“Having thus seen the sun rise and set upon this place of grief, the next day, at the first cry of the stork, I prepared to leave the sacred sepulchre. I quitted it as the spot from which I desired to start upon a career of virtue. Three times I evoked the soul of Atala; three times the genius of the desert responded to my cries beneath the funeral arch. I afterwards saluted the East, and then I perceived, amongst the mountain paths in the distance, the friendly hermit going to the cabin of some unhappy creature. Falling upon my knees, and ardently embracing Atala’s grave, I exclaimed, ‘Sleep in peace in this foreign land, too unfortunate maiden! In return for your love, for your exile, and for your death, you are going to be abandoned, even by Chactas!’ Then, shedding a flood of tears, I separated from Lopez’s daughter, and, tearing myself from the spot, left at the foot of nature’s monument a monument still more august--the humble Tomb of Virtue.” [Illustration: 103 [Illustration: 104] EPILOGUE. [Illustration: 107] Chactas, son of Outalissi the Natchez, related this story to René the European. Fathers have repeated it to their sons; and I, a traveller to distant lands, have faithfully narrated what the Indians told me. I saw in this story the picture of the hunting people and of the laboring people; religion, the first lawgiver of men; the dangers of ignorance and religious enthusiasm opposed to the light, the charity and the veritable spirit of the Evangile; the struggles of the passions and the virtues in a simple heart; and, finally, the triumph of Christianity over the most ardent sentiment and the most terrible fear--Love and Death. When a Seminole related this story to me, I found it very instructive and perfectly beautiful, because he narrated it with the flowery eloquence of the desert, the grace of the cabin, and a simplicity in describing grief which I am afraid I have not been able to preserve. But one thing remained for me to learn. I wished to know what had become of Father Aubry, and no one could tell me. I should never have ascertained if Providence, who guides all, had not led me to discover what I was seeking. This is how the matter came about. I had visited the shores of the Mississippi, which formerly constituted the southern boundary of New France, and I was desirous of seeing, in the north, that other wonder of the American empire, the cataract of Niagara. I had nearly reached the falls, in the ancient country of the Agannonsioni, * when one morning, as I was crossing a plain, I perceived a woman seated beneath a tree, and holding a dead child upon her knees. I quietly approached the young mother, and heard her singing to this effect:--