THE IRIS.

Presented
To
 
C. Schuessele del.   Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.

C. Schuessele del.   Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.
 
LANDING OF WILLIAM PENN.

The IRIS
Souvenir
 
C. Schuessele del.   Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.

THE IRIS:
An Illuminated Souvenir,
FOR
MDCCCLII.

EDITED BY
JOHN S. HART, LL. D.
 
PHILADELPHIA:
PUBLISHED BY LIPPINCOTT, GRAMBO & CO.
SUCCESSORS TO GRIGG, ELLIOT & CO.
1852.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1851,
BY LIPPINCOTT, GRAMBO & CO.,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
 
C. SHERMAN, PRINTER.

xiii

Captain Eastman, of the United States Topographical Corps, having been stationed for nine years on our northwestern frontier, among the Indian tribes, at and around Fort Snelling, made a series of drawings of some of the most striking and remarkable objects connected with the Indian traditions. His accomplished lady, who was with him seven years of this time, collected the traditions themselves, and wove them into tales and poems that let us into the very heart of Indian life. The whole of this valuable and original collection has been secured for the Iris, and gives to the volume for 1852 its distinguishing feature. To make the illustrations conform more to the character of the subjects, they have all been printed in colours, in the style now so deservedly popular. Last year the publishers gave only four of these gorgeous illuminated pages. The present volume contains no less than twelve, all from original designs, and all printed in ten different colours. The happy blending of the colours in these pictures, the disposition of the light and shade, and the skill with which they are printed, give them the appearance of paintings rather than of prints. Such a collection of gems of art in one volume, could not be made without a heavy expense. But the publishers were desirous of making the Iris, as to the splendour of its appearance, not unworthy of the celestial visitant from which it has been named, and of the veryxiv marked favour with which its predecessor of the last season was received.

The literary matter, like that of the former volume, is entirely original, and with the exception of the beautiful poem by Miss Bremer, entirely American, both as to subjects and authorship. Though there are various shades of thought and feeling in these effusions of genius, each subject being coloured according to the mental constitution of the writer, yet, as in the divine bow of promise, all colours are blended and harmonized in the one aim to place before the beholder a new token of hope and gladness.

ILLUSTRATIONS
 
C. Schuessele del.   Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.

xv

19

BY SARAH ROBERTS.

21

BY THE EDITOR.

(See the Frontispiece.)

The first landing of William Penn at Newcastle, in 1682, is one of those striking historical events that are peculiarly suited for pictorial illustration. The late Mr. Duponceau, in one of his discourses, first suggested the idea of making it the subject of an historical painting. This idea is seized with avidity by Mr. Dixon, the most recent biographer of the great Quaker, and the circumstances of the landing are given accordingly, with much minuteness. The artist who designed the picture that forms the frontispiece to the present volume has had this description in view. I cannot do better, therefore, than to quote the words of Mr. Dixon as the best possible commentary upon the picture.

"On the 27th of October, nine weeks after the departure from Deal, the Welcome moored off Newcastle, in the territories lately ceded by the Duke of York, and William Penn first set foot in the New World.1 His landing made a 22 general holiday in the town; young and old, Welsh, Dutch, English, Swedes, and Germans, crowded down to the landing-place, each eager to catch a glimpse of the great man who had come amongst them, less as their lord and governor than as their friend. In the centre of the foreground, only distinguished from the few companions of his voyage who have yet landed, by the nobleness of his mien, and a light blue silken sash tied round his waist, stands William Penn; erect in stature, every motion indicating courtly grace, his countenance lighted up with hope and honest pride,—in every limb and feature the expression of a serene and manly beauty.2 The young officer before him, dressed in the gay costume of the English service, is his lieutenant, Markham, come to welcome his relative to the new land, and to give an account of his own stewardship. On the right stand the chief settlers of the district, arrayed in their national costumes, the light hair and quick eye of the Swede finding a good foil in the stolid look of the heavy Dutchman, who doffs his cap, but doubts whether he shall take the pipe out of his mouth even to say welcome to the new governor. A little apart, as if studying with the intense eagerness of Indian skill the physiognomy of the ruler who has come with his children to occupy their hunting-grounds, stands the wise and noble leader of the Red Men, Taminent, and a party of the Lenni Lenapé in their picturesque paints and costume. Behind the central figure are grouped the principal companions of his voyage; and on the dancing waters of the Delaware rides the stately ship, while between her and the shore23 a multitude of light canoes dart to and fro, bringing the passengers and merchandise to land. Part of the background shows an irregular line of streets and houses, the latter with the pointed roofs and fantastic gables which still delight the artist's eye in the streets of Leyden or Rotterdam; and further on the view is lost in one of those grand old pine and cedar forests which belong essentially to an American scene."

I take much pleasure in quoting also, in this connexion, another scene of somewhat similar character, though greatly misrepresented in the ordinary pictures of it heretofore given. Penn's personal appearance has been even more misapprehended than his character. He was, indeed, one of the most handsome men of his age, and at the time of his first coming to America he was in the very prime of life. West makes him an ugly, fat old fellow, in a costume half a century out of date. So says Mr. Dixon. The passage referred to, and about to be quoted, is from a description of the celebrated Treaty with the Indians at Shackamaxon.

"This conference has become one of the most striking scenes in history. Artists have painted, poets have sung, philosophers have applauded it; but it is nevertheless clear, that in words and colours it has been equally and generally misrepresented, because painters, poets, and historians have chosen to draw on their own imaginations for the features of a scene, every marking line of which they might have recovered from authentic sources.

"The great outlines of nature are easily obtained. There, the dense masses of cedar, pine, and chestnut, stretching far away into the interior of the land; here, the noble river24 rolling its waters down to the Atlantic Ocean; along its surface rose the purple smoke of the settlers' homestead; on the opposite shores lay the fertile and settled country of New Jersey. Here stood the gigantic elm which was to become immortal from that day forward,—and there lay the verdant council chamber formed by nature on the surface of the soil. In the centre stood William Penn, in costume undistinguished from the surrounding group, save by the silken sash. His costume was simple, but not pedantic or ungainly: an outer coat, reaching to the knees, and covered with buttons, a vest of other materials, but equally ample, trousers extremely full, slashed at the sides, and tied with strings or ribbons, a profusion of shirt sleeves and ruffles, with a hat of the cavalier shape (wanting only the feather), from beneath the brim of which escaped the curls of a new peruke, were the chief and not ungraceful ingredients.3 At his right hand stood Colonel Markham, who had met the Indians in council more than once on that identical spot, and was regarded by them as a firm and faithful friend; on his left Pearson, the intrepid companion of his voyage; and near his person, but a little backward, a band of his most attached adherents. When the Indians approached in their old forest costume, their bright feathers sparkling in the sun, and their bodies painted in the most gorgeous manner, the governor received them with the easy dignity of one accustomed to mix with European courts. As soon as the reception was over, the sachems retired to a short distance, and after a brief consultation among themselves,25 Taminent, the chief sachem or king, a man whose virtues are still remembered by the sons of the forest, advanced again a few paces, and put upon his own head a chaplet, into which was twisted a small horn: this chaplet was his symbol of power; and in the customs of the Lenni Lenapé, whenever the chief placed it upon his brows the spot became at once sacred, and the person of every one present inviolable. The venerable Indian king then seated himself on the ground, with the older sachems on his right and left, the middle-aged warriors ranged themselves in the form of a crescent or half-moon round them, and the younger men formed a third and outer semicircle. All being seated in this striking and picturesque order, the old monarch announced to the governor that the natives were prepared to hear and consider his words. Penn then rose to address them, his countenance beaming with all the pride of manhood. He was at this time thirty-eight years old; light and graceful in form; the handsomest, best-looking, most lively gentleman she had ever seen, wrote a lady who was an eyewitness of the ceremony."

26

BY FREDRIKA BREMER.

29

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.
 
WE-HAR-KA.

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

The Indian settlement, the opening scene of our story, presented a different appearance from what we call an Indian village at the present day. The lodges were far more numerous, and the Indians were not drooping about, without energy, and apparently without occupation. The long line of hills did not echo the revels of the drunkard, nor were the faces of the people marked with anxiety and care. The untaught and untamed dispositions of the red men were as yet unaffected by the evil influences of the degenerate white man.

The Sioux4 were in their summer-houses, and the village stretched along the bank of the river for a quarter of a mile. It reached back, too, to the foot of a high hill, and some of the lodges were shaded by the overhanging branches30 of the elm and maple. Above the homes of the living might be seen the burial-place of the dead; for, on the summit of the hill the enveloped forms of the departed were receiving the last red beams of the retiring sun, whose rising and repose were now for ever unnoticed by them.

The long, warm day was closing in, and the Indians were enjoying themselves in the cool breezes that were stirring the waves of the river and the wild flowers that swept over its banks. They were collected in groups in every direction, but the largest party might be found surrounding a mat, on which was seated the old war-chief of the band, who had long dragged a tedious existence, a care to others and a burden to himself. The mat was placed near the wigwam, so that the sides of the wigwam supported the back of the aged and infirm warrior. His hair was cut straight over his forehead, but behind it hung in long locks over his neck.

Warm as was the season, the buffalo robe was wrapped around him, the fur side next to him, while on the outside, in Indian hieroglyphics, might be read many an event of his life. Around the edge of the robe was a row of hands painted in different colours, representing the number of enemies he had killed in battle. In the centre of the robe were drawn the sun and morning star, objects of worship among the Sioux, and placed on the robe as a remedy for a severe sickness which once prostrated his vital powers, but was conquered by the efficacious charm contained in the representation. Ornaments of different kinds adorned his person; but his limbs were shrunken to the bone with age, and the time had long since come to him when even the grasshopper was a burden.

31

The features of the Sioux were still expressive, though the eyes were closed and the lips thin and compressed; he was encircled with a dignity, which, in all ages and climes, attaches itself to an honourable old age.

Close by his side, and contrasting strongly with the war-chief, was one of his nearest relations. She was his granddaughter, the orphan girl of his favourite son. She was at once his companion, attendant, and idol.

They were never separated, that old man and young girl; for a long time he had been fed by her hands, and now he never saw the light of the sun he worshipped except when she raised and held open the eyelids which weakness had closed over his eyes. She had just assisted his tottering steps, and seated him on the mat, where he might enjoy the pleasant evening-time and the society of those who delighted in the strange stories his memory called up, or who were willing to receive the advice which the aged are ever privileged to pour into the hearts of the young.

The evening meal of the warrior had been a light one, for We-har-ka still held in her small and beautiful hand a bark dish, which contained venison cut up in small pieces, occasionally pressing him to eat again. It was evident there was something unusual agitating his thoughts, for he impatiently put aside the hand that fed him, and taking his pipe, the handle of which was elaborately adorned, he held it to have it lighted, then dreamily and quietly placed it in his mouth.

He had long been an object of reverence to his people; though superseded as a warrior and a leader, yet his influence was still acknowledged in the band which he had so long controlled. He had kept this alive in a great measure by32 the oft-repeated stories of his achievements, and above all, by the many personal encounters he had had, not only with his enemies, but with the gods, the objects of their devotion and fear.

The pipe was soon laid aside, and his low and murmuring words could not be understood by the group, that, attracted by the unusual excitement that showed itself in the war-chief's manner, had pressed near him.

After a short communing with himself he placed his hand upon the head of the girl, who was watching every change in his expressive face. "My daughter," he said, "you will not be alone—the Eagle Eye will not again see the form of his warrior son: he would have charged him to care for his sister, even as the small birds watch and guard around the home of the forest god.

"The children of the Great Spirit must submit to his will. My heart would laugh could I again see the tall form of my grandson. I would see once more the fleetness of his step and the strength of his arm; but it is not to be. Before he shall return, crying, 'It is for my father, the scalp of his enemy,' I shall be roaming over the hunting-grounds of the Great Spirit. Do not weep, my daughter; you will be happy in your husband's wigwam, and you will tell your children how the Eagle Eye loved you, even till his feet started on the warrior's journey.

"Your brother will return," he continued, "and it is for him that I lay aside the pipe, which I shall never smoke again; the drum that I have used since I have been a medicine-man, I wish laid near my side when I shall be dead, and wrapped in the buffalo robe which will cover me.

33

"You, my braves, shall know whence I obtained this drum. It has often brought back life to the dying man, and its sound has secured us success in battle. I have often told you that I had seen the God of the Great Deep in my dreams, and from him I obtained power to strike terror to the hearts of my enemies. Who has shouted the death-cry oftener than I? Look at the feathers5 of honour in my head! What enemy ever heard the name of Eagle Eye without trembling? But I, terrible as I have been to my enemies, must grow weak like a woman, and die like a child. The waters of the rivers rush on; you may hear them and trace their way, but soon they join the waves of the great deep, and we see them no more—so I am about to join the company in the house of the Great Spirit, and when your children say, 'Where is Eagle Eye?' you may answer, 'The Great Spirit has called him, we cannot go where he is.'

"It was from Unk-ta-he, the god of the great deep, that I received that drum. Before I was born of woman I lived in the dark waters. Unk-ta-he rose up with his terrible eyes, and took me to his home. I lived with him and the other gods of the sea. I cannot to you all repeat the lessons of wisdom he has taught me; it is a part of the great medicine words that women should never hear.

"There, in the home of the god of the sea, I saw many wonders—the large doors through which the water gods passed when they visited the earth, the giant trees lying in the water higher than our mountains. They had lightning34 too, the weapons of the thunder birds;6 when the winds arose, and the sea waved, then did Unk-ta-he hurl the streaked fire to the earth through the waters.

"The god of the great deep gave me this drum, and I wish it buried with me; he told me when I struck the drum my will should be obeyed, and it has been so.

"When my son returns, tell him to let his name be terrible like his grandfather's. Tell him that my arm was like a child's because of the winters I had seen, but that he must revenge his brother's death; then will he be like the brave men who have gone before him, and his deeds will be remembered as long as the Dacotas hate their enemies. The shadows grow deeper on the hills, and the long night will soon rest upon the head of the war-chief. I am old, yet my death-song shall call back the spirits of the dead. Where are the Chippeways, my enemies? See their red scalps scorching in the sun! I am a great warrior; tell me, where is the enemy who fears me not!"

While the voice of the old man now rose with the excitement that was influencing, now fell with the exhaustion, which brought big drops of perspiration on his face, the Indians were collecting in a crowd around him.

It was, indeed, a glorious evening for the war-chief to die. The horizon was a mass of crimson clouds, their gorgeous tints were reflected on the river; the rocky bluffs rose35 up like castle walls around the village, while on the opposite shore the deer were parting the foliage with their graceful heads and drinking from the low banks.

We-har-ka wiped the forehead and brow of her grandfather. There was something of more than ordinary interest about the appearance of this young person: her features were regularly formed, their expression mild; her figure light and yielding as a young tree; her hair was neatly parted and gathered in small braids over her neck; her dress well calculated to display the grace of her figure; a heavy necklace of wampum7 covered her throat and neck, and on her bosom was suspended the holy cross!

Her complexion was lighter than usual for an Indian girl, owing to the confinement occasioned by the charge of her infirm relative; a subdued melancholy pervaded her features, and even the tone of her voice.

There was a pause, for the warrior slept a few moments, and again his voice was heard. Death was making him mindful of the glorious achievements of his life. Again he was brandishing his tomahawk in circles round the head of his fallen foe; again he taunted his prisoner, whose life he had spared that he might enjoy his sufferings under the torment; again, with a voice as strong as in early manhood,36 he shouted the death-cry—it was his own, for not another sound, not even a sigh escaped him.

Gently they moved him into the wigwam. We-har-ka stood by his head. There was no loud wailing, for he had outlived almost all who were bound to him by near ties.

Those who stood around heaped their most cherished possessions on his feet: the knife, the pipe, and the robe were freely and affectionately offered to the dead.

We-har-ka gazed earnestly upon him: large tears fell on her bosom and on the old man's brow. Some one drew near and respectfully covered his venerable face: the drum was placed, as he requested, at his side.

One of the men said, "Eagle Eye takes proud steps as he travels towards the land of souls. His heart has long been where warriors chase the buffalo on the prairies of the Great Spirit." We-har-ka drew from her belt her knife, and cut long, deep gashes on her round arms; then, not heeding the wounds,8 she severed the braids of her glossy hair, and cutting them off with the knife, red with her own blood, she threw them at her feet.

How did the holy cross find its way to the wilds of a new country? A savage, yet powerful nation, idolaters at heart and in practice, bending to the sun, the forests, and the sea—how37 was it that the sign of the disciple of Jesus lay glittering on the bosom of one of the women of this heathen race?

Did the Christian hymn of praise ever rise with the soft and silvery vapours of morning to the heavens? Had the low and earnest Christian's prayer ever sounded among the bluffs that towered and the islands that slept? Never, and yet the emblem of their faith was there.

But, to what region did not the Jesuit penetrate? Hardly were the resources of our country discovered, before they were upon its shores.

They were there, with their promises and penances, their soft words and their Latin prayers, with purposes not to be subdued in accomplishing the mission for which they were sent. Was it a mission of faith, or of gain? Was it to extend the hopes and triumphs of the cross, or to aggrandize a Society always overflowing with means and with power? Witness the result.

Yet they poured like rain into the rich and beautiful country of Acadie.9 See them passing through forests where the dark trees bent to and fro "like giants possessing fearful secrets," enduring hunger, privation, and fatigue. See them again in their frail barks bounding over the angry waters of Huron, riding upon its mountain waves, and often cast upon its inhospitable rocks.

Follow them as they tread the paths where the moccasin-step alone had ever been heard, regardless of danger and of death, planting the cross even in the midst of a Dacota village. Could this be for aught save the love of the Saviour?38 Those who know the history of the Society founded by Loyola, best can tell.

Among the ranks of the Jesuit were found the Christian and the martyr, as, among the priesthood of Rome, in her darkest days, were here and there those whose robes have, no doubt, been washed in the blood of the Lamb.

Those hearts that were really touched with the truth divine, drew nearer to the path of duty by the solemn spectacle of man, standing on the earth, gay and beautiful as if light had just been created, yet not even knowing of the existence of his great Creator.

Not far from the wigwam of the dead chief, Father Blanc knelt before the altar which he had erected. He wore the black robe of his order, and as he knelt, the strange words he uttered sounded stranger still here. On the altar were the crucifix and many of the usual ornaments carried by the wandering Romish priests.

Flowers too were strewn on the altar, flowers large and beautiful, such as he had never seen even in la belle France. He chaunted the vespers alone, and had but just risen from his devotions when the dying cry of the war-chief rung through the village.

The priest walked slowly to the scene of death. Why was he not there before with the cross and the holy oil? Ah! the war-chief was no subject for the Jesuit faith—he had worshipped too long Wakinyan-Unk-ta-he to listen to the words of the black robe. There were no baptisms, no chauntings of the mass here; there was no interest at stake to induce the haughty Sioux to the necessity of yielding up his household gods. They were not a weaker party warring with39 the French, and obliged from motives of policy to taste the consecrated wafer. Contrasted with the Indian's ignorance was his native dignity. When Father Blanc told them there was but one religion and that was the Roman Catholic, and that the time would come when all would be subject to the man who was in God's place upon the earth, who lived at Rome, then would the Sioux laugh, and say, "As long as the sun shines, the Dacotas will keep the medicine feast."

In vain were the pictured prayer-book and the holy relics exhibited. What were they to the tracks of Haokah the giant, or the gods' house, under the hill which reared itself even to the clouds, under which the gods rested themselves from their battles.

The priest wept when he thought of the useless sacrifice he had made: he could not even gain the love of the strange beings for whose sake he had endured so much. They were not like the Abnakis, "those men of the east," who so loved and obeyed the fathers who sojourned among them.

And the useless life he was leading, how long might it last? Restrained, as the Sioux were, only by the laws of hospitality and the promise they had made to the Indians who conducted him hither, how soon might these influences cease to affect them?

We-har-ka alone spoke gently and kindly to him. She knew that his heart, like hers, vibrated beneath a load of care; she found too a strange interest in his stories,—the woman's love of the marvellous was roused; the miracles of the saints delighted her as did the feats of the gods.

But only so far was she a Christian; though she wore a gift from the Jesuit, the consecrated sign. Perhaps in the40 after accounts of his converts she was reckoned among them. We are told by one of the Jesuit fathers of the true conversion and Christian death of a Canada Indian. "While I related to him," said he, "the scene of the crucifixion, 'Oh! that I had been there,' exclaimed the Indian, 'I would have brought away the scalps of those Jews.'"

The war-chief was arrayed in his choicest clothing; and, but for the silence in the wigwam, and the desolate appearance of the young person who was alone with her dead, one would have supposed that he slept as usual. The charms were still to be left about his person for protection. The body was wrapped in skins: they were as yet laid but loosely about him, ready for their final arrangement, when, with the face towards the rising sun, the warrior should be laid upon the scaffolding, to enjoy undisturbed repose.

But a few hours had elapsed since he sat and talked among them; but now each of the group had returned to his usual occupation. Even his daughter sat with her face drooping over her hands, forgetting for the moment her grief at his loss, and endeavouring to anticipate her own fate. The twilight had not yet given way to night, but the sudden death that had occurred had hushed all their usual noisy amusements. Nothing was heard but the subdued voices of the warriors as they dwelt on the exploits of Eagle Eye, or speculated on the employments that engaged him, now that their tie with him was sundered. Sometimes the subject was changed for another of more exciting interest. A party that had gone in search of the Chippeways,10 who41 had been hovering near their village, was expected to return, and there was some little anxiety occasioned by their prolonged stay. Among the most noted of the party was the brother of We-har-ka and a young brave called the Beaver. These two young men, aspirants for glory and the preference which, among the Indians, is awarded to bravery, cunning, and the virtues, so considered among them, belonged to different clans. The rivalry and hatred between these clans raged high, more so at this time than for some years previous.

The Indian lives only for revenge; he has neither arts nor learning to occupy his mind, and his religion encourages rather than condemns this passion.

The daring showed by the Chippeways had only stimulated them to greater acts of bravery; they were determined that the tree of peace, now torn up by the roots, should never be planted again on the boundaries of the two countries.

We-har-ka had arisen from her recumbent attitude, and stood by the side of her dead relative. She had not time to reflect on the loneliness of her position.

She had only laid her hand on the cold forehead where Death had so recently set his seal, when the well-known triumphant voice of her brother echoed through the village.

Hardly had she turned towards the door when another yell of triumph, sounding even louder than the first, was heard. She knew that voice too, for the colour mounted to her cheeks, and her breath came short and quickly.

A chorus of yells now rent the air, answered by the Indians who had joyfully started up to meet the party. How42 every eye shone with delight, every feature working with convulsive excitement; all the fierce passions of their nature were aroused. Those prolonged and triumphant shouts had prepared them for what was to come. Already they longed to see the blood-dyed scalps, and, it might be, the face of some prisoner in whose sufferings they were to revel.

The figures of the successful war-party soon made themselves visible in the moonlight. One by one they turned the winding trail that led to the village. Over their heads they bore the fresh scalps; and as they came in view, a piercing universal shout arose from all. The eagerness of the women induced them to press forward, and when it was impossible to gain a view, from the great crowd in advance, they ascended the nearest rock, where they could distinctly see the approaching procession.

After the scalps and their bearers were recognised, another deafening shout arose. The prisoners were descried as they neared: it was seen there were two men and a woman. The arms of the men were pinioned back between their shoulders. Nearer still they come, but the shouting is over: intense curiosity and anxiety have succeeded this eager delight.

The prisoners and scalps were their enemies, but over every heart the question passed, Have they all returned? Has each husband been restored to his family, each child to the parent? But not long did these softer feelings influence the conduct of the Sioux. They had now nearly met, and the war-party, with the prisoners, had reached the outskirts of the village. Here the confusion had returned and attained its greatest height; welcomes had been said, and the crowd pressed around the scalps to feast their eyes on the43 precious sight. There were but four, and they had been taken in the hurry of flight: they were round pieces, torn from the top of the head, and from one of them fell the long, glossy hair of a woman.

There was nothing in the carriage of the prisoners to denote their condition, their attitude and demeanour proclaiming the conqueror instead of the conquered—the haughty determination of their looks, the bold freedom of their steps, their gait as erect as possible, with their hands bound behind them. Even the insolence of their language, in reply to the taunts of their victors, showed they were prepared for what was inevitable.

The calm, pale face of the young Chippeway girl showed that she had determined to brave the blood-loving Sioux, and let them see that a woman could meet death as well as a warrior.

The procession stopped, and one of the Sioux women called for her husband. "Where is he, warriors? give me back my husband."

"You will not weep," said one of the men; "here is the Chippeway who killed him," pointing to the younger of the male prisoners. "You may stone him, and then you may sing while the fire is burning under his feet."

A loud laugh of defiance was heard from the prisoner. "The Sioux are dogs," he said; "let them hurry; I am in haste to go to the land of souls." The words were not uttered ere a dozen spears pricked his body. There was no cry of pain; he only laughed at the anger he had excited.

The attention of the Indians was now withdrawn from their prisoners, for We-har-ka was rapidly walking towards44 them. Even the arrangement of her dress was distinctly visible as she approached them: her long and glossy hair disarranged purposely, to mark the intensity of her grief; the blood was still trickling from her arms; her pale face looking even paler than it was, by the moonlight and its broad shadows.

She was hastening to meet her brother, yet she did not offer him one congratulation on his safe return. "My brother," she cried, "your grandfather is dead. He lies cold and still, as the large buffalo when he has ceased to struggle with our hunters. Go to his lodge and tell him of your prisoners, and your scalps. For me, I will go myself to shed tears. I will follow the fresh tracks of the deer, and by the wakeen-stone,11 in the prairie, I will sit and weep where no eye can see me but the Great Spirit's. While the moon walks through the sky, the spirits shall hear my voice."

She was listened to in silence, for the Indians always showed respect to We-har-ka; her being constantly with the war-chief had made them look upon her almost with reverence, as if she might have obtained from him some supernatural power.

"The Sioux listen to the words of a woman," said the old prisoner, as We-har-ka turned towards the prairie. "Why do they not make her a war-chief, and let her take them to battle?"

"We will," answered her brother, "when we go again to45 bring home old men. I would not have been troubled with your old carrion, but I thought to let my father return the kind treatment you once gave him; and I would kill you now, but that I would rather the women would do it."

"The Sioux are brave when their prisoners are bound," again taunted the prisoner; "let them do their will: the Chippeway fears neither fire nor death."

The rage of the Sioux was unbounded; the cold unconcern of their prisoner almost destroyed the pleasure of victory. The women clamorously demanded that he might be delivered over to them. They seized him, and moved forward to a large tree, whose massive trunk indicated its strength. Here they bound him with strong sinews and pieces of skin. His hands were tied in front, and a strong cord was passed about his waist, and with it he was fastened to the tree.

This was all the work of the women, and they evinced by their expedition and hideous laughs the pleasure they found in their employment.

The Sioux then went to see the body of their venerated chief; on their return they found their victim firmly secured to the tree. The son was bound at some little distance from the father, while the daughter was sitting, hiding her face between her hands, weeping for her father's situation. Pride had all gone, only affection occupied her heart. The old Chippeway was convinced now of his immediate sufferings; he had been tranquil and unmoved until the return of the warriors. Suddenly he shouted, in a loud voice, the wild notes of his death-song.

There was no failing in his voice; even his daughter turned46 towards him with satisfaction as he extolled his life, and expressed pleasure at the prospect of seeing the hunting-grounds of the Great Spirit.

As he ceased, Chashé told him he must rest from his journey ere he commenced his long way to the land of souls. "A great many winters ago," said the young Sioux, "my father was in your country; you took him prisoner, you bound him, and you told him what a good warm fire he was to have to die by.

"You said you loved him too well to let him be cold; but while you were binding him he was too strong for you. Unk-ta-he had made him brave; he bounded from your grasp in sight of your warriors. He flew; your bravest men chased him in vain. He came home and lived to an age greater than yours.

"The old war-chief is gone, or he would tell you how welcome you are to his village. He was always hospitable and loved to treat brave men well. But we must eat first, or we cannot enjoy ourselves while you are so comfortable with your old limbs burning."

