and looked as placid as though nothing had ever
penetrated the lonely spot in which it was nestled, to mar its surface.
The chief on emerging into the open glade, saw the sky had become
flecked with clouds that were scudding across the heavens, in a
thousand fantastic waves, while just above the peak of the topmost hill
over the lake, a black cloud, heavy and portentous with a gathering
storm, was rising slowly, leaving a long streak of light unbroken cloud
against the horizon.

The chief surveyed the lake, the hills and the forest from which he had
emerged, with the surrounding scenery long and earnestly, and then
murmured to himself in a tone, that betokened a sorrowful certainty;
"It is not true, these are not the hunting grounds of the Snakes; they
have none so good and beautiful as these. We are lost! lost! in the
interminable wilds of the West, where hope or deliverance may never
come." And the stern but proud chieftain bowed his head in despair for
a moment: then stretching his hands towards the sky, which dimly shone
through the dark rolling clouds, he cried: "Father, Manito! why hast
thou left thy child to wander from his people, and cast a spell[10] over
his feet so that he cannot return?--Has he done an evil in thy sight,
that he is thus punished?--Great Spirit, Manito! thy prophet awaits thy
sign!"

[10] The Indians imagine that good and evil spirits can cast a
spell over any person they desire, and while under it, they have
no control over their own actions, but are obliged to follow the
inclination of the spirit by which the spell is cast.

As he concluded, a peal of thunder that shook the ground, burst from
the clouds above, followed by a blinding flash of lightning, which was
quickly followed by another, and another; and, as the wind came
sweeping down in angry blasts, it seemed as if every element in nature
were warring against each other. The chief stood unmoved on the spot,
his arms still raised, his lips parted but motionless, stupefied by the
storm around him. The Great Spirit he imagined had spoken to him
angrily in the storm, and superstitious as all the Indians are, it
filled his soul with horror. Large drops of rain soon began to fall,
the wind rose furiously, lashing the water on the lake into huge waves,
while wild fowls and birds darted frightened through the air. Still the
chieftain stood there. What was now the storm to him? Was not the Great
Spirit angry? and as