"Than the head-chief, tall Wazi-kute, [74]
but their words are as soft as a maiden's;
Their eyes are the eyes of the swan,
but their hearts are the hearts of the eagles;
And the terrible Maza Wakan [b] ever walks,
by their side like a spirit.
Like a Thunder-bird, roaring in wrath,
flinging fire from his terrible talons,
It sends to their enemies death,
in the flash of the fatal Wakandee." [c]

[a] The Ottawa name for the region of the St. Lawrence River.
[b] "Mysterious metal"--or metal having a spirit in it. This is the
common name applied by the Dakotas to all fire arms.
[c] Lightning.

The Autumn was past and the snow
lay drifted and deep on the prairies;
From his teepee of ice came the foe
--came the storm-breathing god of the winter.
Then roared in the groves,--on the plains,
--on the ice-covered lakes and the river--
The blasts of the fierce hurricanes
blown abroad from the breast of Waziya. [3]
The bear cuddled down in his den,
and the elk fled away to the forest;
The pheasant and gray prairie-hen
made their beds in the heart of the snow-drift;
The bison-herds huddled and stood
in the hollows and under the hill-sides;