There was once a hunter of the tribe of the Dacotas (or Sioux) living near the Falls of St. Anthony. He had but one wife, and loved her and was loved by her so well, that the union and the happiness of the hunter and his wife, Ampota Sampa, was talked of among the tribe as wonderful. They had two children, and lived lonely and happy for several years. But as he became known as a great hunter, and grew rich, several families came and raised their tipis (lodges) near that of the happy pair. And words and whispers came to the young man that he ought to have more wives, so that he might enjoy more happiness. He listened to the tempters, and soon made a choice among the daughters of his new friends. But when he had to tell his first wife thereof, his heart smote him, and, to make the news less painful to her, he began by telling her that he had bethought himself that she had too many household cares, and that she wanted somebody to help her in them, and so he would bring her that help in the form of a young girl, who was to be his second wife. Ampota Sampa answered "No!" She had not too many cares. She was happy to have them for him and his children. She prayed and besought him, by their former love and happy life, by every tender tie, by the love of their little ones, not to bring a new love, a new wife, to the lodge. He said nothing. But this same night he brought home to the lodge his new wife. Early next morning a death-song was heard on the waters of the Mississippi, and a canoe was seen gliding swiftly down the rapids, above the Falls of St. Anthony, and in the canoe was sitting a young woman with two little children folded to her bosom. It was Ampota Sampa; and in her song she told the cause of her despair, of her death, of her departure for the spirit-land. So she sat, singing her death-song, swiftly borne onward by the rapids to the edge of the rocks. Her husband, her friends, heard her and saw her, but too late. In a few moments the canoe was at the top of the Falls; there it paused a second, and then, borne on by the rush of the waters, down it dashed, and the roaring waves covered the victims with their white foam. Their bodies were never seen again; but tradition says that on misty mornings, the spirit of the Indian wife, with the children folded to her bosom, is seen gliding in the canoe through the rising spray about the Spirit Island, and that the sound of her death-song is heard moaning in the wind and in the roar of the Falls of St. Anthony. Such is the legend of the Indian wife.--FREDRIKA BREMER. THE RAIN-DROP. BY MISS E. W. BARNES. It quivered on a bended spray-- A rain-drop, bright and clear-- Though beautiful, it waked sad thoughts, 'Twas so like sorrow's tear.