The Birchbark House
Micro theme 3 In The Birchbark House, three characters had died. There was the visitor, a white man, Ten Snow, Omakayas’ friend, and Neewo, Omakayas’ youngest brother. In Waterlily, Gloku, Waterlily’s grandmother, dies as well as Sacred Horse, Waterlily’s husband. It all started in the beginning to middle of winter when the characters in The Birchbark House started dying off. One day, after the first snow and the lake had frozen over, a group of men dragged their sled of furs from the mainland and stayed for the night. There was one man that Omakayas remembered. He sat by the fire as close as he could without scorching his body, a tired-looking man, thin and scraggly braids, coughing and feeble with a flushed, fevered face (142). The man died the next day. The man left behind a more horrible visitor, small pox. The next few days after the visitor passed, everyone was on high alert for any signs of sickness. Ten Snow was the first to fall into a fever (143). A few days passed and Mama and Nokomis thought the sickness passed over them and their family. They were wrong. Angeline became fevered and didn’t move. Mama gave instructions to Omakayas to build a small lodge outside the house to keep the sickness from spreading to them. And that she did. A few days later the sickness had gotten to Mama. A few nights later, Omakayas felt Neewo’s small body turn heated and molten, soft and fiery with the fevers rage (146). She didn’t want “the house,” the sickness, to suck him in like it did the others. As soon as she dosed off Deydey took little Neewo from her grasp and brought him into the house. Later that night Omakayas was allowed to hold him. She tried and tried to keep him cool by bathing him with cool water over his forehead. Days went by and she never let him go for anything. She held him when he trembled, when he had a hard time breathing, when he spat up blood. She held him when he took that last deep breath. She held him when he died (149). She held him