Page:Iracéma, the honey-lips (1886).djvu/69

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IRAÇÉMA.
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was that of ten braves, yet it did not exhaust the strength of the two great chiefs. When their toma-hawks clashed, the battle trembled to the heart as one man.

The brother of Iraçéma came straight to the stranger who had taken the daughter of Araken from the hospitable Wigwam; the trail of vengeance led him; the sight of his sister maddened him. Cauby the brave furiously assaults the enemy.

Iraçéma remained by the side of her warrior and spouse. She saw Cauby from afar and cried—

"Let the Lord of Iraçéma listen to the prayer of his slave; let him not shed the blood of the son of Araken. If the warrior Cauby must die, let it be by the hand of Iraçéma, not by his."

Martim looked at the savage with eyes of horror.

"Would Iraçéma slay her brother?"

"Iraçéma would see the blood of Cauby stain her hand rather than the hand of her lord, because the eyes of Iraçéma dwell upon him, and not upon herself."

The battle still rages. Cauby fights with fury. The Christian hardly defends himself, but the poisoned arrows from the young wife՚s bow save him from the blows of the enemy.

Poty had already laid low the old Andira and all the braves who during the struggle had encountered his good tomahawk. Martim leaves to him the son of Araken and seeks out Irapúam.

"Jacaúna is a great Chief; his War-collar[1] thrice encircles his neck! This Tabájara belongs to the white warrior."

"Revenge is the honour of warfare, and Jacaúna loves the friend of Poty."

The great Pytiguára chief upraised his formidable

  1. ↑ Seu collar de guerra. The collar which the savages made of the teeth of vanquished enemies (taking from each one tooth), was a blazon and a proof of valour.
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