CHAPTER

      I the request for aid
     II A perilous venture
    III A visit to the flag-ship
     IV we hold A council of war
      V on the deck of the “Santa Maria”
     VI the role of pere Cassati
    VII the chevalier de Noyan
   VIII favored of the gods
     IX the birth of the death-dawn
      X A covert in the cane
     XI A night in the boat
    XII we land an odd fish
   XIII we gain A new recruit
    XIV the mouth of the Arkansas
     XV A passage at arms
    XVI we change our course
   XVII we meet with an accident
  XVIII A hard day’s March
    XIX demon, or what? 
     XX backs to the wall
    XXI the stronghold of the Natchez
   XXII prisoners in the temple
  XXIII the vote of death
   XXIV the daughter of the sun
    XXV A visitant from the sun
   XXVI the chronicles of the Natchez
  XXVII A venture in the dark
 XXVIII speech with Naladi
   XXIX in and out the shadow
    XXX underground
   XXXI we mount the cliff
  XXXII chief priest of the sun
 XXXIII pere Andre Lafossier
  XXXIV the tale of the priest
   XXXV night and the savages
  XXXVI the interference of the Jesuit
 XXXVII the dead bury their dead

ILLUSTRATIONS

I could merely clasp the hands she gave so unreservedly into my keeping, gaze into the depths of her dark eyes, and murmur a few broken words of confidence and farewell. . . . Frontispiece

Had I ventured upon a smile at his predicament he would have popped instantly forth again.

“I am the Daughter of the Sun.  These are my children, given unto me by the great Sun-god. . . .  None of white blood may set foot in this valley and live.”

The woman stood gazing intently down, her red robe sweeping to her feet; below the flaring torches in the hands of her barbaric followers cast their light full upon her.

FOREWORD

The manuscript of this tale has been in my possession several years.  It reached me through natural lines of inheritance, but remained nearly forgotten, until a chance reading revealed a certain historic basis; then, making note of correspondences in minor details, I realized that what I had cast aside as mere fiction might possess a substantial foundation of fact.  Impelled by this conviction, I now submit the narrative to public inspection, that others, better fitted than I, may judge as to the worth of this Geoffrey Benteen.

According to the earlier records of Louisiana Province, Geoffrey Benteen was, during his later years, a resident of La Petite Rocher, a man of note and character among his fellows.  There he died in old age, leaving no indication of the extent of his knowledge, other than what is to be found in the yellowed pages of his manuscript; and these afford no evidence that this “Gentleman Adventurer” possessed any information derived from books regarding those relics of a prehistoric people, which are widely scattered throughout the Middle and Southern States of the Union and constitute the grounds on which our century has applied to the race the term “Mound Builders.”