University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.
THE CONFESSION.

Angry and vehement indignation possessed the mind of the
Ojibwa girl, as she came ashore at the dock from which she
had so recently departed, and received the warmest expression
of sympathy from the lay-brothers of the order, who had seen
the outrage committed, and who, notwithstanding that they well
knew the inferior position which was occupied by women in
the Indian tribes, and the slight estimation in which they were
held, could not overlook, or behold, save with indignant eyes
and wounded feelings, anything so gross and unmanly as a
heavy blow dealt by a powerful warrior against a delicate and
fragile girl. Ahsahgunushk, moreover, was a general favorite
in the Mission. Her beauty, her gentleness and intelligence, had
won for her the regard and esteem of all, even of the grave and
abstracted elders, while among the younger, and especially the
lay companions of the society, she was looked upon with a
warmer and more human feeling, and there were probably many
among them, even of gentle birth from Normandy, Touraine,
and the soft Mediterranean shores of France, who would willingly
have overlooked the dark complexion of the Indian maid,
and, in their voluntary isolation from the charms of the fairer
females of their own race, would have gladly, too gladly, taken
her to be a sharer of the toils, and a consoler of the tedium of
the wilderness.

There was, however, at all times, a tranquil and dignified
reserve evinced by the Reed-shaken-by-the-wind, which had
kept all her admirers somewhat at a distance, a calm and unsuspecting

coldness in her manner of receiving their compliments
and courtesy, as if they were either mere jests, or civilities
due to her rank and position, which had deterred them
from making advances, which, gay and light-hearted and self-confident
as these young Frenchmen were, in common with
most of their countrymen, they could yet understand it to be
doubtful whether she would receive with favor.

Her eyes were very bright, as she landed, and gleaming with
wounded pride, and a keen sense of the degradation, which had
been inflicted on her by that blow, given in the presence of the
white men, who abhorred and repressed to the utmost of their
ability the servitude and ignominious station which was inflicted
on the wives of the aborigines. Nor, although it was no uncommon
thing for an Indian to inflict personal chastisement on
an offending wife, nor by any means considered degrading
either to the recipient or the inflicter of the punishment, was
it usual or decorous, or indeed allowable for a chief even of the
highest caste and distinction, to strike a maiden, especially if
she were the daughter of a chief and of a time-honored race.

Making her way rapidly through the sympathizing and attentive
group, with a burning cheek, on which the marks of that
coward blow was still visible, and a downeast eye, answering
their remarks of sympathy, and their offers of prompt redress,
by monosyllables only, she took her way toward the fort, with
the intention, at first, of repairing immediately to Father Borromee,
and of laying her heart open to him, and demanding his
protection and support against her savage wooer. Before she
reached the gate, however, a change came over the current of
her thoughts, she hesitated, paused, and finally turned off into
a side alley or avenue of the garden, screened from view by an
espalier of trained fruit-trees, and over-arched by the luxuriant
tendrils of the vine. As the first eager sense of wrong and
anger began to subside in her bosom, the memory of her late

interview with the Jesuit, the consciousness of her own helpless
passion, the shame of knowing that her secret had been
penetrated by another, and the agonizing fear that it might also
have been discovered by the object, came home to her heart
with sudden and terrible distinctness. The revulsion was instant
and overpowering, and she felt that he, to whom by a
natural impulse she had intended to disclose her wrongs, was
the very last person living to whom she could speak freely on
such a subject, without revealing her secret, even if at this
time it was not already revealed to him, from whom she would
have most desired to hide it.

Then this reflection suggested yet another train of thought,
and she began to ponder deeply on the confessional, which she
had been enjoined to attend on the morrow; on the secret —
the guilty secret as she half believed it, which she would be
compelled to relate with her own trembling lips, to his astonished
and perhaps indignant ears, whom it concerned the most:
and to wonder how she should ever find courage for the task,
or arrange her thoughts, and frame her words to syllable a confession
so humiliating to pure and delicately-minded woman,
as the avowal, that she had given her love, not only unsought,
but where it could not be accepted even when freely tendered,
where it would perhaps be regarded as a sinful and heathenish
artifice, perhaps be cast back upon her with disgust and rejected
with disdain.

