AN INDIAN CUSTOM.

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'Look here!' said a young fellow as he opened the door of the log-house, in Canada, where he and a friend were 'camping out.' 'See what I have found dangling from a tree in the forest;' and he held up for his friend's inspection a tiny pair of leather moccasins gaudily embroidered with coloured beads.

'You must put those back where you found them,' said his friend quickly.

'They are of no value,' interrupted the other; 'there is a hole in the toe. I expect some Indian mother hung them there to get rid of them.'

'No! no! they were hung there because the child who wore them is buried under that tree, and these moccasins are put there for its use in the next world,' explained his friend.

'Oh, if that's the case!' said the young fellow, 'I will go back at once, and replace the little shoes, for I would not hurt their feelings about their dead friends for anything.'

So the little shoes were once more hung on the bough of the big fir-tree.

Mistaken as are the Red Indian's ideas of the next world, he is yet as careful as we are to honour the last resting-place of his loved ones.

S. C.


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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