with Indian stolidity.

The canoe was swept like a leaf to the verge of the fall and downward
into a gulf of mist and spray. As it trembled on the edge of the
cataract, and its horrors opened beneath her, Wallulah realized her
doom for the first time; and in the moment she realised it, it was
upon her. There was a quick terror, a dreamlike glimpse of white
plunging waters, a deafening roar, a sudden terrible shock as the
canoe was splintered on the rocks at the foot of the fall; then all
things were swallowed up in blackness, a blackness that was death.

Below the falls, strong swimmers, leaping into the water, brought the
dead to land. Beneath a pine-tree that grew close by the great
Columbia trail and not far from the falls, the bodies were laid. The
daughter of Multnomah lay in rude state upon a fawn-skin; while at her
feet were extended the brawny forms of the two canoe-men who had died
with her, and who, according to Indian mythology, were to be her
slaves in the Land of the Hereafter. Her face was very lovely, but its
mournfulness remained. Her flute, broken in the shock that had killed
her, was still attached to her belt. The Indians had placed her hand
at her side, resting upon the flute; and they noticed in superstitious
wonder that the cold fingers seemed to half close around it, as if
they would clasp it lovingly, even in death. Indian women knelt beside
her, fanning her face with fragrant boughs of pine. Troop after
troop, returning over the trail to their homes, stopped to hear the
tale, and to gaze at the dead face that was so wonderfully beautiful
yet so sad.

All day long the bands gathered; each stopping, none passing
indifferently by. At length, when evening came and the shadow of the
wood fell long and cool, the burials began. A shallow grave was
scooped at Wallulah's feet for the bodies of the two canoe-men. Then
chiefs--for they only might bury Multnomah's daughter--entombed her in
a cairn; being Upper Columbia Indians, they buried her, after the
manner of their people, under a heap of stone. Rocks and bowlders were
built around and over her body, yet without touching it, until the sad
dead face was shut out from view. And still the stones were piled
above her; higher and higher rose the great rock-heap, till a mighty
cairn marked the last resting-place of Wallulah. And all the time the
women lifted the death-wail, and Snoqualmie stood looking on with
folded arms and sullen baffled brow. At lengt