Fuller and fuller waxed the overburdened heart, anger and
indignation vanished in an instant, swept away by the full tide
of despairing love, of maiden basefulness, of shame, of terror,
and of deep, desperate self-abasement. The tears swelled fast
and silent to her large dark eyes, and overflowed her burning
cheeks, and abandoning at once the idea of appealing to any
earthly comforter, or seeking any protection or redress from
the friendship of mortal man, she hurried away with fleet, shy

footsteps, to a thick, shadowy arbor, all overrun with wild vines,
creeping plants, ivy, and elematis, at the end of the garden
abutting on the forest, and there casting herself on her knees
and burying her face in her hands, wept bitterly and passionately,
while she prayed fevently for succor and for strength,
to Him, whom she had loved to worship with a sincere and
earnest, though an ignorant and half-superstitious devotion.

Slowly the morning lagged away over the aching head and
throbbing heart of the Ojibwa girl, who still knelt sad and
lonely in the dim bower, battling with her undisciplined heart,
and untamed though innocent affections, while things were passing
in the fort concerning in the last degree the happiness of
her future, which, had she suspected them, would have added
yet wilder anguish to a sorrow, which surely needed no addition.

Scarcely had the Bald-Eagle emerged from the water than
he swam straight across to the Indian shore, and making his
way in obdurate and haughty silence through the company of
Huron girls, who gazed at him with eyes eloquent of tranquil
reproach, and now and then muttered a word of sarcasm or direct
reproach, he entered his own lodge in a mood the most
fiendish — for in that mood were concentrated the disappointment
of a baffled man, the rancorous spite of a jealous man, the
irritated and embittered vanity of a proud and haughty man,
the selfish and stern persistence of an obstinate man, and the
deadly and unforgiving hatred of a pitiless, cold-blooded, remorseless
man, fancying himself wronged, and resolute to gain
his ends, whether by force or fraud, and to be at once gratified
in his passions, and satiated in his thirst for vengeance.

After remaining in this mood, alone in his lodge, for something
better than an hour, he made his appearance again without;
having changed his garments, saturated by the cold waters
of the Wye, and clad himself in his full and ceremonial attire

as the war-chief of his tribe. He was fully armed, too, with
knife and tomahawk of French manufacture, with his bow in
its case, and his quiver full of arrows at his side, and his long-barrelled,
smooth-bored gun in his right hand, while his bullet-pouch
and powder-horn were slung across his shoulders.

Thus equipped and accoutred, he took his place in the stern
of his own canoe, and with half-a-dozen strokes of the paddle
set her across the narrow river, made her fast at the shore, and
walked slowly with a dogged and sullen air, and a firm, haughty,
and insolent carriage, to the entrance into the fort, passing as
he went several of the lay brothers, who had witnessed his
treatment of the girl, and who now looked up from the tasks
about which they were all variously employed, to stare at him
with abhorrent eyes, and to express their disgust and abhorrence
of what they termed the brutality and cowardice of the
man, in no measured terms of reprobation. None of them, indeed,
addressed him directly, probably in their present humor
they would have held it derogatory to themselves to do so, but
they spoke aloud and distinctly, in both the French and the
Iroquois tongues, both of which he perfectly understood; and
they were well assured that no word which fell from their lips
escaped him. Yet he gave no token, by either sign or gesture,
or by any expression of anger, contempt, or emotion, that he
heard or understood them; but passed onward, cold, impassive,
and austere, without changing the position of his head, without
turning an eye toward them, without suffering a muscle of his
face, to display the furious and revengeful rage which must
have been enkindled at his burning and unforgiving heart, by
the terms which he heard applied to himself, terms the last
usually to be applied, and if applied, the first to be resented by
one so proud and arrogant as an Indian chieftain.

On passing through the archway into the interior of the fortress,
for no one had questioned or interrupted him as he entered

the gate in the stockade, he paused and asked of the porter
who was sitting within, cleaning the lock of a harquebuss
where he should see the father Borromee, and his station being
well known and recognised, he was instantly ushered into the
library, where he whom he sought, was seated alone at a large
oaken table, covered with books, manuscripts, and mathematical
instruments, preparing a map, as it would seem, of the great
Georgian bay, with all its islands, and the northern shores
with their net-work of rice lakes, swamps, and noble rivers.

The priest raised his head as the chief entered, and seeing
who it was, invited him courteously to be seated, and inquired
what he could do to pleasure the Bald-Eagle, speaking to him
in the Iroquois dialect, which he used as fluently and even
eloquently as his own polished tongue.

