The old Lakota was wise. He knew that a man's heart away from nature becomes hard.

Only to the white man was nature a 'wilderness'.

For the Lakota there was no wilderness. Nature was not dangerous but hospitable, not forbidding but friendly.

Conversation was never begun at once, nor in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation. Silence was meaningful with the Lakota, and his granting a space of silence to the speech-maker and his own moment of silence before talking was done in the practice of true politeness and regard for the rule that, "thought comes before speech."

Today the children of our public schools are taught more of the history, heroes, legends, and sagas of the old world than of the land of their birth, while they are furnished with little material on the people and institutions that are truly American.

We did not think of the great open plains, the beautiful rolling hills, and winding streams with tangled growth as wild. Earth was beautiful and we were surrounded with the blessings of the Great Mystery.

The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man's heart, away from nature, becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too.