MARY GARDINER HORSFORD.

NEW YORK: J. C. DERBY, 119 NASSAU STREET. BOSTON: PHILLIPS, SAMPSON, & CO. CINCINNATI: H. W. DERBY. 1855.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1855, by MARY GARDINER HORSFORD, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

HOLMAN & GRAY, Printers and Stereotypers.

TO MY FATHER,

SAMUEL S. GARDINER, Esq.,

This Volume is Inscribed,

AS A

SLIGHT TESTIMONIAL OF A DAUGHTER'S GRATITUDE

AND AFFECTION.

[Pg vii]

CONTENTS.

[Pg 9]

INDIAN LEGENDS.

[Pg 11]

THE THUNDERBOLT.

There is an artless tradition among the Indians, related by Irving, of a warrior who saw the thunderbolt lying upon the ground, with a beautifully wrought moccasin on each side of it. Thinking he had found a prize, he put on the moccasins, but they bore him away to the land of spirits, whence he never returned.

[Pg 16]

THE PHANTOM BRIDE.

During the Revolutionary war, a young American lady was murdered, while dressed in her bridal robe, by a party of Indians, sent by her betrothed to conduct her to the village where he was encamped. After the deed was done, they carried her long hair to her lover, who, urged by a frantic despair, hurried to the spot to assure himself of the truth of the tale, and shortly after threw himself, in battle, on the swords of his countrymen. After this event, the Indians were never successful in their warfare, the spectre of their victim presenting itself continually between them and the enemy.

[Pg 23]

THE LAUGHING WATER.

The Indian name for the Falls of St. Anthony signifies "Laughing Water," and here tradition says that a young woman of the Dahcotah tribe, the father of her children having taken another wife, unmoored her canoe above the fall, and placing herself and children in it, sang her death-song as she went over the foaming declivity.

[Pg 27]

THE LAST OF THE RED MEN.

Travellers in Mexico have found the form of a serpent invariably pictured over the doorways of the Indian Temples, and on the interior walls, the impression of a red hand.

The superstitions attached to the phenomena of the thunderstorm and Aurora Borealis, alluded to in the poem, are well authenticated.

[Pg 35]

MISCELLANEOUS.

[Pg 37]

THE PILGRIMS' FAST.

The historical incident related in this poem is recorded in Cheever's "Journal of the Pilgrims."

[Pg 41]

PLEURS.

The town of Pleurs, situated among the Alps and containing about two thousand five hundred inhabitants, was overwhelmed in 1618 by the falling of Mount Conto. The avalanche occurred in the night, and no trace of the village or any of its inhabitants could ever after be discovered.

[Pg 47]