“Justice,” replied the Indian sternly, refusing the seat which
the Jesuit had indicated by a motion of his hand, with a contemptuous
gesture. “The Bald-Eagle is a great chief of the
Hurons, he asks no pleasure of the sons of Jesus, only justice
— only his squaw, and justice.

The priest looked at the man with some astonishment, and
with something of rebuke in his manner, for the tone of the
Indian was arrogant and disrespectful to say the least, and his
air and demeanor bordered on insolence, which the priest,
humble as he was by profession if not by practice, was one
singularly unlikely to endure. He had the rare art, however,
to repress every outward indication of internal emotion, and to
preserve an impassive and inscrutable countenance under all
circumstances of anger, surprise, or apprehension, and he now
looked at his guest steadily and with an inquiring eye, but
manifested neither wonder nor resentment.

“In what does the Bald-Eagle require justice, or against
whom?” he asked at length, “and who is the squaw of the
Huron chief? — I knew not that he was wedded.”

“Not wedded,” replied the dark savage sullenly. “That it
— want be wedded — want justice, want squaw. What for
pale-face want Indian girl? — What for priest want Ojibwa
maiden? Priest not wed any how — priest not have wife —
what for not give Bald-Eagle his own squaw.”

“You must speak plainly, chief,” answered the Jesuit coldly,
“if you wish a reply; much more if you want assistance,
or, as you say, justice. I have neither the time nor the wish to
guess the meaning of riddles, so you must not speak them to
me.”

“Not speak riddles, tell you,” he replied in a fierce tone and
with an angry gesture. “Speak truth. Want squaw, I tell
you. Want Ahsahgunushk Numamahtahseng; what for not
give her? — what for priest keep her, when can't call wife?”
and he burst out into a long, vehement, and rapid speech, detailing
his love for the Ojibwa captive, asserting his right to
her as the prisoner of his bow and lance, as the adopted daughter
of his father's wigwam, demanding that the priest should
compel her to become his wife, and should forthwith unite her
to him in the bonds of Christian wedlock.

The Jesuit perceived that the Indian was much excited if
not enraged, and being entirely ignorant himself and unsuspicious
of the attachment with which he had unwillingly and
unknowingly inspired the bosom of the maiden, he did not
comprehend, or pay any heed to the obscure allusions of the
jealous and suspicious chief. He asked, therefore, quietly
and in the expectation of receiving an affirmative answer,
whether the girl was willing to become his wife, and beginning
to believe that he had found a clew to the mystery of her
behavior in the interview he had with her in the morning.
What was his surprise then, when he received a reply couched
in tones of insolent fury, and accompanied by a fierce blow of

the clenched hand on the table, which rang and quivered to
the stroke.

“What for ask that, when know?” he shouted. “Know that
she not willing — know that make her himself not willing —
what for priest ask lie-question?”

“How dare you, sirrah,” said the Jesuit, his hot Italian
blood out-boiling at the insult, and his pale face crimsoning
with anger, as he started to his feet, with as much fiery excitement
as though he had been still a warrior, “how dare you,
sirrah, use such terms to me? You must be mad, or drunken
with wine. Begone — quit my presence, nor dare to return
hither till you know how to comport yourself toward your
superiors.”

“How dare?” answered the Indian, glaring at him. “Huron
dare anything — yes, anything. Dare kill priest, if
priest dare take squaw. Not begone at all — not quit presence
till speak mind — till speak all mind, every bit — till told all
truth — till got justice — till got squaw. Superior! Ha!
Where Indian chief's superior? Tell that, ha! tell that. Huron
chief no superior, only the Great Spirit. How you dare
— how you dare, wicked pale-face, how you dare, lying priest,
love Ojibwa girl. How you dare make her love you?” and
without giving the Jesuit time or opportunity to interrupt him,
he poured out a torrent of wild, fierce, impassioned words, explanations,
accusations, demands, denunciations, treats, all
incoherently and almost incomprehensibly blended. At first,
the feelings of the father Borromeè were those of pure wrath
and indignation, coupled with no idea what could be the origin
of this strange conduct and insolent declamation on the
part of one who, if he had been somewhat arrogant and haughty
in the calm and grave austerity which he pictured to himself
as the true mould of dignity, had never before failed of respect,
or given way to bursts of impudent aggression; but by degrees

it began to dawn upon his mind that there might be something
of meaning, as there was undoubtedly much of method in what
he had first regarded as mere madness. He began to recollect
many trifles, which he had scarcely observed, and never noted
before, in the girl's demeanor; he thought of her unusual perturbation,
and the confusion and bashfulness of her manner
during their interview that very morning, and above all, at her
very palpable objection to confess herself to him who had always
before been her chosen director and adviser; and he began
most reluctantly and doubtfully to admit to himself that it
might be, indeed, that she loved him with the unregulated and
artless love of a child of nature, an unschooled daughter of the
wilderness.

