his lodge of ice, stretched out on his bed of moss, he may recount the
glories of his nation, and the great deeds of his fathers; And he may
solace himself for the privations he endures, in his present state of
being, by fancying those he will enjoy in that land of rest upon which
he will enter when his spirit goes hence, and returns to the body no
more.

A Chepewyan chief sat by the fire of his cabin in the time of winter,
and the hour of a fall of snow, and told, in the ears of the listening
tribe, a legend of the land of souls, the Chepewyan tradition of the
Happy Hunting-Grounds. Let the assembled nations listen, and hear it
repeated by the tongue of his son, who sat with open ears at his
father's knee, drinking in the beloved words of beloved lips, and
engraving them deeply on the core of his heart.

"Once upon a time," my father began, "there lived in our nation a most
beautiful maiden, the flower of the wilderness--the delight and wonder
of all who saw her. She was called the Rock-rose, and was beloved by a
youthful hunter, whose advances she met with an equal ardour. No one but
the brave Outalissa was permitted to whisper tales of love by the side
of her nocturnal couch in the hour of darkness(1). The rock-moss he
gathered was always the sweetest; and the produce of his hunt, however
old and tough, was, in her opinion, the youngest and tenderest. They had
loved from childhood, and with the deepest affection. But it was not
permitted them to become inhabitants of one lodge, the occupants of one
conch. Death came to the flower of the Chepewyans, in the morning of her
days, and the body of the tender maiden was laid in the dust with the
customary rites of burial. First, dressed in the richest garb she
possessed, the gay-tinted robe of curiously woven feathers, and decked
out with the ornaments bestowed upon her by the youth she loved, they
placed her in the grave, lined with pine branches, amidst the groans
and lamentations of the whole nation. The men howled loud and long, and
the women cut off their hair, and scarred their flesh, and pierced their
arms with sharp knives, and blackened their faces with charred wood.
When the earth covered her from human sight, then woke their loudest
burst of sorrow--all wept, save him who had most cause to weep; he stood
motionless as a tree in the hour of calm, as the wave that is frozen up
by the breath of the cold wind.

"Joy came no more to the bereaved lover. The chase a