Expressions of approbation followed this speech on the part of the Sioux, but there was no notice taken of it by the Chippeway, who was now occupied in contemplating his daughter. He had before seemed to be unconscious of her presence.

No bodily torture could equal the pang of the father, who saw the utterly helpless and unhappy situation of his child. His own fate was fixed—that caused him no uneasiness. There was even a feeling of enthusiasm in the prospect of47 showing his enemies how slight was their power over him; how little he cared for any tortures they might inflict.

But his young daughter, who would have been safe now among her own people, but for her affection for him, which induced her to remain by his side, refusing the opportunity of escape.

The Sioux saw his concern and rejoiced that this pang was added to the torture: not only his own fate to bear, but the consciousness that he had caused the destruction of both his children. His son was surrounded while endeavouring to protect his father.

Thus will nature assert her right in the hearts of all her children; but the Chippeway closed his eyes to all, save the effort of appearing indifferent to his sufferings. Again he sung his death-song, while the Sioux stretched themselves upon the grass, eating the tender venison which had been prepared for them, occasionally offering some to the Chippeway, advising him to eat and be strong, that he might bravely walk on his journey to the land of souls.

While the Dacotas were eating and resting themselves, the Chippeway chaunted his death-song; his son, apparently, was unmoved by his own and his father's desperate situation, but the daughter no longer endeavoured to restrain her grief. Exhausted from fatigue and fasting, she would gladly have known her own fate, even if death were to be her mode of release from her distressing position.

The Indians frequently offered her food. Chashé tried to persuade her to eat: she indignantly rejected the attention, her whole soul absorbed in her father's painful situation.

She saw there was no hope: even had she not understood48 their language, she could have read all in the fierce glaring eyes of her enemies, the impatient gestures of the men, and the eager, energetic movements of the women. The latter were not idle: they were making arrangements for the burning of the prisoner. Under his feet they piled small round pieces of wood, with brush conveniently placed, so as to kindle it at a moment's warning when all should be ready. To their frequent taunts their victim paid no attention: this only increased their anxiety to hasten his sufferings, young and old uniting their strength.

One woman struck him with the wood she was about to lay at his feet, another pierced him with the large thorn she had taken from the branch she held; but the loudest cries of merriment and applause greeted the appearance of an old creature, almost bowed together with the weight of a load she was carrying, large pieces of fat and skin, which she was to throw in the blaze at different times when it should be kindled.

The glare of day could not have made more perceptible the horrid faces of the savages than did the brilliant moonlight. Every sound that was uttered was more distinct, from the intense quiet that pervaded all nature. The face of the victim, now turned to the sky, now bent in scorn over his enemies; that of his son, pale, proud, and indifferent; the unrestrained grief of the girl, who only raised her head to gaze at her father, then trembling, with sobs, hid it deeper in her bosom; the malignant triumph of the Sioux men, the excitement and delight of the women;—all these were distinctly visible in the glowing brightness of the night.

Was there no hope for the aged and weary old man? no49 chance that these stern, revengeful spirits might relent? Will not woman, with her kind heart and gentle voice, ask that his life may be spared? Alas! it is woman's work that we are witnessing: they bound his limbs, they have beaten him, and even now are they disputing for the privilege of lighting the fire which is to consume him. Loud cries arise, but the contention is soon quelled, for the deep bass voice of the medicine-man is heard above theirs, and he says that the newly made widow, and she alone, shall start the blaze, and then all may join in adding fuel to the fire, and insult to the present disgrace of the Chippeway warrior.

And now the brush is piled round the wood and touches the victim's feet, and the men lie still on the grass, knowing their work will be well done, and the women who are crowded together make a way for the widow to advance. See her! the tears are on her cheek, yet there is a smile of exultation too—the blood is streaming from her bosom and her arms.

With her left hand she leads her young son forward. In her right she holds a large and flaming torch of pine. The red light of the burning wood contrasts strangely with the white light of the moon; the black smoke rises and is lost in the fleecy clouds that are flying through the air.

The silence is broken only by the heart-breaking sobs of the Chippeway girl. The Sioux woman kneels, and carefully holds the torch under the brush and kindling-wood. She withdraws her hand, and soon there is something beside sobs breaking the stillness. The dry branches snap, and the women shout and laugh as they hear the crackling sound. The men join in a derisive laugh; but above all is50 heard the loud, full voice of the victim. His death-chaunt drowns all other sounds, yet there is not a tone of pain or impatience in the voice; it is solemn and dignified; there is even a note of rapture as he shouts defiance to his enemies and their cruelty.

The dry twigs snap apart, and the smoke curls around the limbs of the prisoner: now the bright red flames embrace his form.

The warrior is still; he is collecting his energies and challenging his powers of endurance.

Chashé stood up. "My father," said he, "fled from the fire of the Chippeways; but you like the fire of the Dacotas, for you stand still."

"The Sioux are great warriors," replied the Chippeway, "when they fight old men and children," looking at the same time towards his daughter.

"But, is he an old man or a girl?" asked Chashé, pointing to the younger Chippeway.

"He is a great warrior," said the father, "but he was one against many. He could not see his father and sister scalped before his eyes. Had he fought man to man he would have showed you the sharp edge of his tomahawk; but he is a Chippeway, and knows how to suffer and to die."

The noise of the fire drowned the old man's words, for the women were amusing themselves by throwing on small pieces of dry wood and portions of deer-fat, which, crackling as it burned, rapidly consumed the body of the unfortunate man.

No suffering had, as yet, forced from him any cry of pain; it was evident that nature would soon relieve him of his51 agony. His heart had nigh ceased "beating its funeral march." Even he, an untutored savage, felt that

His fortitude to endure was increased by the thought that soon the brilliant but mysterious future would be opened to him.

The Sioux were disappointed at his courage, and longed to have their gratification completed by some acknowledgment of his agony. An old and fierce-looking woman drew her knife from her belt, and springing upon the high roots of the tree, cut a deep gash between the shoulders of the prisoner, then stooping, she raised in her hand a flaming torch, which she applied to the fresh wound she had just made. This agony was unendurable: a deathlike struggle convulsed the heroic countenance of the sufferer; he uttered a sharp and piercing cry; then, as if apologizing for his want of firmness, exclaimed, "Fire is strong!"

This sufficed for his enemies, and shouts of joy echoed through the village, while the agonized daughter, unable longer to endure the dreadful sight, sunk insensible on the grass at her brother's feet.

It was not long ere another shout announced the relief of the Chippeway. The sweet hours of night had passed away while they watched his noble firmness, and awaited his last breath. During the last hour, long, low, black clouds had been deepening in the far west; now and then a distant murmur was heard, and faint flashes gleamed athwart the water. A slight murmuring of the waves witnessed the52 rising of the wind, and the Sioux separated to take a rest, which they all needed.

Seeing that their other prisoner was securely bound, they left him to face the storm and the hideous spectacle of his father's remains. Chashé raised the lifeless form of the girl and carried her to his sister's wigwam.

We-har-ka had taken no interest in the scene that had been enacting; she slept soundly, fatigued with her wanderings on the prairie and the indulgence of her grief. Chashé laid his unconscious burden by the side of his sister. Enemies as they were, the looker-on might observe a strong bond of sympathy between them. Their young faces were shadowed by grief,—that link which should unite, heart to heart, every child of earth.

The low sigh with which the Chippeway girl awoke from her deathlike trance, did not awaken We-har-ka. Starting up, she in a moment recalled the sad tragedy which had just been enacted before her eyes, yet she could not account for her being where she was. The wigwam was dark, except when illuminated by vivid flashes of lightning, which showed her the few articles of furniture and comfort that adorned an Indian woman's home.

The occasional pealing of the thunder, and We-har-ka's breathing, were the only sounds she heard. A thousand painful thoughts drove slumber from her eyelids. Her father she knew was gone: she pressed her hand before her eyes to recall, and then to chase away, the dreadful memory that tortured her. She was spared; it might be for a slave, or to be the wife of some one of her enemies. Her brother,53 she had no doubt, was still living: he had been reserved for protracted tortures. Overcome by these thoughts she sank again upon the ground, but not to sleep.

Could nothing be suggested to give her comfort? She cautiously raised the door of the wigwam, and by the red lightning she saw her brother bound as she had left him. Despair had nearly overpowered her once more, but the natural energy of her mind returning, she looked again to her own heart, to see if there was any hope. Should she never see again the home so dear to her! Were she and her bold brother to die by the hands of her father's murderers! Oh! that she possessed a sharp knife, to sever the thongs that bound him, how soon would they flee away as the birds do when winter's winds are heard from the north!

The idea once prominent in her mind, there was hope. Another flash showed her the most minute objects in the wigwam. Another directed her to the knife of We-har-ka, which lay glittering by her breast. A few moments of intense thought decided her: nerved by a sense of her own and her brother's danger, she no longer hesitated. What horrors could be greater than those by which she was surrounded! What if she were detected and murdered at once! Far better than to witness her brother's fate, and endure her own.

She placed herself near We-har-ka, then gently endeavoured to remove the knife she coveted. The young heart throbbed against her hand. Again she endeavoured to slide the knife from its place. We-har-ka turned upon her side as if disturbed. After a few moments had elapsed she once more made the effort; and now, as it is clasped in her hand,54 her senses have well-nigh left her, for this time she is successful.

But, well she knew there was no time for delay, nor even for consideration. The deepest darkness of night was now upon them; before long the morning twilight would be again resting over the earth.

The perfect and unusual repose of the Sioux was in her favour; and, excited even to desperation, she determined to endeavour to free her brother, and secure his and her own escape.

She first endeavoured to recall the situation of the principal objects in the village. She did not, however, require any effort of memory, for she could see distinctly where her brother was bound, and the path that led to this point. The storm's spirits were her friends: without the lightning she could have accomplished nothing.

There was a turn in the path that led through the village, and once or twice she was at a loss how to proceed. She would not be dismayed, though at times she feared her enemies would hear the loud beatings of her heart. Guided by the lightning, and resting for a moment when she feared her footfall would give the alarm, she at length reached the spot.

There had been no rest for the younger Chippeway. With the heart-crushing spectacle before his eyes, he had only given way to a horror at his father's sufferings, far more dreadful to witness than to endure. There was, besides, the anticipation of his own.

Again and again he looked at the strong cords that bound him. Could he for a short time possess the knife his enemies had wrested from him!

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Useless, indeed, to him, without assistance!

Softer feelings, too, came in turn. His wife had been murdered before his eyes, his young son crushed under the feet of those who now lay sleeping tranquilly around him.

The weary night was wearing on. There would be no breaking of the day to him. There was no hope, but that which pointed to the unknown future; no light but that which glimmered from the silent land.

A slight noise arouses his acute senses, and he turns his head to that part of the village where were the greatest number of lodges. It might be that the footstep was that of some one of his foes, determined alone to enjoy the sight of his death. Oh! what joy thus to be saved the reproaches of his enemies, the laughing of the women, the sneers of all. Eagerly he peers through the darkness, and the first brilliant flash shows him the pale face of his sister, as she advances towards him.

Very near him slept, in a wigwam, two warriors who had the charge of him. They might awake: this thought made the very pulses of his life stand still.

For at once he understood his sister's intention. He knew her courage; he also knew that without an object she would not be thus incurring the risk of arousing their enemies.

Another flash, and she stood close by his side—her hand was upon his, as she felt for the thongs that bound him. One by one they were cautiously severed—slowly, for the slightest noise might be fatal.

It was hard work, too, for the maiden, for the sinews were like iron, and her strength failed her under the repeated56 efforts she was obliged to make. There was no word uttered,—their hearts silently conversed with each other. Time passed, and he was almost free; he was himself severing the last bond that detained him.

It yielded. Once more he could stretch out his muscular arm. Grasping his sister to his side, covered by the darkness and the thunder, and the heavily commencing rain, they made their way under the edges of the bluffs. The young Chippeway knew the route: a short peace had existed between the tribes, and he had more than once passed through the village.

At first their progress was slow and deliberate. There was no faltering, though. They were without weapons, with the exception of We-har-ka's knife. Hunger and faintness were oppressing them, but the danger they were in braced their hearts. As they began to leave the Sioux village in the distance, hope gave vigour to their frames.

After the day broke, the clouds were scattering, and the sunbeams were dotting the hills that lay between them and their foes. Still they could not rest. The wild plum was their only nourishment; nor was it until night had again shrouded the earth, and the young man laid his sister in the hospitable lodge of a Chippeway village, that he realized that he had been a prisoner and was again free.

It were impossible to describe the rage of the Sioux on ascertaining the escape of their prisoners. Chashé went soon after their flight to his sister's wigwam. His sleep had been restless, he thought of his dead relative, but he thought more of the Chippeway girl, whom he had resolved to57 adopt12 in place of his young wife, who had died recently. Seeing his sister alone, he anxiously inquired of her what had become of the girl. What was his surprise when she told him there had been no one there; that when she arose, the storm was passing over, but it was still dark, but that no one had been in the lodge since then. Her brother, much irritated, contradicted her, using the most violent language; yet it was evident to him that his sister was unconscious of his having laid the girl by her side.

He turned away, and sought the scene of the last night's torture. There were the burnt fagots, and the ghastly remains. The smoke still curled and slowly rose from the ashes, but neither of the prisoners was to be seen. The thongs with which he had been bound lay on the ground.

There was no room for doubt: brother and sister had fled; and they lived so near the borders of the Chippeway country that there was every reason to believe they were beyond the reach of recovery.

Disappointment and rage overspread his features. He threw up the door of the lodge where the sentinels still slept calmly. Pushing the foremost over with his foot, "Where is your prisoner?" said he. "You are brave men, that cannot take care of one Chippeway!"

Starting to their feet, the sentinels at once became aware of what had occurred. "Where is the girl?" they asked of Chashé.

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"They are both gone," said he, "and they must both have passed near you."

"And where were you when the girl went?" replied one of the sentinels. "You took her off with you, and if we could not keep the man, you could not keep the woman."

The inmates of the different lodges came forward to learn what had happened. Here advances a brave, followed by his young sons. The women throw down their bundles of sticks, to feast themselves with a sight of the Chippeways ere they commenced their usual avocations; but they only expressed their sorrow by groans of disappointment. It was decided that the fugitives should be pursued. A party of the younger men set out without delay; they were warned, however, not to go too near their enemy's country.

Glowing with the expectation of recapturing the prisoners, and, it might be, of bringing home more scalps, they were anxious to set out. The old medicine-men reminded them of their duty, gave them advice suitable to the occasion, and then, with uplifted hands, called upon Wakeen Tonca, Great Spirit, Father, to help them against their enemies.

The close of another evening found the Sioux quiet, and busy in drying venison, and the usual occupations of the season. With the day, however, were closing their labours. Often a cry of lamentation was heard from the lodge of the Sioux who had recently been killed in battle.

The body of Eagle Eye was deposited upon a high scaffolding. His two children were still engaged at the burial-ground. All cries of sorrow, usual at such times, were hushed. The sides of the high hills were tinged with gold and crimson. Some of these "mountains rose high, high59 up, until they could look into the heavens and hear God in the storm." The river was as calm as if no scene of cruelty had ever been enacted on its banks.

Round the frame where Eagle Eye's form was laid hung his medicine-bag. Chashé placed a vessel of water near the body. We-har-ka lightly lifted the bark dish of buffalo-meat13 and wild rice, where the soul of the departed warrior could take it, and be refreshed when tired and hungry. Very near him was buried his wife. Her bones had been gathered and buried under the ground; branches of trees and solid pieces of wood had been placed crosswise over her grave, to protect it from the wolves.

The graves and scaffolds were continued to the very edge of the bluff, while flowers of the most brilliant hue sprung up at the feet of the mourners, and clung to the low small bushes that grew on the hilltop. The brother and sister were preparing to come down, when We-har-ka perceived the priest seated by one of the graves, apparently unconscious of all that was passing around him. She approached him, and softly laid her hand upon his shoulder. He turned to her slowly, as if aroused from a dream of long past years, and followed them to the village.

His lodge was near hers, and she listened to his full rich voice as he chaunted the vespers. Totally ignorant of what he said, she was yet soothed by the sweet sounds, and after they had ceased, unobserved by others, she sought him in60 his lodge, and night was closing over the earth as the voices of the two mingled in earnest conversation.

The Jesuit had long been anxious to take advantage of the first opportunity that offered to return to Canada. Here, his time was wasted and his health impaired to no purpose. He had succeeded in learning the language of the savages, so as to converse with them tolerably; but his mission was as useless here as it would have been among the wild beasts of Africa.

Constantly exposed to danger, without the means of living, except what he received from We-har-ka, and occasionally from others, his time unoccupied, his life was a burden. His health was not strong enough to enable him to join in the hardy exercises and sports of the red men. How anxiously, then, did he await the means of deliverance.

There was an occasional intercourse with the tribes that lived in the region of the great lakes: in this way he had come among the Sioux, and he hoped thus to return to Acadie. He passed hour after hour watching the approach of canoes, hoping to recognise the tall, gaunt forms of the Hurons, or some of those with whom the Sioux were on friendly terms. Over but one human being, We-har-ka, had he acquired the slightest influence. We have before alluded to the rivalry of the two young men, Chashé and the Beaver, for the disputed honour of being the war-chief of the band. They belonged to opposite clans, which were almost equally divided. It appeared evident that it could only be decided by some act of bravery performed by one of the parties.

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The aspirants had equal claims. They were each daring in the greatest degree. Young, athletic, inured to fatigue and hardships, thirsting like the war-horse for the battle. Chashé owed his reputation in some degree to the reputation of his grandfather, while on the other hand the Beaver's courage made him feared by his own and the opposite clan.

The long-continued feud between the two clans had been more violent than ever since the death of the younger brother of Chashé. His sickness was attributed to a spell having been cast upon him by some one of the other clan. Eagle Eye attributed his death to the family of the Beaver; and so great was the hatred of the two clans14 that murder after murder occurred, and every sickness and disaster was charged upon some individual, and thus revenge was constantly sought.

Especially was Eagle Eye dreaded; his powers as a medicine-man were rated so high, that in passing by him many avoided his observation—they dreaded lest he should, by an undefined power, bring upon them the wrath of an evil spirit. And each warrior wore beneath his richly embroidered hunting-dress a charm, to protect him from a machination that he feared.

Yet did the Beaver love the sister of his rival, and he had induced her to defy her brother's hot temper, and promise him all her young affection. Love had made him eloquent, and he persuaded her out of all the opinions she had62 imbibed from the time she was capable of forming one; while he, blind to the attractions of all others, could only see grace in her person.

It was not likely his life would be safe should he marry her, and remain among his own people; and could he yield the chances of his high position among the braves with whom he had grown up to the love of woman? He knew that We-har-ka would leave all for him. The only question was, could he make the sacrifice?

They had closely kept their secret. We-har-ka had been promised to a young man of her grandfather's clan. She had from time to time delayed the marriage, by her influence over the old man. The husband they had chosen for her was the tried friend of her brother, styled among the Indians, a comrade. Well did We-har-ka know how determined was her brother's temper, and that he would force her into the marriage after her grandfather's death, and that, unless by some great effort, there was no hope.

On the night of the return of the party, and the burning of the prisoner, she had, indeed, gone to the prairies to weep; but it was as much over the difficulties of her position as the death of her relative. It was not without an object that she had come forward to meet the war-party, and told them her intention. When the excitement of the burning of the Chippeway was at its height, her lover had left the group of young men, and a short time brought him to We-har-ka's side. After a few moments passed in the joy of reunion, We-har-ka told him that her fate must soon be decided, and implored him to take her away from their home, as their only chance of happiness. They could go, she said, among63 the Sioux who lived on the Missouri, and there live free from care.

The young man did not answer her at first, and We-har-ka, startled with the boldness of her own proposal, awaited his answer, standing. Her arms were clasped over her breast, and her eyes bent to the ground: the moonlight glittered on the wampum which lay on her bosom, and flashed from the silver cross suspended from her neck.

At length the Indian broke out into angry abuse of her brother and all connected with her. The colour varied in her cheek, and her lips were more firmly compressed when he charged them with cowardice, but still she spoke not. She had counted the cost of his love, and knew, that to retain it, she must resign even the natural impulses of her heart.

She waited until the torrent of his passion had ceased, then pointing to the dark clouds that were gathering in the west, reminded him that they would be missed. The shout that came from the village warned them too of the necessity of separation. He then marked the agitation of her manner, bade her return home, telling her that, after her father was buried, he would come to the lodge of the Jesuit: at what time he could not say, but not until some amusements should engage the Sioux: then he would tell her his determination. We-har-ka, overpowered with fatigue on her return to her lodge, slept soundly, even with the Chippeway girl by her side.

We-har-ka sat in the wigwam of the Jesuit, listening to the accounts of the grandeur of the churches and the magnificence of the altars in the country where Father Blanc64 had passed his youth. He pointed to the small figure of Christ, on the altar of cedar wood, which he had constructed, then told her of the large one of gold which he had often knelt before in assisting in the ceremonies of the church. We-har-ka, whose thoughts had been wandering in quest of her lover, asked him again of the ever interesting story of the death and sufferings of the Saviour. Like those who witnessed the crucifixion, she wondered that that Great Being should submit to such indignities. Her religion would have justified resenting them. Yet she did not believe it was true, loving still to hear it told over and over again; especially was it agreeable to her now to while away the hour until her lover, under pretence of speaking to the priest, should find a chance of acquainting her with the plans he had formed. She looked again at the familiar objects on the altar. Again, as ever, she told the priest he was good and kind, but that she knew the Great Spirit was the father of all. Father Blanc's insinuating eloquence touched her feelings, but her heart was unaffected: yet the father, glad of a listener, even in the untutored Indian girl, dwelt on scenes long past, and it might be forgotten by all but him.

When the moon rose they sat outside the lodge on a mat. They were now both silent. The thoughts of the Jesuit wandered far and wide: memory transported him to the forests of Languedoc.

There he pursued his studies, full of high hope and youthful happiness. He wandered through the most beautiful scenes of nature, and there was one by his side; her smile was bent upon him, as she parted the long ringlets from her65 brow. He gazed again as he was wont when he bade her good night, and wondered if angels smiled so sweetly when they bore the dead to the regions of Paradise. Memory changes the scene. Death and desolation are met; darkness and beauty are blended strangely. Those angel eyes are closed, but the sweet smile is there.

Hushed lips bend over the bier where roses are lavishly strewed. Echoes of grief are heard along the halls, as they pass on with their beautiful burden to the house of death. Then come the long nights of sorrow, the vigils of despair, the renouncing of the hopes and pleasures of life: then the morbid restlessness, the wish for death and forgetfulness. Afterwards, the solitary life of the student, then the seclusion of the cloister, and the longing to wear out life under a different sky. He traced again his course, until he sat here, a wanderer, by the side of the Indian girl.

Her eyes were wandering over the brilliant scenes. The stars seemed almost to rest on the body of her relative, as she looked towards the burial-ground where she had passed the day.

The branches of the large trees were in perfect repose: there was no wind to disturb them; and the gorgeous reflection of the moon on the river seemed almost to illuminate the village.

Richly endowed with the poetry of nature, the anxious girl felt calmed by the beauty and tranquillity of the scene. The evening was passing away, and he had not come. Confident of his affection, she determined to be patient. Sometimes her friends would pass along and converse with her; but they knew her heart was sad, deprived of the affectionate66 caresses of her relative. Her brother she had not seen since they had returned together from the burial-ground, but she supposed he was in one of the groups which were enjoying the lovely quiet of the evening.

Suddenly a wild and piercing cry arrests her attention. Starting to her feet, almost frantic for a moment, she recognised her brother's voice. Again it fell in one long, rich, full cry on her ear.

There was something unusual in that sound. There was no defiance, no fear, no excitement in the voice. It was as if the bald eagle, long watching and hovering over its prey, had at length planted her talons in its side, and was fleeing away far from human hope or protection. So clear was the sound, so long its echo, that some doubted if it were indeed a human voice.

Not so with We-har-ka: pressing her clasped hands tightly over her heart, turning her marble face to the heavens, she knew it all. That was not the cry indicating the presence of enemies; her heart would not have quailed before it as it did now: it was the announcement of the gratification of a long-cherished revenge. Her lover's absence was explained. Only a moment, however, was given to conflicting thoughts. The young girl moved forward, and, as it were, pioneered the others to the quarter from whence the sound proceeded. There was no shrinking in her slight form: she might have been taken for some spirit returned to earth to accomplish some high purpose, unconscious of aught save its own mission.

Passing on to a rock, whence you could see the beautiful valley that spread out before them, the whole story was told in a moment.

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Chashé stood as if expecting witnesses; in his bearing there was a frightful exultation that ill accorded with the other circumstances of his position. In his hand he held the knife, from which drops of blood were slowly falling on his dress. He watched them with a savage laugh of delight. His figure seemed taller, by half, in the moonlight, its long shadow fell so darkly over the grass. He was not alone, for easily could all recognise the manly and noble form of the man he hated, at his feet. Well they know that it was death alone that could keep him there. The blood was oozing from his heart: and they could, even at the distance from whence they first saw him, distinguish the marble paleness of his features.

A loud shout now arose from the Indians as they pressed forward. They were divided as to the interest in this scene. The friends of Chashé exulted with him, and those of the other clan called for revenge. It seemed uncertain how the excitement of the crowd would show itself, when it was diverted for a moment by the appearance of We-har-ka. She rapidly slid down the rocks, which it was necessary to pass, in order to reach the two young men. None of them could keep up with her, so quick and shadowy were her movements.

Throwing herself on the ground beside her lover, she made the most frantic efforts to staunch the flowing of the wound. She tore up the grass, and pressing it together, placed it against the wound; but the blood continued to flow in spite of all her efforts. Her bearing, calm and collected at first, now changed with the evident hopelessness of the case; her wild and frantic screams pierced the air as she threw herself68 upon his body. Her brother seized her roughly by the arm, indignant at this show of affection; but she shrank from his touch, and again springing to his side, before he could divine her purpose, she had wrested the knife from his grasp and pierced it deep in her own breast. Chashé caught it from her ere she could a second time bury it in her bosom; but she glided from him and ascended the bluff over which she had passed to reach the dreadful spot. A stream of blood follows in her path. Now she has reached the edge of the precipice: she springs, and the noise of the dashing waves mingles with the cry of horror that arises from the witnesses of her self-destruction.

The Indians were obliged to return to their village in order to arrive at the place where were their canoes. Every effort was made, but in vain, to recover the body of the unfortunate girl. She was never seen again.

Father Blanc soon after returned to Acadie with a party who were going that route. He was thankful to leave the scene of such accumulated horrors. He had become warmly attached to the young Sioux maiden, whose early sorrows had been impressed on his memory. The horrors of that night were written in characters of blood: nor did he ever relate the incident without trembling at the recollection. He found in the Canada Indians more tractable scholars,—at least, when they feared the cannon of the French.

There is reason to conclude that the efforts of the Jesuits among the aborigines of our country left no abiding impression of good: but, like the waters which the tall ships have passed over, they were agitated for a while from their usual course, then returned to their restless surging as before.

69

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.
 
THE LAUGHING WATERS,
Three miles below The Falls of S^t. Anthony.

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

A few miles from the Falls of St. Anthony are The Little Falls, or, as the Sioux call them, The Laughing Waters.

72

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

It is impossible for one possessed of kind and generous feelings to pass a grave without mournful reflections. Though a stately monument rise over it, it covers the work of death. The mouldering form was once as full of joy and care, of tears and rejoicings, as we;—a being who performed his part in the theatre of life, but who has now, for ever, taken his place behind the closed curtain. And if it be the resting-place of the poor and unknown, we must feel too: the rude stone at the head, the weeds springing up, the indifference of the merry children as they play around it, do not take from the claim that was once possessed by the form that is fast mingling with its native earth, to have been one of the many toilers after a happiness never obtained, a rest never enjoyed on earth! How have passed away many of the nations of the earth. Some have noble monuments. Egypt, Greece, Rome, Palmyra, and the Aztecs, who flourished upon our own shores—gems of wealth and learning are heaped upon their graves; the undying wreath of fame crowns their memory. The older the world, the better they will be known. As time advances,73 so will increase our knowledge of their history and laws—their hieroglyphics will be understood, throwing light upon things hitherto a mystery to us.

