Mr. Catlin, in his Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Condition of the North American Indians, Vol. II. p. 160, gives an interesting account of the Côteau des Prairies, and the Red Pipestone Quarry. He says: "Here (according to their traditions) happened the mysterious birth of the red pipe, which has blown its fumes of peace and war to the remotest corners of the continent; which has visited every warrior, and passed through its reddened stem the irrevocable oath of war and desolation. And here, also, the peace-breathing calumet was born, and fringed with the eagle's quills, which has shed its thrilling fumes over the land, and soothed the fury of the relentless savage. Page 147. Hush! the Naked Bear will hear thee! Heckewelder, in a letter published in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. IV. p. 260, speaks of this tradition as prevalent among the Mohicans and Delawares. run thus: "Their reports," he says, that among all animals that had been formerly in this country, this was the most ferocious; that it was much larger than the largest of the common bears, and remarkably long-bodied; all over (except a spot of hair on its back of a white color) naked. "The history of this animal used to be a subject of conversation among the Indians, especially when in the woods a hunting. I have also heard them say to their children when crying: 'Hush! the naked bear will hear you, be upon you, and devour you." Page 151. haha, etc. Where the Falls of Minne in beauty. The Falls of St. Anthony are "The Great Spirit at an ancient period here called the Indian nations together, and, standing on the precipice of the red pipe-stone rock, broke from its wall a piece, and made a huge pipe by turning it in his hand, which he smoked over them, and to the North, the South, the East, and the West, and told them that this stone was red, that it was their flesh, that they must use it for their pipes of peace, that it belonged to them all, and that the war-club and scalping-knife must not be raised on its ground. At the last whiff of his pipe his head went into a great cloud, and the whole surface of the rock for several miles was melted and glazed; two great ovens were opened beneath, and two women (guardian spirits of the place) entered them in a blaze of fire; and they are heard there yet (Tso-mec-cos-tee and TsoA description of the Grand Sable, or me-cos-te-won-dee), answering to the invo- great sand-dunes of Lake Superior, is given cations of the high-priests or medicine-men, in Foster and Whitney's Report on the Gewho consult them when they are visitorsology of the Lake Superior Land District, to this sacred place." Part II. p. 131. Page 144. Hark you, Bear! you are a coward. Page 165. Sand Hills of the Nagow Wudjoo. He "The Grand Sable possesses a scenic interest little inferior to that of the Pictured Rocks. The explorer passes abruptly from a coast of consolidated sand to one of loose This anecdote is from Heckewelder. In materials; and although in the one case his account of the Indian Nations, he de- the cliffs are less precipitous, yet in the scribes an Indian hunter as addressing a other they attain a higher altitude. sees before him a long reach of coast, rebear in nearly these words. "I was pres-sembling a vast sand-bank, more than three ent," he says, "at the delivery of this cu- hundred and fifty feet in height, without a rious invective; when the hunter had de- trace of vegetation. Ascending to the top, spatched the bear, I asked him how he rounded hillocks of blown sand are obthought that poor animal could underserved, with occasional clumps of trees, stand what he said to it. 'O,' said he in answer, the bear understood me very standing out like oases in the desert." well; did you not observe how ashamed he looked while I was upbraiding him?' - Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. I. p. 240. Page 166. Onaway! Awake, beloved! The original of this song may be found in Littell's Living Age, Vol. XXV. p. 45. Page 167. On the Red Swan floating, off toward the sinking of the sun." - pp. flying. 10-12. The fanciful tradition of the Red Swan may be found in Schoolcraft's Algic Researches, Vol. II. p. 9. Three brothers were hunting on a wager to see who would bring home the first game. Page 170. When I think of my beloved. The original of this song may be found in Oneóta, p. 15. Page 170. Sing the mysteries of Mon"damin. "They were to shoot no other animal," so the legend says, "but such as each was in the habit of killing. They set out different ways: Odjibwa, the youngest, had not gone far before he saw a bear, an animal he was not to kill, by the agreement. He followed him close, and drove an arrow through him, which brought him to the ground. Although contrary to the bet, he immediately commenced skinning him, when suddenly something red tinged all the air around him. He rubbed his eyes, thinking he was perhaps deceived; but without effect, for the red hue continued. At length he heard a strange noise at a distance. It first appeared like a human voice, but after following the sound for some distance, he reached the shores of a lake, and soon saw the object he was looking for. At a distance out in the lake sat a most beautiful Red Swan, whose plumage glittered in the sun, and who would now and then make the same noise he had heard. He was within long bow-shot, and, pulling the arrow from the bowstring up to his ear, took deliberate aim and shot. The arrow took no effect; and he shot and shot again till his quiver was empty. Still the swan