I like small shelters: "_A chico pajarillo chico nidillo_: a little bird, a little nest." I sat down on the slope facing the hut planted on the hillside opposite. In a few minutes, I heard voices in the valley: three men were driving five or six fat cows; they put them to graze and drove away the lean cow with blows of a switch. An Indian woman came out of the hut, went towards the frightened beast, and called it. The cow ran to her, stretching out its neck with a little low. The planters shook their fists at the Indian woman, who returned to her hut The cow followed her. [Sidenote: The Indian woman.] I got up, climbed down the declivity of the hillside, crossed the glen, and climbing the opposite hill, reached the hut. I uttered the greeting I had been taught: "_Siegoh!_ I have come!" The Indian woman, instead of returning my greeting by the customary repetition, "You have come," made no reply. Then I petted the cow: the Indian woman's yellow and saddened face showed signs of softening. I was touched by these mysterious relations of misfortune: there is sweetness in lamenting ills that none have lamented beside. My hostess looked at me a little longer, with a remnant of doubt lingering in her eyes, and then came forward and passed her hand over the forehead of her companion in misery and solitude. Encouraged by this mark of confidence, I said in English, for I had exhausted my Indian: "She is very lean." The Indian woman replied, in broken English: "She eats very little." "They drove her away roughly," I added. And the woman replied: "We are both accustomed to that." I asked: "Does not this meadow belong to you then?" She answered: "This meadow belonged to my husband, who is dead. I have no children, and the pale-faces drive their cows into my meadow." I had nothing to offer this creature of God. We parted. My hostess said a number of things to me which I did not understand; they were doubtless wishes for prosperity; if they have not been heard by Heaven, it is not the fault of her who prayed, but the infirmity of him for whom the prayer was offered. All souls have not an equal aptitude for happiness, just as all lands do not bear equal harvests. I returned to my wigwam, where a collation consisting of potatoes and Indian corn awaited my arrival. The evening was splendid: the lake, smooth as a flawless mirror, showed not a ripple; the murmuring river bathed our peninsula, which the calycanthuses perfumed with the scent of apple-blossom. The whip-poor-will uttered its song: we heard it, now nearer, now farther away, according as the bird changed the spot of its amorous calls. No one called me. Weep, poor Will!