Chapter 5

..."In such a night Did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew;

And saw the lion's shadow ere himself." Merchant of Venice

The suddenness of the flight of his guide, and the wild

cries of the pursuers, caused Heyward to remain fixed, for a

few moments, in inactive surprise. Then recollecting the

importance of securing the fugitive, he dashed aside the

surrounding bushes, and pressed eagerly forward to lend his

aid in the chase. Before he had, however, proceeded a

hundred yards, he met the three foresters already returning

from their unsuccessful pursuit.

"Why so soon disheartened!" he exclaimed; "the scoundrel

must be concealed behind some of these trees, and may yet be

secured. We are not safe while he goes at large."

"Would you set a cloud to chase the wind?" returned the

disappointed scout; "I heard the imp brushing over the dry

leaves, like a black snake, and blinking a glimpse of him,

just over ag'in yon big pine, I pulled as it might be on the

scent; but 'twouldn't do! and yet for a reasoning aim, if

anybody but myself had touched the trigger, I should call it

a quick sight; and I may be accounted to have experience in

these matters, and one who ought to know. Look at this

sumach; its leaves are red, though everybody knows the fruit

is in the yellow blossom in the month of July!"

"'Tis the blood of Le Subtil! he is hurt, and may yet fall!"

"No, no," returned the scout, in decided disapprobation of

this opinion, "I rubbed the bark off a limb, perhaps, but

the creature leaped the longer for it. A rifle bullet acts

on a running animal, when it barks him, much the same as one

of your spurs on a horse; that is, it quickens motion, and

puts life into the flesh, instead of taking it away. But

when it cuts the ragged hole, after a bound or two, there

is, commonly, a stagnation of further leaping, be it Indian

or be it deer!"

"We are four able bodies, to one wounded man!"

"Is life grievous to you?" interrupted the scout. "Yonder

red devil would draw you within swing of the tomahawks of

his comrades, before you were heated in the chase. It was

an unthoughtful act in a man who has so often slept with the

war-whoop ringing in the air, to let off his piece within

sound of an ambushment! But then it was a natural

temptation! 'twas very natural! Come, friends, let us move

our station, and in such fashion, too, as will throw the

cunning of a Mingo on a wrong scent, or our scalps will be

drying in the wind in front of Montcalm's marquee, ag'in

this hour to-morrow."

This appalling declaration, which the scout uttered with the

cool assurance of a man who fully comprehended, while he did

not fear to face the danger, served to remind Heyward of the

importance of the charge with which he himself had been

intrusted. Glancing his eyes around, with a vain effort to

pierce the gloom that was thickening beneath the leafy

arches of the forest, he felt as if, cut off from human aid,

his unresisting companions would soon lie at the entire

mercy of those barbarous enemies, who, like beasts of prey,

only waited till the gathering darkness might render their

blows more fatally certain. His awakened imagination,

deluded by the deceptive light, converted each waving bush,

or the fragment of some fallen tree, into human forms, and

twenty times he fancied he could distinguish the horrid

visages of his lurking foes, peering from their hiding

places, in never ceasing watchfulness of the movements of

his party. Looking upward, he found that the thin fleecy

clouds, which evening had painted on the blue sky, were

already losing their faintest tints of rose-color, while the

imbedded stream, which glided past the spot where he stood,

was to be traced only by the dark boundary of its wooded

banks.

"What is to be done!" he said, feeling the utter

helplessness of doubt in such a pressing strait; "desert me

not, for God's sake! remain to defend those I escort, and

freely name your own reward!"

His companions, who conversed apart in the language of their

tribe, heeded not this sudden and earnest appeal. Though

their dialogue was maintained in low and cautious sounds,

but little above a whisper, Heyward, who now approached,

could easily distinguish the earnest tones of the younger

warrior from the more deliberate speeches of his seniors.

It was evident that they debated on the propriety of some

measure, that nearly concerned the welfare of the travelers.

Yielding to his powerful interest in the subject, and

impatient of a delay that seemed fraught with so much

additional danger, Heyward drew still nigher to the dusky

group, with an intention of making his offers of

compensation more definite, when the white man, motioning

with his hand, as if he conceded the disputed point, turned

away, saying in a sort of soliloquy, and in the English

tongue:

"Uncas is right! it would not be the act of men to leave

such harmless things to their fate, even though it breaks up

the harboring place forever. If you would save these tender

blossoms from the fangs of the worst of serpents, gentleman,

you have neither time to lose nor resolution to throw away!"

