160 WILD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH. 



were proportionately jealous. But honor or jealousy- 

 made no difference in the love of his wife — the same 

 gentle, passionate kiss greeted the soldier if he came 

 back honored or suspected. It was a woman's love, and 

 it flickered not ; and when angry voices told of Spanish 

 aggressions and coming wars, and pointed to him, she 

 merely said : ' He is not a Spaniard, he is my love.' 



" There had been a fierce battle fought between the 

 Yu2^aha tribes and the Apalaches, in which the latter 

 had returned with not their usual success,- bringing home 

 with them the bodies of many of their warriors. They 

 came to the village with all the insignia of woe, beating 

 of drums, formed of the sections of hollow trees covered 

 with deer skins, and the mournful blast of their conch- 

 shell trumpets. 



"Wealuste, the great black water chief, had been 

 killed, and they placed him on the shore, with his 

 arrows and his quiver, his knife and his eagles' plumes, 

 and a goodly store of chinquapin nuts and maize, to 

 support him on that long journey to the happy Hunting- 

 ground that he was to make in darkness and alone. His 

 body was sewed in deerskins, pictured with the scenes 

 of his life, and then placed in a wooden canoe formed 

 from a cypress log. This canoe was fixed on upright posts, 

 and the warrior was left to float away, as a chief should 

 go, to that silent realm that lies beyond our ken. But 

 for forty days and forty nights, or for one whole moon, 

 the corpse was to be watched by comrades of equal rank 

 with the deceased, so that neither beast nor bird dis- 



