“Moodie’s squaw know much—­make Peter Nogan toder day on papare—­make Jacob to-day—­Jacob young—­great hunter—­give much duck—­venison—­to squaw.”

Although I felt rather afraid of my fierce-looking visitor, I could scarcely keep my gravity; there was such an air of pompous self-approbation about the Indian, such a sublime look of conceit in his grave vanity.

“Moodie’s squaw cannot do everything; she cannot paint young men,” said I, rising, and putting away my drawing-materials, upon which he kept his eye intently fixed, with a hungry, avaricious expression.  I thought it best to place the coveted objects beyond his reach.  After sitting for some time, and watching all my movements, he withdrew, with a sullen, disappointed air.

This man was handsome, but his expression was vile.  Though he often came to the house, I never could reconcile myself to his countenance.

Late one very dark, stormy night, three Indians begged to be allowed to sleep by the kitchen stove.  The maid was frightened out of her wits at the sight of these strangers, who were Mohawks from the Indian woods upon the Bay of Quinte, and they brought along with them a horse and cutter.  The night was so stormy, that, after consulting our man—­Jacob Faithful, as we usually called him—­I consented to grant their petition, although they were quite strangers, and taller and fiercer-looking than our friends the Missasaguas.

I was putting my children to bed, when the girl came rushing in, out of breath.  “The Lord preserve us, madam, if one of these wild men has not pulled off his trousers, and is a-sitting, mending them behind the stove! and what shall I do?”

“Do?—­why, stay with me, and leave the poor fellow to finish his work.”

The simple girl had never once thought of this plan of pacifying her outraged sense of propriety.

Their sense of hearing is so acute that they can distinguish sounds at an incredible distance, which cannot be detected by a European at all.  I myself witnessed a singular exemplification of this fact.  It was mid-winter; the Indians had pitched their tent, or wigwam, as usual, in our swamp.  All the males were absent on a hunting expedition up the country, and had left two women behind to take care of the camp and its contents, Mrs. Tom Nogan and her children, and Susan Moore, a young girl of fifteen, and the only truly beautiful squaw I ever saw.  There was something interesting about this girl’s history, as well as her appearance.  Her father had been drowned during a sudden hurricane, which swamped his canoe on Stony Lake; and the mother, who witnessed the accident from the shore, and was near her confinement with this child, boldly swam out to his assistance.  She reached the spot where he sank, and even succeeded in recovering the body; but it was too late; the man was dead.

The soul of an Indian that has been drowned is reckoned accursed, and he is never permitted to join his tribe on the happy hunting-grounds, but his spirit haunts the lake or river in which he lost his life.  His body is buried on some lonely island, which the Indians never pass without leaving a small portion of food, tobacco, ammunition, to supply his wants; but he is never interred with the rest of his people.