remained, moving round and round, stretching its long neck and dipping its bill into the water, as if heedless of the arrows shot at it. Odjibwa ran home, and got all his own and his brother's arrows, and shot them all away. He then stood and gazed at the beautiful bird. While standing, he remembered his brother's saying that in their deceased father's medicine-sack were three magic arrows. Off he started, his anxiety to kill the swan overcoming all scruples. At any other time, he would have deemed it sacrilege to open his father's medicine-sack; but now he hastily seized the three arrows and ran back, leaving the other contents of the sack scattered over the lodge. The swan was still there. He shot the first arrow with great precision, and came very near to it. The second came still closer; as he took the last arrow, he felt his arm firmer, and, drawing it up with vigor, saw it pass through the neck of the swan a little above the breast. Still it did not prevent the bird from flying off, which it did, however, at first slowly, flapping its wings and rising gradually into the air, and then flying The Indians hold the maize, or Indian corn, in great veneration. "They esteem it so important and divine a grain," says Schoolcraft, "that their story-tellers invented various tales, in which this idea is symbolized under the form of a special gift from the Great Spirit. The Odjibwa-Algonquins, who call it Mon-dá-min, that is, the Spirit's grain or berry, have a pretty story of this kind, in which the stalk in full tassel is represented as descending from the sky, under the guise of a handsome youth, in answer to the prayers of a young man at his fast of virility, or coming to manhood. "It is well known that corn-planting and corn-gathering, at least among all the still uncolonized tribes, are left entirely to the females and children, and a few superannuated old men. It is not generally known, perhaps, that this labor is not compulsory, and that it is assumed by the females as a just equivalent, in their view, for the onerous and continuous labor of the other sex, in providing meats, and skins for clothing, by the chase, and in defending their villages against their enemies, and keeping intruders off their territories. A good Indian housewife deems this a part of her prerogative, and prides herself to have a store of corn to exercise her hospitality, or duly honor her husband's hospitality, in the entertainment of the lodge guests." - Oneóta, p. 82. Page 171. Thus the fields shall be more fruitful. "A singular proof of this belief, in both sexes, of the mysterious influence of the steps of a woman on the vegetable and insect creation, is found in an ancient custom, which was related to me, respecting corn-planting. It was the practice of the hunter's wife, when the field of corn had been planted, to choose the first dark or overclouded evening to perform a secret circuit, sans habillement, around the field. For this purpose she slipped out of the lodge in the evening, unobserved, to some obscure nook, where she completely disrobed. Then, taking her matchecota, or principal garment, in one hand, she dragged it around the field. This was thought to insure a prolific crop, and to prevent the assaults of insects and worms upon the grain. It was supposed they could not creep over the charmed line.' Oneóta, p. 83. Page 171. bound him. With his prisoner-string he 66 are "These cords," says Mr. Tanner, made of the bark of the elm-tree, by boiling and then inmersing it in cold water. The leader of a war party commonly carries several fastened about his waist, and if, in the course of the fight, any one of his young men takes a prisoner, it is his duty to bring him immediately to the chief, to be tied, and the latter is responsible for his safe keeping." -Narrative of Captivity and Adventures, p. 412. Page 172. common use. It is rather confined to cer - men who are game of hazard among the Northern tribes of Indians. Mr. Schoolcraft gives a particular account of it in Oneóta, p. 85. "This game," he says, "is very fascinating to some portions of the Indians. They stake at it their ornaments, weapons, clothing, canoes, horses, everything in fact they possess; and have been known, it is said, to set up their wives and children, such desperate stakes I have seen no exand even to forfeit their own liberty. Of amples, nor do I think the game itself in tain persons, who hold the relative rank of gamblers in Indian society, not noted as hunters or warriors, or steady providers for their families. Among these are persons who bear the term of Ienadizze-wug, that is, wanderers about the Wagemin, the thief of cornfields, country, braggadocios, or fops. It can Paimosaid, who steals the maize-ear. hardly be classed with the popular games "If one of the young female huskers of amusement, by which skill and dexterfinds a red ear of corn, it is typical of aity are acquired. I have generally found brave admirer, and is regarded as a fitting present to some young warrior. But if the ear he crooked, and tapering to a point, no matter what color, the whole circle is set in a roar, and wi-ge-min is the word shouted aloud. It is the symbol of a thief in the cornfield. It is considered as the image of an old man stooping as he enters the lot. Had the chisel of Praxiteles been employed to produce this image, it could not more vividly bring to the minds of the merry group the idea of a pilferer of their favorite inondámin. "The literal meaning of the term is, a mass, or crooked ear of grain; but the ear of corn so called is a