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Thus, the region indicated as "over the divide" meaning
the continental water-shed-or "over the range" came to signify not a
delectable land alone, but a sum of delectable conditions, and,
ultimately, the goal of posthumous delights. Hence the phrase in use
to-day: "Poor Bill! He's gone over the divide."
The
Indian's
name of heaven--"the happy hunting ground"--is of similar
significance, and among many of the tribes it had a definite place in
the far Southwest, to which their souls were carried on cobweb floats.
Just before reaching it they came to a dark river that had to be
crossed on a log. If they had been good in the world of the living
they suffered no harm from the rocks and surges, but if their lives
had been evil they never reached the farther shore, for they were
swept into a place of whirlpools, where, for ever and ever, they were
tossed on the torrent amid thousands of clinging, stinging snakes and
shoals of putrid fish. From the far North and East the Milky Way was
the star-path across the divide.
Compiled and
edited by
Kathy Weiser/Legends
of America, updated March,
2010.
About the Author: Charles M.
Skinner (1852-1907) authored the complete nine volume set of Myths
and Legends of Our Own Land in 1896. This tale is excerpted
from these excellent works, which are now in the public domain.
Book your
lodging right
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