But not so with our Indian nations; they must depart with hardly a memorial of their existence. Few now care to learn aught that one day may be spoken in memory of a noble people passed away; few now reflect that the soul of this people stands winged for its flight.

Some recollections of the time passed among the Northwestern Indians are very delightful to me, but many are equally sad—none more so than the history of a poor idiot creature with whom we were well acquainted.

O-ko-pee, "The Nest." I have often reflected upon his eventful life, and melancholy death—his patience and humility, the muscular strength of his form, and the passionless expression of his features. The mortal tenement was able and healthful when I first knew him, but the spiritual no longer animated it; indeed, as a companion he was no better than the game he hunted, for his mind was gone.

When overcome with hunger he would tell us how very long it was since he had eaten. He knew, too, when he was cold, for he would direct our attention to his threadbare clothing. Like the prairie deer or buffalo, he would seek shelter from the storm or burning sun; but though he might once have reflected upon the occupations of a disembodied spirit, when it should be released from the shackles of earth, he had long since ceased to do so. His mind floated on the stormy waves of life, like the wreck at sea, far alike from light, hope, or help.

74

His life was an eventful one for an Indian's. Born when the Sioux were not dependent upon white people, he trod his native earth with the consciousness of owning it. He routed up the timid grouse from the prairies, and brought down the red-head and wood-duck on the wing, never fearing that they and he would be chased from the haunts they loved. Often, when a small boy, would he kill the plover and woodcock in numbers, carrying them to his mother as trophies of his skill. How gaily he laughed as for the first time he stayed the fleet course of the wild deer, and watched her panting, as she lay beside the brook, looking for the last time at her own image in its clear waters, longing to suage the thirst of death with its refreshing coolness.

His bones were still tender and his frame small when he sped his wild horse among the buffalo, sending his lance into their sides, and shouting as they tore up the earth, roaring in their agony. Was he in danger from the restiveness of his horse? he knew he had only to fix his black eye upon the revengeful buffalo, and, by the power of the soul speaking there, subdue his rage. The eye of man meeting the eye of beast, never turning or yielding its glance, would quell the passions of the animal, and he would be safe.

He could not stay in the wigwam, even for an hour: child of the woods and prairies, he needed only their companionship. The streams, the rocks, and hills were the friends whose society he loved. Among them he could "commune with his own heart, and be still."

Threading the passes among the hills, or stepping from point to point on the dangerous rocks by the shore, he ever75 took the lead in the chase, and early gained the reputation of being the most famous hunter among the Sioux. How he obtained the soubriquet of "The Nest"15 I know not, but he retained it through all the varying events of his life on earth, and it has followed him to the Indian's unhallowed grave, over which hovers no spirit of hope, but the dark and fallen angels of ignorance and superstition.

As O-ko-pee approached to manhood, the English claimed and obtained jurisdiction over the Sioux. But the hunter, well acquainted with his own laws, showed no inclination to meddle with those of another nation, who showed the might of right.

Perhaps he did not feel with the many, who were more sensitive and less happy, the soul-destroying anticipation of slavery. So long as he had his lance and bow and arrow, what cared he for innovation? and he was too ignorant of the economy of nations to recognise the fact that when a people loses the right of self-government, it yields for ever the power of advancing in strength or happiness.

Living in his own world, turning his eyes in adoration to the sun he worshipped, he believed the Great Spirit would not interfere with his concerns farther than to punish him should he neglect to celebrate the feasts and customs of his nation, or turn from the faith of his ancestors. Never was he happier than when listening to the flapping of the wings76 of the mischievous thunder-birds, the gods of his nation, as they roused themselves at the bright and forked streaks in the heavy clouds.

There were many, however, among the Sioux who would not willingly yield to the oppressions of the English, as they now would gladly resent, had they the power to do so, the encroachments of the people of the United States. Thus, a Dacota, who had received a personal injury from an Englishman, determined to take an opportunity of resenting it; he did so, according to Indian rules of strategy. He watched when his victim was unawares, and took aim successfully, then plunging into the thick forests, was lost to the search of his foes, as was the dead Englishman, to the distress of his family. The English pursued a system then which has since been adopted by our own countrymen; a system sometimes productive of great injustice, yet, under the peculiar circumstances, the best one that could be fixed on. I allude to that of taking hostages, and retaining them until the offender should be given up.

O-ko-pee, who had dreamed away his childhood among the most beautiful scenes of nature, found himself a prisoner, torn from the objects which were dear to him as life; nay, they were his life, for deprived of them he sunk to the level of the beasts of the forests.

Immured in a prison, far from the refreshing air of his native hills, shut in by the bars he vainly strove to loosen or to break, seeing no more the bear, the buffalo, the otter, or the deer, his heart was broken.

After many years of imprisonment, useless, for the real murderer never was found, he was turned loose, like an animal77 from whence the owner can no longer derive either amusement or profit: he returned mechanically to his former occupation. Once again free in the woods, he was soon a laughing-stock for the Sioux. "He has no heart since he was prisoner to the white man!" they cried, as he passed to the prairies, with his vacant look and humbled demeanour. Where was the proud glance and the free step? Ask those who with the iron arm of power punished the innocent for the guilty.

Still, as ever, he followed the chase—thirteen deer did he kill in one day, and never tired of hunting, even as age advanced seemed to increase his passion for roaming.

Often has he come to us with every variety of game, never breaking his word, whatever might be the state of the weather. But in coming or going, giving or receiving, his demeanour and countenance never changed; his eyes were wandering in vacancy, save when the fire-water, given by the white man in exchange for the soft furs he brought him, would tinge his sallow cheeks with the flush of madness, and lighten his eye with the glances of a fiend, and change from the sober quiet and calmness of the unhappy idiot to the noisy, reeling, hellish figure, which seemed a visitant from the world of darkness rather than a suffering inhabitant of earth.

O-ko-pee is dead. It is not mine to say whether or not, in another state of existence, he enjoys happiness sufficient in degree to make up for the heavy trials of life: I have only to do with him here; and as I have said he lived a sacrifice to the all-conquering and indomitable spirit of the Saxon race, so did he die.

78

Some years ago, a band of Sioux, distant from Fort Snelling, attacked a party of Winnebagoes, taking fourteen scalps. Hearing that the scalps were carried from village to village, and danced round day after day, there was a party sent from the Fort to take these scalps from the Indians, as there was a fear lest the hot blood of the young warriors should be roused, and serious difficulties would then occur between the two tribes. So the scalps were brought into the Fort; the affair was reported at Washington. The Winnebagoes asked for indemnity for the injuries they had received, and the authorities at Washington decided that four thousand dollars should be paid to the Winnebagoes out of the annuities received by the Sioux from our own government. It was in the summer: the Indian potato, hard and indigestible, was just ripening: the corn was green. The Sioux were without flour and other provisions; even if game had been abundant, they had neither powder nor shot. They pined away by fever and weakness; death stalked among them like a giant, laughing as he crushed to earth men who were like children beside him.

Was there no help for them? the mandate had gone forth. The children fell to the ground dying for want of nourishment; the strong man clung to the trees for support, and the gray-haired leaned against the insensible rocks. Few there were who could bring down the game with their bows and arrows as did their forefathers, and the white people were crowding in their country and driving the game back where they were too feeble to pursue it.

Then came forward the kind missionaries to the aid of their unhappy friends. How liberally they shared with79 them all that they possessed, striving too to quiet their minds, agitated by burning fever. They gave them medicine and food, supporting the dying mother and taking charge of the infant and the aged. They sought to assuage the agonies of exhausted nature, directing in its flight the restless spirit standing upon the borders of life to that happy place where hunger and sickness are unknown.

It was on one of the warmest days of summer when my little children, with their father, crossed the St. Peter's, and advanced towards the trading establishment at Mendota. On the shores of the river one wigwam was placed, and, attracted by the groans of anguish which proceeded from it, they entered. It was O-ko-pee dying; yes, dying as he had lived, a sacrifice to the white man's rule—dying as he had lived, alone.

No friend supported his aching head, which was burning with fever, or chafed the cold limbs covered with ashes. Indeed, his head was pillowed on a bed of ashes. He recognised his visiters, and seeing their young faces solemnized by what they had never before witnessed, the presence of death, he spoke to them by name, said he was sick, and asked them for medicine. It was too late for medicine or sympathy; in another hour O-ko-pee, the hunter of the Sioux, was gone for ever from the earth.

80

THE AGED SIOUX WOMAN.

84

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

Fire-face was willing to die, he said, but not until he had killed another white man. He was sincere in acknowledging hatred towards the people of the United States. There was no doubt but he had stained his hands with the blood of one white man; but this did not satisfy him: let him take the life of another, and he was willing to be made prisoner, and to meet what punishment might be designed for him. The mantle of Cain had indeed fallen upon him; his heart was turned even from his own people, and angry threatenings were ever upon his lips, against those with whom he had grown up side by side. Wabashaw, chief of one of the bands of Sioux on the Mississippi, left his home, where the prairies stretch out to the distance, without even a hill to relieve the level sameness, or trees to shelter them from the short but intense heat of the summer, to encamp, by permission, on the St. Peter's River, opposite Fort Snelling. Fire-face, one of the band, was with them, accompanied by his two wives.

He was feared by all of the band; even the brave chief Wabashaw, whose life he had threatened, turned from the fierce gaze of the man, over whom had been cast a spell from the spirits of evil, for he frowned alike upon friend and foe. Only his wives seemed easy when he was near,85 and they not only feared but loved the strange being, whose hand was against every man's.

He passed the most of his time seated near his lodge, with his medicine-bag hanging near; his implements of war and hunting glistening in the light, and his loaded gun ever by his side.

Many efforts had been made to apprehend this desperate man, yet he had always eluded the pursuit of the soldiers; and now, although aware of the danger he was in, when living so near the garrison, he appeared to be perfectly unconcerned, saying, he knew the soldiers would make every effort to arrest him; but that he would never be taken until another of the pale faces had fallen by his arm. Wabashaw, the chief, frequently visited the Fort, always accompanied by his late friend Many Lightnings, and on every occasion he pressed the necessity of taking Fire-face prisoner. "He was a bad Indian," said Wabashaw, "who loved to see blood; and, if allowed to go at liberty, some one would be murdered by him."

The chief said that he did not sleep at night in his own lodge, but went for safety to the near village of Mendoto, where he remained until the sun was high in the heavens the next day. In consequence of these representations, a party of soldiers was sent to arrest him, and the Indians were to assist in the capture.

Fire-face was on the lookout: he appeared to show himself in the way of danger for the pleasure of overcoming it. He would remain at ease until the party was near him; and then, like an arrow from the bow, he would fly through the village, no man daring to stay him: and you might as well have86 attempted to catch the sunbeam on the waters as the hunted man. Pursuit was unavailing, and the soldiers each time returned disappointed to the Fort.

He would soon come back to the encampment. What a courage was his, thus purposely throwing himself in the way of danger, knowing too that he had not one friend to whom he could turn. His frightened, helpless family alone cared for him. It was evidently a pleasure to him to be in a situation of peril, to show his adroitness in extricating himself.

About ten o'clock one night he sat in his lodge, gloomily meditating on his position. Could he eventually escape the pursuit of his enemies? Was he not a doomed man, when the bands of friendship were severed between him and those with whom he had fought, and whose lives had been tracing an even course with his?

The children's heavy breathing was the only sound that could be heard. His wives sat mute in the lodge. He had been hunted to the death, and now sleep was overcoming him, and his watchfulness was yielding to his fatigue; while he thought to lay his tomahawk beside him, and seek repose, the door of his lodge was turned aside, and the long-knives (as the soldiers were called) were upon him.

Their exulting looks were met by his calmest demeanour: he offered no resistance; but when the soldiers placed their hands upon his wrists to secure the captive, he glided from their grasp as easily as a serpent might pass from the touch of a child; he bounded from their sight, and again they vainly sought the strange man: the protecting shades of night were about him, and he knew full well the hiding-places87 of the neighbourhood. When out of their reach he laughed as he looked at his oiled hands and arms, for there was the secret of his escape.

Morning found him again in his lodge, calm, fearless as ever. The Sioux thought he must wear a charmed life, and they kept from the reach of his arm: and the children, even his own, played where they could not see his dark face as he watched their amusements.

There is a spell, however, that few Indians can resist; it is to them an unfailing quietus for care: they can fancy they are free when fire-water quickens the coursing of their veins. They curse the white man from the heart, and hope and look forward to the time when the red man shall have his own again. They then forget that the outstretched arms of desolation are ready to clasp them, and that destruction, like the night-bird, is hovering over their heads with its hoarse cry sounding to their hearts.

Fire-face could not refuse the charm. The Indians pressed it upon him, and then informed the soldiers that they were going out with the intention of hunting, as Fire-face thought, that on this occasion he might be followed and taken.

The party went on their route, stopping occasionally to drink and to smoke. Fire-face, overcome by the liquor he had drank, could hardly keep up with them. His gun swung carelessly from his shoulder, and his usual gravity was changed for a loud and boisterous cheerfulness.

"The white people fear me," he said, laughing; "well they may, for my arm is strong, and before I die I will kill another of them. I have already murdered a white man, and should be satisfied if one of their women died by my88 tomahawk. I should like to take her scalp with the long light hair hanging from it."

The Indians still encouraged him to drink, and as the morning advanced he became the more unfitted to pursue his way. From a state of passion and excitement he had passed into one of stupor: at length he rested himself against a tree, and alternately muttered and dozed.

In the mean time soldiers were following him up. Wabashaw gave information of the path Fire-face had taken, and they were soon upon him.

He was a prisoner at last, and that consciousness sobered him. His hands were bound. One of the Sioux, indignant at this proceeding, attempted to cut the straps, but was pushed off. After a slight delay, the soldiers returned with him to the garrison.

He continually reproached himself with his own unwatchfulness, telling the soldiers that he had always intended killing one of them ere he should be in their power. He mournfully said it was too late now to accomplish his purpose.

At about six o'clock in the afternoon he was brought into the Fort. The news of his capture had reached the encampment of Wabashaw on the opposite side of the river, and as he approached the guard at the gate of the Fort, a number of Sioux wore seen watching him. His two wives stood there, and as their husband's figure passed, guarded and bound, they literally lifted up their voices and wept.

Fire-face, in the mean time, was turned over to the tender mercies of the guard, and he was soon seated at the grated window of his cell. I had heard a great deal of the man,89 and thought that one who combined so many terrible traits of character must show it in his countenance: in order to see this singular being, I determined to visit him in his cell. We passed the guard-room and entered his dark and dreary-looking place of confinement. His back was to us, as he was looking through the bars of his window towards his home. Hearing some one approach, he turned to us with an expression of face entirely mild; there was neither passion nor murder portrayed in his features, not even a restlessness in his manner—only a quiet dignity, a calm unconcern.

He begged of the commanding officer to be shot at once, deprecating the thought of imprisonment—only let him die or be free. It was in vain to remind him of his offences: the laws of the white man were not for him. He then said that he wished to see his wives. The request was granted: they were sent for, and after a little while they, trembling with fear, passed the terrible-looking guard and entered their husband's cell, with their faces covered with their blankets.

The next day a council was held at the council-house, and I could not resist the wish I had to be present. I longed to see the aborigines of my country presiding as it were in their own halls of legislature. There was always a charm and freshness in listening to their unstudied eloquence.

When I reached the council-house the speaking was nearly over, but the scene repaid me for the trouble I had taken to witness it.

The warriors were seated in rows round the room on the floor, with the exception of Wabashaw, Many Lightnings, and a few of the principal men,—these occupied a bench.

Their dresses were very rich; their fans were of large90 feathers, stained in many colours. "The Owl" was looking grave, for he had been reproved for interfering with the soldiers, by attempting to cut the prisoner's straps. One old man was in mourning, and he looked particularly en dishabille, his clothing (and there was little of it) was dirty in the extreme. His face he had painted perfectly black; his hair he had purposely disarranged, to the greatest degree. Thus he presented a striking contrast to the elaborately adorned warriors around him.

Many Lightnings was dressed with scrupulous care. He had been presented with an old uniform-coat, which he wore with the utmost complacency. We noticed the warriors were almost all young: we asked where were all their old men. Wabashaw said, they were all carried off by the small-pox, which had nearly destroyed their band some years before. Several of them, besides the chief, were deeply marked from this disease.

When we left Fort Snelling, Fire-face was still in confinement, but was soon to go to Dubuque for trial. I learned some months after, that he had escaped: I thought then, his long-cherished wish might still be gratified.

91

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

95

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

"Yes," said We-har-ka, who had outlived children and grandchildren, whose face and neck were covered with wrinkles, but who still could walk with the youngest and strongest, "the old woman must pick up what she can get to eat. I hate the white people. Have I forgotten the death of my son? Do I not see him now as he fell dead by the gate of the Fort? What if the Dacotas had killed some Chippeways! The Dacotas have a right to kill their enemies. Enah! I hate the Chippeways too. If I were a warrior, I would ever be tracking them and shooting them down, and I would laugh when I saw their blood flow."

"The white people caused the death of your son," said Harpen.

"I hate them both," replied We-har-ka. "My son and two others killed some Chippeways, and they were taken, prisoners, to the Fort, because the long-knives had said we must not kill our enemies. Then the Chippeways wanted the Dacotas who murdered their friends, that their women might cut them in pieces. So the long-knives told the Dacotas they might start from the gate of the Fort, and run for their lives; but they told the Chippeways to be there too, and they might fire at them and kill them if96 they could. The Chippeways fired, and the three Dacotas fell. The Chippeways shouted and were glad, and the Dacota women wept. I lay on the ground many days, with my limbs bleeding. See the scars on my arms! With this very knife did I make these wounds. I, a widow, and childless, who has there been to give me food since?

"When Beloved Hail was killed," continued the old woman, "the white men would not let our warriors go to war against the Chippeways. Red-boy, too, was wounded by the Chippeways, and even he could not go out to fight them. Our warriors are like children before the white men."

"Red-boy was badly wounded," said Harpen.

"Yes, he was badly wounded: I saw him at the time. If I were Red-boy, I would only live to revenge myself on those who had tried to take my life."

While the woman talked, little Wanska sat by them, playing with her wooden doll. "Grandmother," said she, "may I take your canoe and go over to the village? You can come home with the others. I want to talk to my mother about Red-boy."

"Go, go," said We-har-ka, "our brave men may no longer do brave deeds, and by the time that you are a woman, there will be no more warriors. It has been five winters since Beloved Hail was killed and Red-boy wounded, and no one has avenged them yet."

The child entered the canoe and paddled towards the village, thinking all the while of what she had heard. "Grandmother says, by the time I am a woman, there will be no more warriors: what will I do then for a husband?"97 and thus divided between the disgrace of not being married, and the remembrance of Red-boy's wound, which she thought had occurred recently, she entered the village in a state of trepidation, which was yet exceeded by the condition in which her mother was thrown, on hearing the announcement that Red-boy was badly wounded by the Chippeways; that We-har-ka had seen the wound; that all the old women were very angry with the Chippeways and white people; then, bursting into tears, the girl of ten years added: "Mother, the Chippeways and white men are going to kill all the Dacota warriors, so that, when I am a woman, I can never have a husband!"

Up rose the eyes and hands of the mother, and down went the moccasins she was making to the ground; and up and down she made her way through the village, giving the alarm, that Red-boy was killed by the Chippeways!

Shall I tell of the scene that followed? Oh! for a pen of magic, to describe how Red-boy's relations cried, and how everybody's relations cried with them; how the children ran to their mothers, sheltering themselves under their okendokendas.17 How the dogs yelped and howled, and sprung on the children's backs, ready to go wherever prudence might dictate. How the old men started from sleeping in the lazy summer's sun, and held their tomahawks as firmly as if time were made to be laughed at, and the young men throwing away the pebbles with which98 they were playing a game of chance, walked swiftly on, bent on avenging Red-boy.

How the wind all at once began to rise, and the very fish leaped out of the water, as if they would like to fight too; while already, Indian runners were far on their way to tell the news at Man-in-the-cloud's and Good-road's villages, and to give the word to those whom they might meet, who would take up the cry, and rush forward with revenge on their lips, and murder in their hearts.

On they went, until they reached the house of the Interpreter, near Fort Snelling, and then he went with them, to report to the officers at the Fort of the outrage; that Red-boy was killed, and that the Dacota warriors wished to go and avenge the death of their friend.

This was, of course, considered an infringement of the treaty of peace then existing between the two tribes; and the Chippeways had showed their daring by committing a murder so near the walls of the Fort. It was immediately determined to send a detachment of soldiers to arrest the offenders.

In ten minutes a number of men were on the parade-ground, ready to march, looking as fiercely at the officers' quarters as if they were about to enter into mortal combat with the doors and windows; obeying the word of command as quickly as it was reiterated, while the ringing noise of their ramrods sounded through the garrison.

The Dacotas were perfectly satisfied with the promise made them, that the Chippeways should be punished in a manner satisfactory to themselves, for the death of Red-boy.

We women felt quite solemn in the Fort. The Chippeways99 might resist: in fact, there was no saying what they might, or what they might not do. The command in garrison was very small: we felt as if we had been "through seven wars, and this was the worst of all."

Retreat, the assembling of the command at sundown, came—the evening gun was fired, and the flag was lowered—and nothing was heard of the war-party, white or Indian. Tattoo had come, the soldier's bedtime, and our anxieties were not at rest. Towards twelve o'clock the men returned with their officer, without having had even a show of fight. To their intense mortification and disappointment, Red-boy had been seen, and talked with, large as life. He had eaten a saddle of venison that day, without any assistance, and was, accordingly, in a good state of preservation, having received no wound since the one of five years' standing, the scar of which he showed.

Now, we know that among white people, as well as Indians, women have the credit of raising all the false reports, and circulating all the scandal that is going the rounds. Most unjust charge! and all men, red skins and pale faces, are defied to prove it. Among the Indians women have no chance whatever. Is an Indian charged with stealing pork from the traders? It was not the warrior who did it, but his wife. Has a party of Indians been admitted into the Fort, and some loaves of bread and pieces of meat been abstracted? Somehow or other the women are sure to be in fault. Has the garrison been alarmed, and a party of soldiers sent out uselessly? As usual, the women made the trouble.

Yet, with a sigh from my heart, I must confess that appearances are against the sex.

100

There were many threats of vengeance made against We-har-ka in the present instance, for the trouble which her longings for vengeance had occasioned; but she was not afraid: she had taken care of herself for nearly a hundred years, and would be apt to do so during the short remnant of her life.

Indian women will talk of their wrongs as long as they feel them, and that will be until the heart has ceased to beat, and the tongue is silent for ever.

We-har-ka lives on the memory of her sorrows. She holds them to her heart, as does the mother her child of a day old. They are dear to her as would be the hope of vengeance.

I say she lives, but I know not. Seasons have gone since I bade adieu to her home, and it may be, she is all unconscious that winter is gone, and that summer's breath is waving the green boughs of the forest trees as they lift up their branches to the heavens.

It must be soon, if not now, that her form, covered with garments of poverty and misery, and perhaps shielded from the gaze of passers-by by the tattered blanket of some friend poor as she, reposes quietly near the river bank.

Would you not like to have heard her talk of her amusements as a child, and her happiness when a maiden—of the scenes of pleasure she remembers, and of terror from which she has fled—of the pains, the hunger, the watchings she has endured—of the storms and sunshine of a life passed away?

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C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph.
 
INDIAN COURTSHIP

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

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BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

Far away in one of the fair valleys of the West, where dark forests frown alike in summer, when the richly clad boughs wave to the passing breeze, and in winter, when the bare maple and thick evergreens are covered with snow,—far away, just on the borders of the valley, close by the huge rocks which rear their heads above the bluffs that hang over the water,—an Indian village, with its many-sized lodges rising here and there, reposed, as it were, without fear from storm, or the sun's heat, or the aggressions of enemies. Sometimes, indeed, the mighty thunder rolled angrily towards it, and the streaked lightning called over and over again, to the many hills around, to rouse up the tardy storm-spirits; but they loved not to linger here. Their voices could be heard in angry murmurs, then they would pass on in the river's course, with many a wild shout, to seek some spot less lovely on which to spend their wrath.

A very few miles below the village, an Indian might be seen, slowly paddling his canoe over the placid waters. The dark lines of his face were fixed in deep thought. His countenance was pale, though the hue of his race was there; his nostrils large, and quivering with the remains of passion; his eyes bright and lustrous, as if with fever; but105 around his mouth might be traced an expression which seemed to indicate that grief as well as passion was struggling with him. As he slowly touched with his paddle the passive waters, he looked around him with a bewildered air.

Suddenly, he started, as his eye fell upon something that lay in the bottom of the canoe; he raised it: 'twas the arrow of his child. How came it there? and why should the father, forgetting all, as he dropped unconsciously the paddle into the waters, cover his face with both his hands, and while the tears forced their way through his fingers, tremble with remembrances too strong even for him, the Iron Heart, to bear?

All was quiet and peace. Not a voice was heard; even nature's was still. No human eye looked upon the warrior as he wept. Silence and solitude surrounded him. The vast prairie that stretched abroad might have recalled to his mind the unending future, which he was to spend in the society of the honoured dead. The soft vapoury clouds of evening that hung over him, might have told him, as they have told many, that it is not far from the wretched to the land of spirits. The waters, on which his canoe rested almost motionless, might have called to his remembrance, that life was a sea, sometimes troubled and sometimes calm, over which the mortal must pass to reach immortality.

But no such tranquillizing thoughts calmed the tempest which was raging in his bosom; his bare chest heaved with emotion; but at length he raised his head, and taking another paddle from the bottom of his canoe in his right hand, with the other he threw the small arrow that had106 occasioned him so many painful thoughts, and watching till the waters closed over it, he made his way towards the bend in the river, where lowlands and prairies were no more to be seen, and an hour's time brought him in sight of the village, and soon he was clambering over the rocks towards it.

When he met his friends, there was a stern coldness in his manner, and he replied fiercely to the greeting salutations of his younger wives, and called for his daughter Wenona, whose mother had long since been dead, to prepare him some food.

Wenona obeyed with alacrity her father's commands, at the same time glancing uneasily towards her two step-mothers, whose smothered wrath she knew would break forth at some future time. They sat silent on the ground in seeming submission to the will that wrested from them their rights, in favour of the child of a dead rival; but those accustomed to read the writing on a woman's countenance, could see they were rebelliously inclined, but were forced to conceal their vexation under a calm demeanour.

It was in August, "the moon that corn is gathered." Wenona had during the long day paid the penalty of her father's love; she had toiled unceasingly, though the sun scorched her face and bosom; the watchful eyes of her father's wives were upon her, and when he was absent, they hardly allowed her a moment's rest. Her young companions wondered at the little spirit she showed; but Wenona was of a peace-making disposition, and preferred submission to contention. The large bundles of corn she had gathered during the day were hanging outside the107 wigwam to dry. Not even had she allowed herself time to join the other girls, who were diving at noon in the cool waters, and raising their heads up to call Wenona, looking like mermaids as the water flowed from their long, unbraided hair.

It was not long before she placed before Iron Heart his evening meal, venison and boiled corn—while her face was so good-humoured, and her motions so easy and graceful, that one would suppose the wrath of the evil spirits themselves would have been disarmed, much less the anger of those to whose children she so often sung sweet lullabies. Iron Heart did not relish his food; but tasting the venison, then lighting his pipe, he appeared lost to what passed before him: he often looked in Wenona's face, with a strange repentant look, as if he had done her an injury, but sought to conceal it in his own bosom.

After a while he rose, and joined a group of warriors, who were seated without the wigwam, Wenona following in his protecting shadow, out of the reach of complaint or reproof.

The group that Iron Heart joined was composed of the principal men of the band, who were listening to the words of one of their wisest men. No one interrupted him, as he boasted of the feathers he had won, as he told of the bears and buffaloes he had destroyed; no one showed impatience as he dwelt upon the time when he was young, and all admired his feats of valour and strength. Respect and attention were on every countenance, as the white hair of the old man was lifted from his brow by the evening breeze.

