My excellent and esteemed fellow-traveller, like a true Englishman, has untiringly stuck by me through all difficulties, passing the countries above-mentioned, and also the Upper Mississippi, the St. Peters, and the overland route to our present encampment on this splendid plateau of the Western world. * * * * * * * Thus far have I strolled, within the space of a few weeks, for the purpose of reaching _classic ground_. Be not amazed if I have sought, in this distant realm, the Indian _Muse_, for here she dwells, and here she must be invoked—nor be offended if my narratives from this moment should savour of poetry or appear like romance. If I can catch the inspiration, I may sing (or yell) a few epistles from this famed ground before I leave it; or at least I will _prose_ a few of its leading characteristics and mysterious legends. This place is great (not in history, for there is none of it, but) in traditions, and stories, of which this Western world is full and rich. “Here (according to their traditions), happened the mysterious birth of the red pipe, which has blown its fumes of peace and war to the remotest corners of the Continent; which has visited every warrior, and passed through its reddened stem the irrevocable oath of war and desolation. And here also, the peace-breathing calumet was born, and fringed with the eagle’s quills, which has shed its thrilling fumes over the land, and soothed the fury of the relentless savage. “The Great Spirit at an ancient period, here called the Indian nations together, and standing on the precipice of the red pipe stone rock, broke from its wall a piece, and made a huge pipe by turning it in his hand, which he smoked over them, and to the North, the South, the East, and the West, and told them that this stone was red—that it was their flesh—that they must use it for their pipes of peace—that it belonged to them all, and that the war-club and scalping knife must not be raised on its ground. At the last whiff of his pipe his head went into a great cloud, and the whole surface of the rock for several miles was melted and glazed; two great ovens were opened beneath, and two women (guardian spirits of the place), entered them in a blaze of fire; and they are heard there yet (Tso-mec-cos-tee, and Tso-me-cos-te-won-dee), answering to the invocations of the high priests or medicine-men, who consult them when they are visitors to this sacred place.” Near this spot, also, on a high mound, is the “_Thunder’s nest_,” (_nid-du-Tonnere_), where “a very small bird sits upon her eggs during fair weather, and the skies are rent with bolts of thunder at the approach of a storm, which is occasioned by the hatching of her brood!”