Christians! are you without blame?
Have you thought of the privations, the wants of those who once owned your country, and would own it still but for the strong hand?
Have you remembered that their souls are dear in His sight, who suffered for them, as well as for you?
Have you given bright gold that their children might be educated and redeemed from their slavery of soul?
Checkered Cloud will die as she has lived, a believer in the religion of the Dahcotahs.

The traditions of her tribe are written on her heart.

She worships a spirit in every forest tree, or every running stream.

The features of the favored Israelite are hers; she is perchance a daughter of their lost tribe.
When she was young, she would have listened to the missionary as he told her of Gethsemane and Calvary.

But age yields not like youth to new impressions; the one looks to the future, the other clings to the past.
See! she has put by her pipe and is going, but she is coming oft again to talk to me of her people, that I may tell to my friends the bravery of the Dahcotah warrior, and the beauty of the maiden! the legends of their rivers and sacred isles--the traditions of their rocks and hills! If I cannot, in recounting the wild stories of this prophetess of the forest, give her own striking words, I shall at least be faithful to the spirit of her recitals.