This doubtful and most painful sensation led him to supress
his indignation at the mode in which the chief addressed him,
and, though he felt himself pure and self-acquitted, he was inclined
to feel and make allowance also for the disappointment,
the jealousy, and the rage of the baffled and rejected suitor,
and in some sort to pity rather than to blame the sufferer too
severely. To one so acute a reasoner on the motives which
sway the human breast, so wise a judge of the actions, so close
and correct a scrutinizer of the thoughts of men, it was not
difficult to obtain from the passionate and fluent lips of the
Huron chief a full recital of all that had occurred between him
and the maiden, even to her positive rejection of his suit, and
the blow which he had dealt her in the vexation of his spirit.
And while he was, indeed, wringing every word, every admission
from the unwilling lips of the warrior by dint of the most
rigid and ingenious cross-examination, the Indian never entertained
a suspicion how completely he was cheated out of his
unintended confidence, but fancied that he was heaping coals
of fiery retribution on the head of the priest, and confounding
him by the revelations of his own villany.

At length he ended, as he had commenced, by a demand
that the girl should be immediately compelled, by the censure
and authority of the church, to become his wife, willing or
unwilling, and united to him in due ceremonial on the following
day in presence of the congregation.

To this demand the priest replied at length, but by what was
in fact a simple and direct refusal to do what was required,
and a positive denial of the existence in himself, or in the
church which he represented, of any authority or power, such
as should compel a girl to bestow herself in marriage contrary
to her own choice and conviction; and though he treated the
suspicion that she was moved by any attachment to himself —
an attachment of which he spoke, could such a thing be, as
corrupt, sinful, adulterous, nay, almost incestuous — as a mere
chimera and hallucination of morbid and exaggerated jealousy,
though he endeavored with all his powers of eloquence, with
all his influence over the spiritual terrors of the half-converted
savage, to convince, to soothe, to console him — though he
offered sympathy, advice, and aid, though he offered to act as
mediator with the maiden, even while he refused positively to
exercise any coercion, or even persuasion, it was all in vain.
The rage of the Indian was deeply grounded — his suspicions
were converted into certainties, and his own alternatives were
instant possession of the girl, or vengeance, deep, thorough,
and eternal, on all who bore the name, or wore the hue, of
Christians and pale-faces. With words such as these, and a
glare of the eye that portended deadly mischief, he turned on
his heel, and left the Jesuit, who, now roused again to indignation,
was rebuking him severely for his perversity and hardness
of heart, and threatening him with the terrors of excommunication.

Sullenly, silently he strode back to his canoe, repassed the
river, and returning to the village, where he learned that the

Reed-shaken-by-the-wind had not yet returned home, but was
believed to be sheltered in the fort of the pale-faces, whither
she had been seen to repair, he once more retired to his own
lodge, where he proceeded without delay to make all preparations
for a hurried departure and long absence from the settlement.

At evening, when the tribesmen and chiefs returned from
the chase, the fisheries, and the fields — for many of them,
under the teaching of the good Jesuits, had learned something
of agriculture, and applied themselves to the cultivation of
maize, beans, and other esculent roots or grains — the Bald-Eagle
was awaiting them by the council-fire, where, without
the slightest allusion to what had passed between himself and
the girl, or any allusion to her name, he announced to them his
intention of going on a great hunt down the shores of the lake,
to be absent for a moon at the least, and perhaps for a yet
longer period. Such voyages were not uncommon among the
bolder and more adventurous of the tribesmen, so that no wonder
was manifested, though several of the younger of the warriors
desired permission to accompany him, in pursuit, as they
expected, of both sport and profit, if not of honor; the fur-bearing
animals were then abundant in those regions, and peltries
were already beginning to be an article of considerable value,
both for use and for exportation, with the Frenchmen of the
provinces lower down the St. Lawrence, with whom a communication
was maintained by means of canoes and bateaux,
which came up through the inland water-courses of lakes and
rivers, interrupted by occasional portages, but extending far to
the northward from the mouth of the French river, on the
Georgian bay, to that of the great Ottawa river, above a thousand
miles below, close to the rising settlement of Montreal.

