hrust the torch, and went
forward, with the light dancing through the green leaves at every turn
of his head, to prepare the evening meal.

He again spoke to his cousin, but gently, to learn whether he was in
truth asleep. The cousin murmured, but made no reply; and Wassamo
stepped softly about with the dancing fire-plume lighting up the gloom
of the forest at every turn he made.

Suddenly he heard a laugh It was double, or the one must be the perfect
echo of the other. To Wassamo there appeared to be two persons at no
great distance.

"Cousin," said Wassamo, "some person is near us. I hear a laugh; awake
and let us look out!"

The cousin made no answer.

Again Wassamo heard the laughter in mirthful repetition, like the ripple
of the water-brook upon the shining pebbles of the stream. Peering out
as far as the line of the torchlight pierced into the darkness, he
beheld two beautiful young females smiling on him. Their countenances
appeared to be perfectly white, like the fresh snow.

He crouched down and pushed his cousin, saying, in a low voice, "Awake!
awake! here are two young women."

But he received no answer. His cousin seemed lost to all earthly sense
and sound; for he lay unmoved, smiling, in the calm light of the moon.
Wassamo started up alone, and glided toward the strange females.

As he approached them he was more and more enraptured with their beauty;
but just as he was about to speak to them, he suddenly fell to the
earth, and they all three vanished together. The moon shone where they
had just stood, but she saw them not. A gentle sound of music and soft
voices accompanied their vanishing, and this wakened the cousin.

As he opened his eyes, in a dreamy way, he saw the kettle near him. Some
of the fish he observed were in the bowl. The fire flickered, and made
light and shadow; but nowhere was Wassamo to be seen. He waited, and
waited again, in the expectation that Wassamo would appear.

"Perhaps," thought the cousin, "he is gone out again to visit the nets."

He looked off that way, but the canoe still lay close by the rock at the
shore. He searched and found his footsteps in the ashes, and out upon
the green ground a little distance, and then they were utterly lost.

He was now greatly troubled in spirit, and he called aloud, "Netawis!
cousin! cousin!" but there was no answer to his call. He called again in
his sorrow, louder and louder, "Netawis! Netawis! cousin! cousin!
whither are you g