BY MRS. MARY EASTMAN.

"Yes," said We-har-ka, who had outlived children and grandchildren, whose face and neck were covered with wrinkles, but who still could walk with the youngest and strongest, "the old woman must pick up what she can get to eat. I hate the white people. Have I forgotten the death of my son? Do I not see him now as he fell dead by the gate of the Fort? What if the Dacotas had killed some Chippeways! The Dacotas have a right to kill their enemies. Enah! I hate the Chippeways too. If I were a warrior, I would ever be tracking them and shooting them down, and I would laugh when I saw their blood flow."

"The white people caused the death of your son," said Harpen.

"I hate them both," replied We-har-ka. "My son and two others killed some Chippeways, and they were taken, prisoners, to the Fort, because the long-knives had said we must not kill our enemies. Then the Chippeways wanted the Dacotas who murdered their friends, that their women might cut them in pieces. So the long-knives told the Dacotas they might start from the gate of the Fort, and run for their lives; but they told the Chippeways to be there too, and they might fire at them and kill them if they could. The Chippeways fired, and the three Dacotas fell. The Chippeways shouted and were glad, and the Dacota women wept. I lay on the ground many days, with my limbs bleeding. See the scars on my arms! With this very knife did I make these wounds. I, a widow, and childless, who has there been to give me food since?

"When Beloved Hail was killed," continued the old woman, "the white men would not let our warriors go to war against the Chippeways. Red-boy, too, was wounded by the Chippeways, and even he could not go out to fight them. Our warriors are like children before the white men."

"Red-boy was badly wounded," said Harpen.

"Yes, he was badly wounded: I saw him at the time. If I were Red-boy, I would only live to revenge myself on those who had tried to take my life."

While the woman talked, little Wanska sat by them, playing with her wooden doll. "Grandmother," said she, "may I take your canoe and go over to the village? You can come home with the others. I want to talk to my mother about Red-boy."

"Go, go," said We-har-ka, "our brave men may no longer do brave deeds, and by the time that you are a woman, there will be no more warriors. It has been five winters since Beloved Hail was killed and Red-boy wounded, and no one has avenged them yet."

The child entered the canoe and paddled towards the village, thinking all the while of what she had heard. "Grandmother says, by the time I am a woman, there will be no more warriors: what will I do then for a husband?" and thus divided between the disgrace of not being married, and the remembrance of Red-boy's wound, which she thought had occurred recently, she entered the village in a state of trepidation, which was yet exceeded by the condition in which her mother was thrown, on hearing the announcement that Red-boy was badly wounded by the Chippeways; that We-har-ka had seen the wound; that all the old women were very angry with the Chippeways and white people; then, bursting into tears, the girl of ten years added: "Mother, the Chippeways and white men are going to kill all the Dacota warriors, so that, when I am a woman, I can never have a husband!"

Up rose the eyes and hands of the mother, and down went the moccasins she was making to the ground; and up and down she made her way through the village, giving the alarm, that Red-boy was killed by the Chippeways!

Shall I tell of the scene that followed? Oh! for a pen of magic, to describe how Red-boy's relations cried, and how everybody's relations cried with them; how the children ran to their mothers, sheltering themselves under their okendokendas.17 How the dogs yelped and howled, and sprung on the children's backs, ready to go wherever prudence might dictate. How the old men started from sleeping in the lazy summer's sun, and held their tomahawks as firmly as if time were made to be laughed at, and the young men throwing away the pebbles with which they were playing a game of chance, walked swiftly on, bent on avenging Red-boy.

How the wind all at once began to rise, and the very fish leaped out of the water, as if they would like to fight too; while already, Indian runners were far on their way to tell the news at Man-in-the-cloud's and Good-road's villages, and to give the word to those whom they might meet, who would take up the cry, and rush forward with revenge on their lips, and murder in their hearts.

On they went, until they reached the house of the Interpreter, near Fort Snelling, and then he went with them, to report to the officers at the Fort of the outrage; that Red-boy was killed, and that the Dacota warriors wished to go and avenge the death of their friend.

This was, of course, considered an infringement of the treaty of peace then existing between the two tribes; and the Chippeways had showed their daring by committing a murder so near the walls of the Fort. It was immediately determined to send a detachment of soldiers to arrest the offenders.

In ten minutes a number of men were on the parade-ground, ready to march, looking as fiercely at the officers' quarters as if they were about to enter into mortal combat with the doors and windows; obeying the word of command as quickly as it was reiterated, while the ringing noise of their ramrods sounded through the garrison.

The Dacotas were perfectly satisfied with the promise made them, that the Chippeways should be punished in a manner satisfactory to themselves, for the death of Red-boy.

We women felt quite solemn in the Fort. The Chippeways might resist: in fact, there was no saying what they might, or what they might not do. The command in garrison was very small: we felt as if we had been "through seven wars, and this was the worst of all."

Retreat, the assembling of the command at sundown, came—the evening gun was fired, and the flag was lowered—and nothing was heard of the war-party, white or Indian. Tattoo had come, the soldier's bedtime, and our anxieties were not at rest. Towards twelve o'clock the men returned with their officer, without having had even a show of fight. To their intense mortification and disappointment, Red-boy had been seen, and talked with, large as life. He had eaten a saddle of venison that day, without any assistance, and was, accordingly, in a good state of preservation, having received no wound since the one of five years' standing, the scar of which he showed.

Now, we know that among white people, as well as Indians, women have the credit of raising all the false reports, and circulating all the scandal that is going the rounds. Most unjust charge! and all men, red skins and pale faces, are defied to prove it. Among the Indians women have no chance whatever. Is an Indian charged with stealing pork from the traders? It was not the warrior who did it, but his wife. Has a party of Indians been admitted into the Fort, and some loaves of bread and pieces of meat been abstracted? Somehow or other the women are sure to be in fault. Has the garrison been alarmed, and a party of soldiers sent out uselessly? As usual, the women made the trouble.

Yet, with a sigh from my heart, I must confess that appearances are against the sex.

There were many threats of vengeance made against We-har-ka in the present instance, for the trouble which her longings for vengeance had occasioned; but she was not afraid: she had taken care of herself for nearly a hundred years, and would be apt to do so during the short remnant of her life.

Indian women will talk of their wrongs as long as they feel them, and that will be until the heart has ceased to beat, and the tongue is silent for ever.

We-har-ka lives on the memory of her sorrows. She holds them to her heart, as does the mother her child of a day old. They are dear to her as would be the hope of vengeance.

I say she lives, but I know not. Seasons have gone since I bade adieu to her home, and it may be, she is all unconscious that winter is gone, and that summer's breath is waving the green boughs of the forest trees as they lift up their branches to the heavens.

It must be soon, if not now, that her form, covered with garments of poverty and misery, and perhaps shielded from the gaze of passers-by by the tattered blanket of some friend poor as she, reposes quietly near the river bank.

Would you not like to have heard her talk of her amusements as a child, and her happiness when a maiden—of the scenes of pleasure she remembers, and of terror from which she has fled—of the pains, the hunger, the watchings she has endured—of the storms and sunshine of a life passed away?