“From thence we arrived at the entrance to a valley, where I saw a wonderful work. It was a natural bridge, similar to that in Virginia, of which you have perhaps heard. Men, my son, especially those of your country, often imitate Nature, and their copies are always insignificant. It is not the same with Nature when she appears to imitate the labors of men by in reality offering them models. Then it is that she throws bridges from the summit of one mountain to the summit of another, suspends roads in the air, spreads rivers for canals, carves out hills for columns, and for basins excavates seas. “We passed beneath the sole arch of this bridge, and found ourselves in front of another wonder, the cemetery of the Indians of the Mission, or the Groves of Death. Father Aubry had permitted his neophytes to bury their dead in their manner, and to continue its original name to their place of sepulture. He had merely sanctified the place with a cross. * The soil was divided, like fields set out for harvest, into as many lots as there were families. Each lot formed a wood of itself, which varied according to the taste of those who had planted it. A stream meandered noiselessly through the groves. It went by the name of the River of Peace. This smiling refuge of souls was closed on the east by the bridge beneath which we had passed. Two hills bounded it on the north and on the south, and it was open only towards the west, where stood a large forest of fir trees. The trunks of these trees, spotted with green, and growing without branches up to their very summits, resembled tall columns, and formed the peristyle of this temple of death. We remarked a religious sound, similar to the half-suppressed murmurs of an organ beneath the roof of a church; but when we had penetrated into the interior of the sanctuary, we could hear nothing beyond the hymns of the birds celebrating an eternal fête to the memory of the dead. “On emerging from the wood, we perceived the village of the Mission, situated on the side of a lake, in the midst of a savannah planted with flowers. It was reached by an avenue of magnolias and oaks, which bordered one of ‘those ancient roads met with towards the mountains that separate Kentucky from the Floridas. As soon as the Indians saw their pastor in the plain, they abandoned their labors, and hastened to meet him. Some of them kissed his gown, others assisted him to walk; the mothers raised their little children in their arms to show them the man of Jesus Christ who had shed tears. Father Aubry inquired as he went along of what was going on in the village. He gave counsel to one, and a mild reprimand to another, He spoke of harvests to be gathered, of children to be instructed, of troubles to be consoled; and he alluded to God in every topic he touched upon.