He told them they had long been at peace with the Chippeways;108 their young men were becoming like women, without the ennobling and exciting employment of war. That the edge of the tomahawk was blunted for want of use. He said the Chippeways had again intruded on their hunting-grounds, and it was time that the war-cry of the Dacotas should be heard, to show their enemies their power.

The old man, who had lived nearly a century, ceased speaking, and The Buffalo, who leaned against a tree near the others, turned towards them, as if he, too, would speak.

"My words are not good, like the words of the aged; my voice is low, like the sound of the waters in a small stream, but the wise speak, and the sound of the Father of many Waters is in your ears. But our brave men say they are at peace with the Chippeways: they promised they would bury the hatchet deeper than the roots of our tallest trees; they said we would live together like friends, and that the war-cry only should be heard when we joined together against our enemies."

The old man prepared to answer him: his limbs shook with rage and excitement; he raised his finger, and pointed towards The Buffalo, then, when the crimson blood dyed his cheeks, he said, "Shame on the coward who fears his enemies: go gather corn with the women, and the old and feeble man will die with his tomahawk raised against those who hate his nation."

In vain The Buffalo essayed to speak: they would not hear him; and he left the council amid the sneers of all.

War was decided upon; and night was fast approaching when Wenona, with pale and agitated looks, pressed forward109 among the warriors. "My father," said she, "where is my brother?"

Iron Heart started; but recovering himself, he replied, "I know not. Seek him yourself, if you would find him."

"I have sought him," she said, "but the old woman, Flying Cloud, tells me I may seek him no more, for she saw his body floating down the river, as she came up in her canoe. She laughed, too, and said I would see him one day in the land of spirits."

All looked towards Iron Heart, but he made his way among them, and returned to the wigwam. In vain Wenona wept, and besought him to go in search of her brother; not even would he inquire of Flying Cloud.

"I will go, then, and look for him myself," said the girl. "Is he not my brother, my mother's son?"

"Cease your noise," said her father, sternly. "If the Great Spirit have called my son, is he not already a brave warrior in the city of spirits?"

Wenona was quiet at her father's rebuke, but her heart was ill at ease. She hoped he would return in the night. She remembered that Flying Cloud was always bitter and ill-tempered; and besides, was not her brother at home on the water? Could he not swim as easily as he could tread down the grass on the prairie? She reasoned herself into the hope that Chaské had been tired, and had laid down to rest; and she fell asleep with the expectation that his merry voice would arouse her at break of day.

And how did he sleep in whose heart lay the secret of the death of his son? in whose ear was sounding the voice of that son's blood?

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In vain might we seek to follow Wenona in her untiring search for her brother—she knew all his accustomed haunts—at one time making her way over rock and crag, to find out the eagle's home; at another, pushing her small canoe up the stream, where the beavers made their houses; weeping, yet hoping too.

Day after day passed thus: and ever as she returned to the village would Flying Cloud tell her she must go beyond the clouds to seek him.

Iron Heart neither assisted in the search for the boy, nor spoke of his loss. He was calm as usual: yet in the last four days he seemed to have lived as many years.

He employed himself sharpening the instruments he was soon to use against the Chippeways, while hanging near the medicine-sack, which was attached to a pole outside the wigwam, was a knife which glittered in the sun, which was only touched or moved by himself.

Days and weeks passed by: Wenona ceased to look for her brother, or hope for his return; yet still she wept. The heart of the motherless girl clung ever in thought to him who had been not only her companion, but her charge from his birth. She had taken him from her mother's bosom when dying; she had watched his childish sports, and sung to him the legends of her people. Could she have closed his eyes, and wept at his feet, her grief would not have been so hopeless. It often occurred to her that her father was not unacquainted with the circumstances of his death.

Strange and solemn was the secret of the death of the Indian111 boy. Dearly loved by his father, they stood together one day by the river's side. "Did you not say, my father," said the boy, "that we would go to the forest for the deer? Let us go now; my arrows are swift and strong, and to-morrow the girls will come and help us drag them in. Come, my father, your looks have been sad for many days, but you will laugh when you see the red deer fall as we strike them. The old woman, Flying Cloud," continued the boy, "says she knows what is going to happen to me. She says I will never go to war against the Chippeways; that my knife shall never sever the scalps from the head of my enemy; that my voice shall not be heard in the council, nor shall my wife ever stand at the door of her lodge to wait my coming. But I laughed at her: she is old and poor; she loves not the young and happy. See her now, my father, as she stands upon that high rock, waving her arms to me. What have you done to her that she hates you so? She says she has cast a spell upon our race."

"Flying Cloud is not of our clan, my son," replied Iron Heart; "her son died, and she says my mother caused his death. She says she cannot die till my mother is childless like herself. But come, before the night we must kill many deer."

"Is your knife sharp?" said the boy; "you know we must draw the skins off while they are warm. My sister will work our moccasins and leggins. She says she is never so happy as when she is sewing for me."

Shall we follow them—shall we penetrate the deep forests to see the father raise his knife to pierce from side to side the strong, healthy frame of his son!

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Not in anger did he take the life that was dearer to him than his own. Was the burden of his sins lying heavily against his heart? Who shall tell his agony when he saw the blood flow! Who shall say how his soul was wrung with grief as the reproachful face of his much-loved child was turned towards him in death!

The wild deer flew past, but he saw them not. The serpent glided by as it did in Paradise, but its stealthy motion was unobserved. The sweet song-birds raised their notes to the sky, but they all fell unheeded on the ear of the father who had taken the life of his son.

Raising the form of the boy in his arms, he bore it carefully to the shore, and casting it where the current hurried impetuously on, the dead boy was borne along to share the lot of many who will rest in their ocean grave, till the land and the sea shall alike give up their dead.

When I reflect on the tradition of the Sioux, that once only has human life been offered in sacrifice, and then a father took the life of his son—when in the quiet night I mind me of those whose destiny seems now to be in our power for good or evil, I remember that when the world was new, Abraham, in holy faith, yet with a breaking heart, led his much-loved child—the child of hope and promise, to sacrifice his life in obedience to the command of God. Can you not see his lip quiver and his cheek turn pale as he lays him on the altar? Can you not hear the throbbings of his heart as he binds him to the wood?

Abraham's son was spared, but I mind me of another sacrifice, where God spared not his own Son, but yielded him, the pure and sinless, a sacrifice for the guilt of all.

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BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

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C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph^a.
 
SOUNDING WIND.
The Chippewa Brave.

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

The amnesties that have been made between the Sioux and Chippeways for many years have been of short duration: it appears now that the two nations will be friendly only when the lion and the lamb shall lie down together, should the two nations exist at that happy period. The sight of each other's blood is as precious to a Chippeway or Sioux as would be the secret of perpetual youth to an octogenarian, who eagerly grasps his tenure for life, loving, and fearing to lose it to the last. At the time of my story, a longer peace than usual had existed between the two nations. They hunted and danced, and even married together. Many a child, that had never trembled at hearing the war-whoop, wondered at the old men's stories, that invariably closed with the triumph of the Dacota tomahawk over the weaker blade of the enemy: but that child grew to be a man only to hate a Chippeway, as his father had done in youth; one offence had brought on another, and the slumbering spirit of vengeance that had reposed in the hearts of the red men was roused up, and with a double vengeance118 foe sought foe. In vain were the women and children hidden in the holes of the earth at night for safety; they were hunted out, as the starving wolf scents its prey: after the desperate fight was over, when the strong were laid low, then were the aged and the infants dragged from their hiding-places.

The red morning sun, parting the sullen clouds, hid again from the sight of the blood that was covering the ground, and dyeing the very stream where but yesterday the village belle, seated by its fair banks, listened to the words that every maiden loves to hear.

A sad scene was presented at the village of Gray Eyes: the old chief lay helpless among those who had obeyed his slightest word, the glaze of death dimming an eye that for more than eighty winters had watched the snow, as it drifted from vale to vale. Life had not yet departed: you could feel the pulse still flutter, and the heart faintly beat, but the thoughts of the chief were in spirit-land, and his soul hasted to burst its prison bars, that it might renew the combat where the Dacotas would aye be the victors.

A gleam of life and consciousness passed over his faded features, as an Indian girl advanced towards him: it was a child he dearly loved, soon to be left without a protector.

"My daughter," said the old man feebly, as the maiden threw herself on the ground beside him, and covered with her tears his cold hands; then raising herself, as she saw the wound still bleeding, she tore a piece from her okendokenda, and endeavoured to staunch it. "It is too late, my child; the soul of your father longs to join the warriors who live in the land of spirits. Where are your brothers?"

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"There!" said the weeping girl, pointing to the dead bodies that lay across each other.

"And your mother?"

"There too," she answered; "all are gone, my father, but you and me. I knew how the rocks lay, and where I could hide myself, and there I stayed, hearing my mother's cries, and my brothers' shouts, as they died. I saw, too, the Chippeways, as they carried away the scalps. When you are gone what will become of me? Who will care for Wenona?"

"Not Wenona," said her father, "but 'The Lonely One.' That will be your name when you will have neither father nor brother left. But see," continued the old man, "our enemies' blood! Your brothers fought well: they have already passed the warriors' road to the City of Spirits."

His breath came quickly—big drops stood on his forehead—another struggle—a last sigh—and Wenona was indeed "the lonely one."

The attack of the night before had not been unexpected. The Sioux had placed pickets around their village, and a guard had been kept; but their enemies were too wily for them. The violent storm that raged during the battle was favourable to the Chippeways; they were upon the Sioux ere the watches had heard the slightest sound, except the wind, and the peals of thunder that shook the earth. Some escaped with their families from the lower end of the village, but almost all who remained to fight for their families were massacred with them.

While Wenona awaited the struggle, she was overcome with fear and excitement; but now she was as one without120 hope. The blow had been struck. Chippeway and Sioux had fallen in the death-struggle, locked in the embrace which bound foe to foe. She had given her heart's devoted love to one whom she must now consider as her enemy. Sounding Wind, a noble young Chippeway, handsome in person, and already favoured among his own people, had promised to take her to his wigwam when the two nations were at peace, though there were many then who foreboded the strife that would rend the ties of friendship between the nations. Even after hostilities had commenced, Sounding Wind had sworn to himself the woman he loved should be his wife, though every brave in the nation might stand between him and the accomplishment of his vow.

Wenona, as she rose from her father's body, gazing upon the scene of terror before her, looked like the flower beside her, which still reared its head, though its fair companions were all crushed to the earth by the storm of the night. Silence and death reigned here—nature was as tranquil as the hearts of her children. Near by swept the lake of the thousand isles: undisturbed were its waters; there was no requiem for the dead, even in the passing breeze.

"My heart weeps," murmured the girl; "but shall the bodies of my friends remain until night brings the wolves and hungry birds? Sounding Wind has forgotten the maiden who loves him. He told me our village should be safe; that he would talk like a wise man; that he would lead the Chippeways far away from us: that, as the little islands sleep peacefully in the lake through the long summer's day, so might I rest from fear for myself and for my friends.

"I will go alone and find our people, that they may come121 and help me bury our dead. Why should I fear, when all who have loved me are gone, and he who once loved me would take my life as he would pierce the deer on the prairie?"

Wearily she turned her steps, intending to go to the nearest village, avoiding the dead bodies at every step: yet her moccasins were red with blood, which, as she pursued her way, crimsoned the earth at her feet. The reverence that every Indian woman feels for all things connected with death, gave her courage to undertake the task before her. Every change in the scene brought with it some reminiscence: grief for the dead were connected with each, but there were thoughts of the living hard to bear.

Here had she sat with her mother, working with porcupine quills gay garments for her brothers. Here had she stood and watched the canoe of her lover; here had he given her the charm which she still wore about her neck: it was to secure her from any accident till she had left her friends, and until the gods that the Chippeways worshipped were hers.

She pursued her way; but as the waters became bright with the warm rays of the sun, and the pleasant breezes were wafted to the shore, a sense of oppression and fatigue overcame her.

In vain she essayed to rouse herself to the task before her: it was, indeed, in vain, for at last she threw herself under a large tree, and yielded to the repose which exhausted nature demanded. She slept on for hours as calmly as if she could only remember and look forward to joy. Bright eyes were glancing before her—laughter greeted her ears,122 she was a child again in her dreams, and passing over the gay waters with her boy lover by her side.

Sounding Wind, we have said, was already a man of consequence in his tribe; but he had refused to accompany the war-party of the preceding night, nor did he seek to hide his reasons. They had lived peaceably with the band that lived near the Lake of the Thousand Isles. While he was willing to resent the aggressions of the band that by treacherous acts had broken their faith, he would not assail those who had given them no cause of offence.

A better reason was in his heart: the love he bore to Wenona was strong, even stronger than death; and could he raise a murderous tomahawk against her family? He was anxious to know the result of the attack on the Sioux. He met the Chippeways as, taking the trail by the river, they were on their way home.

Shortly after he joined them, they seated themselves by the great tree whose branches sheltered Wenona. They were resting and eating. Sounding Wind stood by them: no one interfered with his gloomy mood—there was that in him that kept them in control. They were all silent, when suddenly a sigh of grief and fatigue was uttered near them. Startled by it, each warrior rose to his feet and grasped his knife and tomahawk. Sounding Wind sprung over the bushes that were between them and the spot from whence the sigh issued.

At his feet, just rousing from slumber, was the girl who was dearer to him than home or friends. One gleam of joy at seeing her again, one shade of terror at her probable fate, and the young man, placing himself between her and the123 Chippeways who had followed him, showed himself ready to protect her so long as his arm could wield the tomahawk that glistened in the sun.

"Come not towards her," he said to them, for they had recognised her by her dress, "she is my prisoner. I first touched her—I claim her before you all. I am your chief. I have led you against the Sacs and Foxes, and I will lead you against the Dacotas, who have become our enemies, but this girl's life shall be spared, for she is to be my wife.

"I have taken her prisoner: I shall spare her life. Am I not a Chippeway? and shall I forget my promise to her, to make her my wife?"

Wenona had covered her face with her hands, every moment expecting the blow that would terminate her sorrows; but no one offered to touch her. They were many and strong in the love of revenge. Sounding Wind was but one; but stronger than a host was the love that made him brave the stern spirits before him.

She arose at the bidding of her lover. She eat of their food, and pursued, without fear of harm, her journey to her new home. There, amid the struggles of the Sioux and Chippeways, she was ever safe. And happy, too, save when the remembrance of the fate of her family came between her and the bright visions that cheer and gladden even an Indian woman's home, when the love of her husband and children hallow it.

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BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

127

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

If ever "life was a fitful fever," it was with Old John, the Medicine-Man.

Coming to the Fort at times when you would not suppose any human being would expose himself to the elements,—always laughing, always hungry—seating himself before the fire to sleep, and starting up the moment his eyelids closed over his restless, twinkling eyes—talking for ever and singing in the same breath—troublesome and intrusive, yet always contriving to be of use. And useful he often was to an artist who was with us; for he would stand, sit, or lean, assuming and retaining the most painful attitudes, looking good-humoured all the time, and telling of his many wonderful adventures and hairbreadth escapes.

He came to us one day in the middle of winter, for the picture of the medicine-feast was in progress, and he had promised to show how the priest was to be represented, that the white people might know in very truth how were conducted the sacred ceremonies of the Dacotas.

While he warms himself, and eats, and smokes, he has as usual a great deal to say, and this in a half-muttered128 tone; for he is a little drowsy from the effect of the fire on his chilled limbs.

He takes from his head the three-cornered cloth hood which is worn by the men in severe weather, and throws his blanket a little from his shoulders, displaying his handsomely embroidered coat.

There is the strongest odour of smoke and stale tobacco from his dress, and he laughs heartily as we throw open the doors and windows for the benefit of the fresh air.

How many strange stories he has of the different medicine-feasts, and in each he figures largely. About some portions of the dance he is silent; you may question him closely, but you get no satisfactory answer.

He tells that the feast commences when there is no sun in the heavens; at midnight, when often even the moon and stars are hiding their light. He cannot tell white people what occurs then, nay, even the uninitiated Indians would not dare intrude themselves upon the scene; only the medicine-men and women are allowed to be present. Neither entreaties nor bribes have any effect: he will not intrust to your keeping the solemn secret. All we may know of this part of it is, that the feast is given in honour of some departed friend, and these ceremonies are taking place near where lies the body. A conversation is carried on with the dead, and food is placed near, that the spirit may eat.

"Bury my dead out of my sight." This is not the sentiment of the Dacota mourner. The mother wants her child to rest on the boughs of the tree, under which she has sat and lulled it to sleep in her arms. Here, while129 she works, she can see its form swayed by the branches, rocked by the summer winds: its innocent spirit, according to her faith, must still guard the decaying frame. She feels not the separation so keenly, when she fancies the soul of her first-born is hovering round her. She steals away from the noisy revelling in the wigwam to weep. She can hardly recall the bright eye and healthy glow, which once belonged to the lost one, but the suffering countenance and wasting frame are ever before her; and in the loud call of the night-bird, she often fancies she hears again the cry with which her young child yielded up its life.

Old John is telling of the medicine-feast. He shows us the medicine-bag which he uses: it is an otter skin, though sometimes a mink, a swan, or even a snake, is used, and often has he performed wonderful cures, or executed terrible vengeance, by the power of this medicine-bag.

He will not say what is the medicine which the skin contains; whether it is a root, or the leaf of a tree, a precious gum, a mineral substance, or the bone of some animal which has been preserved for centuries. He says that he breathed into the nostrils of the dead animal, and thus imparted to it qualities which made it sacred. Thus has he often restored to life the dying man, and by the same power has he cast the spell of misfortune, disease, and even death, upon one he hated. This is why he is so much feared.

Feared by all, but most by the women, Old John's eyes twinkled until you could only see a black line, when he told how he could frighten the women in the dance, by holding130 towards them the skin which contained the medicine of his clan.

As if to afford him an opportunity of proving the truth of his statements, two or three squaws had just brought venison to the kitchen, and we sent for them to pay them, and, at the same time, to give them the chance of talking a little—a privilege of which all women are glad to avail themselves.

The picture was half done; the medicine-man was to be represented jumping towards the women, with his dreaded medicine-bag; and Old John assured us it was invariably the case that the person he selected from the crowd fell down as if in a fit. This, he insisted, was purely the effect of his medicine. He offered to prove this by exercising his prerogative as a medicine-man upon the women who had just entered the room. The women were much fatigued, and glad of a chance to rest. They little expected to see any part of a medicine-feast celebrated in a white man's house.

The artist seated himself before his easel, and commenced sketching the figure of the medicine-man. Old John stoops, and holds the bag with both hands, as if ready to dart it towards some person. You wonder how he can retain his painful position so long a time. The veins in his temple swell, and his hands tremble, yet he does not offer to move until the sketch is made. Then, when told he is at liberty to sit down, he gives a merry, mischievous look towards us, and commences going round the room, singing with a loud voice, holding the bag as if about to avenge on some one present a long-remembered injury.

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The women were taken completely by surprise. From the moment Old John commenced his performance in earnest, they showed every symptom of terror, now covering their faces with their hands, and crying "Enah! Enah!" and again, as the medicine-man passed round the room, looking after him as if he were something supernatural, instead of being a compound of art and wickedness. He was now going to embrace the opportunity that had presented itself to convince us of the ease with which he could excite the superstitious fears of these women.

He continued going round the room in measured time, and it was impossible not to observe the increasing awe which was stealing upon the women. He kept perfect time to his own music, stopping the while, as if absorbed in the thoughts attendant on the celebration of a religious ceremony—when suddenly he sprang towards the women, holding the bag close in the face of one of them.

The woman sank to the ground: a severe and stunning blow could not have had a more immediate effect on her system than the terror into which she had been thrown. She lay on the ground motionless, with her hands pressed over her eyes. Old John, perfectly satisfied with the result of his experiment, laid down his medicine-bag, and seated himself on the carpet.

We spoke to the woman, and endeavoured to rouse her. For some minutes she appeared not to hear; but, after arising, she looked as pale and ill as if she had indeed been in the presence of an evil spirit; and she was at that very time, for I doubt if in the Sioux or any other country a132 more determined and hopeless reprobate could be found than Old John.

I wondered to observe the trepidation into which a female of so strong and healthy a frame could be thrown. To what could it be ascribed, but to the influence of an all-powerful superstition on a mind chained by ignorance to its natural estate of dark degradation?

Among the most curious ideas of the Sioux are those concerning the Aurora Borealis, which is considered a kind of goddess of war. Old John will tell you all about her; for not only is he skilled in all that relates to the mysteries of his religion, but, if you will take his word for it, he has seen all kinds of visions. He will tell you how the gods look—for he has seen them at different times—and to no better person could you apply for information about the Aurora (as they call her, Waken-kedan, the old woman). He will tell you that she is one of their chief objects of worship; that her favour and protection are invoked as a necessary preparation for going to war.

Old John declares he has had several visions of the goddess. When she has appeared to him, she has given him the most minute directions as to the hiding-places of the enemy. Sometimes she insures success to the party;—if, however, she predicts misfortune, it is sure to occur.

The goddess, he says, wears little hoops on her arms. When she appears to the war-chief, if they are to be successful, she throws as many of these hoops on the ground as they are to take scalps. These hoops resemble the hoops that the Indians use in stretching the scalps of their enemies, when they are preparing for the scalp dance.133 But, should the goddess throw broken arrows on the ground, woe to the war-party! for this tells the chief how many of his comrades are to be scalped, an arrow for a scalp.

Sometimes, when the successful party is on its return, it is made more triumphant by the appearance of the goddess. She does not then take the form of a woman, but quietly enfolds the heavens with her robe of light. This they interpret as a favourable omen. The heavens, they say, are rejoicing on their account; the stars shine out brighter in honour of their victory; while, to use the Indian warrior's own words, it is as if their goddess said to them, "Rejoice and dance, my grandchildren, for I have given you victory." "The old woman," he says, wore a cap, on the top of which were little balls or knots, of the same kind with which warriors adorn themselves after having killed an enemy. She held in her hand an axe, with a fringe fastened to the handle: this represents an axe that has killed an enemy, as it is a universal custom among the Sioux to attach a strip of some kind of animal to the implement that was used in battle.

The Aurora appears and disappears at the pleasure of the goddess, or as she is sometimes called, "the old woman who sits in the north." It is not to be wondered at that the minds of this people should be thus impressed with the brilliant flashing of the Aurora, in their far northern home.

Her appearance is not always considered a favourable omen. Sometimes it is a warning of coming danger. The mind, overwhelmed with ignorance and superstition, is apt to read darkly the signs of nature; while a prospect of success134 in any contemplated undertaking will change the interpretation.

Old John loves to tell of another of his gods, the meteor; of this god they stand in great awe, calling him Waken-ne-ken-dah, or man of fire. He strides through the air to punish recreant Indians, who forget the claims of the Great Spirit upon them. Around this god is ever a circle of fire, while small meteors flow from this "great fiery man." In each hand he holds a war-club of bone, and every blow is fatal to that Sioux who deserves his condemnation. He is said to be very wily, attacking the Indians when they are asleep.

On this account Sioux are often timid about sleeping out of doors; they have traditions of Indians having been carried off by these errant meteors.

Old John thinks the "great fiery man" does not deserve a reputation for bravery, as he never attacks a waking foe. He says there was once a Sioux who, tired and sleepy, laid down, rolling himself in his blanket, though the weather was hot, for the musquitoes were biting him, and rendering it impossible that he should obtain any rest. The first thing of which he was conscious was the sensation of being whirled through the air, passing over miles of prairies and forests with the speed of light.

All at once they approached a small pond, which was full of mallard duck. The appearance of the meteor threw the inhabitants of the lake into the greatest trepidation, and in consequence a most unearthly quacking took place. The fiery man not being aware of the cause of this commotion,135 never having seen a duck, dropped his affrighted burden, gladly making his way back to the regions of space.

But it will be impossible to get anything more from Old John to-day: the savoury fumes of the kitchen have reached our sitting-room. He has done with the arts and with religion; he is enough of a philosopher to take the goods "the gods provide:" and the hearty dinner that he ate showed that the mystical attributes of a medicine-man did not prohibit him from the indulgence of his appetite; while the Sioux women were well repaid for their venison and their fright by some gaudy calico, for okendokendas, and a few needles, thread, and some other "notions," of great value among them.

136

BY ELIZA L. SPROAT.

139

BY ELIZABETH WETHERELL,
AUTHOR OF "THE WIDE, WIDE WORLD."

I took a walk with my father last evening. Now the pleasure of this walk was so great that I will even jot down some notes of its history.

It was just the pretty time of a summer's day,—the sun's "parting smile," when he has a mind to leave a pleasant impression behind him: the hot hours were past; the remnant of a sweet north wind, which had been blowing all day, just filled the sails of one or two sloops, and carried them lazily down the bay; and the sun, having taken up his old trade of a painter, coloured their white canvass for the very spots it filled in the picture: the same witching pencil was upon a magnificent rose-bush at the foot of the lawn, tinting its flowers for fairy-land; and had laid little stripes of fairy light across the lately-mown grass; and, through a slight haze of the delicious atmosphere, the hills were mellowed to a painter's wish.

My father and I strolled down the walk, and took one or two turns almost in silence, tasting all this too keenly at first to say much about it. There were beauties near hand140 too. The rose-trees had shaken out all their luxuriance, and defied the eye to admire aught else. Yet, but for them, there was enough to be admired. The pure Campanulas looked modestly confident of attractions; little Gilias filled their place in the world passing well; the sweet double pinks gave us a most good-humoured face as we went by; the tall white lily-buds showed beautiful indications; and some rare geraniums, and my splendid English heart's-ease quietly disdained or declined competition. And in that evening-light, even the flowers of humbler name and lower pretension, looked as if they cared not for it. Sprawling bachelor's-buttons, and stiff sweet-williams, and pert chrysanthemums, all were pretty under the sun's blessing; I think none were overlooked.

"How much pleasure we take in at the eye!" said my father.

"Where the eye has been opened," said I.

"Ay. How many people go through the world with their eyes tight shut;—not certainly to every matter of practical utility, but shut to all beautiful ends."

"Oh, those practical eyes!—the eyes that have no vision but for the useful,—what wearisome things they are!"

"It is but a moderate portion of the useful that they see," said my father;—"it was not an empty gratuity that things were made 'pleasant to the eyes.'"

"But how the eye needs to be educated," said I.

"Rather the mind, Cary," said my father. "Let the mind be educated to bring its faculty and taste into full play, and it will train its own spies fast enough."

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"It was that I meant, papa,—that cultivation of taste;—I was thinking, before you spoke what a blessing it is."

"Why, yes," said my father; "with that piece to bring down game, one is in less danger of mental starvation. But hush; here comes somebody that won't understand you."

And as he spoke, I saw the trim little figure of Mrs. Roberts, one of our neighbours, come in sight round a turn in the shrubbery.

"What a lovely evening, Mrs. Roberts," said I, as we met.

"Delicious!—such charming weather for the grass and the dairy, and everything. It was so fine, I told Mr. Roberts I would just run down and see your mamma for a minute; I wanted to ask her a question. I shall find her at home, shan't I?"

I satisfied Mrs. Roberts on that point, and my father and I turned to walk back to the house with her, thinking that our pleasure was over.

"The roses are in great beauty now," I remarked.

"Beautiful!—and what an immense quantity of them you have. I don't know what ails our roses, but we can't make them do, somehow. They seem to get a kind of blight when they're about half open, and what are not blighted are full of bugs. What do you do with the bugs? I don't see that you have any."

I suggested the effectiveness of daily hand-picking.

"Oh, but bless me! it's so much trouble. Mr. Roberts would never let the time be taken for it. How stout your grass is! It's a great deal stouter than ours. There's half as much again of it, I'm sure. And you're cutting it! We haven't begun to cut yet; Mr. Roberts thought he'd let it142 stand as long as he could, to give it a chance; but I'm sure it's time. What do you do with all your roses?—make rose-water?"

I said no.

"I never saw such a quantity! I'll tell you what—if you'll send me a basket or two of 'em, I'll make some rose-water, and you shall have half of it. Oh, what beautiful heart's-ease! My dear Caroline, you must just give me one of those for my girls, for a pattern; you know they are making artificial flowers, and they want some of these for their bonnets. Really, they are quite equal to the French ones, I think, and—thank you!—that is superb. Now, my dear Caroline, one more—that one with so much yellow in it;—want a little variety, you know. They will be delighted. You know it is just the fashion."

