nd its delights had been truly told to them. Much had it been talked
of, but who were they that talked? They were mortals--men, who had never
quitted the corporeal state, nor stood forth disembodied spirits; things
with the feelings which attend human nature. They wished to see if
thorns and arrows would not wound the flesh of those who had departed
hence; nor fire burn, nor cold freeze, nor hunger pinch, nor repletion
distress, nor grief draw tears, nor joy produce excitement. Bending low
before the Master of Life, with clay upon their heads, one of them, the
elder, thus addressed him:

"Spirit of the Happy Lands! Tamenund, and the son of his father's wife,
are on their knees before thee, with clay spread on their hair. It is
not required that we name our wishes to thee; if thou art, as we think,
the all-pervading and all-knowing spirit, thou knowest what they are
before we have uttered them; if thou art not gifted with these
attributes, why should we pour our words into the ears of one unable to
grant us the boon we ask? We wish to die for a time; we wish that our
eyes may be enabled to see the Happy Hunting-Grounds, if there be such
grounds, and our ears to drink in the music of the streams which our
fathers told us welled softly along beside the village of the dead.
Master of Life, hear us, and grant our request."

Tamenund, and the son of his father's wife, lay down upon their couch of
skins and soft grass, when the dews first began to descend upon the
earth, and the deep sleep of death came over them. They found that their
prayers had been heard, and themselves released from the thraldom of
life and the load of the flesh. The spirit, unchained from the matter
that shrivels and becomes dust, danced about like the winds of spring
over the bosom of a prairie. It could stand upon the slenderest stalk
of grass without bending it, and ascend and descend upon the sunbeams,
as a healthy boy rung up and down a slight hill. Soon they found
themselves irresistibly impelled by a wish to rise, and travel towards
the bright track in the skies, where the light of innumerable stars is
mingled in such confusion. They rose, and as a canoe, moving in the
vicinity of the dwelling of Michabou[A], is drawn rapidly towards it by
the hands of unseen spirits, so were they hurried towards the road of
souls, which our white brother calls the Milky Way. They came to it, and
found it thronged by innumerable hosts of spirits of all colours, al