KINEO.

Kineo, as a boy, grew up with more than usual Indian taciturnity, and with ever-increasing gloominess of disposition. His mother, Maquaso, watched the development of these characteristics with anxiety. He gave so little heed to her solicitude that when she suddenly disappeared, suspicion at once fell upon him, and he was excluded from the councils of his tribe. He departed, and encamped on a neighboring mountain. The rest of the story is told in the lines which follow.

WHILE quietly the water laps the shore,

And scarce the breathing of the moonlit night

Rustles the leaves of yonder birchen trees,

Listen awhile. The languor of the scene

Befits the tale of him who, fierce erewhile, -

The stoutest warrior of a warrior tribe,

The bulwark of his race, - at last retired,

And, where yon dark and lowering precipice

Looms on the bluish mountain's shaggy side,

Night after night surveyed with keen-eyed glance

The spreading landscape; nor did thought of arms

Or battle rouse him from intent repose,

Or interrupt his everlasting gaze.

And never did the all-surveying sun,

With heart-inflaming vision, cast his rays

More earnestly on lovely heliotrope

Than did this Indian warrior's steady eye

Measure the liquid outline of the hills.

Once only when the shout of contest loud

Sprang from the vale, rebounded from the hill,

And leaped to die in echoes on the lake, -

Once only, like the bright Dioscuri,

Sons of the sky and brothers of the day,

Did Kineo i' the foremost of the fight

Appear, and, by his single-handed strength,

Thrust back defeat upon the enemy.

Once only - and no sooner had the shout

Of joy proclaimed his kinsmen's victory

Than he was gone, ne'er to be seen again.

Stretched at full length above the towering rock,

Still with unswerving eyes he scanned the lake

And distant hills; nor recked he of the blood

Which gushed in quick pulsations from his side

And stained the unfeeling rock; nor did he see

The deer who gazed with large and wondering eyes

From out their bushy coverts. Seemed he less

Like man than like the reflex and impress

Of what he saw, - the scene personified.

But once, when overhead a comet's tail,

Omen of strange import, illumed the night,

His yearning eyes descried upon the side

Of what has since been called "Maquaso's Mount"

A solitary fire. Then his heart

Gave one great bound, and quivered with intense

And dread excitement, while his flying feet,

Swifter than hers who spurned the lingering seas,

Bore him across the land that lay between.

And as her dear-remembered warrior son,

Once more her own, approached the wigwam low,

Maquaso gave one tender dying cry,

And fell, a happy mother, on his neck.

True souls, who loved with such devoted hearts,

That she from separation did not shrink

For her son's comfort, and he could not live

With others in her absence. Faithful hearts,

To whom the petty joys of village life

Were nothing when they could not firmly clasp

Each other in undying sympathy.

W. P. E.