Companionship such as this would not, however, have suited
in the least the views of intentions of the Bald-Eagle, who

contented himself by merely expressing his intention to go
alone, and by indicating the inferior chief to whose guidance
and direction in the hunts and fisheries he desired his young
men to submit themselves. Nor did he depart without instructing
his tribesmen to watch over the safety of the good
pale-faces, to supply them with a due proportion of the venison,
the ducks, the bear's-meat, as well as of the white fish and
mamaycush which should fall to the share of the tribe during
the latter summer and the autumn.

This done, and all arrangements having been duly made, his
largest and best canoe having been newly gummed and fitted
out with his fur robes and blankets, his fishing spears, and
traps, and implements of all kinds, in addition to his much-prized
gun, and culinary apparatus, meager and simple as that
was, as well as with a store of parched and unparched corn,
sugar, and tobacco, the Bald-Eagle wandered out into the
camp, or village, and strayed through it to and fro, as if without
any object, but, in truth, with a hope, if it were not with
an expectation, that he should learn something of the Reed-shaken-by-the-wind,
if he should not succeed in seeing her
once more before departing on the journey, which he trusted
would result in making her his own for ever.

She did not, however, meet his eye — for, in truth, overpowered
with anxiety, and worn-out by the vehemence of her
passions, she had sunk gradually from sobbing into sleep within
the precincts of that green sequestered arbor, and was now
slumbering in the gray gloaming of the summer's evening, forgetful
of all her sorrows, and forgotten or neglected alike by
all her friends and foes, if she indeed had any of the latter,
save the enamored and irritated warrior, whose thoughts dwelt
on her altogether, even while his pride prevented him from
making any direct inquiries of her presence, or her absence,
from the wigwam of his father.

None of the girls of the tribe had seen her, indeed, since she
walked directly toward the fort after the indignity which had
been offered her, but they all believed her to have sought protection
from the insolence of her overbearing lover at the hands
of the fathers, and they all rejoiced at the evident annoyance
and disappointment of the chief, whose unrequited love for the
Ojibwa captive had not escaped their quick-sighted eyes, and
whose overbearing demeanor, headstrong temper, and stern
rudeness of disposition, had so little endeared him to his tribeswomen,
that they were certainly anything rather than annoyed
by his unquestionable rage and spite, the causes of which, as
well as of his unexpected departure, was no secret to them at
least, whatever it might be to the males of their tribe.

In the meantime twilight fell thick and gray; the nighthawks
wheeled aloft on balanced wings with their mournful
and oft-repeated call; the katydids, those shrill alaras of the
west, opened their shrill, sonorous serenade; the frogs commenced
their loud, nocturnal concert from the shallow marshes
and dank meadow edges; the great owls hooted from the forest-depths,
and were answered by the echoes through the
breezeless night-air; the myriads of bright fire-flies lighted
their amorous torches, and flitted fast and far, now glimmering
clearly, now vanishing into thick gloom, over the dewy
grass, and among the fragrant underwood; the fishes leaped
out of the water at the swarming insects, and fell back with a
short splash on the surface; and, ever and anon, the long,
melancholy howl of a wolf would rise upon the night, and die
away in lugubrious cadences, striking a singular and deep awe
into the boldest heart. It was night in the wilderness. The
evening-bell of the Mission had rung its last sweet chime,
and the long swell of the choral voices had sent up the vesper
hymn to the Virgin Mother from the wood-girded sanctuary.
The stars came out thick and bright, like diamond-gems set in

the dark azure canopy of the summer night, and after a while
the broad moon, now approaching to the full, soared up above
the verdurous tree-tops, filling the heavens with her serene
and holy light, and casting a broad, wavering path of silver
adown the middle of the river, enclosed on this hand and on
that by the deep, black shadows on the walls of stately evergreens,
which towered up from the margin of the brimful current,
so that no human eye could discern which was the limit
between the low shore and the level water.