"How can such a wish be doubted! Have I not already offered

--"

"Offer your prayers to Him who can give us wisdom to

circumvent the cunning of the devils who fill these woods,"

calmly interrupted the scout, "but spare your offers of

money, which neither you may live to realize, nor I to

profit by. These Mohicans and I will do what man's thoughts

can invent, to keep such flowers, which, though so sweet,

were never made for the wilderness, from harm, and that

without hope of any other recompense but such as God always

gives to upright dealings. First, you must promise two

things, both in your own name and for your friends, or

without serving you we shall only injure ourselves!"

"Name them."

"The one is, to be still as these sleeping woods, let what

will happen and the other is, to keep the place where we

shall take you, forever a secret from all mortal men."

"I will do my utmost to see both these conditions

fulfilled."

"Then follow, for we are losing moments that are as precious

as the heart's blood to a stricken deer!"

Heyward could distinguish the impatient gesture of the

scout, through the increasing shadows of the evening, and he

moved in his footsteps, swiftly, toward the place where he

had left the remainder of the party. When they rejoined the

expecting and anxious females, he briefly acquainted them

with the conditions of their new guide, and with the

necessity that existed for their hushing every apprehension

in instant and serious exertions. Although his alarming

communication was not received without much secret terror by

the listeners, his earnest and impressive manner, aided

perhaps by the nature of the danger, succeeded in bracing

their nerves to undergo some unlooked-for and unusual trial.

Silently, and without a moment's delay, they permitted him

to assist them from their saddles, and when they descended

quickly to the water's edge, where the scout had collected

the rest of the party, more by the agency of expressive

gestures than by any use of words.

"What to do with these dumb creatures!" muttered the white

man, on whom the sole control of their future movements

appeared to devolve; "it would be time lost to cut their

throats, and cast them into the river; and to leave them

here would be to tell the Mingoes that they have not far to

seek to find their owners!"

"Then give them their bridles, and let them range the

woods," Heyward ventured to suggest.

"No; it would be better to mislead the imps, and make them

believe they must equal a horse's speed to run down their

chase. Ay, ay, that will blind their fireballs of eyes!

Chingach--Hist! what stirs the bush?"

"The colt."

"That colt, at least, must die," muttered the scout,

grasping at the mane of the nimble beast, which easily

eluded his hand; "Uncas, your arrows!"

"Hold!" exclaimed the proprietor of the condemned animal,

aloud, without regard to the whispering tones used by the

others; "spare the foal of Miriam! it is the comely

offspring of a faithful dam, and would willingly injure

naught."

"When men struggle for the single life God has given them,"

said the scout, sternly, "even their own kind seem no more

than the beasts of the wood. If you speak again, I shall

leave you to the mercy of the Maquas! Draw to your arrow's

head, Uncas; we have no time for second blows."

The low, muttering sounds of his threatening voice were

still audible, when the wounded foal, first rearing on its

hinder legs, plunged forward to its knees. It was met by

Chingachgook, whose knife passed across its throat quicker

than thought, and then precipitating the motions of the

struggling victim, he dashed into the river, down whose

stream it glided away, gasping audibly for breath with its

ebbing life. This deed of apparent cruelty, but of real

necessity, fell upon the spirits of the travelers like a

terrific warning of the peril in which they stood,

heightened as it was by the calm though steady resolution of

the actors in the scene. The sisters shuddered and clung

closer to each other, while Heyward instinctively laid his

hand on one of the pistols he had just drawn from their

holsters, as he placed himself between his charge and those

dense shadows that seemed to draw an impenetrable veil

before the bosom of the forest.

The Indians, however, hesitated not a moment, but taking the

bridles, they led the frightened and reluctant horses into

the bed of the river.

At a short distance from the shore they turned, and were

soon concealed by the projection of the bank, under the brow

of which they moved, in a direction opposite to the course

of the waters. In the meantime, the scout drew a canoe of

bark from its place of concealment beneath some low bushes,

whose branches were waving with the eddies of the current,

into which he silently motioned for the females to enter.

They complied without hesitation, though many a fearful and

anxious glance was thrown behind them, toward the thickening

gloom, which now lay like a dark barrier along the margin of

the stream.

