like so many Indian girls, but were slight of build, and
willowy of motion. Their hair was long and black, but it
was as fine as silk, and shone like the plumage of a
blackbird. There was not that oily swarthiness in the
complexion, which makes so many Indian women hideous in
the eyes of a connoisseur of beauty; but the cheeks of
these girls were a pale olive, and sometimes, when they
were excited, a faint tinge of rose came out like the
delicate pink flush that appears in the olive-grey of
the morning. And these maidens, too, began to cast
languishing eyes upon the pale-faced stranger; and sighed
all the day while they sewed fringe upon their skirts
and beads upon their moccasins. Their affections now were
not for him who showed the largest number of wolves'
tongues or enemies' scalps, but for the gracious stranger
with his gentle manners and winning ways. They soon began
to put themselves in his way when he came to shoot chicken
or quail among the grasses; would point out to him passes
leading around the swamps, and inform him where he might
find elk or wild turkey. Then with half shy, yet half
coquettish airs, and a lurking tenderness in their great
dusk hazel eyes, they would twist a sprig off a crown of
golden rod, and with their dainty little brown fingers
pin it upon the hunter's coat. With shy curiosity they
would smoothe the cloth woven in Paisley, forming in
their minds a contrast between its elegance and that of
the coats of their own red gallants made of the rough
skin of the wolf or the bison. So it came to pass that
in due season most of the pretty girls among the Jumping
Indians had gone with triumph and great love in their