And nobody ever did find fault and soon was the affair almost forgotten, for now the merry jingling of more dog bells was heard, and who should come into the wigwam of Kinnesasis but the parents of Sagastao and Minnehaha!

Cordially were they greeted.  At first it was difficult for them to recognize the staid little gentleman in his full suit of broadcloth as the lively but generally ill-clothed Kinnesasis.  The visitors—­who quickly saw and were delighted with the transformation—­greeted him as though he were some distinguished stranger.  This vastly amused the children.  Screaming with laughter at Kinnesasis’s pretense of keeping up the farce, they shouted out, “Why, this is only our dear old Kinnesasis.  He is no great stranger.  It is only Kinnesasis with his new clothes.”

“Well,” then was asked, “who is that charming old lady over there with such a fine shawl and brilliant handkerchief on, and such fancy new shoes on her feet?  Surely she is a stranger.”

“No!  No!” the children again shouted.  “Why, that is Kinnesasis’s wife, with her new presents on!  My! doesn’t she look nice!”

Here the little ones seized hold of the happy old Indian woman and made her get up and show herself off in her new apparel, of which she was just as proud as Kinnesasis.

“And she gave us such a jolly dance in them, papa!  Wouldn’t you like to see her do it again?” cried Minnehaha.

But here Kinnesasis, pretending to be shocked beyond measure, in a most diplomatic manner directed the attention of the parents to some other matter, and so the mischievous child did not succeed in making a church scandal by inducing one of the flock to dance before the missionary.

“Tell us, Kinnesasis,” said Sagastao, “how it was that that old man and his daughters first obtained the fire which Nanahboozhoo so cleverly stole from them and gave to the Indians long ago.”

At first Kinnesasis hesitated about telling the old legend, saying that he did not think the father and mother of the children would care for such stories.

“Don’t they, though!” cried the children.  “You don’t know them very well, then, if you don’t know that they like stories just about as well as we do.”

And with this they at once appealed to the parents, who of course sided with them and expressed their desire to listen to this story that the children had told them they were to hear from dear old Kinnesasis.

Throwing some more logs on the fire, around which the white visitors with the Indians gathered, Kinnesasis began: 

“It was long ago, when I was a young lad, that I heard the story from the old story-tellers of our people.  I had traveled with my father for many days far toward the setting sun.  We reached the land of the great mountains, and there, with our people of those regions, we spent some moons.  It was while we were among them that I heard from the ancient story-teller the legend of how the fire was stolen from the center of the earth, where it was kept hidden away from the human family.