Why dost thou weep, mother of the bride? Weepst thou to be parted from thy daughter? Weep no more. What is life? A reed beat down by every wind that stirs, A flower nipt by the first autumnal blast, A deer that perishes by prick of thorn, Here at morning, Gone at evening. Weep not, tender mother of the bride; Soon thou'lt meet her in the happy vales Beyond the setting sun: Ask the lover, he will tell thee so. [Illustration: _Designed & Etched by W. M. Brookefield R. H. A._ Then mounting the noble Horse they bade farewell.] When the feast was concluded, the songs and dances, and sacrifices, finished, the Wahconda's son prepared to take his departure to the mountains where his father dwelt. The tribe attended him to the edge of the forest, which had been the hunting-grounds of the Ottoes ever since the rivers ran, and there they left him to pursue his journey with his beautiful and happy wife to the abodes of spirits, and great warriors, and just men. But before the chief parted from his daughter, he made her husband a long speech, and prayed that peace might ever be between them and their people. He told him he had given him his all--his dearly beloved daughter, to whom he must be kind and affectionate. He must not put heavy burdens upon her; he must not send her to cut wood, nor bring home the bison's flesh, nor pound the corn, for her hands had never been hardened in tasks like these, nor her shoulders bowed in her father's house to the labours of the field, or forest, or cabin. "She had been," he said, "the darling of her father's household, and knew not labour but by name." The Wahconda's son smiled at the words of the old chief, and told him "that services, like those he had mentioned, were never required of women in the Wahconda's dwelling. The people of the happy vales and the spirits of the mountains fed not," he said, "upon bison's meat, nor pounded corn; and the sun, which was the same at all seasons, beamed so warm, that they kept no fires. It was a lovely land, far pleasanter than that which the Ottoes abode in, nor was it subject to those dreadful storms and tempests which terrified and annoyed those who dwelt upon the banks of the Great River." And then, mounting his noble horse, and taking his little wife behind him, he again bade them farewell and rode away.