l lake all night long, and at last, when
the sun rose, he saw on the shore in front of him the wigwam of the
great magician, Pearl-Feather. The canoe darted ahead faster and faster
until it grated on the beach, and Hiawatha fitted an arrow to his
bowstring and sent it hissing into the open doorway of the wigwam.

"Come out and fight me, Pearl-Feather!" cried Hiawatha; "come out and
fight me if you dare!"

Then Pearl-Feather stepped out of his wigwam and stood in the open
before Hiawatha. He was painted red and yellow and blue and was terrible
to see. In his hand was a heavy war-club, and he wore a shirt of shining
wampum that would keep out an arrow and break the force of any blow.

"Well do I know you, Hiawatha!" shouted Pearl-Feather in a deep and
awful voice. "Go back to Nokomis, coward that you are; for if you stay
here, I will kill you as I killed her father."

"Words are not as sharp as arrows," answered Hiawatha, bending his bow.

Then began a battle even more terrible than the one among the mountains
when Hiawatha fought with Mudjekeewis, and it lasted all one summer's
day. For Hiawatha's arrows could not pierce Pearl-Feather's shirt of
wampum, and he could not break it with the blows of his magic mittens.

At sunset Hiawatha was so weary that he leaned on his bow to rest. His
heavy war-club was broken, his magic mittens were torn to pieces, and he
had only three arrows left. "Alas," sighed Hiawatha, "the great magician
is too strong for me!"

Suddenly, from the branches of the tree nearest him, he heard the
woodpecker calling to him: "Hiawatha, Hiawatha," said the woodpecker,
"aim your arrows at the tuft of hair on Pearl-Feather's head. Aim them
at the roots of his long black hair, for there alone can you do him any
harm." Just then Pearl-Feather stooped to pick up a big stone to throw
at Hiawatha, who bent his bow and struck Pearl-Feather with an arrow
right on the top of the head. Pearl-Feather staggered forward like a
wounded buffalo. "Twang!" went the bowstring again, and the wizard's
knees trembled beneath him, for the second arrow had struck in the same
spot as the first and had made the wound much deeper. A third arrow
followed swiftly, and Pearl-Feather saw the eyes of Death glare at him
from the darkness, and he fell forward on his face right at the feet of
Hiawatha and lay there dead.

Then Hiawatha called the woodpecker to him, and as a mark of gratitude
he stained the tuft of feathers on the