The Children Carried Off by the Indians--The Feast in
the Wigwam--Souwanas, the Story-teller--Nanahboozhoo,
the Indian Myth--How the Wolves Stole His Dinner, and
Why the Birch Tree Bark is Scarred--Why the Raccoon
has Rings on His Tail.

Without even knocking at the door there noiselessly entered our northern
home two large, unhandsome Indians. They paid not the slightest attention
to the grown-up palefaces present, but in their ghostly way marched across
the room to the corner where the two little children were playing on the
floor. Quickly but gently picking them up they swung them to their
shoulders, and then, without a word of salutation or even a glance at the
parents, they noiselessly passed out of that narrow door and disappeared in
the virgin forest. They were pagan Saulteaux, by name Souwanas and Jakoos.

The Indian names by which these two children were called by the natives
were "Sagastaookemou," which means the "Sunrise Gentleman," and
"Minnehaha," "Laughing Waters."

To the wigwam of Souwanas, "South Wind," these children were being carried.
They had no fear of these big Indians, though the boy was only six years
old, and his little sister but four. They had learned to look with laughing
eyes even into the fiercest and ugliest of these red faces and had made
them their friends.

So even now, while being carried away among the dense trees, they merrily
laughed and shouted to each other. The bright patches of sunshine on the
ground, the singing birds, and the few brilliant-hued summer flowers,
brought forth their exclamations of delight, while all the time the grave,
silent Indians hurried them on deeper and deeper into the forest. Yet