haha, and
Nokomis could not frighten them away.

"Hark!" said Minnehaha as the Fever gazed upon her, "I hear a rushing
and a roaring. I hear the falls of Minnehaha calling to me from the land
of the Dacotahs!"

"No, my child," said Nokomis, "it is nothing but the wind of night that
blows amid the pine trees."

"Look!" said Minnehaha, as the Fever drew still closer to her bed. "I
see my father standing in his doorway. I see him beckoning to me from
his wigwam!"

"Ah no, my child," said Nokomis sadly; "it is nothing but the smoke of
our fire curling upward to the smoke-flue."

"Oh," said Minnehaha, "I see the eyes of Death glaring at me in the
darkness! I feel his icy fingers clasping mine! Hiawatha! Hiawatha!"

The wretched Hiawatha, miles away in the dark forest, heard Minnehaha
cry to him and he hurried homeward with a sinking heart, but before he
reached his wigwam he heard the voice of Nokomis wailing through the
night. What a sight met his eyes as he burst into his dreary lodge!
Nokomis was rocking sadly to and fro, moaning and weeping; and Minnehaha
lay, cold and dead, upon her bed of branches!

Hiawatha gave such a cry of sorrow that the forest shuddered and
groaned, and even the stars in heaven trembled. Then he sat down at the
feet of Minnehaha, and covered his face with both his hands. Seven days
and nights he sat there without moving or speaking, and he did not know
whether it was night or day.

At last he rose and wrapped Minnehaha in her softest robes of ermine,
and they made a grave for her in the snow beneath the hemlock trees.
Four nights they kindled a fire on her grave, so that her soul might
have cheerful light upon its journey to the Blessed Islands, and
Hiawatha watched from the doorway of his wigwam to see that the fire was
burning brightly so she might never be left in darkness, and he said:
"Farewell, my Minnehaha! My heart is buried with you, and before long my
task here will be finished and I will join you in the Blessed Islands.
Soon I shall follow in your footsteps to the Land of Hereafter!"

XXI

THE WHITE MAN'S FOOT

IN a lodge built close beside a frozen river sat an old man, whose hair
was whiter than the whitest snow, and he shook and trembled as he sat
there, hearing nothing but the gale that raged outside and seeing
nothing but the flakes of snow that leaped and whirled about his chilly
wigwam. All the coals of his fire were covered with white ashes and the
fire i