ut all the time, night and day, until led forth for execution.

The Great Sun, Stung Serpent, his brother, and all the other Indians
were brought out to witness the execution. When the two condemned
chiefs were brought forward, these witnesses of their death sang the
death-song; but the chief of the Beard looked sternly at them, and
defiantly at the executioners; and taking his position, turned to his
people and, addressing them, said:

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez. A child is born to them
of the race of their Suns. A boy is born with a beard on his chin. The
prodigy still works on from generation to generation.' So sang the
warriors of my tribe when I sprang from my mother's womb, and the
shrill cry of the eagle, in the heavens, was heard in joyful response.
Hardly fifteen summers had passed over my head when my beard had grown
long and glossy. I looked around, and saw I was the only red man that
had this awful mark on his face, and I interrogated my mother and she
said:

"'Son of the chiefs of the Beard,
Thou shall know the mystery
In which thy curious eye wishes to pry,
When thy beard from black becomes red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez! A hunter is born to
them--a hunter of the race of the Suns. Ask of the bears, of the
buffaloes, of the tigers, and of the swift-footed deer, whose arrows
they fear most! They tremble and cower when the footstep of the hunter
with the beard on his chin is heard on the heath. But I was born with
brains in my head as well as a beard on my chin, and I pondered on my
mother's words. One day, when a panther which I slaughtered had torn my
breast, I painted my beard with my own blood, and I stood smiling
before her. She said nothing; but her eye gleamed with wild delight,
and she took me to the temple when, standing by the sacred fire, she
thus sang to me:

"'Son of the chiefs of the Beard,
Thou shall know the mystery,
Since, true to thy nature, with thine own blood
Thy black beard thou hast turned to red.'

"Let there be joy in the hearts of the Natchez; for a mighty chief,
worthy of the race of their Suns, has been born to them in thee, my
son--a noble chief with a beard on his chin. Listen to the explanation
of this prodigy. In days of old a Natchez maid of the race of their
Suns was on a visit to the Mobelians. There she soon loved the youthful
chief of that nation, and her wedding-day was nigh, when there came
from the big