have fled from the face of the Summer
Since here by the cataract's roar,
in the moon of the red-blooming lilies,[71]
In the _tee_ of Ta-te-psin[I] was born
Winona--wild-rose of the prairies.
Like the summer sun peeping, at morn,
o'er the hills was the face of Winona.
And here she grew up like a queen--
a romping and lily-lipped laughter,
And danced on the undulant green,
and played in the frolicsome waters,
Where the foaming tide tumbles and whirls
o'er the murmuring rocks in the rapids;
And whiter than foam were the pearls
that gleamed in the midst of her laughter.
Long and dark was her flowing hair flung
like the robe of the night to the breezes;
And gay as the robin she sung,
or the gold-breasted lark of the meadows.
Like the wings of the wind were her feet,
and as sure as the feet of _Ta-to-ka_[J]
And oft like an antelope fleet
o'er the hills and the prairies she bounded,
Lightly laughing in sport as she ran,
and looking back over her shoulder
At the fleet-footed maiden or man
that vainly her flying feet followed.
The belle of the village was she,
and the pride of the aged Ta-te-psin,
Like a sunbeam she lighted his _tee_,
and gladdened the heart of her father.

[I] _Tate_--wind,--_psin_--wild-rice--wild-rice wind.

[J] mountain antelope.

In the golden-hued _Wazu-pe-wee_--
the moon when the wild-rice is gathered;
When the leaves on the tall sugar-tree
are as red as the breast of the robin,
And the red-oaks that border the lea
are aflame with the fire of the sunset,
From the wide, waving fields of wild-rice--
from the meadows of _Psin-ta-wak-pa-dan_,[K]
Where the geese and the mallards rejoice,
and grow fat on the bountiful harvest,
Came the hunters with saddles of moose
and the flesh of the bear and the bison,
And the women in birch-bark canoes
well laden with rice from the meadows.

[K] Little Rice River. It bears the name of Rice Creek to-day and
empties into the Mississippi from the east, a few miles above
Minneapolis.

With the tall, dusky hunters, behold,
came a marvelous man or a spirit,
White-faced and so wrinkled and old,
and clad in the robe of the raven.
Unsteady his steps were and slow,
and he walked with a staff in his right hand,
An