So soon as Cora and Alice were seated, the scout, without

regarding the element, directed Heyward to support one side

of the frail vessel, and posting himself at the other, they

bore it up against the stream, followed by the dejected

owner of the dead foal. In this manner they proceeded, for

many rods, in a silence that was only interrupted by the

rippling of the water, as its eddies played around them, or

the low dash made by their own cautious footsteps. Heyward

yielded the guidance of the canoe implicitly to the scout,

who approached or receded from the shore, to avoid the

fragments of rocks, or deeper parts of the river, with a

readiness that showed his knowledge of the route they held.

Occasionally he would stop; and in the midst of a breathing

stillness, that the dull but increasing roar of the

waterfall only served to render more impressive, he would

listen with painful intenseness, to catch any sounds that

might arise from the slumbering forest. When assured that

all was still, and unable to detect, even by the aid of his

practiced senses, any sign of his approaching foes, he would

deliberately resume his slow and guarded progress. At

length they reached a point in the river where the roving

eye of Heyward became riveted on a cluster of black objects,

collected at a spot where the high bank threw a deeper

shadow than usual on the dark waters. Hesitating to

advance, he pointed out the place to the attention of his

companion.

"Ay," returned the composed scout, "the Indians have hid the

beasts with the judgment of natives! Water leaves no trail,

and an owl's eyes would be blinded by the darkness of such a

hole."

The whole party was soon reunited, and another consultation

was held between the scout and his new comrades, during

which, they, whose fates depended on the faith and ingenuity

of these unknown foresters, had a little leisure to observe

their situation more minutely.

The river was confined between high and cragged rocks, one

of which impended above the spot where the canoe rested. As

these, again, were surmounted by tall trees, which appeared

to totter on the brows of the precipice, it gave the stream

the appearance of running through a deep and narrow dell.

All beneath the fantastic limbs and ragged tree tops, which

were, here and there, dimly painted against the starry

zenith, lay alike in shadowed obscurity. Behind them, the

curvature of the banks soon bounded the view by the same

dark and wooded outline; but in front, and apparently at no

great distance, the water seemed piled against the heavens,

whence it tumbled into caverns, out of which issued those

sullen sounds that had loaded the evening atmosphere. It

seemed, in truth, to be a spot devoted to seclusion, and the

sisters imbibed a soothing impression of security, as they

gazed upon its romantic though not unappalling beauties. A

general movement among their conductors, however, soon

recalled them from a contemplation of the wild charms that

night had assisted to lend the place to a painful sense of

their real peril.

The horses had been secured to some scattering shrubs that

grew in the fissures of the rocks, where, standing in the

water, they were left to pass the night. The scout directed

Heyward and his disconsolate fellow travelers to seat

themselves in the forward end of the canoe, and took

possession of the other himself, as erect and steady as if

he floated in a vessel of much firmer materials. The

Indians warily retraced their steps toward the place they

had left, when the scout, placing his pole against a rock,

by a powerful shove, sent his frail bark directly into the

turbulent stream. For many minutes the struggle between the

light bubble in which they floated and the swift current was

severe and doubtful. Forbidden to stir even a hand, and

almost afraid to breath, lest they should expose the frail

fabric to the fury of the stream, the passengers watched the

glancing waters in feverish suspense. Twenty times they

thought the whirling eddies were sweeping them to

destruction, when the masterhand of their pilot would bring

the bows of the canoe to stem the rapid. A long, a

vigorous, and, as it appeared to the females, a desperate

effort, closed the struggle. Just as Alice veiled her eyes

in horror, under the impression that they were about to be

swept within the vortex at the foot of the cataract, the

canoe floated, stationary, at the side of a flat rock, that

lay on a level with the water.

"Where are we, and what is next to be done!" demanded

Heyward, perceiving that the exertions of the scout had

ceased.

"You are at the foot of Glenn's," returned the other,

speaking aloud, without fear of consequences within the roar

of the cataract; "and the next thing is to make a steady

landing, lest the canoe upset, and you should go down again

the hard road we have traveled faster than you came up; 'tis

a hard rift to stem, when the river is a little swelled; and

five is an unnatural number to keep dry, in a hurry-skurry,

with a little birchen bark and gum. There, go you all on

the rock, and I will bring up the Mohicans with the venison.

A man had better sleep without his scalp, than famish in the

midst of plenty."

