s of her own age were given her. The most sedulous
attention was paid to her wants. She was dressed in gay apparel,
continually feasted on the choicest luxuries which their fields and
hunting grounds afforded, and treated with the utmost tenderness by all
about her. Every possible means was employed to allay her grief, and
promote that cheerfulness of spirit, which is essential to health and
comeliness, in order that she might thus be made a more suitable and
acceptable offering.

The personal charms of Monica required no such system of treatment, in
order to their full development. She was a rare specimen of native grace
and loveliness, and would have been a fitting model, in every feature
and limb, for a Phidias or a Praxitiles. The exceeding beauty and
gentleness of their captive, while it won the admiration and regard of
all her young companions, only made her, in the view of the priests and
chiefs of the tribe, a more desirable victim for the altar.

For a long time, Monica was inconsolable. Deprived of that dearest
privilege of visiting daily the grave of her brother, distracted in view
of the anxiety which her mother would feel for her, she refused to be
comforted, or to take any pleasure in the means employed to amuse her.
Time and kindness, however, and the promise that she should, by and by,
return to her father-land, restored, in a degree, her serenity of mind.
She was too affectionate and confiding, to reject the sympathy and
kindness even of an enemy. Grateful for the unwearied efforts which her
companions made to amuse and comfort her, she came, at last, to regard
them as friends. Gratitude begat affection. Affection created
confidence. She unburdened her heart of the sorrows that oppressed it.
By that effort, the burden was lightened. Something of the elasticity
and vivacity of youth returned. She sang and played, if not to amuse
herself, yet to gratify others, whose assiduous kindness, and seemingly
generous sympathy, she had no other means of repaying. Thus, entirely
ignorant of the terrible doom that awaited her, Monica passed the winter
of her captivity, looking ever forward to the opening spring as the
period of her promised release, and return to the wigwam of her mother.

At length the fatal day arrived, and every thing was ready for the
sacrifice. The whole Pawnee tribe was assembled to witness and take part
in the solemnities. From every side, they were seen emerging from the
thick forest, or g