"I did not, indeed, Mrs. Roberts."

"Didn't you? They wear little open bonnets of some light straw—rice is the prettiest, or some kind of open-work—and here, at the side, just here, a bunch of heart's-ease, right against the side of the head;—it is very elegant."

"Caroline has bad taste," said my father gravely; "she never wears heart's-ease in a bonnet."

"O no, of course, not these,—she is too careful of them—but you know false heart's-ease, I mean. No, go on with your walk—you shall not come in—I am not going to stay a minute."

And my father and I quietly turned about and went down the walk again.

"False heart's-ease!" said my father.

143

"What a different thing all this scene is to those eyes, and to ours, papa."

"Yes," said my father. "Poor woman!—she carries a portable kitchen and store-closet in her head, I believe, and everything she sees goes into the one or the other."

"Poor Mrs. Roberts!" said I, laughing. "Now that is the want of cultivation, papa."

"Not entirely, perhaps. There must be soil first to cultivate, Cary."

"Well, her want is the same. And how much is lost for that want!"

"Lost?—what is lost?" said another voice behind us; and turning, we welcomed another and a very different neighbour, in our old friend Mr. Ricardo.

"What is lost?"

"Happiness," said I.

"For the want of what?"

"For the want of a cultivated taste."

"Pshaw!" said Mr. Ricardo, letting go my hand. "That has nothing to do with happiness."

"Do you think so, sir?"

"Certainly. What can a cultivated taste do for you, but create imaginary wants, that you would do just as well without?"

"If you have not them, you have not the exquisite pleasure of gratifying them."

"Well, and what if you haven't? How are you the worse off? The want that is not known is not felt."

"But the range of pleasure is a very different thing without them," said I.

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"And character is a very different thing," said my father.

"Character?" said Mr. Ricardo.

"Yes," said my father.

"I should like to hear you make that out."

"And so should I," said I. "I was arguing only for enjoyment—I did not venture so far as that."

"Well, enjoyment," said Mr. Ricardo. "Do you think you have more enjoyment here now, than one of the plain sons of the soil, who would see nothing in roses but roses, and who would call 'Viola tricolor' a 'Johnny-jump-up?'"

"In the first place, learning is not taste; and, in the second place, you do not mean what you say, Mr. Ricardo. You know what Dr. Johnson says of the quart pot and the pint pot—both may be equally full, but the one holds twice as much as the other."

"Ah, Dr. Johnson!" said Mr. Ricardo, with an odd little flourishing wave of his hand; "you delude yourself! The quart pot is twice as likely to be spilled. If you have some pleasures that other people haven't, you have pains of your own, too, that they are exempt from. Now I suppose a little mal-adjustment of proportions—a little deviating from the exquisite line of correctness in men or things—would overturn your whole cup of enjoyment, while his or mine would stand as firm as ever."

"But perhaps a sip of mine would be worth his entire cupful."

"Now," said Mr. Ricardo, not minding me, "I fell in with a family once—it was at the West, when I was travelling there. They were good, plain, sensible, excellent people, happy in each other, and contented with the rest145 of the world. They had everything within themselves, and lived in the greatest comfort, and harmony, and plenty. I was with them several days, and it occurred to me that people could not be happier than they were."

"But for your bringing them up as instances, I suppose their having 'everything within themselves' did not include the pleasures of a cultivated intelligence?"

"Well, I don't suppose they would have quoted Dr. Johnson to me. But now of what use to them would be all that extra cultivation?"

"Of what use to you," said my father, "is that window you had cut in your library this spring, that looks to the west?"

"Of very little use," said Mr. Ricardo, "for my wife sits in it all the time."

"Ah, Mr. Ricardo!" said I, laughing.

"Well, now," said he, but his face gave way a little, "how are you any better off than those people?"

"I don't wish to make myself an example, sir; but put them down here this evening, and what would they see in all this that we have been enjoying?"

"They would see what you see, I suppose. They had reasonably good eyes—they were not microscopes or telescopes."

"Precisely," said my father. "They would see what mere ordinary vision could take in, without the quick discernment of finely trained sensibilities, and without the far-reaching and wide views of a mind rich in knowledge and associations. Where cultivated senses find a rare mingling146 of flavours, theirs would at best only perceive the difference of stronger or fainter—of more or less sweet."

"Senses literal or figurative, do you mean?"

"Both," said my father. "You rarely find the one cultivated without the other."

"You may find the other without the one," said Mr. Ricardo. "I knew a man once who had no aptness for anything but judging of wines, and he was curious at that. He did it mostly by the sense of smell, too. All the mind the man had seemed to reside in his nose."

"That is an instance of morbid development," said my father, smiling, "not in point."

"You would have thought it was in point, if you had seen him," said Mr. Ricardo, glancing at my father.

"But the pleasures of a cultivated taste, Mr. Ricardo," said I, "may be constantly enjoyed; and they are some of the purest, and most satisfying, and most unmixed that we have."

"And, I maintain, of the most useful," said my father.

"To the character," said Mr. Ricardo. "But I do not believe that, where they most prevail, are to be found in general the strongest minds or the most hopeful class of our population."

"My good sir," said my father, "do not confound things that have nothing to do with each other. That may be true, and it may be equally true of sundry other matters, such as correct pronunciation and the usages of polite society, Mocha coffee and fine broadcloth,—none of which, I hope, have any deleterious effect upon mind."

147

"Well, go on," said Mr. Ricardo, without looking at him, "let us hear how you make out your case."

"Learning to draw nice distinctions, to feel shades of difference, becoming alive to the perception and enjoyment of most fine and delicate influences, the mind acquires a habit of being which will discover itself in other matters than those of pure taste. This faculty of nice discrimination and quick feeling cannot be in high exercise in one department alone, without being applied more or less generally to other subjects. It will develope itself in the ordinary intercourse and relations of social and domestic life, and the tendency will be to the producing or perfecting of that nice sense of proprieties, that quick feeling of what is due to or from others, which we call tact."

"But tact cannot be given, papa," said I.

"And how is it useful if it could?" said Mr. Ricardo.

"Useful?" said my father, meditating—"why, sir, the want of it is a death-blow to I know not what proportion of the efforts that are made after usefulness. How many an appeal from the pulpit has been ruined, simply by bringing in a coarse or unhappy figure, which the speaker's want of cultivation did not allow him to appreciate! How many a word, intended for counsel or kindness, has fallen to the ground, because the kindly person did not know how to work out his intentions!"

"But, you cannot give tact, father," I repeated.

"No, Cary—that is true—tact cannot be given; it is the growth only of minds endowed with peculiarly fine sensibilities; but the mind trained to nice judging in one set of matters can exercise the same acumen upon others, so soon148 as its attention is fairly called out to them. Taste is a thing of particular growth and cultivation in each separate branch; but certainly the mind that has attained high excellence in one is finely prepared to take lessons in another."

"There may be something in that," said Mr. Ricardo, as if he thought there wasn't much.

"But, beyond that," said my father, "the cultivation of taste opens truly a new world of enjoyment utterly closed to every one destitute of it. Nature's stores of beauty and wonder, the fine analogies of moral truth that lie hidden under them, the new setting forth of nature which is Art's beautiful work,—how numberless, how measureless the sources of pleasure to the mind once quickened to see and taste them! Once quickened, it will not cease to rejoice in them, and more and more. And as the mind always assimilates itself to those objects with which it is very conversant, and as these sources of pleasure are all pure, it follows, that not only a refined but a purifying influence also is at work in all this; and the result should be, if nothing untoward counteract, that everything gross, everything improper, in the strict sense of the word, everything unseemly, unlovely, impure, becomes disgustful, and more and more. And whatever is the reverse of these meets with a juster appreciation, a keener relish, a truer love than could be felt for them by a mind not so cultivated. This refining and purifying effect will be seen in the whole character. It will make those solid qualities, which are, indeed, more worth in themselves, show with yet new lustre and tell with higher effect, and not the outward attire only, but the very inward graces of the mind will be worn with a more perfect adjustment."

149

"Hum—well," said Mr. Ricardo, about a minute after my father had done speaking, "you have made a pretty fair case of it."

My father smiled, and we all three paced up and down the walk in silence. I thought we had done with the subject.

"That's a beautiful sky!" said Mr. Ricardo, coming to a stand, with his face to the west.

"Look down yonder," said my father.

In the southwestern quarter lay a beautiful fleecy mass of cloud: the under edges touched with exquisite rose-colour, sailing slowly down the sky—pushed by that same faint north wind. Just over it—just over it, sat a little star, shining at us with its unchanging ray.

"Would your Tennessee friends see enough there to hold their thoughts for half a minute?" said I, when we had looked as long; but Mr. Ricardo did not answer me.

"That painted cloud," said my father, "is like the pleasures of earth—catching the eye with fair hues; the star, like the better pleasures, that have their source above the earth. That light fills, indeed, it may be, a much smaller space in our eye, or our fancy, than the colours on the cloud; but mark,—it is pure, bright, and undying, while the other is a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away."

I looked at the star, and I looked at my father, and my heart was full. I thought Mr. Ricardo had got enough, and I think he thought so too, for when we reached the far end of the walk, he left us, with a very hearty shake of the hand, indeed.

150

My father and I walked then, without talking any more, till glow after glow passed away and night had set in. The little cloud had lost all its fair colours, and had drifted far down into the southern sky, a soft rack of gray vapour, and the star was shining steadily and brightly as ever in the deepening blue.

151

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Phil.
 
MISSION CHAPEL OF SAN JOSE, NEAR SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS.

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

155

BY EDITH MAY.

156

BY MRS. JULIA C. R. DORR.

There was no spot in all Elmwood that we children so dearly loved to visit as Hillside Cottage. No matter where our wanderings began—whether we started for the meadow, in pursuit of the rich strawberry—for the thick woods, where the wild flowers bloomed so luxuriantly, and the bright scarlet clusters of the partridge-berry, contrasting beautifully with its dark green leaves, sprang up at our feet—for the brook, to gather the shining pebbles, or to watch the speckled trout, as they darted swiftly through the water—no matter where our wanderings began, it was a strange thing if they did not terminate somewhere about the sweet wild place where Aunt Mary lived.

Now, prythee, gentle reader, do not picture to your "mind's eye" a stately mansion with an unpretending name, when you read of Hillside Cottage. Neither was it a cottage ornée, with piazzas, and columns, and Venetian blinds. It was a low-roofed dwelling, and its walls had never been visited by a single touch of the painter's brush: but the wild vines had sprung up around it, until their interlacing tendrils formed a beautiful network nearly all over the little building; and the moss upon the roof had been gathering there for many years, growing thicker and greener after157 the snows of each succeeding winter had rested upon it. It stood, as the name given it by the villagers indicated, upon the hillside, just in the edge of the woods that nearly covered the rounded summit of the hill; a little rivulet danced along, almost beneath the very windows, and at a short distance below fell over a ledge of rocks, forming a small but beautiful cascade, then, tired of its gambols, it flowed onwards as demurely as if it had never leaped gaily in the sunlight, or frolicked, like a child at play, with every flower that bent to kiss its bright waters. We thought there was no place where the birds sang half so sweetly, or where the air was so laden with fragrance; and sure am I there was no place where we were more cordially welcomed than in Aunt Mary's cottage.

I well remember Aunt Mary's first arrival in Elmwood. For two or three weeks it had been rumoured that the cottage on the hill was to receive a new tenant. Some slight repairs were going on, and some one had seen a wagon, loaded with furniture, unladen at the door. This was enough to excite village curiosity; and when we assembled in the church, the next Sabbath, I fear that more than one eye wandered from the pulpit to the door, to catch the first glimpse of our new neighbour. Just as our old pastor was commencing the morning service, a lady, entirely unattended, came slowly up the aisle, and entered the pew designated by the sexton. Her tall and graceful figure was robed in deepest black, and it was evident that grief, rather than years, had dimmed the brightness of her eye, and driven the rich colouring of youth and health from her cheek. But there was something in the quiet, subdued glance of those large,158 thoughtful eyes, in the intellect that seemed throned upon her lofty forehead, and in the sweet and tender expression that played around her small and delicately formed mouth, that more than compensated for the absence of youthful bloom and freshness. I did not think of these things then; but, child that I was, after one glance I shrank back in my seat, awe-struck and abashed by the dignity of her bearing. Yet when she rose from her knees, and I caught another glimpse of her pale face, my little heart seemed drawn towards her by some powerful spell; and after service was concluded, as we passed down the aisle side by side, I timidly placed in her hand a wild rose I had gathered on my way to church. She took it with a smile, and in a sweet low voice thanked me for the simple gift. Our homes lay in the same direction, and ere we reached my father's gate I imagined myself well acquainted with Miss Atherton.

From that hour my visits to Hillside Cottage were neither "few" nor "far between." My parents laughed at my enthusiastic praises of my new friend; but they soon became assured that they were well grounded: and it was not long before the answer, "Oh, she has only gone to see Aunt Mary," was the most satisfactory one that could be given to the oft-repeated query, "Where in the world has Jessie gone now?"

She lived almost the life of a recluse; seldom mingling with the villagers, save in the services of the sanctuary, or when, like a ministering angel, she hovered around the couch of the dying. Formed to be an ornament to any circle, and to attract admiration and attention wherever she moved, she yet shrank from public notice, and was rarely159 seen, except by those who sought her society in her own little cottage. To those few it was evident that her love of seclusion was rather the effect of some deep grief, that had in early life cast its shadow over her pathway, than the constitutional tendency of her mind. Hers was a character singularly lovely and symmetrical. With a mind strong, clear, and discriminating, she yet possessed all those finer shades of fancy and feeling, all that confiding tenderness, all those womanly sympathies, and all that delicacy and refinement of thought and manner which, in the opinion of many, can rarely be found in woman, combined with a high degree of talent. Love of the beautiful and sublime was with her almost a passion, and conversing with her, when animated by her favourite theme, was like reading a page of rare poetry, or gazing upon a series of paintings, the work of a well-skilled hand.

Years passed on. The little village of Elmwood had increased in size, if not in comeliness: the old church had given place to one of statelier mien and prouder vestments, and the winding lane, with its primroses and violets, had become a busy street, with tall rows of brick bordering it on either side. But still the cottage on the hill remained quiet and peaceful as ever, undisturbed by the changes that were at work beneath it. A silver thread might now and then be traced amid the abundant raven tresses that were parted on Aunt Mary's forehead; and my childish curls had grown darker, and were arranged with more precision than of yore. Yet still the friendship of earlier years remained unbroken, and a week seldom passed without finding me at Hillside Cottage. My visits had of late been more frequent than160 ever, for the time was drawing near when our intimacy must be interrupted. I was soon to leave my father's roof, for a new home in a far-off clime, and to exchange the love and tenderness that had ever been lavished upon me there for a nearer and more engrossing attachment.

It was the evening before my bridal. I had stolen away unperceived, for I could not resist the temptation of one more quiet chat with Aunt Mary.

"I scarcely expected you to-night, my dear Jessie," said she, as I entered, "but you are none the less welcome. Do you know I am very selfish to-night? When I ought to be rejoicing in your happiness, my heart is heavy, because I feel that I can no longer be to you what I have been, chief friend and confidant. Oh! I shall indeed miss my little Jessie."

"You will always be to me just what you have been, Aunt Mary," I replied, and tears filled my eyes, as I threw myself upon a low seat at her feet. "You must not think that because I am a wife, I shall love my old friends any the less: and you of all others, you who have been to me as a dear, dear elder sister,—you who have instructed and counselled me, and have shared all my thoughts and feelings since I was a little child; oh! do you think any one can come between our hearts? We may not meet as frequently as we have done, but you will ever find me just the same, and I shall tell you all my thoughts, and all my cares and sorrows, and all my joys too, just as I always have done."

"No, no, Jessie, say not so. That may not be. You may love me just as well, but you will love another more.161 Your heart cannot be open to me as it has been, for it will belong to another. Its hopes, its fears, its joys, its sorrows, its cares, its love, will all be so intimately blended with those of another, that they cannot be separated. No wife, provided the relations existing between her husband and herself are what they should be, can be to any other friend exactly what she was before her marriage."

"Why, Aunt Mary!—you surely do not mean to say that a wife should never have any confidential friends?"

"The history of woman, dear Jessie, is generally simply a record of the workings of her own heart; in ordinary cases, she has little else to consider. 'The world of the affections is her world,' and there finds she her appropriate sphere of action. What I mean to say is,—not that a wife should have no friend save her husband,—but that, if the hearts of the twain are as closely linked together as they should be, if they always beat in perfect unison, and if their thoughts and feelings harmonize as they ought to do, it will be difficult for her to draw aside the veil from her own heart, and lay it open to the gaze of any other being, without, in some degree, betraying the confidence reposed in her by him who should be nearer and dearer than all the world beside. The heart is like a temple, Jessie. It has its outer and its inner court, and it has also its holy of holies. The outer court is full: common acquaintances,—those that we call friends, merely because they are not enemies,—are gathered there. The inner court but few may enter,—the few who we feel love us, and to whom we are united by the strong bonds of sympathy; but the sanctum sanctorum, the holy of holies, that must never be profaned by162 alien footsteps, or by the tread of any, save him to whom the wife hath said, 'Whither thou goest I will go, thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.'"

The deepening twilight hung over us, wrapping all things in its sombre mantle, and its solemn stillness fell with soft, subduing power upon our hearts, as we sat, for many moments, each lost in reverie, ere I spoke again.

"Aunt Mary, why were you never married?"

"Rather an abrupt question that, my love. What if I say, in the words of the old song, because 'nobody ever came wooing me?'"

"Nay, nay, Aunt Mary, I know you have never passed through life unloved, and I have sometimes fancied not unloving either. But pardon me, I fear my obtrusive curiosity has given you pain," I added quickly, as in the dim light I saw that her pale cheek was growing still paler, and that deep, though subdued, anguish was stamped in legible characters upon her brow.

"I have nought to pardon, my child, for our long familiarity has given you a right to ask the question; and I wonder that you have never made the inquiry before, rather than that you make it now. The history of my early life is a sad one, but you shall hear it, and know why I am now such a lone and isolated being.

"Upon the early part of my life it will be necessary for me to dwell but slightly. My childhood passed dreamily away, marked by no event of sufficient importance to leave a very deep impression upon my mind. An only child, I was my father's idol, and he loved me none the less tenderly, because the destroying angel had snatched his young163 wife from his bosom, and I was all that was left to him of her. I was very young when my mother died—too young to appreciate the magnitude of my loss, or to feel that I was motherless. Yet I have an indistinct recollection of a sweet, girlish face, that used to bend over my couch, and of a melodious voice that was wont to lull me to my baby slumbers. The remembrance is a very faint one, but I have never thought of angels in my dreams, or in my waking hours, when the vision did not wear the semblance of my mother's face, nor of angel voices without in fancy hearing again my mother's low, soft tones.

"As I grew older, the best instructors in the country were procured for me, and I was taught all the accomplishments of the day, while, at the same time, I was not allowed to neglect any of the plainer, but equally important branches of female education. At last my education was completed, and 'I came out' under auspices as flattering as those under which any young girl ever made her debut upon the stage of life. The harsh fingers of Time have wrought such changes upon my face and form, that you may find it difficult to believe that in my youth I was called beautiful. Yet so it was, and this, together with my father's station in society and reputation for wealth, drew a crowd of admirers around me. One of my father's chief sources of delight, was the exercise of an almost prodigal hospitality, and he dearly loved to see me, attired with all the elegance that his ample means could afford, presiding at his table, or moving among our guests, in his fond eyes 'the star of the goodly companie.'

"It was by the bedside of his dying sister, that I first met164 Walter Elmore. Effie had been a schoolmate of mine, and an intimate friendship had sprung up between us. Sisterless as I was, I had learned to cherish for her almost a sister's love. Soon after we left school, her father removed his residence from a distant part of the country to the city near which mine resided, and our girlish attachment was cemented and strengthened, as we entered, hand in hand, upon the duties and pleasures of early womanhood.

"Effie's constitution was naturally weak, and she had been subject from her childhood to a slight cough; but her friends gave little heed to it, as the buoyancy of her spirits and her unchanged demeanour seemed to preclude the idea of any seated complaint. But the destroyer came, and disease had made fearful havoc before we awoke to a sense of her danger. I was with her day and night for a few weeks, and then Effie Elmore, in her youth and loveliness, slept the 'sleep that knows no waking.'

"Her brother, of whom I had often heard her speak in terms of enthusiastic fondness, had been abroad, completing his studies, and I never met him until we stood, side by side, gazing upon the calm, still face of the beautiful being whom we both so tenderly loved.

"It is needless for me to say that from that hour we met often. At my father's house he became a frequent and a welcome guest; and we met too, at no distant intervals, by Effie's grave, in her favourite walks, and in every nook that had been made sacred by her presence. We thought that it was our mutual love for the departed that drew us together; we thought it was her memory, and the recollection of the hour when first we met, that made us seek each165 other's society, and that rendered the moments we spent together so dear to us both; but ah me! but few months had rolled over our heads before we found that it was even a stronger tie; that it was the mystic chain that binds heart to heart, the deep love of congenial spirits.

"And Walter Elmore was indeed one that any maiden might be proud of loving. His face and figure were cast in nature's finest mould. But that were nothing—it is of the nobleness of his character of which I would speak. Proud and high-spirited even to a fault, he could not stoop to a mean or unworthy action. Generous and confiding, his soul was filled with all true and noble impulses, and his heart was the home of pure and elevated affections. His intellectual powers were such as to win the admiration and esteem of all who knew him, and he possessed also the rare gift of eloquence,—a gift that seldom fails to find its way to a woman's heart. What wonder was it then that I yielded mine to him wholly and unreservedly, and soon learned to listen for his footstep, as I listened for no other? My father smiled upon his suit, and gave it his unqualified approbation. Elmore was not wealthy, but his family was one of the first in the country, and my father was proud of his brilliant talents and untarnished name. I had wealth enough for both, and it was decided that upon my twentieth birthday our nuptials should be celebrated.

"Alas! how little know we of the future! Ere that day came, I was penniless—I had almost said a penniless orphan. My father's capital was all invested in the business transactions of two of the oldest, and, it was supposed, the wealthiest houses in New York. Two successive weeks166 brought news of the failure of both firms, and he found himself, when far advanced in life, stripped of the fortune he had acquired by his own hard exertions in earlier years, and utterly destitute. He sank beneath the blow, and for weeks I hung over his couch, fearing each night that the next rising sun would see me an orphan.

"He rose at length from that bed of suffering, but oh, how changed! His hair, which had before but lightly felt the touch of time, was white as snow; his once erect form was bent and trembling; his eye had lost its lustre, and what was far more sad than all, his mental vigour had departed, and he was as imbecile and feeble as a little child. Accustomed as I had ever been to lean upon his strong arm for support, to look to him for guidance and direction in all things, I was now obliged to summon all my fortitude, and be to him in turn protector and guardian.

"The whole of our property was gone, our ruin was complete, and for a time I was overwhelmed by the new and strange cares that were pressing so heavily upon me. But I soon found that it was time for me to act rather than mourn, and I began to look around me for some means by which to obtain a comfortable livelihood for my poor father. I might have obtained a situation as governess, where the labour would be light, and the salary more than sufficient for my wants; but in that case I must be separated from my parent, and leave him to the tender mercies of strangers. The same objection arose in my mind in connexion with almost every course that presented itself, and I finally concluded upon renting a small house in a pleasant little village167 not far from the city, where I could obtain a few pupils, and still be able to watch over my feeble charge.

"It was in the 'merry, merry month of May,' that the news of our reverses came, but it was late in October before we left our home, that home rendered sacred by so many hallowed associations. The intervening months had been spent by me in watching over the sick couch of my aged parent, in striving to compose my own agitated spirits, and to gain sufficient courage to gaze unshrinkingly upon the new and strange pathway I was about to tread.

"Slowly and wearily passed they away, and the day at length dawned that was to witness our departure. All was bright and joyous in the outer world. The air was soft and balmy as a morning in June. The trees were just changing their green summer robes for the gorgeous attire of autumn, with its rich colouring and brilliant dyes; and the sky was as cloudless as if the storm-king had been dethroned, and his banners furled for ever. The house, and everything around it, presented much the same appearance as in happier days; for the gentleman who had purchased it had bought the furniture also, with the exception of a few indispensable articles, that the kindness of the creditors allowed us to retain for our new dwelling.

"But oh, the darkness of the inner world! the gloom in which my own soul was wrapped, when I awoke from a short and troubled sleep, and the thought fell as a dull, sickening weight upon my heart, that I had slept for the last time in that quiet chamber! I passed from room to room, and every step but added to my grief. Here was the nursery and the little crib, where I could just remember168 sleeping in my very babyhood; here the retired study, with its perfect stillness, and the light coming in so stealthily through the stained glass; here the library, my father's favourite apartment, and there, in the recess with its bay window, the arm-chair that had ever been his chosen resting-place; and here the room where my mother had lain, in her quiet beauty, ere the coffin-lid was closed, and she was borne hence for ever.

"In a distant part of the grounds, where the forest-trees had not yet fallen, and where the hand of art had done little more than to clear away the tangled underbrush, there was a small plot enclosed by a stone wall, over which wild vines and running mosses had been trained until the gray stones were almost entirely hidden. The grass in the enclosure was of the deepest green, and shaded though it was by the overhanging trees, there had not a faded leaf or a withered branch been suffered to rest upon it. In the centre was a mound of earth, and over it a slab of white marble, upon which lay the sculptured image of a woman, young and of surpassing loveliness. She lay as if in sleep, one rounded arm thrown over her head, and the other dropping by her side; while from the half-opened hand a white rose-bud had seemingly just fallen. It was my mother's burial-place, and I bent my steps thitherward that I might cast one farewell look upon it, before it passed into the possession of strangers. A tide of softening recollections swept over me as I stood by the grave, and falling upon my knees, I poured out my full heart in prayer.

I rose from my knees calmer than I had been for many weeks. I was sad, but not despairing,—and felt again, what in my despondency I had well-nigh forgotten, that I was in the hands of One who careth for His children.

"When I returned to the house, I found the vehicle that was to convey us away waiting at the door. My father was already in his seat, and I sprang quickly in, not trusting myself to cast another look around me. He—thanks to his weakness and imbecility—had partaken little of my dread or agony. Provided his daily wants were supplied, it mattered little to him where his lot was cast."

"But, Aunt Mary, where was Walter Elmore all this time?"

"I should have told you, my love, that business of vital importance called him to a distant part of the country a short time previous to our misfortunes, and there detained him. He was kept apprised by my letters, however, of all that had befallen us, and hastened to my side as soon as he returned. He vehemently opposed my pursuance of the course I had marked out for myself, and with all the eloquence and earnestness of love, besought me to become his wife at once, and give him a right to protect and guard me.

"But fervently as he prayed, and strongly as my own heart seconded his entreaties, I could not yield. I had thought that it was to be my blessed privilege to aid and assist him I loved; to place him where it would no longer170 be necessary for him to confine his noble mind to close and ceaseless drudgery, and constant toil for his daily bread. And how could I now consent to be a drawback upon his efforts, and to burden him with the care of my helpless parent?

"'No, no, Walter,' said I, in reply to his oft-repeated solicitations; 'urge me no longer. For the present our paths must be separated. Your task will be hard enough, while you are taking the first steps towards acquiring a name and a competence, even if you have no interests but your own to regard. Were I alone in the world, I would joyfully link my fate with yours, and we would toil together, side by side. But as it is, it may not be. My father cannot understand why he need be deprived of any of his accustomed luxuries. Be it my care that he misses them not. I will labour for his sustenance and my own, until you are so circumstanced that, without detriment to your own prospects, you can relieve me of the charge. Then come to me, and the hand pledged to you in brighter days shall be yours!'