As the light fell upon the bosom of the waters, the canoe
of the Bald-Eagle shot out from the shore, and under the
noiseless guidance of his well-managed paddle, went down the
stream toward the outlet, and, long before the first paly glimmer
of the dawn had told of the returning day, was skimming
the surface of the broad lake near to the islet-rock known as
the giant's grave, leaving no trace of the path he had taken,
nor to be seen again by Jesuit or neophyte, till days had run
on into weeks, till weeks had become months, and the green
robes of the summer forest had been exchanged for the gorgeous
purples, the crimsons, and the gold of their autumnal garniture.

As the chief's canoe darted away and was lost in the darkness,
a change seemed to come over the village; a change of
cheerfulness and merriment, for the gay, light-hearted laughter
of the happy girls, and now and then a snatch of wild-resounding
song, rose up from the neighborhood of the watch-fires,
and the joyous shout of playful children, which had been all
silenced and held in sullen constraint by the perverse authority
and gloomy mood of the war-chief, burst out with redoubled
glee, freed from the restraint imposed by his unwelcome presence.
He had gone unregretted — and it was evident enough
that his return, be it late or early, would meet with no sincere
or earnest welcome.

And still in her forest-bower, under the pale lustre of the
moon, Ahsahgunushk Numamahtahseng slept like an innocent
and happy flower, folded in the fragrance of her own sweet
thoughts, and unguarded; except by His care, who watches
ever over the repose of the spotless and the young. All night
long she slept dreamless and uninterrupted, until the morning
was beginning to grow gray in the east, and one or two of the
earliest birds began to chirp and flutter in the branches, then
she awoke suddenly, and with something of a start, and even
after she was awake she looked around for the moment thoughtfully
and doubtfully, as if she were endeavoring to collect
herself, and to remember how or wherefore she had passed
the night in that unusual and unfrequented spot.

Few minutes sufficed to bring everything that had passed
on the previous day to her memory, nor that only, for she remembered
somewhat uneasily, that she had the task of confession
before her, and while she recoiled, as a delicate and virtuous
girl must recoil naturally, from owning that she had
granted her love unsolicited, and that she still loved on, not
wisely, but too well, and that so she must go on living hopeless
of return, until life itself should be over; still, as a sincere
and faithful catholic, she never contemplated anything
short of confessing the whole undisguised and undistorted
truth, believing that otherwise she could not so much even as
hope for salvation, and confident that she should receive consolation
and pity for weakness, though she looked for no sympathy,
and absolution of her sin from her gentle and grave
director.

This morning, too, in the pure light of the early dawn, in
the soft and gentle air, and in the midst of all sweet rural
sounds and sights, apart from any external influences to disturb,
or internal emotions to distract her mind, she could think
and reason more rationally, and with a clearer judgment of her

duties and her rights, both as a Christian and woman, than
she had been able to do when struggling in the first pangs of a
newly-comprehended and hopeless attachment, and striving
against the haughty and over-mastering will of a being at once
powerful and selfish, with whom contention must be difficult,
if not altogether vain, and whom she regarded with abhorrence
the more settled in proportion to the obstinacy with
which he seemed resolved to press on her his odious suit.

Now, therefore, she had neither doubt nor fear, but resolved
at once to attend the regular service of the day, to pour out
her whole soul in the confessional, to implore the protection
of the order against the oppressor of the Iroquois, and if she
could avert by no other means that detested union, to devote
herself to perpetual celibacy, becoming the bride of heaven,
and giving up for ever all vain imaginations, all hopes of the
woman's brightest prospect, a happy wedded life, and a serene
old age, and peaceful death-bed, amid the quiet tears of affectionate
and mournful children.

No sooner had she collected her thoughts, and made up her
mind as to the course she would pursue, than she stole rapidly
through the dimmest and least-frequented walks to the edge
of the river, for she knew not as yet whether the inhabitants
of the fort were stirring and the gates open, and she had no
desire to call attention to her proceedings, or to be required to
reply to any question as to the where or wherefore she had
passed that night beyond the precincts of the village, and without
her own lodge. But it was too early as yet for her fears
to be justified, the dwellers in the mission-house were all still
buried in deep sleep, and the girl made her way, unobserved,
down to the spot where she had left her canoe, unfastened it
from the pile to which she had attached the painter, and paddling
rapidly over to the other shore, stole with a foot so light
and noiseless among the skin-tents, and wood-built lodges of