conventional type of a little old man pilfering ears of corn in a cornfield. It is in this manner that a single word or term, in these curious languages, becomes the fruitful parent of many ideas. And we can thus perceive why it is that the word wagemin is alone competent to excite merriment in the husking circle. the chiefs and graver men of the tribes, p. Page 181. To the Pictured Rocks of sandstone. The reader will find a long description of the Pictured Rocks in Foster and Whitney's Report on the Geology of the Lake Superior Land District, Part II. p. 124. From this I make the following extract: "The Pictured Rocks may be described, in general terms, as a series of sandstone bluffs extending along the shore of Lake "This term is taken as the basis of the Superior for about five miles, and rising, cereal chorus, or corn song, as sung by the in most places, vertically from the water, Northern Algonquin tribes. It is coupled without any beach at the base, to a height with the phrase Paimosaid, -a permuta-varying from fifty to nearly two hundred tive form of the Indian substantive, made from the verb pim-o-sa, to walk. Its literal meaning is, he who walks, or the walker; but the ideas conveyed by it are, he who walks by night to pilfer corn. It offers, therefore, a kind of parallelism in expression to the preceding term.". Oneóta, p. 254. Page 177. pieces. Pugasaing, with thirteen This Game of the Bowl is the principal feet. Were they simply a line of cliffs, they might not, so far as relates to height or extent, be worthy of a rank among great natural curiosities, although such an assemblage of rocky strata, washed by the waves of the great lake, would not, under any circumstances, be destitute of grandeur. To the voyager, coasting along their base in his frail canoe, they would, at all times, be an object of dread; the recoil of the surf, the rock-bound coast, affording, for miles, no place of refuge, the 66 Reader, there being yet living so many credible gentlemen that were eyewitnesses of this wonderful thing, I venture to publish it for a thing as undoubted as 't is wonderful." lowering sky, the rising wind, all these | Ch. VI. It is contained in a letter from would excite his apprehension, and induce the Rev. James Pierpont, Pastor of New him to ply a vigorous oar until the dreaded Haven. To this account Mather adds wall was passed. But in the Pictured these words:Rocks there are two features which communicate to the scenery a wonderful and almost unique character. These are, first, the curious manner in which the cliffs have been excavated and worn away by the action of the lake, which, for centuries, has dashed an ocean-like surf against their base; and, second, the equally curious manner in which large portions of the surface have been colored by bands of brilliant hues. "It is from the latter circumstance that the name, by which these cliffs are known to the American traveller, is derived; while that applied to them by the French voyageurs Les Portails') is derived from the former, and by far the most striking peculiarity. "The term Pictured Rocks has been in use for a great length of time; but when it was first applied, we have been unable to discover. It would seem that the first travellers were more impressed with the novel and striking distribution of colors on the surface than with the astonishing variety of form into which the cliffs themselves have been worn. "Our voyageurs had many legends to relate of the pranks of the Menni-bojou in these caverns, and, in answer to our inquiries, seemed disposed to fabricate stories, without end, of the achievements of this Indian deity." Page 189. Toward the sun his hands were lifted. In this manner, and with such salutations, was Father Marquette received by the Illinois. See his Voyages et Découvertes, Section V. Page 212. That of our vices we can frame The words of St. Augustine are, "De vitiis nostris scalam nobis facimus, si vitia ipsa calcamus." Page 215. And the Emperor but a Macho. Macho, in Spanish, signifies a mule. Golondrina is the feminine form of Golondrino, a swallow, and also a cant name for a deserter. Page 217. Oliver Basselin. Oliver Basselin, the "Père joyeux du Vaudeville," flourished in the fifteenth century, and gave to his convivial songs the name of his native valleys, in which he sang them, Vaux-de-Vire. This name was afterwards corrupted into the modern Vaudeville. Galbraith was a bugler in a company of This poem is founded on fact. Victor volunteer cavalry, and was shot in Mexico for some breach of discipline. It is a comballs will kill them unless their names are mon superstition among soldiers, that no written on them. The old proverb says, "Every bullet has its billet.' Page 219. I remember the sea-fight far away. This was the engagement between the Enterprise and Boxer, off the harbor of Portland, in which both captains were slain. They were buried side by side, in the cemetery on Mountjoy. Page 222. Santa Filomena. "At Pisa the church of San Francisco contains a chapel dedicated lately to Santa Filomena; over the altar is a picture, by Sabatelli, representing the Saint as a beautiful, nymph-like figure, floating down from heaven, attended by two angels bearing the lily, palm, and javelin, and beneath, in the foreground, the sick and A detailed account of this "apparition maimed, who are healed by her intercesof a Ship in the Air" is given by Cotton sion."-MRS. JAMESON, Sacred and LeMather in his Magnalia Christi, Book I. | gendary Art, II. 298. Sermon III. De Ascensione. Page 212. The Phantom Ship. |