arry home as the bones of a noble
chief.

I have seen the stakes, which was all that remained of "Big Thunder"
after he was dried up and blown away.

INDIAN TRADITION--THE DELUGE.

The Oneidas have a tradition about the deluge, which is very singular.
According to their story, an unlimited expanse of water covered the
whole space now occupied by the world we live in.

At this time the whole human family dwelt in a country situated in the
upper regions of the air. Everything needed for comfort and pleasure
was found. The people did not know what death was, nor its attendant,
sickness or disease; and their minds were free from jealousy, hatred,
or revenge.

At length it happened that all of this was changed, and care and
trouble came to them.

A certain youth was seen to withdraw himself from the circle of social
amusements, and he wandered away alone in the groves, as his favorite
resort.

Care and sorrow marked his countenance, and his body, from long
abstinence from food, began to make him look to his friends like a
skeleton of a man. Anxious looks could not solve the mystery of his
grief; and by-and-by, weakened in body and soul, he yielded to his
companions, and promised to disclose the cause of his trouble, on
condition that they would dig up by the roots a certain pine-tree, lay
him in his blanket by the edge of the hole, and place his wife by his
side; at once all hands were ready. The fatal tree was taken up by the
roots; in doing which the earth was opened, and a passage made into the
abyss below. The blanket was spread by the hole; the youth lay upon it
the wife also (soon to be a mother) took her seat by his side. The
crowd, anxious to know the cause of such strange and unheard-of
conduct, pressed close around; when, all of a sudden, to their horror
and surprise, he seized upon the woman and threw her headlong into the
regions of darkness below! Then, rising from the ground, he told the
people that he had for some time suspected that his wife was untrue to
him, and so, having got rid of the cause of his trouble, he would soon
recover his health and spirits.

All those amphibious animals which now inhabit this world then roamed
through the watery waste to which this woman, in her fall, was now
hastening. The loon first discovered her coming, and called a council
in haste to prepare for her reception,--observing that the animal which
approached was a human being, and that earth was necessary f