the village, that she reached her own wigwam unsuspected,
and when an hour or two afterward, when the camp was
awakened, and the dim voices were heard once more on the
peaceful banks of the Wye, she issued from the door of her
dwelling, with her hair neatly dressed, her dress decorously
arranged, and her dark skin healthfully glowing after her usual
bath in the clear, cold waters of the neighboring river. There
was some little hurry and excitement displayed by the Huron
girls as they saw their companion, absent as they knew her to
have been at the close of night, issue from her dwelling as
tranquilly as if she had passed the night therein in customary
sleep, but they betrayed no indiscreet curiosity, no uttered
remarks even to her, much less to others, which would induce
any questions or remarks concerning her disappearance and
return. After awhile, however, when they were satisfied that
the suspicions of none of the chiefs pointed to the subject of
their own surmises, they all began to crowd around her, to
inquire into the cause and the meaning of the strange scene
which they had observed on board the canoe, and to tell her of
the departure of the Bald-Eagle on a long hunting-excursion,
which they all attributed unanimously to her peremptory rejection
of the young warrior's suit.

The Reed-shaken-by-the-wind replied as slightly and indefinitely
as might be; but her surprise and pleasure at the
unexpected and welcome departure of the chief, were too great
and too sincere to be disguised, much less concealed, and she
laughed as heartily and gayly as if she had not spent half the
preceding day and night in tears that would not be consoled,
when the girls described with faint mimicry the gloomy and sullen
disappointment with which the Bald-Eagle had stalked to
and fro among the lodges, from dewy eve well-nigh to midnight
in search of her, though he had been too cunning to ask any
overt questions, and had departed without suffering any one of

the warriors to suspect the reasons of his going, or ascertaining
where she was whose repulse had driven him to seek
consolation in the wild sports of the woods and waters.

Hope cheerfully dawned in the poor girl's breast as she listened,
and she fully believed that between shame at the unmanly
part he had played — striking a woman before the eyes
of so many witnesses — and mortification at the unfavorable
reception of his addresses, he had abandoned the pursuit, and
taken this way of showing her that he had withdrawn himself
in the capacity of suitor, and she now felt that she could go
through the duty to which she had bound herself, not contentedly
only, but gratefully, and with a good hope of favorable
and happy results. For she was a woman of strong mind and
energetic will, and once convinced that her love was hopeless,
vain, and unmaidenly, if not actually sinful and impious, she
was not one to suffer it to haunt her to her misery and degradation,
but to tear it from her heart of hearts, even if the heart-strings
must needs break with the shock.

By the time that the few light feminine duties of the day
were performed, and the morning-meal prepared and taken,
the bell began to announce that it was holyday, and to summon
the dusky worshippers to be present at the celebration of high
mass in the chapel, whither the brethren were even now congregating;
and with their humble offerings, and innocent and
happy hearts, the poor Indian maidens hastened to meet their
spiritual advisers, and to do homage at the altar of grace.

The service was performed, all shorn of the splendors of its
pompous and sublime ceremonial, a few home-made candles
only gleaming through the mist of incense collected from the
native gums and aromatics of the forest, ministered by no
splendidly-attired priests in alt, and cope, and dalmatique, nor
harbingered by the glorious swell of sacred music and the
deep diapason of the pealing organ, but it was heard by humble

and attentive ears, and garnered up in penitent and trusting
hearts; and it may well be that the little flock gathered
from the howling wilderness into the fold of the truth, was
found more acceptable in the eyes of the All-seeing than many
a wealthier and prouder congregation. After the masses were
ended, a few of the warriors and many of the younger girls
entered the confessional, and after recounting their simple
errors, and rehearsing their half-unconscious doubts, briefly received
full absolution. But not till all beside had departed did
Ahsahgunushk Numamahtahseng enter the stall of the penitent,
so that no ear heard the deep sobs of shame and anguish with
which she rehearsed her sad but sinless tale, or marked the
suppressed groans of the strong-minded, energetic man who
listened to her artless speech; but when they issued from the
chapel, all saw that the sweet maiden's face was radiant with
tranquil peace and serene happiness, while the high features
of the Father Borromeè were darker and more gloomy than
their wont. That night he kept vigils alone before the cross,
and the clang of the self-inflicted scourge was heard above the
“culpa mea,” and the “ora pro nobis,” and the steps of the
high altar reeked red on the morrow with dark blood-gouts
from the lacerated flesh of the self-condemned and penitent
ascetic, who visited thus grievously upon himself the punishment
of his unconscious error, hoping that therefore vengeance
would hold aloof from him hereafter, and the atonement be
accepted on high.