d deeds. His name was Mosh Kohta.

"It is a long while! No Pale-faces dwelt in the land of plenty (the
translation of the Indian word `Texas'); our grandfathers had just
received it from the Great Spirit, and they had come from the setting of
the sun across the big mountains to take possession. We were a great
nation, we are so now, we have always been so, and we will ever be. At
that time, also, our tribe spread all along the western shores of the
great stream Mississippi, for no Pale-face had yet settled upon it. We
were a great people, ruled by a mighty chief; the earth, the trees, the
rivers, and the air know his name. Is there a place in the mountains or
the prairies where the name of Mosh Kohta has not been pronounced and
praised?

"At that time a strange warlike people of the Pale-faces broke their big
canoes along our coasts of the South, and they landed on the shore, well
armed with big guns and long rifles, but they had nothing to eat. These
were the `Maha-mate-kosh-ehoj' (the French); their chief was a good man,
a warrior, and a great traveller; he had started from the northern
territories of the Algonquins, to go across the salt water in far
distant lands, and bring back with him many good things which the
Red-skins wanted:--warm blankets to sleep upon, flints to strike a fire,
axes to cut the trees, and knives to skin the bear and the buffalo. He
was a good man and loved the Indians, for they also were good, and good
people will always love each other.

"He met with Mosh Kohta; our warriors would not fight the strangers, for
they were hungry and their voices were soft; they were also too few to
be feared, though their courage seemed great under misfortune, and they
would sing and laugh while they suffered. We gave them food, we helped
them to take from the waters the planks of their big canoe, and to build
the first wigwam in which the Pale-faces ever dwelt in Texas. Two moons
they remained hunting the buffalo with our young men, till at last their
chief and his bravest warriors started in some small canoes of ours, to
see if they could not enter the great stream, by following the coast
towards the sunrise. He was gone four moons, and when he returned, he
had lost half of his men, by sickness, hunger, and fatigue; yet Mosh
Kohta bade him not despair; the great chief promised the Pale-faces to
conduct them in the spring to the great stream, and for several more
moons we lived all together, as br