"A year passed not unhappily away in the earnest and faithful discharge of the new duties devolving upon me. My school flourished beyond my expectations. I had gained the esteem and confidence of those around me, and I found no difficulty in supplying our daily wants. Elmore was in an adjacent city, in the office of an eminent lawyer, who, it was imagined, would ere long make him a partner in his business. During the last few months his visits had been less frequent than of yore. Rumour told strange tales of a young and exceedingly beautiful girl, the sister of his171 employer, who was playing the mischief with the hearts and brains of half the young men in M——, and more than hinted that my lover was among the number of her admirers. Things went on thus for some time. I fancied that, when we met, which was rarely, his manner was cold and reserved, and that he seemed to shrink from my presence. I now know that my own jealous fancies threw a false colouring over all his actions, and that, if there was any coldness in his demeanour, it sprang from the unusual, and, in fact, unintended reserve of mine.

"At last I heard, from the lips of one whose veracity and friendship I thought I could not question, that his leisure hours were all spent in the society of my supposed rival, and that, when rallied by some of his associates with regard to myself, he had denied our engagement, and spoken lightly and contemptuously of the 'school-mistress.'

"A thousand contending passions were striving for the mastery in my breast, when, upon the evening of that day, after its weary labours were over, I threw myself upon a low seat in the room that served alike as school-room and parlour. Woman's pride—and who does not know that 'there is not a high thing out of heaven her pride o'er-mastereth not?'—was all aroused. Memory was wide awake, bringing back the recollection of by-gone days, when my hand had been sought by the proudest in the land. Then came thoughts of our early love—of the exquisite happiness that had filled my heart, when I had so rejoiced that wealth was at my command, and that I could place it all at the feet of one whom I deemed so noble and so pure—and of a later period, when, rather than place the172 slightest barrier in his way to fame and fortune, I had resisted all his entreaties, and confined myself to close and unremitting toil. It was at this very moment when I was half maddened by the retrospect, that the door opened, and Walter Elmore entered.

"Hastily rising, with every appearance of calmness, I received him with a cold and stately courtesy, surprising even to myself.

"'What means this, Mary?' said he; and I could see that his lip quivered, and the hand he had extended trembled. 'Why do you greet me thus coldly?'

"'Let your own heart answer the question, Mr. Elmore. To that and to your own words I refer you for reasons why we must henceforth be strangers.'

"'You speak enigmas to-night, my dear Mary. My heart tells me no tale that can enable me to comprehend this unlooked-for change in you. It will take more than your simple assertion that we are strangers, to render us such; and he again attempted to take my hand.

"I drew back more haughtily than before, and words that I cannot now repeat burst from my lips. I can only tell you that they were harsh, stinging words—words fraught with contempt and bitterness—words that a proud spirit like Elmore's could not brook.

"He sought no farther explanation. 'Be it as you will,' he said, and his manner was as stern as my own; 'I have asked you to account for this change, and you refuse compliance, couching that refusal in terms that I can hear twice from no one, not even from yourself. We meet no more; but remember, Mary Atherton, the words you have this173 day uttered will ring in your ear until it is closed to all earthly sounds. You have given heed to some idle tale of calumny, and have wantonly flung away a heart that was filled but with your image—a heart that had centred upon you its every dream and wish for the far future—that lived but in the hope of one day calling you its own—and that looked forward to that period as to the commencement of a better and a happier existence. The hour will come when you will feel that this is true, and then will you bewail the step you have now taken!'—and without one farewell look he rushed from the room.

"This prophecy was fulfilled almost before the echo of his departing footsteps had died away. I felt that I was labouring under some strange delusion, and bursting into tears, I wept long and bitterly. I would have given worlds to recall him; but his fleet steed was bearing him from me, as on the wings of the wind. Yet, hope whispered: 'We shall surely meet again. My harsh words angered him; but he has loved me so long and so fondly, that he will not resign me thus easily. All will yet be explained.'

"But day after day passed and he came not; and my heart was as if an iron hand was resting upon it, pressing it downward to the very earth. The excitement of passion had died away, and I could now see how greatly I had erred, in not telling him frankly the tale that had reached my ears, and thus giving him an opportunity to exculpate himself from the charge. Alas! for pride and anger, how often does the shadow of one unguarded moment darken our life-paths for ever!

174

"Two weeks had elapsed; and one night, after vain attempts to sleep, I rose from my couch and threw open the lattice. The glare of daylight was wanting; but the moon poured forth such a flood of radiance that the minutest object was distinctly visible. All heaven and earth were still; the very leaves upon the trees hung motionless as those painted upon canvass. The perfect silence was becoming painfully oppressive, when a low sound, like distant footsteps, fell upon my ear. Nearer and still nearer it came, and I could distinguish a faint murmur, as of half-suppressed voices. Then a group of men approached. They walked slowly and heavily, and as they drew near I perceived that they bore a dark object. Soon, by their reverential mien, and by the unyielding, uneven nature of their burden, the stiff outlines of which were discernible beneath the mantle thrown over it, I knew they were bearing the dead.

"They were passing directly beneath my window, when a sudden movement of the bearers disarranged the pall, and the moonbeams fell clear and soft upon the uncovered features. I leaned forward, and—oh, God! it was the face of Walter Elmore!

"With a shriek that rang out fearfully upon the night-air, I rushed forth, and threw myself upon the motionless form. The men paused in astonishment; but I heeded them not; I lifted the wet, dark locks from his forehead: more than living beauty rested upon it; but it was cold, icy cold,—so cold that the touch chilled my very life-blood. I placed my hand upon his heart: but it beat no longer. I kissed his pale lips again and again, and wildly called175 him by name, and prayed that he would speak to me once, only once more; but he answered not. They thought I was mad, and attempted to raise me, and bear the body on; but I clung to it with a frenzied clasp, exclaiming: 'You shall not separate us,—he is mine,—he is mine!' Then, suddenly, in thunder tones, a voice from the depths of my own spirit sounded in my ears: 'He is not yours: your own hand severed the ties that bound you. What dost thou here?' and I fell senseless to the ground.

"When I next awoke to consciousness, the snow had rested for many weeks upon the grave of Walter Elmore.

"I cannot dwell longer upon this theme. Years have fled since that name has passed my lips, until this evening; but my brain whirls, even now, when I recall the agony of that moment. Elmore had been crossing a narrow bridge, when his foot slipped, and he was precipitated into the water beneath. The current was strong; and his body was found, by some travellers, washed on shore some distance below.

"I learned, before many months had passed, that the tale to which I had given credence was an entire fabrication, having its origin solely in jealousy and malice. He had never swerved from his fidelity, even for one moment; but I,—oh! would to God that my spirit might but for once hold communion with his, that I might humble myself before him, and implore forgiveness for the injustice and coldness of our last interview!

"Little more remains to be told. Shortly after, my father sank to his rest; and the death of a distant relative placed me in possession of a small annuity, which enabled176 me to purchase this cottage. Here I shall probably live until called to rejoin my loved ones in a happier clime."

Aunt Mary's story was ended. My heart was too full for utterance, and silently I pressed my lips upon her pale forehead, and wended my way homewards.

The next morning I left Elmwood. When I again revisited my early home, a plain slab of marble in the churchyard bore the name of Mary Atherton.

177

BY J. I. PEASE.

178

BY S. A. H.

180

BY JAMES T. MITCHELL.

185

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph^a.
 
WENONA'S LEAP. LAKE PEPIN, MISS. RIVER.

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

Love, which "rules the court, the camp, the grove," is not without a share of influence in the wigwam.

It is true that in a polished and refined society, woman is more likely to receive a just appreciation, than where the intellect of man is like the one talent rolled in a napkin, useless, because neglected and unimproved. In an enlightened country, woman is not considered as being only created to perform the household duties of a wife and mother. She is a companion, in the highest sense of the word. Her aim, like his, may be towards the great purposes of life.

Not unmindful of her first duties, those which lie in her province alone, she can go on towards that exalted state of perfection of which the soul is capable, though not to be attained here. Religion, that teaches her "that the price of a virtuous woman is far above rubies," also commends her that "she openeth her mouth with wisdom." We find her in the sacred history not only the friend, the mother, and the wife, but the poet, the heroine, the prophetess, and even the judge. But among Indian nations we find her186 position more than equivocal. Her influence is undoubted in the domestic relations, but she is still a slave. She was born to labour—what merit then in her strongest efforts! She is an inferior—how then can she hope for justice?

Among the Sioux, the men appear indeed to be a superior class of beings. They are noble-looking, while the women are often repelling in appearance. The difficulties with which they must contend in the harsh climate of their country; their poverty increasing year after year; their frequent and long fastings: these all make the men more hardy, more capable of a continued struggle, but they have a different effect upon the women. They are compelled to remain in the lodge; the care of their children obliges them to forego the excitement of seeking for food, and thus sickness and even death is often brought upon them that could otherwise have been avoided. They are often found buried in the snow in winter, prevented by sickness from making such efforts as saved the lives of their husbands and brothers.

But their noble courage, where the emotions of the heart are concerned, gives them the first place in the romantic traditions of their country.

The Sioux will soon have taken a farewell look of the lands which the Great Spirit gave them in the olden time. The lodge and its occupants are vanishing away. The occasional war-whoop will soon be forgotten where it has been heard in unrecorded ages. The scenes of many a romantic tradition will be forgotten by those who succeed the valiant but doomed people, who must look upon them no more. The hunter and his wild steed depart, and the white man,187 the axe, the plough, and the powder-horn take their place.21 The fairy-rings22 on the prairie must be trodden down.188 Spirits will no more assemble where are heard the noise and excitement of advancing civilization. The same sun gilds the hills, the same breezes play upon the waters—but the red man must go.

He must, with his heart full of patriotism and sorrow, find another site for his lodge, another country for his hunting-grounds. The wakeen-stone to which he was sacrificed is no longer his. The graves of his ancestors reproach him as he departs.

The illustration of Wenona's Rock presents one of the most striking and beautiful scenes in Indian country. Even were there no tradition connected with it, its wonderful beauty must give it interest. One must indeed feel that God made it. That huge rock with its worn and broken sides—the lake that reflects it in her placid bosom—the everlasting hills stretching out before the eye,—these would show the Creator's handiwork.

But there is an additional interest in viewing it when we recall the tale of sorrow and passion connected with it. When we recollect that here a young heart throbbed its last emotions—that from that high eminence the sweet notes of woman's voice pealed forth their last music. That here her arms were raised to heaven, appealing for that justice which earth had denied her.

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Ph^a.
 
MARRIAGE CUSTOM OF THE INDIANS.

But it is not only on Wenona's Rock that the devotion of an Indian woman's love is recorded. Go among them189 and hear the traditions of each band; how many have loved and died. Learn of the sacrifices that only woman can make—of the devotion that only woman can feel—of the sorrows that only woman can endure.

You may see one, who, though past her youth, still attracts you by the full and expressive glances of her dark and brilliant eyes. Her hair (a marvel among Indians), waves along her forehead—and when damp from heat or bathing, divides itself into locks, that would with any pains be formed into ringlets. Her smile lights up her countenance, for her white teeth shine, and her mouth, though large, is expressive. She will not open her heart to a stranger, but to one she loves, she told all.

She had seen but fourteen summers when she left her mother to go to her husband's lodge. She loved to dwell upon that time, for no bride ever boasted greater adornment, and her marriage was celebrated according to the old and venerated customs.23

She was a whole morning preparing herself, for her mother loved her, and was proud of her. She had obtained from the traders gay beads of every colour, and brooches in numbers, too.

Her father was a favourite of the traders. He carried them so many beautiful furs—for he was a great hunter—that they gave him trinkets for her in abundance. They gave him, besides, fire-water; and then she and her mother190 used to leave the wigwam and hide, for fear he would kill her.

When she was ready to go to her husband's lodge, her father and two of her brothers attended her. Her cousin, Whistling Wind, came to meet her, and, taking her upon his back, carried her in and placed her by her husband's side.

She was very happy at first, for her husband loved her; but many moons passed away, and she had no child.

Her husband reproached her, and she could only weep—and no infant's voice was heard in their lodge.

At last her husband brought home another wife, and she was forgotten. Soon she watched him as he carved the thunder-bird on his son's cradle; and the second wife laughed at her, because she could not be a happy mother like herself.

He has beaten her sometimes—for he drinks fire-water too.

She might return to her mother, for her family is a powerful one, but she cannot leave her husband. She cannot forget the love of her early youth. She stays by him, for he is often sick, and she can take better care of him than his other wife, who has many young children.

Wherever is man, with his proud, exacting spirit, there is woman, with her devoted and enduring love. There are many instances of heroic affection, not recorded in the traditionary annals of the Sioux; but Wenona's Rock will stand, as long as the world lasts, a monument in memory of woman's love.

191

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

194

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

Those who have lived among the Indians are accustomed to their faith in the protecting power of the Spirits of Nature. Especially powerful is the god of the woods and forests.

196

BY MRS. M. E. W. ALEXANDER.

206

BY ANN E. PORTER.

To assure my readers that I am telling them what is truth, and not drawing upon the treasury of fancy for a sketch, I will first relate to them in what manner I became acquainted with the Doctor and the Widow. I was once a teacher: yes, for seven years I held sway in the school-room, and learned by severe discipline the art of self-government, and to bear in secret many a sorrow of which the cherished daughter in the domestic circle remains in blissful ignorance. Whenever I see a young lady, at the close of school-hours, turning with a weary step to her solitary room in some boarding-house, my first impulse is to go and ask her to share my own fireside, sit down at my table, and forget for a while, in my little family circle, that she is away from the loved ones of her own home.

I shall never forget my first preparations for leaving home. I was to go eight hundred miles,—a long journey in the days of stages and canal-boats. My little purse grew thin and lank under the unusual exertion. I had a trunk and a large bandbox (the latter article I have since learned to dispense with): in this was placed all the "varieties" of my wardrobe, as Parson Milton would call them; or the accessories to strengthen the arsenal, as Bonaparte termed207 the feminine requisites to the toilet. My little store of collarets, ribbons, and cravats, my lace capes and fancy handkerchiefs were all folded in one box, and placed inside the larger one. They were few in number; but what girl of eighteen does not cherish her own small hoard of treasures? I was to go as far as Pittsburg in the company of a lady and her brother, a boy of sixteen. Three days and nights we were to travel by stage, stopping only for meals, and occasionally an hour for rest, besides the intervals caused by changing horses. Two strangers, young gentlemen from Philadelphia, joined us at the latter city, and remained with the party to Pittsburg. Nothing, perhaps, makes people better acquainted with the disposition of their companions, than the old-fashioned mode of coach-travelling; the petty troubles and peculiar annoyances excite the mirth of some, but elicit only the grumbling of others, so that for days together we are entertained by the fun of laughter-loving girls, and gallant young gentlemen, with growling interludes from some gouty old man, or the groans of an epicure, who talks only to condemn the dinner, and curse the cooks.

I had never spent a whole night out of my bed before, and though the excitement kept me up at first, I found myself so exhausted by the middle of the second night, that it was with difficulty I could retain my seat.

One of the passengers, perceiving my situation, and alarmed by my almost deadly paleness, requested the driver to stop, and ordered a cup of tea. This, and a resting-place for my poor head, relieved me a little; but208 with what joy did we hail, the next day at evening, the smoky city of Pittsburg.

"Ladies, shall we have the pleasure of meeting all our little party together in the parlour this evening?" said one of the gentlemen. The next morning we were to separate, taking three different routes. We therefore cheerfully acquiesced, and Miss S. and myself repaired to our rooms to dress. What was my astonishment to find my treasures gone, and with them a valuable breastpin, the gift of my grandfather, shortly before his death! I was weary, sick, and sad; but at the earnest request of my companion, I put on a black silk dress, and felt not a little refreshed by my bath, and the privilege of using thoroughly the brush and comb, which, denied me for two days and nights, had given to my head, with its exuberance of hair, a most moppish appearance on the outside, while the brain within seemed to share the entanglement without.

But the efforts of my companions could not chase away the homesickness of the heart. The morning would find me alone in the world. Sixty miles of my journey were yet to be travelled: and, wearied in body and faint in spirit, I longed to see my dear father, and be at home again under his protection. I shrunk, too, from the duties before me: they seemed more arduous and difficult as I approached them; and with a sad feeling of my own incompetency and the lack of personal charms, which might prepossess my employers, I laid my head upon my pillow that night and watered it with my tears. Sleep! blessed, blessed Sleep! Thou dost take the burdens from the weary and fling them into the waters of oblivion; the infant, in its guileless rest,209 is pillowed on thy lap, and the aged lean lovingly on thy shoulder. Merciful was the great Father of all, that he did permit thee to follow Adam from Paradise, and travel with his children in this world of guilt,—thus are we permitted to forget, for a while, at least, our sorrows and our sins. Early the next morning I went on board a steamboat for Wheeling, and though shrinking and timid, I still found protection and kindness when needed; but when we arrived, at midnight, in the village of P., and I found myself alone in a large, desolate-looking room of the hotel, all the former feeling of sadness came over me, and with them an indefinable dread of the future.

I must send word to the patrons of the school that I had arrived: and fearful that their expectations would be disappointed, I could not sleep. The next morning I despatched a messenger, and two of the trustees called. They were polite, but said little, excepting what related to business; but when they left me, remarked, "We will procure a more agreeable home for you than this." I thanked them with my lips, but they little comprehended how earnestly the heart craved for a home again. The day passed, and I saw no one till the twilight shadows were creeping into that lonely room, and with them also dim visions of home and friends, bringing with them that sad heart-longing which the young feel during their first absence from home, when I was startled from my reverie by a gentle knock at my door. I opened it, and an old lady stood before me, so kind, so motherly in her appearance, and so plainly yet tastefully dressed, that my heart clung to her at first sight. If my Father in heaven had sent an210 angel to me, I should certainly have chosen just such a face and garb, in my present condition, rather than the white robes and bright-winged cherubs of Raphael's glorious fancy.

"Why, my dear child," said she, as if struck at once by my girlish figure and pallid face, "you must have been lonely here to-day, and you need a mother to nurse and take care of you after your long journey. My name is Warner, and I am going to take you home with me, if you will go. My brother called this morning, and my husband would have accompanied me, but he was very busy; and I was so fearful that you would be homesick, that I thought I would come and introduce myself."

My heart bounded with delight, and I could hardly speak for gratitude; and I said so little, and that in such a blundering way, that I was afraid she would not know how much relief she had brought me.

"Come, my dear, get your bonnet," said she pleasantly, "and I will send for your baggage."

I obeyed, and in a few minutes we stopped at a large but neat residence, almost hid in a profusion of shrubbery. The climbing multiflora rose covered one side of the house, and, with welcome intrusiveness, peeped into the chamber windows, while a honeysuckle and woodbine threw their mantle of green over the door, and mingled their blossoms with those of a tall snowball tree, which had grown high, and, clinging to the house, showered a white welcome upon every corner. A few steps from the house, on the right side, but in the same enclosure, was a small brick office;—on the other side a cottage, shaded by two large beech trees, children of the forest, spared by some merciful woodman211 when the land was cleared. Such was the outward appearance of my new home—a word as to its inmates. My companion ushered me into a small sitting-room, prettily furnished, and occupied at the time by two persons,—one a tall, white-haired old gentleman, with spectacles on nose, reading the newspaper—the other Mrs. Travis, a young widow, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Warner, who had returned again to the home of her youth. She was sewing as we entered, but, laying aside her work, rose to greet us. Her countenance was plain, but a pair of sparkling black eyes gave animation and expression to her features; and, as I returned her salutation, I thought her welcome not quite so cordial as her mother's. It seemed to express this—"Whether you and I like each other will depend on circumstances." But the old gentleman looked at me for an instant over his spectacles; then, laying them aside with his paper, rose, and taking my hand, welcomed me to the West with a hearty greeting; then, placing a chair near to his own, begged me to be seated. His whole countenance was expressive of goodness; and, as I sat down by his side in all the timidity of a girlish stranger, I felt, for the first time since leaving home, a delicious sense of security and peace. It seemed as if the wing of some guardian angel was over me, and a refuge opened in time of sorrow.

And here, en passant, I must add, those first impressions never changed; and, from that hour till the day when that blessed spirit was carried by angels to its own pure home in heaven, I always found consolation in trouble, advice in perplexity, and gentle reproof in error, by the side of the good old man. How sweet was the fragrance of his daily212 life, and how precious the kiss he imprinted upon my forehead, and the blessing he implored upon my head when I bade him farewell! Oh! the hopeless darkness of atheism, which draws the veil of oblivion between us and all further intercourse with such spirits! No, no!—let us rather say with St. Paul, "I know in whom I have believed;" and with Job, "I shall live again."

But my limits forbid any extended notice of the members of the family, though the years I spent under that charmed roof are marked in my life with a white stone. There I emerged from the bashful, timid girl, into the more active, energetic woman; and under the blessed influence of love I trust I grew wiser and happier.

When, at nine o'clock, the family Bible was opened, and father

and all knelt at the family altar in prayer, my own heart was full, and I was thankful that no eye could see my face. Soon afterwards the old lady said, "You look tired, and must retire; I will show you to your room." Then, leading me through a small entry, she opened the door of a commodious room, saying, as she did so, "This will be yours." It was carpeted, a centre-table was in the middle of the room, an open stove with its grate, ready at any chilly hour for coal, and a nice, cosy-looking bed in one corner of the apartment. The old lady lighted a candle, and bade me good night. Did she, or did she not, think I was a cold-hearted little thing, that I said good night in such a low, tremulous tone? I know not; but this I do know, that, as213 soon as she had left the room, I sat down, and, laying my head on the table, burst into tears.

They were tears of thankfulness and joy, and they refreshed the heart, as a summer shower the parched earth.

I seemed a child again, and, with my childhood's prayer upon my lips, I dropped to sleep that night. I would love to sit and write till night about my after-life there, but I have limited myself to one little episode, and to that I will proceed. I had been there some months; Elizabeth had learned that we were so unlike that we could love, and neither be enemies nor rivals. Her high, ambitious, buoyant spirit had nothing to fear from the timid, yielding, sensitive girl who was to be her companion. Not a single trait in the character of each came in collision. One was self-reliant, could keep her own secrets, extricate herself from her own difficulties, feared none but God, cared little for the opinion of others, loved deeply, hated cordially. The other had an inordinate "love of approbation," lacked hope and courage, but, supported by a stronger arm, could endure the bitterest trial even to the end. The one was proud to uphold, the other loved to trust.

And thus we moved on, loved and loving, whereas, had we resembled each other more closely, bitter heart-burnings and jealousies might have been the result. One day we sat together in the little sitting-room. We were reading "Deerbrook," by Miss Martineau, and wondering that such want of trust and faith should ever take place between sisters, when the door-bell rang, and a young gentleman, a total stranger to us, was ushered in. He was a tall young man, with a fresh countenance, a somewhat diffident manner,214 and gray eyes, which had a downcast expression. It was difficult for him to observe that simple rule of politeness, "Look directly at the person to whom you speak." Mr. Warner endeavoured to make him more at his ease by casual remarks upon the weather, and other topics of the day; but he elicited little besides "Yes, sir," "No, sir," "I agree with you perfectly, sir," and suchlike replies. At last he drew a card from his pocket, and handed it to Mr. Warner, saying, "I have been in town some days, and am looking out for an office. Learning that the one near your house is unoccupied, I have made an early application."

"I will think of it," said the old gentleman. "This is Dr. Vandorsen, ladies, come to take up his residence in our village." This somewhat awkward introduction over, I took the opportunity to slip out of the room, just as they commenced talking upon the terms of rent and other business matters.

"Well, now," said Elizabeth, as she came hastily into my room, an hour afterwards; "what do you think of the Doctor?"

"Why, I haven't thought of him since I left the room; I have been preparing my lesson in Butler's Analogy, and I assure you it requires all the strength of my feeble brain to grasp his arguments and make them clear to my class."

"A truce to such work! I thought you had been studying the young stranger's physiognomy, and were prepared to give me an analysis of his character."

"Let me see," I said; "I cannot give you his character, but I believe his personal appearance I can remember; cheeks like your rusty-coat apples, rusty brown with a215 touch of red, foxy eyes, slick, very slick hair, as the Yankees say, an inflexible spine, and in one respect only like St. Paul."

"Pray what is that?"

"Brethren, I came unto you in much weakness of speech."

Lizzy's eyes snapped, and she looked, for a moment, almost angry. "Then," said she, "I really thought you had some penetration of character, but I must be mistaken. Did you not see the evidence of fine feelings beneath that bashful exterior? And then he was so modest and unassuming; why I no sooner heard his errand than my fancy drew a beautiful picture in perspective. He seemed so much like yourself,—you that we are beginning to love so much, that I thought it would be love at first sight. Father will let him have the office, and then here's the cottage: a nice, snug place it would be for you, and we could have you always with us, and a doctor handy to cure 'the ills to which flesh is heir.'"

"You have a vivid imagination, truly; but let me tell you that you are right in supposing that I have very little penetration of character. I have none; but sometimes, though I cannot account for it, I have a strong aversion to a person on the first meeting; and when it is so, I never overcome it."

"Nonsense," said Lizzy, "that is all imagination; a belief without reason, but it cannot be so in this case."

"We will leave this for the present," I said; "and I will take more particular notice of the Doctor the next time. If you like him, I have no doubt I shall also. But why so disinterested? why not take the good Doctor yourself, and216 then the office and cottage will follow as a life possession for him?"

"Why, don't you know, my dear child, he is not the man for me? I should be the death of so amiable a personage in two years. If I marry again, it must be a man of boldness and spirit. I care not if he have the temper of Bonaparte, if he have his courage and spirit."

"And could you endure like Josephine? You forget the broken vows and crushed hopes."

A shade passed over her countenance a moment.

"Let us not talk about marriage now," said she.

"Agreed," I replied. "I must study, and bury all other aspirations for the present in my school."

The next day the Doctor took possession of the office, and long rows of vials and boxes of bones usurped the place of law books and deeds. The boy pounded medicines in the morning, and the Doctor played on his flute at night.

He was neighbourly, and very attentive to both the young ladies, evidently studying to make no difference in his attentions. To be sure, he talked most with myself, and I noticed whenever an opportunity occurred, Lizzy would direct the conversation to some subject in which I was especially interested. Every Wednesday evening we went to a lecture, and he was usually present to accompany the family. The whole family seemed interested in him, and good old Mr. Warner too, especially as he now spoke of his intention to join the church. When that event did take place, I found some excuse for staying at home. The more I tried to overcome it, the stronger my aversion became. I thought it must be groundless—the rest of the family had217 more experience and wisdom than myself,—why then should I feel such an unaccountable prejudice towards an innocent young gentleman who had done me no harm?

I determined to overcome it, and most severely did I blame myself for suspecting that any other than holy motives led to this public act of consecration. The next evening, when he proposed to me that we should take a short walk, I cheerfully consented. As we passed a large flouring mill, he said, "This, I believe, is Mr. Warner's?"

"Yes," I replied.

"It seems, to be a very valuable one."

"One of the most so in the region. The old gentleman came to this country many years ago. Like Abraham, he went forth, not knowing whither he went, and like him has he been prospered. He has flocks and herds, houses and lands, and, what shall I call those?" I asked, as a drove of swine marked by him came grunting along with their snub noses in the gutter.

"Oh, that is but one species of property," he remarked, "and has its value. The good old man seems to be very worthy."

"Worthy!" I repeated to myself—what harm in that, and yet I didn't like the question, or rather the tone of the remark.

"He is one of the excellent of the earth—belonging to that species of salt which never loses its savour."

"They seem to be a very affectionate family, no wonder they feel almost idolatry for their interesting daughter. Did you know her husband?"

218

"Not at all," I replied, and by my silence indicated that I had no wish to continue this conversation.

The very next morning I had occasion to go into the private room or study of the old gentleman, to deposit in his hands a sum of money, the proceeds of my labour, and for which he gave me good interest and security. I found the old lady there, and as I opened the door she remarked, "Oh yes, husband, lend him freely if he needs; he is young, and a hundred dollars may aid him greatly now; I have perfect confidence in the Doctor."

I bit my lip, for I found myself inclined to smile, and did not wish to be observed. But the old gentleman remarked the expression of my face, and looking over his spectacles archly said, "Ay, ay, my little schoolma'am! and so you don't think so highly of the Doctor as the rest of us, or do you sail under false colours just now?"