His passengers gladly complied with these directions. As

the last foot touched the rock, the canoe whirled from its

station, when the tall form of the scout was seen, for an

instant, gliding above the waters, before it disappeared in

the impenetrable darkness that rested on the bed of the

river. Left by their guide, the travelers remained a few

minutes in helpless ignorance, afraid even to move along the

broken rocks, lest a false step should precipitate them down

some one of the many deep and roaring caverns, into which

the water seemed to tumble, on every side of them. Their

suspense, however, was soon relieved; for, aided by the

skill of the natives, the canoe shot back into the eddy, and

floated again at the side of the low rock, before they

thought the scout had even time to rejoin his companions.

"We are now fortified, garrisoned, and provisioned," cried

Heyward cheerfully, "and may set Montcalm and his allies at

defiance. How, now, my vigilant sentinel, can see anything

of those you call the Iroquois, on the main land!"

"I call them Iroquois, because to me every native, who

speaks a foreign tongue, is accounted an enemy, though he

may pretend to serve the king! If Webb wants faith and

honesty in an Indian, let him bring out the tribes of the

Delawares, and send these greedy and lying Mohawks and

Oneidas, with their six nations of varlets, where in nature

they belong, among the French!"

"We should then exchange a warlike for a useless friend! I

have heard that the Delawares have laid aside the hatchet,

and are content to be called women!"

"Aye, shame on the Hollanders and Iroquois, who circumvented

them by their deviltries, into such a treaty! But I have

known them for twenty years, and I call him liar that says

cowardly blood runs in the veins of a Delaware. You have

driven their tribes from the seashore, and would now believe

what their enemies say, that you may sleep at night upon an

easy pillow. No, no; to me, every Indian who speaks a

foreign tongue is an Iroquois, whether the castle* of his

tribe be in Canada, or be in York."

* The principal villages of the Indians are still

called "castles" by the whites of New York. "Oneida castle"

is no more than a scattered hamlet; but the name is in

general use.

Heyward, perceiving that the stubborn adherence of the scout

to the cause of his friends the Delawares, or Mohicans, for

they were branches of the same numerous people, was likely

to prolong a useless discussion, changed the subject.

"Treaty or no treaty, I know full well that your two

companions are brave and cautious warriors! have they heard

or seen anything of our enemies!"

"An Indian is a mortal to be felt afore he is seen,"

returned the scout, ascending the rock, and throwing the

deer carelessly down. "I trust to other signs than such as

come in at the eye, when I am outlying on the trail of the

Mingoes."

"Do your ears tell you that they have traced our retreat?"

"I should be sorry to think they had, though this is a spot

that stout courage might hold for a smart scrimmage. I will

not deny, however, but the horses cowered when I passed

them, as though they scented the wolves; and a wolf is a

beast that is apt to hover about an Indian ambushment,

craving the offals of the deer the savages kill."

"You forget the buck at your feet! or, may we not owe their

visit to the dead colt? Ha! what noise is that?"

"Poor Miriam!" murmured the stranger; "thy foal was

foreordained to become a prey to ravenous beasts!" Then,

suddenly lifting up his voice, amid the eternal din of the

waters, he sang aloud: "First born of Egypt, smite did he,

Of mankind, and of beast also: O, Egypt! wonders sent 'midst

thee, On Pharaoh and his servants too!"

"The death of the colt sits heavy on the heart of its

owner," said the scout; "but it's a good sign to see a man

account upon his dumb friends. He has the religion of the

matter, in believing what is to happen will happen; and with

such a consolation, it won't be long afore he submits to the

rationality of killing a four-footed beast to save the lives

of human men. It may be as you say," he continued,

reverting to the purport of Heyward's last remark; "and the

greater the reason why we should cut our steaks, and let the

carcass drive down the stream, or we shall have the pack

howling along the cliffs, begrudging every mouthful we

swallow. Besides, though the Delaware tongue is the same as

a book to the Iroquois, the cunning varlets are quick enough

at understanding the reason of a wolf's howl."

The scout, while making his remarks, was busied in

collecting certain necessary implements; as he concluded, he

moved silently by the group of travelers, accompanied by the

Mohicans, who seemed to comprehend his intentions with

instinctive readiness, when the whole three disappeared in

succession, seeming to vanish against the dark face of a

perpendicular rock that rose to the height of a few yards,

within as many feet of the water's edge.

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