and the trail entering the forest showed traces of a woman's footprints. A _pursuing party was or ganized but returned unsuccessful, and a score of years passed by without further news of the lost wife and mother. One afternoon, twentythree years after the events just described, the captured wife again stood on the spot where she had been captured. But oh ! how changed it was. Instead of the dense forest on every side, and huge stumps stir• rounding the cabin, were beautiful meadows covered with waving grain. A substantial house occupied the position of the old cabin, while at the foot of the grassy slope, the shrill whirr of a saw drew her attention to' a large mill surrounded by tall piles of lumber. Her heart sank as she noted the changes which had taken place and for a moment she turned to leave the spot, but as she did so a tall well-sweep, with its hanging bucket, attracted her attention, beside the same old well she had helped her husband to dig so many years before. At this sight the thought that she was the only remaining heir came to her, for she had seen her husband struck down, and the hut burn ing before her captors had forced her to follow them into the forest. Feeling that she knew the worst, she gathered courage to approach the house and faintly knock at the door. In response the door was opened by a young woman holding a babe in her arms. This sight was too much for the wanderer. Staggering forward with out- stretched arms she cried 'lt is mine ; give me my child ; give me both of them.' At the sound of her voice, a shattered, feeble, prematurely old man tottered forward calling, 'have the dead come to life ; are the graves opened ?'' It is her voice; it is my wife !' No words can picture the scene. Husband and wife after twenty-three years of separation, and as each supposed, by death, were standing on the same threshold, each looking intently into the face of the other, seek- ing to discover some resemblance to the face of a score of years before, while standing by was one THE FREE LANCE. of the daughters, now married and with a babe of her own, looking on with no less interest., After the first excitement had subsided,. and the news spread, neighbors came flocking in to hear the wife's story of her captivity. It was told with difficulty, for she had lost much of her na tive language. Her story was this : After tying her hands and stifling her cries by her handkerchief, the Indians showed her a tomahawk and terrified her. into si lence. Of killing her they had no thought, for the chief who had planned her capture was a re cent widower with a baby to care for, the mother squaw having died while on their march to the settlement. To their captive the Indians brought the little papoose, and though at first the poor mother could not bear to touch it, its. cries soon found an echo in her heart, and she accepted it as a gift from Heaven, to console her in her misery. Turning their faces westward the band of In. dians and their captive began their weary march. Often it seemed to the poor captive that her strength was exhausted, but after several weeks they reached their home on the shores of a fresh water sea, believed to have been Lake Ontario. Here sufferings and trials were her fate for many years as the chief who had captured her, endeav ored to induce her to become his wife. Finally, however, the chief died, his son whose foster mother she had been, grew large enough to as sume his proper position, and she began to receive recognition as a member of the tribe, her knowl edge of cooking and of medical treatment earn ing for her the title of."the .medicine woman:" Here she might perhaps have even been happy, if the scene of her capture had not been so vividly impressed on her memory. But so strong were her longings for her own people, that she finally resolved to escape. Food was prepared, mocca sins made, and one rainy night she stole away into the darkness. For weeks she travelled eastward guided only by the sun, until she reached the ocean, when she met with white persons who aid-
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