r to the land of souls. Far South, beyond
the region of ice and snows, he came to a lodge standing before
the entrance to wide blue plains. Leaving his body there, he
embarked in a white stone canoe to cross a lake. He saw the souls
of wicked Indians sinking in the lake; but the good gained an
elysian shore, where all was warmth, beauty, ease, and eternal
youth, and where the air was food. The Master of Breath sent him
back, but promised that he might at death return and stay. 26 The
Wyandots tell of a dwarf, Tcha ka bech, who climbed a tree which
grew higher as often as he blew on it. At last he reached heaven,
and discovered it to be an excellent place. He descended the tree,
building wigwams at intervals in the branches. He then returned
with his sister and nephew, resting each night in one of the
wigwams.

22 Schoolcraft, History, &c. of the Indian Tribes, part iv. p.
240.

23 Ibid. part ii. p. 135.

24 Ibid. part v. p. 64; part iv. p. 55.

25 Longfellow, Song of Hiawatha, xix.: The Ghosts.

26 Schoolcraft, Indian in his Wigwam. p 79.

He set his traps up there to catch animals. Rising in the night to
go and examine his traps, he saw one all on fire, and, upon
approaching it, found that he had caught the sun!

Where the Indian is found believing in a Devil and a hell, it is
the result of his intercourse with Europeans. These elements of
horror were foreign to his original religion.27 There are in some
quarters faint traces of a single purgatorial or retributive
conception. It is a representation of paradise as an island, the
ordeal consisting in the passage of the dark river or lake which
surrounds it. The worthy cross with entire facility, the unworthy
only after tedious struggles. Some say the latter are drowned;
others, that they sink up to their chins in the water, where they
pass eternity in vain desires to attain the alluring land on which
they gaze.28 Even this notion may be a modification consequent
upon European influence. At all events, it is subordinate in force
and only occasional in occurrence. For the most part, in the
Indian faith mercy swallows up the other attributes of the Great
Spirit. The Indian dies without fear, looking for no punishments,
only for rewards.29 He regards the Master of Breath not as a holy
judge, but as a kind father. He welcomes death as opening the door
to a sweet land. Ever charmingly on his closing eyes dawns the
prospect of the aboriginal elysium, a gorgeous reg