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By Root 1314 0

them, that might have been done and it was done, too, atween the Sarpent, yonder, and me, when we were on the trail of Hist”—here the hunter stopped to laugh in his own silent fashion—“but it’s no easy matter to sarcumvent the sarcumvented. Even the fa‘ans get to know the tricks of the hunters afore a single season is over; and an Indian, whose eyes have once been opened by a sarcumvention, never shuts them ag’in in precisely the same spot. I’ve known whites to do that, but never a redskin. What they l‘arn comes by practice, and not by books; and of all schoolmasters, exper’ence gives lessons that are the longest remembered.”

“All this is true, Deerslayer; but if you have not escaped from the savages, how came you here?”

“That’s a nat’ral question, and charmingly put. You are wonderful handsome this evening, Judith, or Wild Rose, as the Sarpent calls you, and I may as well say it, since I honestly think it. You may well call them Mingos savages, too, for savage enough do they feel, and savage enough will they act, if you once give them an opportunity. They feel their loss here, in the late skrimmage, to their hearts’ cores, and are ready to revenge it on any creatur’ of English blood that may fall in their way. Nor, for that matter, do I much think they would stand at taking their satisfaction out of a Dutchman.”

“They have killed father; that ought to satisfy their wicked cravings for blood,” observed Hetty, reproachfully.

“I know it, gal—I know the whole story; partly from what I’ve seen from the shore, since they brought me up from the point, and partly from their threats ag‘in myself, and their other discourse. Well, life is unsartain at the best, and we all depend on the breath of our nostrils for it, from day to day. If you’ve lost a staunch fri’nd, as I make no doubt you have, Providence will raise up new ones in his stead; and since our acquaintance has begun in this oncommon manner, I shall take it as a hint that it will be part of my duty in futur’, should the occasion offer, to see you don’t suffer for want of food in the wigwam. I can’t bring the dead to life, but as to feeding the living, there’s few on all this frontier can outdo me, though I say it in the way of pity and consolation like, and, in no particular, in the way of boasting!”

“We understand you, Deerslayer,” returned Judith hastily, “and take all that falls from your lips, as it is meant, in kindness and friendship. Would to heaven all men had tongues as true, and hearts as honest!”

“In that respect men do differ, of a sartainty, Judith. I’ve known them that wasn’t to be trusted any farther than you can see them; and others ag’in whose messages, sent with a small piece of wampum, perhaps, might just as much be depended on, as if the whole business was finished afore your face. Yes, Judith, you never said truer words, than when you said some men might be depended on, and some others might not.”

“You are an unaccountable being, Deerslayer,” returned the girl, not a little puzzled with the childish simplicity of character that the hunter so often betrayed—a simplicity so striking, that it frequently appeared to place him nearly on a level with the fatuity of poor Hetty, though always relieved by the beautiful moral truth that shone through all that this unfortunate girl both said and did. “You are a most unaccountable man, and I often do not know how to understand you. But never mind, just now; you have forgotten to tell us by what means you are here.”

“I!—O! That’s not very onaccountable, if I am myself, Judith. I’m out on furlough.”1

“Furlough! That word has a meaning among the soldiers that I understand; I cannot tell what it signifies when used by a prisoner.”

“It means just the same. You’re right enough; the soldiers do use it, and just in the same way as I use it. A furlough is when a man has leave to quit a camp, or a garrison, for a sartain specified time; at the end of which he is to come back and shoulder his musket, or submit to his torments, just as he may happen to be a soldier, or a captyve. Being the last, I must take the chances