"I have no cause for that," I replied, "and if I had, your penetration would find it out; so honesty is really my best policy, for no other reason than because I can have no other."

"Well, time works wonders; I only desire that you settle among us, and I must say, prudence would hardly advise the Doctor at present; so take good care of yourself and all will come right," so giving me my receipt and a kiss on the cheek, I left the good couple in the act of counting out a hundred dollars for the Doctor. Weeks passed, and Lizzy, delighted at every new patient the Doctor had and at the increasing reputation she thought he was gaining, always had some interesting fact to relate to me when I returned from school at night. At one time he219 had refused all pay from a sick old woman, one of Lizzy's protégés, whom he visited daily. At another time, he had spent half a day in the garden with her good mother, budding, trimming, and tying up her bushes; again, he had gone into the field and mowed for three hours, to help her father, when there was a prospect of rain. "And wouldn't he make a good husband, Sissy dear?" she said.

"Yes, love, if he was only a little more fiery, like Bonaparte, and had the courage and spirit of a hero."

Lizzy looked annoyed. In the mean time, common report had, to my great vexation, coupled the Doctor's name with mine; but to attempt to stem the current of village gossip is like using Dame Partington's broom to sweep the sea. Firmness and patience are the only salves for such annoyances. Happily, a vacation of a week occurred, and I was to spend it with one of my pupils.

On my return, it was a pleasant summer's evening, the doors were open, and the same vines and trees which the year before looked so inviting to the little homesick girl, were again loaded with blossoms. The old folks sat just inside the door enjoying the mild air, and Lizzy on an ottoman, which stood on the broad step. The Doctor, with a hideous black patch on the side of his forehead, and one arm in a sling, stood leaning in a picturesque attitude by her side. Lizzy's eyes looked milder than I ever saw them before, and when she turned them upon the Doctor, there was an expression of interest and sympathy which I had never noticed before. "The victory is won," I said to myself, and then, like a shadow on my heart, came those first impressions, which no after acquaintance had removed.220 Mr. Warner came forward to welcome me, and wait upon me into the house, saying to the Doctor, with a smile, "We will excuse all want of gallantry this evening."

"And excuse me, also," he replied, "I will do myself the pleasure of calling on Miss Porter to-morrow," he said.

"What in the name of wonder has happened?" I said to Lizzy, who had flown to my side as the Doctor left.

"Oh, it is quite a story, I assure you; but I ought not to tell you, for I shall spoil it for the Doctor to-morrow. He tells it so well; you'll find that your stammering St. Paul can speak with the tongue of an angel sometimes."

But my curiosity would not allow me to wait: and in truth, neither would Lizzy's enthusiasm permit her to do the same; so she gave the outlines, promising that the Doctor should fill them up in the morning.

"Would you believe it," she commenced, "the Doctor has been robbed and shot at, and"—

"Shot at, and then robbed, Sis," said the old gentleman.

"There, I knew I should spoil the story."

"Never mind, do go on," I said, "where, pray?"

"Why, on the turnpike road to McConnelsville; don't you remember a piece of woods there?"

"Why, yes; but honest black Gassoway's house is near about half way as you pass the woods. I came from there on horseback, at eight o'clock in the evening, only two weeks ago."

"You must never go there again, my child," said Mrs. Warner, in a sort of sepulchral tone; "it may be the death of you."

"Just as the Doctor came to where the woods commenced,221 two horrible-looking ruffians with masks came out of the woods, and while one seized the horse's bridle, the other pointed a pistol to his heart, and demanded his money. He had two hundred dollars by him, which he was then taking to a man he owed. It was all the spare money he had; you know the Doctor is just commencing his profession, and he does not wish to urge his debtors too hard at present. But he was too brave to yield at once; he knocked the pistol aside, but it went off, grazing his arm; but after a hard fight with his opponents, he found they were too much for him, and after resigning all his money he came back home. Isn't it too bad, so industrious and prudent as he seems to be?"

"It is a hard case surely; but for the life of me I cannot imagine how robbers dared come so near the town; the pistol-shot must have been heard at Gassoway's."

"No, it was midnight, and they were sound asleep, probably. I wish they had heard and gone in pursuit."

The next day was Sunday, and, as usual, I went to meeting in the evening. Lizzy complained of slight indisposition, and did not accompany us; but when we returned we found the two invalids together, and one at least looking very agreeable, though Lizzy's face expressed embarrassment whenever she caught my eye.

The next morning the good old lady called me into her room a little while before the hour of school, and, bidding me sit down by her side, said affectionately, but seriously,

"My child, do you love the Doctor?"

Though not naturally mirthful, I could scarce refrain222 from laughing in the old lady's face. Respect forbade, and I answered, with all the seriousness I could command,

"Dear Aunty, because you and Lizzy wished it, I have tried hard to do so; but I do not love him, and I am convinced I never can."

The good woman looked relieved, and said, "I am glad it is so; you are far away from home and friends, and I should be sorry to have you in trouble while with us. Come to me at all times with your sorrows, and I will try and be a mother to you."

The smiles were now exchanged for tears. What in the world does any one wish to cry for, when they are grateful? But some seem to have that unfortunate propensity.

"I was only to add," said the old lady, "that the Doctor loves Lizzy; and I feared," she said, "it might make one heart sad. We fancied you felt more interest in the Doctor than you are willing to acknowledge."

"I now give you a solemn promise," I said, and it was sealed with a kiss, "that I will always speak the truth to yourself."

This conversation only gave me new cause for regret. I could not see my dear Lizzy married to the Doctor, so long as I was unable to shake off my own dislike to him, and my own mouth was fettered by the suspicions concerning myself. For two days I was pondering in my own mind what could be done; and learning that Mr. Warner would permit no engagement to take place at present, concluded that time and patience would bring all right.

Thus I mused, with my book open, but my mind wandering, when Lizzy burst into the room.

223

"Heigh-ho! my little hypocrite, you never can keep a secret, you say. Is that the truth?" And she held a card towards me.

"I never had any secrets to keep, Lizzy, so I don't know how much strength I possess."

"Well here, then—'Joseph Dushey, St. Louis, Mo.'"

"Upon my word, Lizzy, I know no more about this gentleman than yourself. Does he wish to see me?"

"That he does, and is waiting your ladyship's presence in the parlour."

"Some business relating to the school," I said. "I must not keep him waiting."

So to the parlour I went, and soon found myself in the presence of a gentleman upon whom nature had put her unmistakeable sign of nobility. His address and manner were those of one accustomed to refined society, and his ease and suavity quite overcame my own timidity. But, after a few minutes' general conversation, it was his turn to become embarrassed; and, after apologizing for interference in my private affairs, he said that, hearing that an engagement of marriage existed between myself and Dr. Vandorsen, he had felt it his duty to expose the character of the Doctor. It was painful, but it seemed to him an act of justice and mercy. He then related the history of this adventurer—a reckless swindler, ingratiating himself into the favour of others, and then repaying kindness with black ingratitude. "I have often," he said, "from regard to his father, helped him to money. He is owing me now; and, learning that I was in the vicinity, he invented the account of the sham robbery, which he says took place on Saturday224 evening." He then placed in my hands the papers containing proofs of that which he had asserted, and again, with much delicacy, apologized for his intrusion.

I thanked him most sincerely for what he had done, and assuring him that no such engagement existed between us, yet these papers were valuable as guarding against future trouble for others.

He allowed me to retain them. On going to my room I sat down and examined them carefully, and blessed God that I had it in my power to save Lizzy from a dreadful sacrifice. I laid them aside, determined to place them in the hands of Mr. Warner in the morning.

When morning came, the Doctor's office was found deserted; the key hung upon the outside, his valuables were removed, and from that time to this I have heard nothing from Dr. Vandorsen, nor has my good mother Warner or her family. Neither have the two hundred dollars, which they at different times loaned him, ever been returned.

Lizzy is most delightfully situated, and I know of but one drawback to her perfect happiness, viz., that her husband is one of the most amiable of men, never allowing his temper to conquer his reason, and never likely to allow ambition to overpower the deep affection he bears his wife.

225

BY ERASTUS W. ELLSWORTH.

"It was a notion of the ancients, that if one perished at sea, or where his body could not be found, the only way to procure repose for him was to build an empty tomb, and by certain rites and invocations, call his spirit to the habitation prepared for it."

Eschenburg.

I.
1.

2.

3.

II.
1.

2.

3.

4.

III.
1.

2.

IV.
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2.

V.
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2.

Note.—Nathan Hale was a native of the town of Coventry, in Connecticut; and graduated at Yale College, in 1773. He entered the army of the Revolution at an early period, as a captain in a light infantry regiment, under command of Colonel Knowlton. After the defeat of the 27th August, 1776, and the retreat of the Americans from Long Island, Washington became exceedingly desirous to gain some information respecting the future operations of the enemy, and applied to Colonel Knowlton, through whom Hale was introduced, and volunteered his services.

He disguised himself, crossed to Long Island, procured admission to the British camp, obtained the information desired, and was about leaving the Island, when a refugee and a relative recognised, and betrayed him.

The case was clear. Hale confessed; and Sir William Howe ordered him243 hung the next morning. He suffered like a patriot and a Christian. "I lament," said he, "that I have but one life to lose for my country." The provost-marshal, who superintended the execution, was a savage-hearted man, and refused him the attendance of a clergyman, and the use of a Bible, and destroyed letters which he had written to his mother, and other friends, making the remark, that "the rebels should not know that they had a man in their army who could die with so much firmness."

An aged physician, recently deceased, was accustomed to relate an anecdote that is worthy of preservation. The Doctor, when a small boy, attended a school taught by Hale in the town of East Windsor, Connecticut. One day Hale was standing at his desk, in a deep study, when certain wide-awake boys began to take advantage of his inattention.

The narrator thereupon went softly to his side, touched him, and pointed to the scene of mischief. Hale, without turning his head, dropped a look25 upon the little informer—a mild look, but full of rebuke,—"Go back to your seat," said he. The boy slunk away, and neither misunderstood nor forgot this rebuke of the ungenerous and disloyal, from his true-hearted teacher; and associated as the incident became with the subsequent fate of Hale, it made a deep and affecting impression upon his memory.

244

BY MARY E. HEWITT.

245

C. Schuessele del. Drawn by Cap^t. S. Eastman. Chromolith of P. S. Duval Phil.
 
FALLS OF S^T. ANTHONY

BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

CHAPTER I.

The glowing noonday's sun was resting over the rocks that lay and the waters that dashed in the region of St. Anthony's Falls. The long row of hills in the distance was tinged with gold, which mixed gaudily with their purple hues. The dark green of the trees that grew on the opposite shore interposed between the brightness of the hills beyond and the white glare of the foaming waters.

Above the Falls, large trees lay fixed in the river, notwithstanding the efforts the waves appeared to be making to remove every obstacle that lay in their way, which led to the edge of the precipice, where they threw themselves into the abyss below.

Large and small fragments of rocks dotted the water in every direction, and in the centre of the Falls lay a number of rocks reposing against each other, with rich, luxuriant shrubs and trees rising from among them.

Notwithstanding the noise of the falling waters, and the roaring of the boiling waves below, there was great beauty mingled with the grandeur of the scene. The width of the246 river at this point made the height of the Falls appear less than it really was. The association connected with the death of Wenona,26 the injured, but loving wife, gave a romantic cast to the red man's thoughts, as he rested from the toils of the chase near this beautiful scene. He could identify the very spot where she raised her arms, while the notes of her death-song pealed above all other sounds, as her slight canoe bent towards her child's and her own grave. He marvelled that the boiling of the waters did not appal her, or that the voice of her husband did not rouse her from her fatal purpose.

But now there is no person near, to take from the solitary beauty of the scene. If the screaming of the loon were heard, it was immediately followed by the flapping of her wings, as she passed to the spirit lakes, over whose quiet surface she loved better to rest. The deer were all far distant;—the shade of the forest trees was more acceptable now than the rays of the summer's sun. Whatever might be the burden of the song of the waters, it was unheard, save by the spirits that are ever assembled in numbers around this hallowed spot.

When the intense heat had passed away, a fresh, invigorating wind was felt among the rocks and waves. Evening was unfolding her mantle, and her breath was playing over the bright flowers that even here enjoy their short season247 of life. The flitting clouds were gathering towards the horizon, constantly changing their hues, and resting in golden lines above the hills. Large fish, the bass, and the pike, moved at their ease in the restless waters, as if there were no fear of being bearded in this their stronghold. The beautiful red deer, too, has been tempted to come and be refreshed,—ever on their guard, though, as might be seen by the tossing of their heads when the winds rose and whispered over the earth.

Now they start and flee like lightning, for the light sound of woman's step is heard; and in the very spot where one of them rested, looking over the waves, stands a slight figure, bearing in her face and form the marks of youth, while her short and richly embroidered skirt, and the crimson okendokenda, that partly covered her arms and chest, showed her to belong to a family at least not unimportant among her people.

She stood still for some moments in a listening attitude, her face pale, and every feature fixed in intense thought. She carried a bundle of small size: this she seemed to think of value, for she grasped it as if her life depended on the preservation of what it contained.

Turning towards the course of the rocks by the river's edge, she surveyed their way; then, bending where she stood, she looked unappalled at the waters becoming dark by the shadows of evening.

There was but little current where she stood, for the position of the rocks prevented this, though quite near them the impetuous stream hurried on like one tired of existence,248 eager only to reach and be lost in the great ocean of forgetfulness.

There was evidently some great difficulty in her position, for her colour flushed and left her, and she pressed her hands across her bosom, without quelling its tumult: yet it was equally evident her object was self-preservation. Life was dear to the young and active blood that animated her veins. There was too much brightness in the depths of those dark eyes to be quenched by death. She looked all around her; and well might she have asked if the red man's heaven boasted a more beautiful picture than the one now before her.

The sound of voices has recalled her from her meditations. Loud, stern voices, speaking in tones of anger and disappointment. They were not yet very near, but she knew them well. The language was her own, but the lips that spoke it were threatening death to her. She recognised his voice—her husband's—he was the pursuer. And she smiled a bitter smile as she listened to the harsh sounds. Notwithstanding the perils that surrounded her, she was as calm as when she sat by her mother's door, in the far-off home of the Indians, who live by "Le Lac qui Parle." All her terror, all her restlessness was forgotten. She raised her arm to its greatest height, and elevating her lithe frame too, she threw her bundle as far as her strength enabled her; listening till the voices sounded nearer, and the steps could be distinguished in the dead leaves that lay in their path, she swayed her form to and fro, and sprung, laughing as she did so, from the rocks. Then swimming round them, disappeared, concealed by the overhanging precipices, as249 well as by the thick foliage that grew close to the water's edge.

Hardly was she out of sight when her place was again occupied. A large, fierce-looking Sioux stood where she had been standing. He looked round as if the object of his search might be hid among the rocks and bushes. The waters laughed just as she had, as he complained of fatigue and disappointment. He looked like a fiend who had forced himself where but a moment ago some gentle spirit had been resting. The passions in their prime worked in his haughty face. Stripes of different-coloured paint lay across his cheeks and around his eyes. His broad chest and brawny arms were uncovered—he raised his hand, and moving it in a half circle, as he turned towards his companions, "I have looked for her until I am tired," he said; "perhaps she has killed herself; if she is living, my vengeance shall yet reach her,—I will tear her heart from her breast."

Then turning, wearied and angered beyond endurance, he strode back towards his home. His giant figure rose far above his companions. His eye flashed like the lion's deprived of his prey. Well might they call him the Fiery Man.

CHAPTER II.

We must go back two days before this incident occurred. In a large wigwam were two persons. The one, a young, pale woman, seated on a mat. The white lips and the black shadows beneath the eyes, told of watchings and despair. No tear moistened the colourless eyelids, no sigh relieved250 the overburdened heart. Still as death itself, the young mother gazed on the unconscious cause of her agony.

There it lay, peaceful and calm, against her throbbing heart. There it lay, as it was wont, when seated on the high rocks by the Mississippi, it heard the sweet tones of a mother's voice. There it lay, never to hear even them again.

Absorbed in her grief, the mother knew not that there was another in the wigwam. She was recalling, as she gazed on the crushed flower thus rudely torn from her love, the many and strange changes of the past year. She had once looked forward to the future, as the young always do. She loved and was promised to the one she loved.

Fiery Man came from afar, with his powerful, athletic frame, and his deep and piercing eyes, and his voice so low and solemn. He stopped at her father's village, returning from a successful expedition against the Sacs; and he was full of proud boastings. He said he was "a great warrior, and hunter too, for his lodge was always full of game; that he had taken more scalps than any brave of his band; that when he held his enemies, they were like children in his large hand."

In an evil hour his eye fell upon White Moon. He loved her because she was the opposite of himself. He fancied the gentle and submissive way in which she received the directions of her parents. When he saw her eyes droop and her cheek mantle when the warriors danced—when he watched her and marked that she only looked at one—when he inquired, and learned that to that one was she destined, then did he mark her for his own; he was as251 cool and determined as if he had been aiming his arrow at the frightened grouse; as sure of his prey as if the bird lay already bleeding at his feet.

He went to her mother, and showed her the rich crimson cloth he had received from the traders on his way.

Other presents he laid before her, very valuable then; for traders were just coming in the country, and articles for use or adorning were rare among the Sioux.

The mother told him her child was promised,—that White Moon loved the noble young warrior she was to marry, and she could not break her daughter's heart.

The father came in, and Fiery Man showed him his new gun,—they were scarce then, and were deemed wakun (supernatural). Fiery Man enlarged upon its merits, and he pressed on the foolish old man the advantages of securing him as a friend, by giving him his daughter in marriage.

White Moon's mother interfered, saying, "her daughter was a good girl, and deserved to be happy. She was not like the other girls, always running away to look among the rocks in the water for young beavers; but she was steady and industrious, and should make herself happy by marrying the man she loved."

Fiery Man stamped, and his eyes were bloodshot with rage. He showed the parents his medicine-bag; he would make them know what it was to refuse a medicine-man; he would charm them; he would dry up the red rivers of life; he would make their steps feeble.

Already would White Moon have trembled, had she been present.

Fiery Man saw his advantage, and continued: he was252 the friend of Chat-o-tee-dah, the forest god, and he could go where no other Indian could, protected by this powerful friend. He was strong and brave, and it was well for the woman who married him, and for her family too.

The old man had kept his eyes fixed on the gun. Fiery Man told him to follow him; he did so, but could hardly keep pace with the strides of the tall warrior. Fiery Man led him towards the lowlands, where, among the trees, the woodcock were in numbers. They seated themselves on a mound, the work of their more enlightened ancestors; they were quiet at first, only listening to the passing of the birds through the low trees.

Fiery Man pointed the gun, and fired; the birds fell to the ground. The old man laughed, and Fiery Man showed him the powder and shot.

He took the gun and explained to his companion the mode of preparing it to fire. "Ha!" said he, "you cannot shoot as well as I; but try and bring down one." The old man pointed, and fired; his aim was sure: again a bird fell before his astonished gaze.

"It is yours," said Fiery Man, "and the girl is mine. We will go back and tell her mother what we have agreed upon."

Again he led the way, and the old man followed him back to the wigwam. There they found mother and daughter. There were tears upon the cheek of the latter; she was soon to know how vainly they were shed. She turned away from the gaze of her tall lover, and hid her face against her mother's bosom.

"Tell her," said Fiery Man to White Moon's father; but253 the old man knew of the bitter dregs he would stir up in the fountain of life before him: he could not find words to tell the young maiden her doom.

Fiery Man could not brook the delay. He laid his brawny hand on the young head that had not yet been lifted from its refuge-place. "She is mine," he said to the mother; "I have bought her. That wakun gun is her father's, that red cloth is yours. White Moon must go with me to my lodge: she must give me warriors like myself for sons. She will be obedient and happy, because her husband is powerful, and feared."

White Moon raised her head and looked in his face; for hope? as well might she have asked it in the glancing of the tomahawk of a Chippeway.

That dark, stern face was softened, it is true: but it was from the contemplation of her attractive features; pride was changed to satisfaction: but it was because he knew that the graceful figure which clung to her mother for protection would soon lean only on him. She sighed and turned away her face; she trembled and sank upon the mat with weakness; no hope—all her bright visions changed: darkness and gloom had come where day had presided in all her brightness.

A short time saw Fiery Man lead to his wigwam his sad young wife, wearied to death with her long journey. Could love have consoled her, she had been happy: for she was as dear as life to the heart of the passionate, overbearing man. As he led her into the wigwam, he pointed to its present occupant. He said she was his sister, but the first glance did the same. There was the tall, gaunt figure; the fierce,254 flashing eye; the passionate, commanding countenance; but far more repelling in her than in him. White Moon read her own fate; she was to endure hatred as well as love. She could see no shelter from the storm that was settling over her head.

CHAPTER III.

The sister of Fiery Man stood unnoticed, we have said, in the lodge where White Moon sat with her dead child. On her back she carried a large bundle of wood. As she threw it to the ground, the noise roused White Moon from her dreams. She rose from her mat, clasping the child yet more closely to her breast. Giving one look towards her sister, in which was concentrated all the passion and all the harshness of which she was capable, she left the lodge. The crimson flush soon died away from her face, and she was calm and pale as before.

Assisted by several of the women, she proceeded to place her child upon its last resting-place. It was at some distance from the lodge, yet in sight. She returned, and carried to the place of burial the cradle and some little trinkets belonging to the child, and hung them in reach of the infant's hand, on the scaffolding.

All day she sat on the ground near it. She wept there, as only a mother can weep, for her first and only child. She refused the food the women offered her; she had not eaten since its death.

Even when night came, she was still there, through its255 long watches giving vent to her violent grief. The breaking of the morn found her sleeping for a short interval on the ground; on awakening, she remembered there were duties that still claimed her care. Her new buffalo-skin lodge was still unfinished, and she had promised her husband she would be in it on her return. The one they were living in was her sister's; it was an old one, torn, and admitting the rain, so that it was not comfortable. Some of the women had assisted her in making it, and she had still to finish and set it up before the evening.

On the day of the child's death she had been obliged to leave her work, to go out at some little distance to cut wood. She did not, as usual, take her child with her: it was asleep in its carved board cradle, and she left it in charge of a girl, the child of one of her friends. Fiery Man's sister had gone out, telling White Moon she should be away all day. So great was her dread of this proud woman—so fearful was she that she would revenge on her child the hatred she felt towards herself—that otherwise she would not have left the infant at home.

The anticipations of White Moon at her first interview with her husband's sister were all realized. This woman possessed all the bad qualities of Fiery Man, without any of his redeeming ones.

She had been married, and was a widow. Both of her children were dead: there was no avenue by which kindness could find its way to her heart. She disliked White Moon, because she had so won her brother's love. But there needed to assign no reason, for she disliked all who were better off than she.

256

It is not only in civilized life that the dread passion of envy has full sway: the human heart, the same by nature, varies only by association and circumstance.

Had it not been for the unhappy disposition of Fiery Man's sister, White Moon had been happy. She could not but be proud of her husband, and of his affection for her: it was not in the nature of a Sioux woman to see unmoved the many trophies of his skill and bravery. But the curse of envy was about her; and when White Moon smiled over her boy, and Fiery Man exulted in the pride and affection of a Sioux father for his son, his sister could not rejoice with them—she envied and hated them.

Fiery Man exacted the most implicit obedience from his wife, and from all around him. He would not have brooked the slightest contradiction from her; but she did not attempt it.

In most cases an Indian wife is little more than a serving-woman to her husband. To this White Moon was accustomed from observation, and from her short experience. She trembled at her husband's voice, though against her it had never been raised in anger. But the violent passions, the abusive language, the frequent blows—these, coming from one who ought to have no power over her, made her often wish for death. Yet so great was the likeness of brother and sister, that she bowed to the tyranny of the one, from having done so to the other. Her spirit, too, was broken. She could easily submit, but not forget. When she left her child in the wigwam it was quietly sleeping; when she returned it still slept. She had been a257 long time away, and yet the rest of the infant appeared to have been unbroken.

She missed the girl who had promised to remain with the child. She had brought a heavy burden of wood to her lodge, and she sat down by the child to rest, and to watch its awakening.

Its unusual paleness alarmed her; she held her own breath that she might distinguish the breathing of the child, but in vain. She placed her hand before its parted lips; the warm breath of infancy did not play upon it.

She thought it strange; but death did not present itself to her mind. Going to the door of the lodge, she looked around, and saw her sister gazing, with fixed attention, towards the wigwam. This alarmed her, and she returned to her child; again she listened for its breath: she pressed its small and clammy hand. Then did the real truth flash across her. She took in her arms the infant and rushed with it into the open air.

As she stood outside calling for help, the Indians collected around her. Her sister, calm and unconcerned, approached with them and looked on.

The Indian doctors were there, and White Moon, under their direction, carried her child back to the lodge. She placed it on a buffalo-robe, which was folded on the floor. Red Head, the great medicine-man, seated himself near it. He held the sacred rattle, shaking it, and chaunting in a loud voice. He shouted to the women to stand off, for near him, on the ground, he had laid his pipe and medicine-bag.

White Moon alternately wept and hoped; she knew Red258 Head was a powerful medicine-man: but still her baby showed no signs of life. Despairing, at last, and frantic with grief, she broke in upon his incantations. She raised her child, and placed its little face against her breast. She knew this test would be decisive.

There was no motion, on its part, to receive the offered sustenance. She raised her despairing eyes, and they met the cold glances of her sister. Then she told Red Head there was no hope. She asked to be left alone with her dead; she wept until the power of weeping was gone: and then, until the time was come to place it in its cradle grave, she held it to her heart. She did not dare reflect on the passionate grief of the father, when he should return, and ask of her his son.

She could not rouse herself to say, what she believed to be the case, that his sister had destroyed it. There was no mark,—no apparent cause for its sudden death.

On returning to the wigwam, after the burial of the child, she found her sister there, more than usually bent upon an altercation. She endeavoured to avoid it by employing herself in silence. She eat for the first time since her child's death, and then applied herself to the task of finishing her lodge. Her bereaved condition might have excited the pity of her companion; but there was no sympathy in that breast. For a time, White Moon would not reply to her taunts. This the more enraged the other, who at length charged the heart-broken mother with the murder of her child!

White Moon heard her in stupified horror and amazement. That a mother could destroy her infant,—no such259 sentiment could reach her understanding or her heart. Yet again and again did her sister repeat the charge, dwelling upon the impossibility of the child's dying without a cause. No one, she said, had been with the infant during her absence; the young girl, who had promised to take care of it, having gone off soon after White Moon left. She then insisted, that as White Moon had been forced to marry her brother, she had thus resented upon him her wrong. She had killed his child, forgetting it was her own.

The despairing woman was roused by a sense of the injustice done her. She saw, too, her position,—the danger in which she stood. She felt, in anticipation, the reproaches, the hot anger of her husband.

She was roused even to madness. Her many wrongs stood up in witness against the woman who, in her deep sorrow, thus goaded her. Her slight frame expanded; the gentle and obedient wife, the submissive woman, had become a murderer; her knife lay in the heart of her husband's sister,—the strong had bowed before the weak!

The act was so instantaneous, that White Moon stood alone to behold the consequences of her passion. It was during the hottest part of the day, and their lodge stood apart from the rest. Most of the men were on the hunt with Fiery Man; the women, some sleeping away the sultry hours, others off at their different employments.

The hoarse groans of the dying woman were not heard outside the lodge, so that White Moon was not detected. On one of the mats lay the embroidered dress of a young warrior that Fiery Man's sister had just finished. She immediately determined upon making her escape, and260 taking these clothes with her as a disguise. She made them into a bundle before the eyes of the dying woman, and resolved upon flying from her husband's resentment.

How often she had called for death, yet how closely she now clung to life. The violent excitement through which she had passed had brought again the colour to her cheek. Brightness had succeeded to the expression of languor in her eyes. There was no tie to keep her in her husband's home. She now only thought of him as the avenger of his sister's blood.

She left the lodge without even a glance towards the cause of her misery and her sin. She turned from the places which would now know her no more.

CHAPTER IV.

