[CJ] E-tan-can—­Chief.

Young and fair was Ape-duta[CK]—­full of craft and very fair;
Proud she walked a queen of beauty with her dark, abundant hair. 
In her net of hair she caught him—­caught Wanata with her wiles;
All in vain his wife besought him—­begged in vain his wonted smiles. 
Ape-duta ruled the teepee—­all Wanata’s smiles were hers;
When the lodge was wrapped in sleep a star[CL] beheld the mother’s tears. 
Long she strove to do her duty for the black-eyed babe she bore;
But the proud, imperious beauty made her sad forevermore. 
Still she dressed the skins of beaver, bore the burdens, spread the fare;
Patient ever, murmuring never, though her cheeks were creased with care. 
In the moon Maga-o kada, [71] twice an hundred years ago—­
Ere the “Black Robe’s"[CM] sacred shadow
          stalked the prairies’ pathless snow—­
Down the swollen, rushing river, in the sunset’s golden hues,
From the hunt of bear and beaver came the band in swift canoes. 
On the queen of fairy islands, on the Wita Waste’s [CN] shore
Camped Wanata, on the highlands just above the cataract’s roar. 
Many braves were with Wanata; Ape-duta, too, was there,
And the sad Anpetu-sapa spread the lodge with wonted care. 
Then above the leafless prairie leaped the fat-faced, laughing moon,
And the stars—­the spirits fairy—­walked the welkin one by one. 
Swift and silent in the gloaming on the waste of waters blue,
Speeding downward to the foaming, shot Wanata’s birch canoe. 
In it stood Anpetu-sapa—­in her arms her sleeping child;
Like a wailing Norse-land drapa [CO] rose her death-song weird and wild: 

[CK] A-pe—­leaf,—­duta—­Scarlet,—­Scarlet leaf

[CL] Stars, the Dakotas say, are the faces of the departed watching over their friends and relatives on earth.

[CM] The Dakotas called the Jesuit priests “Black Robes,” from the color of their vestments.

[CN] Wee-tah Wah-stay—­Beautiful Island,—­the Dakota name for Nicollet Island, just above the Falls.

[CO] Drapa, a Norse funeral wail in which the virtues of the deceased are recounted.

[Illustration:  ANPETU-SAPA]

  Mihihna,[CP] Mihihna, my heart is stone;
    The light is gone from my longing eyes;
  The wounded loon in the lake alone
    Her death-song sings to the moon and dies.

  Mihihna, Mihihna, the path is long,
    The burden is heavy and hard to bear;
  I sink—­I die, and my dying song
    Is a song of joy to the false one’s ear.

  Mihihna, Mihihna, my young heart flew
    Far away with my brave to the bison-chase;
  To the battle it went with my warrior true,
    And never returned till I saw his face.

  Mihihna, Mihihna, my brave was glad
    When he came from the chase of the roebuck fleet;
  Sweet were the words that my hunter said
    As his trophies he laid at Anpetu’s feet.