“Certainly it is not pleasant,” replied her father; “but I once dined in Boston, at a house of high civilization, where the odor of venison and of Stilton cheese produced much more internal disturbance than I have ever experienced from any of their Indian messes.”

This philosophical way of viewing the subject was thought by some of the neighbors to be assumed, as the best mode of concealing wounded pride.  They said, in compassionate tones, that they really did pity the Whartons; for, let them say what they would, it must be dreadfully mortifying to have that squaw about.  But if such a feeling was ever remotely hinted to Uncle George, he quietly replied,—­

“So far from feeling ashamed of A-lee-lah, we are truly grateful to her; and we are deeply thankful that William married her.  His love for her safely bridges over the wide chasm between his savage and his civilized life.  Without her, he could not feel at home among us; and the probability is that we should not be able to keep him.  By help of his Indian wife, I think we shall make him contented, and finally succeed in winning them over to our mode of life.  Meanwhile, they are happy in their own way, and we are thankful for it.”

The more enlightened portion of the community commended these sentiments as liberal and wise; but some, who were not distinguished either for moral or intellectual culture, said, sneeringly,—­

“They talk about his Indian wife!  I suppose they jumped over a stick together in some dirty wigwam, and that they call being married!”

Uncle George and Aunt Mary had been so long in the habit of regulating their actions by their own principles, that they scarcely had a passing curiosity to know what such neighbors thought of their proceedings.  They never wavered in their faith that persevering kindness and judicious non-interference would gradually produce such transformations as they desired.  No changes were proposed, till they and their untutored guests had become familiarly acquainted and mutually attached.  At first, the wild young couple were indisposed to stay much in the house.  They wandered far off into the woods, and spent most of their time in making mats and baskets.  As these were always admired by their civilized relatives, and gratefully accepted, they were happier than millionnaires.  They talked to each other altogether in the Indian dialect, which greatly retarded their improvement in English.  But it was thus they had talked when they first made love, and it was, moreover, the only way in which their tongues could move unfettered.  Her language no longer sounded to William like “lingo,” as he had styled it in the boyish days when he found her wandering alone on the prairie.  No utterance of the human soul, whether in the form of language or belief, is “lingo,” when we stand on the same spiritual plane with the speaker, and thus can rightly understand it.