grieve for them? Alas! like all Indian boys, they had been bred up to treat their sisters with contempt and ignominy; and the effects of a vile education had been such as to blunt their natural affections, and to make them regard the fraternal sentiment as a weakness which no boy who hoped to become a great warrior ought to entertain.
The winter months had never seemed to We-no-na less tedious. March, with its cold blasts, and April, with its torrents of rain, had passed; and the south wind unlocked the fettered Mississippi, and the blue waters of Lake Pepin again sparkled in the sunshine, and the verdure began to creep over bluff and prairie, and the delicate foliage to fringe the trees, and bright flowers to open amid the springing grass and by the border of the groves. We-no-na's winter experiences had given her a feeling of independence and self-reliance, which was in itself a great source of happiness. Never before had she known the true luxury of freedom. If heretofore she had roamed the prairie, or paddled the canoe, it was but to anticipate her degradation the moment she should enter the filthy hovels where her people were herded. She had a womanly sense of neatness, which now she could indulge unchecked. She delighted in nature, and her delight was now unmarred by embittering associations. She grew in stature and in beauty, and in strength and fleetness; and as she snuffed the pure morning breeze, and saw the sun crimsoning the eastern clouds, or as she looked up to the starry heavens, or to the coruscations of the Aurora by night, she would exclaim: "Yes, the Great Spirit is generous and good; it is man only who is bad, and who spoils the gifts that are lavished on his race!"
It was one of the last days of May, when, as We-no-na was descending to that beautiful prairie, where the little house now stands, she saw a red strawberry amid the grass, and plucked it. She then remembered Ish-te-nah's injunction, and walked musingly back to her wigwam. It was almost with a pang of regret that she prepared to leave this beautiful region. All the means of subsistence seemed so abundant around her; earth, air, and water seemed so kind in rendering up their stores; and then, as summer came on, the whole landscape was clothed in such affluent beauty; the verdant bluffs swept in such graceful curves to the water's edge; and the distant prairie
