ordinary buffalo soup than Chateaubrand's
Indian maidens did to one of the Paw-
nee girls, who slouched about the settle-
ment with noxious tresses and sullen slavish
coquetries.

Father de Smet would not at any time
have called Ninon a scarlet woman. But
when he ate the dish of soup or tasted the
hot corn-cakes that she invariably invited
him to partake of as he passed her little
house, he refrained with all the charity of
a true Christian and an accomplished epicure
from even thinking her such. And he re-
membered the words of the Saviour, "Let
him who is without sin among you cast the
first stone."

To Father de Smet's healthy nature
nothing seemed more superfluous than sin.
And he was averse to thinking that any
committed deeds of which he need be
ashamed. So it was his habit, especially if
the day was pleasant and his own thoughts
happy, to say to himself when he saw one
of the wild young trappers leaving the cabin
of Mademoiselle Ninon: "He has been
for some of the good woman's hot cakes,"
till he grew quite to believe that the only
attractions that the adroit Frenchwoman