last that will be recorded.* The Irrekees, or six nations, supported by the English, were at war with the Indian allies of the French at Michillimakinak. A famous Irrekee warrior was taken prisoner in a skirmish, and doomed to the stake. The execution took place in front of the fort, and, by order of the commander, the Outiaks, an allied tribe, were invited "to drink the broth of their enemies." A strong post was fixed firmly in the earth, fires were prepared, and ramrods and old gun-barrels were heated. The Irrekee chief, naked and painted black, was marched into the middle of the circle, singing his death-song. He was fastened to the post strongly, by his hands and feet, yet with liberty to move about. Then commenced the operations. A French trader seized a ramrod, being made red-hot at one end, and an Outiak chief another; they drew the irons across the feet, and slowly up the insides of the legs and thighs, the victim singing his death-song all the time without flinching; they then suddenly applied the bottom of a metal pan, heated red-hot, to his thighs, rubbing it on his hips and loins. He now shouted out loud, that fire was powerful; upon which the whole assemblage gave a shout of triumph : "You a warrior chief, indeed!" they cried, "you shrink from the fire like a child-you are no man!" An Outiak then

* Histoire de l'Amerique Septentrionale par M. de la Potherie, tom. ii.

made a long slash down his side, and stuffed the wound with gunpowder, to which he set fire. The prisoner, scorched and parched to a cinder, cried out for water, which was given him, not for his relief, but to enable him to suffer still worse. An Indian with a scalping-knife now stepped forward and tore off the scalp, which hung down his neck, whilst another clapped a platter of red-hot gravel on the denuded cranium. The tortured wretch now lost all his fortitude, and abandoned himself to despair, attempting to beat out his brains against the post. His tormentors all the time were shouting with joy, and insulting him with the most cutting railleries. He was thus tortured without the least relaxation for more than two hours! At length, when he became feeble and faint, they unloosed him, and said, "Now be off, we give you your life!" He, bleeding and burnt at every pore and fibre, tumbled about, rising and falling like a drunken man. They drove him towards the setting sun, the road to the shades, pelting him with stones, which he had still spirit enough to return on his pursuers. At length he was crushed to death under a heap of stones, and every one cut off a small slice of flesh to be broiled, and thus to finish the horrible feast.

THE FALLING OF THE LEAF.

BY THE REV. THOMAS RAFFLES, LL. D.

CH, mortal man! the falling leaf,
In solemn silence, speaks to thee :-
"Thy stay on earth, like our's, is brief,
And man is but a fading tree.

Thy spring of youth is quickly past;
Thy manhood's summer sheds its bloom;
Then age, like autumn's chilling blast,
Brings on the winter of the tomb."

But spring returns, and trees again
Put on their foliage, fresh and green;

But nought of man shall e'er remain
To mark the place where he hath been.

Yet, in a brighter, happier state,
They that believe in Jesus rise;
A fairer spring shall them await,
And endless summer in the skies.