Fiery Man and the large party of hunters came in sight of their home on the evening of the same day. They had brought a large number of buffalo, and were glad to reach the vicinity of their village, where their wives and other women came forward to relieve them of their burden. Merry work it was to them on this occasion, until they learned some of the hunters were missing.

Fiery Man looked to see his wife and child among them, and was disappointed and irritated at not seeing them; but he remembered White Moon was always backward in joining these noisy parties, and thus he accounted for her absence.

His tall figure was slightly clad, for the weather was261 warm—in his right hand he held a spear, and on its top was a scalp recently taken. He strode on without waiting to explain the occasion of this, only thinking of his wife and son. He did not miss his sister, though he might well have done so, for she was always ready with her strong arm to assist the hunters, and her loud voice to give directions to the women.

There was a great deal of confusion as they entered the village, for the absence of the three hunters had been accounted for, though not by Fiery Man, who had passed forward towards his lodge.

The hunters, enthusiastic with their success, (for the number of buffalo they had killed was unusually great,) were surprised by a party of Iroquois, and in the sudden terror three of the Sioux, who had laid down their arms, intending to sleep, were killed and scalped. These Iroquois had come from a great distance; their villages were in the western part of New York. They were then in the height of their power, and constantly performed exploits that astonished other Indian nations.

But that a small party should have travelled four hundred leagues, living by chance, surrounded by their enemies; that they should venture among so powerful a people with such an object, is indeed remarkable; that they should have been successful, is still more so.

They lost one of their party. Fiery Man pursued them, with some others, as they endeavoured to make their escape, and killed one, whose scalp adorned his spear.

The lamentations of the families whose relatives had been killed, their affectionate but melancholy reception of their262 dead bodies—for they had been wrapped in skins and brought home—the loud talking of those engaged in caring for the immense quantities of buffalo-meat and the valuable skins,—all these were unnoticed and indeed unheard by Fiery Man.

Even his stout heart quailed before the silent and gloomy appearance of his lodge. There was not even an evidence of habitation.

The lodge on which White Moon had been engaged lay heaped up near it; but there was no one there to welcome him.

He threw up the door and looked in; then started almost affrighted at what he saw. His sister lay dead—and the only creature near her was the small dog that had been always by her side during life. He could not mistake the horrible symptoms,—the fallen jaw, the dark-looking blood, the face calm and composed in its expression, as it never had been in life.

He turned again from the lodge to seek his wife and child,—the former with her timid and almost fearful salutation, the latter with his merry infant laugh, as he reached forth his hands to be taken close to his father's heart.

He looked around among the groups talking here and there. They were gazing at him, with doubt and consternation in every countenance; for who would dare tell him of all?—who would expose himself to the violence of his wrath?—who but feared to see that iron frame bowed with the tale of horror he must hear?

He hastened towards them, and shook Harpstinah roughly by the arm. "Where is my wife?—my child? Speak!"263 he said, as the woman, in her fright, seemed to have lost the power of speech.

An old man, who had not accompanied the hunting party, on account of his age, came forward. "There is your son," he said, pointing to the burial-ground. "Your wife left him asleep, and your sister—"

Harpstinah, having recovered herself, interrupted him: he had but a confused notion of the state of things. She told Fiery Man all the circumstances, even to her going to the lodge, drawn thither by the continual crying of the dog, and finding his sister there in her death-pangs. She had tried to make Harpstinah comprehend a message to her brother, but had expired with the effort. Previous to that she had told several persons that White Moon had killed her child, but no one believed it. The affectionate care of the mother was too well known; besides, the girl who had been left in charge of her, said the infant had awakened a short time after White Moon had left, and had then fallen asleep again.

White Moon had been seen as she hurried from the village, but no one had seen her return. Harpstinah had heard angry words passing between them, but did not know that anything more serious had occurred, until some time after, when she entered the lodge, as she had before described. All presumed it must have been the act of White Moon, as she had expressed previously her intention of remaining at home, in order to finish her lodge.

This was the substance of the intelligence, to which Fiery Man listened with an ashy countenance and a trembling frame. His wife, whom he had so loved—his264 boy, the noble, healthy child, whose growth he had watched day by day! As he bent forward to listen, large tears rested on his cheek. The women moved off affrighted at the spectacle, that tears, such as women shed, should be seen there.

There was one who still remained beside him. Fiery Man had not heard the charge brought against his wife of the murder of her child. So stricken was he, that he only heard and felt that they were gone. The Fawn still remained beside him: she had loved Fiery Man, and had hoped to be his wife. She waited to speak when he should arouse from the first stupor of his grief. He turned to go, he knew not where; he heard his name called, and saw the Fawn beside him. "Your sister said that White Moon had never loved you, and was now revenged; that you had torn her from all she had loved; that even her old mother had wept, and asked you to leave her with her, but in vain; and it was for this White Moon had killed your child, that you might have sorrow too."

Then came back the colour to the bronzed cheek of Fiery Man, and the flashing to his eye. Then did he stand erect, like one that had never known grief—then did love change to bitter hatred. The wife of his bosom was his worst enemy. There were no more tears, but loud threats of vengeance—no trembling, but firm purposes of revenge.

He went again to the lodge, to look at his sister's body. He left her, and stood by the grave of his child. He laid his hand upon the little body, and stood thus while he decided what to do. He shouted for the young men, and265 told them to go and hunt for his wife, and bring her back to him.

It was fearful to see the paroxysms of his hot anger. He lay down on the grass near his child; he rested, but not with sleep. He sought his wife through the night, but in vain. He went into the thick forests; he remembered Chat-o-tee-dah, the god of the woods, was his friend; he prayed to the god; he sacrificed to the wakeen-stone; but still he was unsuccessful.

He knew neither sleep nor rest until the evening of the next day, when he was forced to yield to his overtaxed condition. There did he stand, by the Laughing Waters, where she had stood. The White Moon was making her way, slowly and sadly, but clinging to life—full of grief, but fearing the avenger—living on the berries of the woods, and sleeping where the red deer and its young lie down to rest.

CHAPTER V.

A short time after the events we have noticed, a young and slight-looking Sioux warrior entered one of the villages of that nation. He was a stranger and alone. This was enough to insure him a hospitable reception. On approaching the lodges which were nearest him, he seemed to hesitate as to what course he should pursue as regards making himself known. In the mean time his appearance had attracted a good deal of attention.

His limbs were slight but well formed, his figure denoting agility rather than strength. His dress was new266 and handsomely ornamented; his leggins were of very fine deer-skin, dressed so as to be white and soft, and these, as well as his coat, were richly embroidered with porcupine quills. He had no blanket, nor were there any war-eagle feathers in his head; his pipe, made of an earthen material, was large and heavy. He was without arms of any kind: this was the most remarkable feature in his appearance.

He was pale, as if he had been ill, and there was at times an expression of wildness, almost amounting to ferocity, in his appearance. He advanced towards a lodge outside of which stood the family; they spoke to him at once, telling him to sit down and rest himself. One of the women seeing his mocassin was torn, untied it, saying she would mend it.

Before asking him his name or errand, they insisted upon his eating, knowing from his features and dress he was a Sioux.

His feet they found blistered and inflamed. The women of the lodge got some herbs, laid them in cold water, and applied them to the inflamed parts.

They gave him wild rice, in an earthen bowl of a kind manufactured by themselves, the art being now lost. They were then destitute of metallic vessels of any kind.

The young warrior, after he had eaten, proceeded to give an account of himself. He said he had come a great distance in search of an uncle who had suddenly disappeared from among them. He was a very important man among them, famous for his wisdom, and for knowing all the history of their people, the Mendewakantonwau Dacotas. He could always tell them the year when buffalo would be the most267 plentiful; he could direct them to the very spot where the largest herds could be found.

His people, he said, lived on the banks of the Minesota; the mouth of this river, his uncle said, lay immediately over the centre of the earth, and under the centre of the heavens: the Great Spirit had ordered this, that they might know they were his favourite people, superior to all other nations.

All these things his uncle had learned in dreams; and often he spoke of them to the young people, that they might be proud of their country, and might remember who was their Great Father and friend.

On one occasion he had assembled the young people, and told them of the bloody battles they had fought with the Sacs and Foxes and other nations. Some of the Dacota bands had been destroyed by them, but they had been saved because they were under the centre of the heavens, and the eye of the Great Spirit was always upon them. They knew more too than the other bands, and were in consequence much better off.

On that occasion he had talked nearly all night, and after that they all retired to rest. On awaking, the old warrior had disappeared, and since then had never been seen. Whether Unk-ta-he had drawn him into the deep, or Chat-o-tee-dah, the god of the woods, had drawn him under the earth, or the Great Spirit had taken him, no one knew. He was no more among them.

The young man went on to say he had had a dream, in which he was told to array himself in new clothing, and to go in search of his uncle. He was forbidden to take arms or268 provisions of any kind; and in a short time he would have an interview with his uncle. This he had done in spite of the objections of his friends, who urged him at least to take his bow and arrows, but he had refused to do so, preferring to follow implicitly the directions he had received in his dream. He had been in the woods a long time, and was almost despairing, when one night he fell into a deep sleep, and his uncle stood before him; not old and wrinkled and time-worn, as he remembered him, but erect and firm. His voice was strong too, and he could have been heard a long way off, he spoke so loud and distinctly.

He said that the Sioux need not any more look for his return, for that in the far-off country where he lived, he had none of those weaknesses and pains to contend with, which are constantly among the aged on earth: he had wanted to try the bravery of his young nephew, to see whether or not he would have courage to do as he was told. He was glad he had done so, for now he would be a favourite of the gods, who delighted in courageous acts. He directed him as to what route he should take, telling him of everything that would happen to him on his way to the village, and charged him to say to them, that he should be furnished with a lance, bow, and arrows, and also have given to him a comrade, and be allowed to stay in the band. The Indians were overcome with admiration at the courage shown in these adventures, and they immediately presented him with the arms he required, and in every other way gratified his wishes.

He accepted these things proudly, as a right, rather than a favour; this bearing made him still more popular with his269 new friends. One of them came forward and told him he should have his oldest daughter—pointing to the well-pleased maiden—for a wife: the stranger said he had promised his uncle he would not marry until he had killed three Winnebagoes, and wore the feathers of honour he had thus earned.

He continued to grow in their favour, and was preparing to accompany some of their braves on a war-party, when, one morning, a party of Sioux approached the village. One of the men was much taller and larger than all the rest, his eagle feathers towering above their heads. The hospitable people pressed forward to welcome them: and when they were rested, and had eaten and smoked, the chief missed their stranger friend. He was not to be seen; when they found he did not return to them, they told his strange story to Fiery Man and his band.

The wretched man knew it was his wife who had thus baffled him. He went on his way, but some evil spirit stood between him and the accomplishment of his purpose. She was not to be given to his vengeance or his love. There was happiness yet in store for White Moon.

CHAPTER VI.

Chat-o-tee-dah, the god of the woods and forests, holds a high rank among the Sioux; by some he is considered even greater than the Thunder-Bird. Were it not for the great number of Thunder-Birds, that race would long since have been extinct; so many battles have they had, and so powerful270 is the god whose home is in the dark woods, whose guardians and servants are every bird that rests itself in the branches of the trees, whose notes welcome the coming of the day.

Chat-o-tee-dah passes by the shrubbery of the lowlands, and makes his home on the largest tree on the highest eminence of the forest; his dwelling is in the root of the tree. He is not confined to this part of it, but comes out when occasion may require.

Is he hungry? he takes his seat upon the branch of the tree, and, by his power of attraction, he is soon surrounded by the winged messengers of the forest, ready to do his bidding. While he is thus holding his court, the limb of the tree on which he is seated becomes smooth as glass.

Chat-o-tee-dah and the Thunder-Bird, as I have said, are enemies: and many hard battles have been fought between them, the god of the woods being generally the victor.

This is to be ascribed, in a great measure, to the attachment and vigilance of his body-guard, the birds of the forest.

At the slightest commotion in the heavens, whose stormy portents indicate the coming of the Thunder-Bird, Chat-o-tee-dah is roused from his sleep, or whatever occupation may engage him at the time, by his servants; he has thus ample time to make his arrangements.

While the clouds roll swiftly and angrily towards the habitation of the water god, and streaked lightning plays in vivid flashes on the earth, Chat-o-tee-dah is coolly making his preparations for the work of death, assured, by his very calmness, of victory. The little birds, hid in271 the dark branches of the trees, are faithful sentinels, momentarily making their report, while the god of the woods keeps safely hid in the root of the tree, his stronghold in time of danger.

The Thunder-Bird resorts to cunning. He takes the form of a large bird, but his disguise is always penetrated by the smallest forest-bird; they know him, and, like faithful servants, keep near their lord. Again and again the thunder rolls, and the lightning plays about the branches of the tree. The waters swell and rise up to anger the Thunder-Bird, and to tempt him to do battle, but he has too many quarrels to resent against the forest gods, and the day of his vengeance is come. It is not often that he has courage to tempt the forest god to battle, for he knows his power; but now he will show him his own strength, when he is roused.

There is a stillness of the elements, and now again the deafening sound is heard, and the lightning pierces the home of the forest god; but Chat-o-tee-dah is safe, for there is a communication with the roots of the tree and the waters, and he passes through it safely, hearing the while the noise of the elements, while he descends to the great waters below.

Again the earth shakes, for the Thunder-Bird has cast forth his lightning, and pierced the root of the tree; but he is again defeated by the cunning of the god, who has found a refuge in the dominions of Unk-ta-he.

But at last the forest god is angry, and he has determined to come forth from his watery retreat, and beard the Thunder-Bird with his own weapons. He hurls back at him the272 lightning;—in an instant the daring invader is dead at his feet.

The battles of their gods are unending themes of adventure among the Sioux. Conversing upon them, the hours are whiled away from evening until midnight, and often from midnight to morn. The intellect must have occupation. How many a noble mind has thus gone to waste!

We may judge, from the importance attached to these fanciful stories, how hard must be the work of the Indian missionary. What a system of error to uproot! We may also look into our own hearts:—which is the greater absurdity, the worship of Chat-o-tee-dah or mammon?—the bowing down to the glorious works of the hand of God, or devotions paid to the gilded idol of this world?

Fiery Man no more boasted of his intercourse with the gods; they seemed to have forgotten they were his friends.

He had sought far and near for his wife. At times his heart was full of revenge: that she should have destroyed his son was the bitterest reflection of all. His sister's blood seemed still to be flowing before him; vengeance was called for on her who had made his lodge dark for ever. Then a different mood would affect him. She would stand before him, obedient, docile, and timid, with her soft, fearful voice, so different from the loud tones of his sister's. He could remember her so distinctly, as she held up her child for him to see, as he left the lodge to go with the hunting party. Her long, braided hair, falling about her shoulders, as her infant's cheek lay pressed against hers. For the first time he thought she looked sad at parting with him, and he273 had treasured the thought. He knew then she never raised her hand against her child. He would have crushed his evil-minded sister for the suggestion, had she stood before him in life. He would sit buried in thought, the storms of passion breaking away from his heart; but this did not last, and woe to the man who came before him in his fierce mood.

He died in battle; but the Indians said he gave his life away, for he met his enemy as if he were in a dream, and shouted no cry as he was wont. They brought his body back and buried it by the side of his son: and even death did not break the spell of awe connected with him, for the women were afraid to sit and plait grass near his grave. Harpstinah moved her lodge from where it stood, saying, she must live farther off from the graves, that she might not hear Fiery Man in the night calling for vengeance on his wife, who had deserted him, and murdered his child.

No one could tell the fate of White Moon. Her parents died soon after her disappearance. But the Black Eagle, who some years after visited the Sioux who live among the thousand isles at the head of Rum River, said, that when he arrived there, White Moon's old lover took him to his lodge, and that his wife helped him off with his snow-shoes, and made him broth, for he was nearly perished with cold and hunger, having been at one time covered with snow for several days and nights, as his only chance of life.

When he told them he had come for some of the stone that lay on the shores of that river, to make knives, the war-chief asked him what band he belonged to, and that while he was answering, the woman ceased her employ274ment, listening intently to him. That the war-chief asked him what had become of that tall chief called the Fiery Man; and that while he was telling of his death, and of his strange condition before it, the woman laughed, and said that after all Chat-o-tee-dah had not been as true a friend as the warrior thought, for a weak woman had escaped from his fiercest anger; and that when he asked her if she had ever known Fiery Man, her husband was angry, and told her to hush, saying, women always talked too much, and that it was time she had done his leggins, which he wanted to wear in the morning, when he met the wise men of their band in council; that when she returned to her work, as she was told, that he was reminded of the quiet obedience with which White Moon ever listened to the commands of her husband, that tall warrior, Fiery Man, who had gone to that country where thousands of warriors assemble and shout through the heavens their song, as they celebrate the medicine feast.

NOTE.

A Tradition of the Falls of St. Anthony.—There is a little island, just below the Falls, surrounded by their spray, with picturesque rocks and dark cedars, looking lonely and romantic, more attractive than the Falls, through its peculiar looks, and its story, connected with the Falls and with the people which still hovers around them, on the territory of Minesota, raising tents of one night soon to depart, kindling fires soon to be quenched. It is called the Spirit Island, and its tale is that of many an Indian woman,—is in fact the poetic truth of woman's fate among the red men. It tells:

There was once a hunter of the tribe of the Dacotas (or Sioux) living near the Falls of St. Anthony. He had but one wife, and loved her and was loved by her so well, that the union and the happiness of the hunter275 and his wife, Ampota Sampa, was talked of among the tribe as wonderful. They had two children, and lived lonely and happy for several years. But as he became known as a great hunter, and grew rich, several families came and raised their tipis (lodges) near that of the happy pair. And words and whispers came to the young man that he ought to have more wives, so that he might enjoy more happiness. He listened to the tempters, and soon made a choice among the daughters of his new friends. But when he had to tell his first wife thereof, his heart smote him, and, to make the news less painful to her, he began by telling her that he had bethought himself that she had too many household cares, and that she wanted somebody to help her in them, and so he would bring her that help in the form of a young girl, who was to be his second wife.

Ampota Sampa answered "No!" She had not too many cares. She was happy to have them for him and his children. She prayed and besought him, by their former love and happy life, by every tender tie, by the love of their little ones, not to bring a new love, a new wife, to the lodge. He said nothing. But this same night he brought home to the lodge his new wife.

Early next morning a death-song was heard on the waters of the Mississippi, and a canoe was seen gliding swiftly down the rapids, above the Falls of St. Anthony, and in the canoe was sitting a young woman with two little children folded to her bosom. It was Ampota Sampa; and in her song she told the cause of her despair, of her death, of her departure for the spirit-land. So she sat, singing her death-song, swiftly borne onward by the rapids to the edge of the rocks. Her husband, her friends, heard her and saw her, but too late. In a few moments the canoe was at the top of the Falls; there it paused a second, and then, borne on by the rush of the waters, down it dashed, and the roaring waves covered the victims with their white foam.

Their bodies were never seen again; but tradition says that on misty mornings, the spirit of the Indian wife, with the children folded to her bosom, is seen gliding in the canoe through the rising spray about the Spirit Island, and that the sound of her death-song is heard moaning in the wind and in the roar of the Falls of St. Anthony. Such is the legend of the Indian wife.—Fredrika Bremer.

276

BY MISS E. W. BARNES.

279

BY MISS L. S. HALL.

281

BY CAROLINE EUSTIS.

283

BY A MISSIONARY.

It was the close of a cloudy afternoon, about sunset, in February, 1818, and I began to think it high time to seek a lodging-place. The prairie—the first I had seen, unless it might have been a patch of a few acres, the day before—was covered with snow; and, although a good many bushes grew on it, and it was somewhat "rolling"—I hope my readers know what that is—I confess its aspect was to me, just then, more dreary than picturesque. Our road is best described by the term which designated it, "The old Rocky Trace," by which may be understood the "blazed" road usually travelled from Shawneetown to Kaskaskia. The dwellings were not very numerous—indeed, we had the privilege of considerable exercise in passing from one to another. Now and then a block-house, in good condition, showed the rather recent Indian troubles, which had frequently compelled the inhabitants to "fort."

The sight of a cabin, after a while, was quite cheering. My wife was somewhat tired of carrying the babe all day, and was glad to see a prospect of rest and shelter. We drove up, and inquired, as usual, if we "could get to stay,"284 not doubting an affirmative answer. And so we had; yet there was difficulty in the case.

"I'm afeard, stranger, you'll have to go furder. Our childer's got the hoopin'-cough, and maybe you moughtn't like yourn to go whar it mought git it—'less it's had it. You may stop, ef you're a mind to resk it, for I don't never turn anybody away; but I didn't like to let you carry your baby in without lettin' you know."

Here was a difficulty. We had had the child vaccinated at Pittsburg, on our way, but had used no precautionary measure against hooping-cough, and in "the dead of winter" there was some hazard in it. I looked at my wife: she looked troubled. Our friend—for he was friendly—told us there was "a house on the Turkey Hill Road, a mile or two ahead; but it was a smart little bit on the Rocky Trace, afore we'd git any place to stop." The roads forked just where we stood, and we might choose either, to go to St. Louis; but some circumstance made it necessary for me to go through Kaskaskia.

"What shall we do, wife?"

"I really don't know what to advise. I am afraid to expose Amy to the hooping-cough, and I am afraid to go on far. It will soon be dark."

I was irresolute and anxious. We would have "timber," and probably a stream to cross; and, with my little "dearborn," it might be somewhat hazardous in the dark. The man sympathized with us—told us we "were welcome to stay, ef we'd a mind to resk it;" but then, if we did stay, we would have to be huddled in the same room with the285 family, and I don't know how many of "the childer" had the dreaded disease.

All this while my wife was sitting in the wagon, and, if not freezing, was sufficiently cold to wish for a good fire. We had hardly observed another man standing near, with whom the man of the house had been talking. He listened in silence for a considerable time, but at length spoke.

"Ef you'll put up with sech as I have—it's tol'able poor—you can go to my house and stay."

I looked now at the speaker, and discovered an elderly man, in a mixed jeans hunting-shirt—it was not the fashion to call it a blouse then—tied round the waist, a 'coon-skin cap, and "trousers accordin'." He had a rifle, or an axe—though I think it was the latter—lying across his arm, and looked wrinkled, and rough, and all drawn up with the cold. The twinkle of his deep-set eyes might be merry, or it might be sinister. I inquired where he lived.

"Why, it's rayther on the Turkey Hill Road, and about a mile from t'other; but I can go in the mornin' and show you the way. It's mighty easy gittin' over from thar to yon road."

It occurred to me that his neighbour had not once referred to him to solve the difficulty, and I wondered why; but he now rather intimated that I might as well take up with the old man's offer. I did so, without consulting my wife's opinion.

He trudged on, and I trudged after him, leading my horse,—which I did much of the way across the State,—through the snow. After a little while I discovered that we left the road, and were winding through a sort of ravine,286 or rather depression of the prairie, almost deserving the name of valley. The snow-covered ground—the brown, or bare bushes—the bleak, though diminutive hills—all looked cold, and wild, and dreary. My guide still trudged on, seldom looking round; and we seemed to be travelling without a road to "nowhere." My wife called me to her. Her looks gave token of alarm.

"Do you think it safe to go on with that old man? I don't like his looks, and this is a wild place. Hadn't we better go back, or try some other way? I feel afraid."

I laughed at her, but her fears troubled me. She was not given to false alarms; or, if she ever felt them, she never annoyed me with them. I cannot say that I participated in her fears now. Indeed I did not. The old man looked anything but terrible. I thought his countenance mild rather than austere. Still, these backwoodsmen were famous for a quiet ferociousness that could do a brave or terrible deed without the least fuss. I did not know what to think. But what to do seemed to admit of but one answer—I must go on with him, and trust Providence, who had brought us safely some fifteen hundred miles. My wife shuddered, perhaps trembled, and hugged the child closer; but she submitted quietly—I may say trustfully. She certainly gave him no hint of her fears.

At length—for the time did not seem very short to me, and doubtless stretched out much longer to my wife—but at length, after a long and very gradual slope down a hollow, such as I have failed to describe, we saw the habitation of our guide. It was a cabin of the rudest sort and smallest size, in what had perhaps in "crap time" been an287 enclosure on the ascent of a slope beyond a little wet weather brook. I took notice—for it was an interesting fact to me—that for the accommodation of my horse there was a "rail-pen," though, whether it was covered with straw, or "shucks," or prairie hay, or the cloudy sky, I do not now remember; for I have seen more such many a time since then; but there was "cawn" in another rail-pen close by. So my horse was supplied. But my wife and child must be got into the house first; and in we went.

Reader, in that little dearborn-wagon was all I had in this world, or of it; and though, to say the truth, all, except the wife and child, might have been well sold for a very few hundred dollars—and probably that is an enormous over-estimate—yet it was precious to me, for much of their comfort depended on its preservation. And a few hundred dollars—nay, a few dollars—would make quite an addition to the comforts of the habitation we entered, and of those who dwelt in it. There was neither table nor chair. The puncheon floor was not air-tight nor a dead level. The stick chimney and hearth were covered with clay; but there was a fire in it. The bed—but we have not got to the bed yet.

I suppose it happened very well that we had our provisions with us, for I saw no cooking nor anything to cook. I forgot to say, that the inmates when we arrived were a boy, dressed something like his father, and a girl, whose single garment—we judged from appearances—was a home-spun cotton frock, not white, though I think it had never been dyed. Both were barefoot. They might be twelve and fourteen years old.

288

"Whar's yer mammy?"

"Mom's went over to Jake Smith's; and she haint never come home yit. I reckon she's agwine to stay all night."

I don't know what made me think so, but I remember I did rather surmise that it was just as well for us. Something made me think of a shrew.

Presently, while my wife was spreading the table (i.e. a short bench, usually a seat) for our supper, I observed the old man seated on something, with a plate on his knees, plying his hunting-knife on some cold meat and corn bread for his. I suppose the children had eaten before our arrival. We had, I believe, our provision-box and an inverted half bushel for seats, and ate our supper with commendable appetites; for by this time I think my wife's fears were sensibly abated. At length bedtime came, and what should be done? There was a bed, or something like one, in a corner, but that would hardly accommodate all five of us and the baby. Soon, however, that doubt was solved. The girl spread a pallet on the floor, taking the straw bed for the purpose; and the feather bed—yes, feather bed—was made up on the bedstead for us. That bedstead would be a curious affair, doubtless, in a Philadelphia furniture store. I will endeavour to describe it. It consisted of one post and three rails; or rather, what was intended to correspond with those parts of a bedstead. The post aforesaid was a round pole, with the bark on, reaching from the floor to the joist or rafter, inserted at top and bottom into auger-holes. At a convenient height, a branch cut off not quite close on each of two sides, formed a rest for two of the poles that served for a side and foot rail, the other end being inserted in auger-289holes in the logs which constituted the wall of the house. One end of the other side-rail rested on the foot-rail. Across the two longest poles, or side-rails, split clapboards rested; and on the scaffold thus formed, the bed was made. I remember that it was comparatively clean; and the bedstead being quite elastic, and my wife's fears now entirely removed by the cheerful consent of our host to unite in family devotion, we slept well and soundly: while the family reposed no doubt quite as sweetly on their bed on the floor.

After we had breakfasted, our host, for whom we saw no more preparation than on the night before, piloted us through a grove of tall trees to the Kaskaskia Road, and pointed out our course; when we went on our way rejoicing, and saw that day, for the first time, a herd of seven wild deer together.

But the old man! What became of him? Didn't you pay him?

He turned homeward, and we saw him no more. We did pay him his full charge, amounting to twenty-five cents!

I do not think my wife was ever afraid of a man after that, because he looked rough in his dress. As for Amy, she had the hooping-cough; I don't remember how soon, but she survived it; and has weaned her eighth baby.

Does the reader want an apology for a dull story?

"Story—God bless you, I have none to tell."

I could have made one, embellished with various incidents; could have had a rifle pointed, or frozen all our hands and feet at least, "or anything else that's agreeable;" but it would not then have been, as it is now, the simple truth.

290

BY MARY YOUNG.

"But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife; for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost."—Matthew i. 20.

293

BY CHARLES D. GARDETTE, M.D.

295

BY E. M.

297

BY MISS PHŒBE CAREY.

THE END.