storm.
“The crows and ravens won’t wait,” he said to his dogs. “They will be happy to have a breakfast of fresh bear meat.” He peered out at the falling snow. “I should go. But now I must travel by land. It will take me a full day to go there and return. If the snow continues, it will take longer, and I will have to sleep in the forest overnight. Should I wait or should I go right now, before it is too late?” he wondered, staring at the falling snow. “No. I will stay. If Gitchee Manitou decides the animals need the meat more than I, then so it must be.”
The old chief built a small fire in his lodge and spent the rest of the day trimming fat from the bear hide, preparing to tan it in better weather.
The late November snowfall continued all day and well into the night. He heard the wind switch to the north, then slow, then stop. He felt the temperature drop. By morning an inch of ice covered the lake. The snow in the woods was knee-deep.
As the sun peeked over the treetops, Namakagon hitched up his dogs. They took the trail south. Each exhaled breath made a white cloud in the freezing air. The near shore ice was strong enough to hold them as they crossed onto the mainland and followed the shoreline to the south, then west. As they struggled to climb to the top of the ridge, the chief saw the tracks of two other men heading east. “Hunters,” he said to his dogs. “They must also be looking for extra food for the winter months.” At the top of the ridge he turned west again, finding the stand of giant white pines where he had killed the bear. He circled to the trail leading into the balsam swamp. Two ravens flew up from the ground and into the branches above. The bear meat he left hanging from the pine limb was frozen as solid as stone. Birds had knocked most of the snow from it but had devoured little meat. Protected from freezing by the snow lay the last of the innards, nearly consumed by ravens.
Namakagon untied the rope and dropped the two front quarters and large rib cage into the sled below. The heavy load in this deep snow would be a challenge. Off they went, the dogs following their own trail back toward the lake. The burden was heavy. The hunter pushed from behind as his dogs pressed on under a cold, clear sky.
The chief was steaming with sweat by the time he neared the lake. In the frigid air, moisture from his breath froze, making icicles on his beard and hair. On the trail ahead he saw two Ojibwe hunters who left the tracks that morning. They dragged a large doe and waved as he approached.
“Boozhoo!” shouted the chief, with a friendly motion.
“Boozhoo!” came the reply. “Where are you going with such a heavy load, Mikwam-migwan?”
“To my lodge, the lodge of Old Bear,” said the chief. “But why do you call me Mikwam-migwan?”
Grinning, they pointed at the frost on Namakagon’s face and hair. “The ice you have made on your whiskers looks like the feathers of the osprey,” one man laughed. “You will scare our friend Old Bear out of his wits!”
Namakagon smiled, feeling the ice around his face. “Old Bear is no longer here. He has given me his lodge. I have taken the name of the lake as my own.”
“Then, Mikwam-migwan, we will let our people at Pac-wa-wong know we have met Namakagon, the tall man with ice feathers. You must come visit us when you can. We are near. One-half day by canoe in summer, one day walk in winter.”
“I will come to your camp soon,” said Namakagon “Look for me when the river ice will carry the weight of my sled and dogs.”
Two hours later, as the bright November, 1831, sun descended over the western shore of the lake, Ogimaa Mikwam-migwan, known, too, as Chief Namakagon, built a fire in his lodge to cook a fresh bear steak for his supper.
Cha
pter 9
Oshkosh, Chippeway, and Northbound