whom we missionaries preach to you, and who is the great head of our church.  Although the Jews, or Israelites, as we call that people, were thus honored and thus favored of the Manitou, they were but men, they had the weaknesses of men.  On more than one occasion they displeased the Great Spirit, and that so seriously as to draw down condign punishment on themselves, and on their wives and children.  In various ways were they visited for their backsliding and sins, each time repenting and receiving forgiveness.  At length the Great Spirit, tired of their forgetfulness and crimes, allowed an army to come into their land, and to carry away as captives no less than ten of their twelve tribes; putting their people in strange hunting-grounds.  Now, this happened many thousands of moons since, and no one can say with certainty what has become of those captives, whom Christians are accustomed to call ‘the lost tribes of Israel.’”

Here the missionary paused to arrange his thoughts, and a slight murmur was heard in the circle as the chiefs communed together, in interested comments on what had just been said.  The pause, however, was short, and the speaker again proceeded, safe from any ungracious interruption, among auditors so trained in self-restraint.

“Children, I shall not now say anything touching the birth of Christ, the redemption of the world, and the history of the two tribes that remained in the land where God had placed his people; for that is a part of the subject that comes properly within the scope of my ordinary teaching.  At present I wish only to speak of yourselves; of the red man of America, of his probable origin and end, and of a great discovery that many of us think we have made, on this most interesting topic in the history of the good book.  Does any one present know aught of the ten lost tribes of whom I have spoken?”

Eye met eye, and expectation was lively among those primitive and untaught savages.  At length Crowsfeather arose to answer, the missionary standing the whole time, motionless, as if waiting for a reply.

“My brother has told us a tradition,” said the Pottawattamie.  “It is a good tradition.  It is a strange tradition.  Red men love to hear such traditions.  It is wonderful that so many as ten tribes should be lost, at the same time, and no one know what has become of them!  My brother asks us if we know what has become of these ten tribes.  How should poor red men, who live on their hunting-grounds, and who are busy when the grass grows in getting together food for their squaws and pappooses, against a time when the buffalo can find nothing to eat in this part of the world, know anything of a people that they never saw?  My brother has asked a question that he only can answer.  Let him tell us where these ten tribes are to be found, if he knows the place.  We should like to go and look at them.”