village, were jogging along on the summit of an elevated bluff, overlooking an immense valley of high grass, through which we were about to lay our course.—— * * * * * * * * * “Well, then, you say you have seen the prairies on fire?” Yes. “You have seen the fire on the mountains, and beheld it feebly creeping over the grassy hills of the North, where the toad and the timid snail were pacing from its approach—all this you have seen, and who has not? But who has seen the vivid lightnings, and heard the roaring thunder of the rolling conflagration which sweeps over the _deep-clad_ prairies of the West? Who has dashed, on his wild horse, through an ocean of grass, with the raging tempest at his back, rolling over the land its swelling waves of liquid fire?” What! “Aye, even so. Ask the red savage of the wilds what is awful and sublime—Ask him where the Great Spirit has mixed up all the elements of death, and if he does not blow them over the land in a storm of fire? Ask him what foe he has met, that regarded not his frightening yells, or his sinewy bow? Ask these lords of the land, who vauntingly challenge the thunder and lightning of Heaven—whether there is not one foe that travels over their land, too swift for their feet, and too mighty for their strength—at whose approach their stout hearts sicken, and their strong-armed courage withers to nothing? Ask him _again_ (if he is sullen, and his eyes set in their sockets)—‘Hush!————sh!————sh!’—(he will tell you, with a soul too proud to confess—his head sunk on his breast, and his hand over his mouth)—‘that’s _medicine_!’” * * * * * * * * * * * *