Storied Waters, Cliffs, and Mountains
too. Next day the hunters came with water, but, incensed by their delay, the chief ordered them to be slain in sacrifice to the manes of the dead. A large grave was dug and the last solemnities were begun when there was a roaring and a shaking in the earth—it parted, and the corpses disappeared in the abyss. Then from the pit arose a flood of water that went foaming down the valley. Crazed with grief, remorse, and fear, Wampahseesah hung himself into the torrent and was borne to his death. The red men built a dam there later, and often used to sit before it in the twilight, watching, as they declared, the faces of the dead peering at them through the foam.
During the rush for the California gold-fields in the '50's a party took the route by Gila River, and set across the desert. The noon temperature was 120°, the way was strewn with skeletons of wagons, horses, and men, and on the second night after crossing the Colorado the water had given out. The party had gathered on the sands below Yuma, the men discussing the advisability of returning, the women full of apprehension, the young ones crying, the horses panting; but presently the talk fell low, for in one of the wagons a child's voice was heard in prayer: "Oh, good heavenly Father, I know I have been a naughty girl, but I am so thirsty, and mamma and papa and baby all want a drink so much! Do, good God, give us water, and I never will be naughty again." One of the men said, earnestly, "May God grant it!" In a few mo-
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