he dead a living woman,
One wild cry she gave despairing,
One wild cry as of a demon.
Up she sprang and from the wigwam
To the tall cliff flew in terror;
Frantic sprang upon the margin,
Frantic plunged into the waters,
Headlong plunged into the waters.

Dead she tossed upon the billows;
For the Nebe-naw-baigs knew her,
Knew the crafty, wicked woman,
And they cast her from the waters,
Spurned her from their shining wigwams;
Far away upon the shingle
With the roaring waves they cast her.
There upon her bloated body
Fed the cawing crows and ravens,
Fed the hungry wolves and foxes.

On the shore of Gitchee Gumee,
Ever young and ever handsome,
Long and happy lived the Sea-Gull,
Long and happy with the Panther.
Evermore the happy hunter
Loved the mother of his children.
Like a red star many winters
Blazed their lodge-fire on the sea-shore.
O'er the Bridge of Souls[43] together
Walked the Sea-Gull and the Panther.
To the far-off Sunny Islands--
To the Summer-Land of Spirits,
Sea-Gull journeyed with her husband--
Where no more the happy hunter
Feels the fangs of frost or famine,
Or the keen blasts of Kewaydin,
Where no pain or sorrow enters,
And no crafty, wicked woman.
There she rules his lodge forever,
And the twain are very happy,
On the far-off Sunny Islands,
In the Summer-Land of Spirits.
On the rocks of Gitchee Gumee--
On the Pictured Rocks--the legend
Long ago was traced and written,
Pictured by the Water-Spirits;
But the storms of many winters
Have bedimmed the pictured story,
So that none can read the legend
But the Jossakeeds,[44] the prophets.

Sweet Water.

A LEGEND OF DAHKOTAH LAND.

Within the forest, by a crystal spring
Where I, a weary hunter, paused to fling
My form at length upon the velvet bank,
And from the cool, delicious water drank
A draught so comforting it well might seem
The fabled fount of Ponce de Leon's dream,
I met an aged half-breed, on whose cheek
The marks of seasons wild and winters bleak
Were softened by the warm light from the west--
Sunset--the last day-beauty, and the best!
Beside the spring he sat and gazed and dreamed
In melancholy silence, till it seemed
His very soul was pouring from his eyes
And melting in that mirror, where the skies
Were glassed in all their purity, and where
No ripple reached the surface from the fair
White bosom of the palpitating sand,--
A constant flowing breast o'er Nature's grand,
Tender, never weary heart! 'Twas life