with clay, to
pour out their souls in the song of gratitude for past, or in a prayer
of supplication for future, favours; they no more scarified their
bodies in deprecation of his anger, but, believing themselves--vain
fools!--able to do without his aid, they shook off their duty and
allegiance to him, and bade him, if not in words at least in their
deeds, defiance. Pride now possessed their souls, and hardness their
hearts.

It need not be told my brother that the Great Spirit is slow to anger.
Knowing his power to crush with a wink of his eye every living
creature; to rend asunder the mightiest hills, yea, shake to its
centre the very earth with a puff of his breath; he is loth to put
forth his powers or to call into action the whirlwinds of his wrath.
He suffers men to revile him long before he attempts to punish them;
he permits them to raise the finger of defiance many times before he
strikes it down, and the tongue to utter many a scornful word before
he dooms it to the silence of death. It is so with the creatures of
this world, as my brother must know. The strongest man--he who feels
most confident of his power to repel aggression, and to command
respect and obedience, is slowest to provocation, and, when excited to
anger, the easiest to be soothed and calmed. The prairie-dog oftener
shows his teeth than the wolf; the imbecile adder than the
death-dealing rattlesnake. And my pale-faced brother has told us the
wondrous tale, that, in his own land beyond the Great Waters, the
mighty animal which is called the King of Beasts is, save only when he
lacks food, as mild as the dove or the song-sparrow. And thus it was
with the Great Spirit, as regarded the scoffing and wickedness of the
Andirondacks. Long he resisted the importunities of the subordinate
Manitous, that the haughty tribe might be punished for their
insolence; long he waited with the hope that their eyes might be
opened, and repentance seize their hearts, and amendment ensue. He
waited in vain, each day they grew worse, until at length they brought
down upon their heads the vengeance which could be no longer delayed.

There was among the Andirondacks a youth who, from the moment of his
birth, was the favourite of the being who rules the world. While yet
an unfledged bird, his words were the words of grey-headed wisdom;
while yet a boy his arm was the arm of a strong man, his eye the eye
of a cool man, and his heart like the heart of a brave man. He was