ar on the lakes, and as he was approaching his own town in the
sunset, he chanced to notice a column of white smoke curling from a
hollow in one of the bluffs. He stepped aside to see what was there. As
he looked over the bluff he saw a fire, and an aged Indian sitting alone
on a prayer-mat before it, as though humbling himself before the Great
Spirit. He went down to the place and found that the man was his old
friend.

"'How came you here?' asked Black Hawk. But, although the old Indian's
lip moved, he received no answer.

"'What has happened?' asked Black Hawk.

"There was a pitiful look in the old man's eyes, but this was his only
reply. The old Indian seemed scarcely alive. Black Hawk brought some
water to him. It revived him. His consciousness and memory seemed to
return. He looked up. With staring eyes he said, suddenly:

"'Thou art Black Hawk! O Black Hawk, Black Hawk, my old friend, he is
gone!'

"'Who has gone?'

"'The life of my heart is gone, he whom you used to love. Gone, like a
maple-leaf. Gone! Listen, O Black Hawk, listen.

"'After you went away to fight for the British, I came down the river at
the request of the pale-faces to winter there. When I arrived I found
that the white people had built a fort there. I went to the fort with
my son to tell the people that we were friendly."

"'The white war-chief received me kindly, and told us that we might hunt
on this side of the Mississippi, and that he would protect us. So we
made our camp there. We lived happy, and we loved to talk of you, O
Black Hawk!

"'We were there two moons, when my boy went to hunt one day,
unsuspicious of any danger. We thought the white man spoke true. Night
came, and he did not return. I could not sleep that night. In the
morning I sent out the old woman to the near lodges to give an alarm,
and say that my boy must be sought.

"'There was a band formed to hunt for him. Snow was on the ground, and
they found his tracks--my boy's tracks. They followed them, and saw that
he had been pursuing a deer to the river. They came upon the deer, which
he had killed and left hanging on the branch of a tree. It was as he had
left it.

"'But here they found the tracks of the white man. The pale-faces had
been there, and had taken our boy prisoner. They followed the tracks and
they found him. O Black Hawk! he was dead--my boy! The white men had
murdered him for killing the deer near the fort; and the land was ours.
His face was al