From that moment he bestowed all his care on the achievement of his revenge, and the maintenance of his martial character.
Throwing himself on his horse, he made a sign, with the air of a prince to his followers, to imitate his example, interrupting, without ceremony, the war songs and solemn rites by which many among them were stimulating their spirits to deeds of daring.
When all were in order, the whole moved with great steadiness and silence towards the margin of the river.
The hostile bands were now separated by the water.
The width of the stream was too great to admit of the use of the ordinary Indian missiles, but a few useless shots were exchanged from the fusees of the chiefs, more in bravado than with any expectation of doing execution.
As some time was suffered to elapse, in demonstrations and abortive efforts, we shall leave them, for that period, to return to such of our characters as remained in the hands of the savages.
We have shed much ink in vain, and wasted quires, that might possibly have been better employed, if it be necessary now to tell the reader that few of the foregoing movements escaped the observation of the experienced trapper.
He had been, in common with the rest, astonished at the sudden act of Hard-Heart; and there was a single moment when a feeling of regret and mortification got the better of his longings to save the life of the youth.
The simple and well-intentioned old man would have felt, at witnessing any failure of firmness on the part of a warrior, who had so strongly excited his sympathies, the same species of sorrow that a Christian parent would suffer in hanging over the dying moments of an impious child.
But when, instead of an impotent and unmanly struggle for existence, he found that his friend had forborne, with the customary and dignified submission of an Indian warrior, until an opportunity had offered to escape, and that he had then manifested the spirit and decision of the most gifted brave, his gratification became nearly too powerful to be concealed.
In the midst of the wailing and commotion, which succeeded the death of Weucha and the escape of the captive, he placed himself nigh the persons of his white associates, with a determination of interfering, at every hazard, should the fury of the savages take that direction.
The appearance of the hostile band spared him, however, so desperate and probably so fruitless an effort, and left him to pursue his observations, and to mature his plans more at leisure.
He particularly remarked that, while by far the greater part of the women, and all the children, together with the effects of the party, were hurried to the rear, probably with an order to secrete themselves in some of the adjacent woods, the tent of Mahtoree himself was left standing, and its contents undisturbed.
Two chosen horses, however, stood near by, held by a couple of youths, who were too young to go into the conflict, and yet of an age to understand the management of the beasts.
The trapper perceived in this arrangement the reluctance of Mahtoree to trust his newly-found flowers beyond the reach of his eye; and, at the same time, his forethought in providing against a reverse of fortune.
Neither had the manner of the Teton, in giving his commission to the old savage, nor the fierce pleasure with which the latter had received the bloody charge, escaped his observation.
From all these mysterious movements, the old man was aware that a crisis was at hand, and he summoned the utmost knowledge he had acquired, in so long a life, to aid him in the desperate conjuncture.
While musing on the means to be employed, the Doctor again attracted his attention to himself, by a piteous appeal for assistance.
“Venerable trapper, or, as I may now say, liberator,” commenced the dolorous Obed, “it would seem, that a fitting time has at length arrived to dissever the unnatural and altogether irregular connection, which exists between my inferior members and the body of Asinus.
Perhaps if such a portion of my limbs were released as might leave me master of the remainder, and this favourable opportunity were suitably improved, by making a forced march towards the settlements, all hopes of preserving the treasures of knowledge, of which I am the unworthy receptacle, would not be lost.
The importance of the results is surely worth the hazard of the experiment.”
“I know not, I know not,” returned the deliberate old man; “the vermin and reptiles, which you bear about you, were intended by the Lord for the prairies, and I see no good in sending them into regions that may not suit their natur’s.
And, moreover, you may be of great and particular use as you now sit on the ass, though it creates no wonder in my mind to perceive that you are ignorant of it, seeing that usefulness is altogether a new calling to so bookish a man.”
“Of what service can I be in this painful thraldom, in which the animal functions are in a manner suspended, and the spiritual, or intellectual, blinded by the secret sympathy that unites mind to matter?
There is likely to be blood spilt between yonder adverse hosts of heathens; and, though but little desiring the office, it would be better that I should employ myself in surgical experiments, than in thus wasting the precious moments, mortifying both soul and body.”
“It is little that a Red-skin would care to have a physician at his hurts, while the whoop is ringing in his ears.
Patience is a virtue in an Indian, and can be no shame to a Christian white man.
Look at these hags of squaws, friend Doctor; I have no judgment in savage tempers, if they are not bloody minded, and ready to work their accursed pleasures on us all.
Now, so long as you keep upon the ass, and maintain the fierce look which is far from being your natural gift, fear of so great a medicine may serve to keep down their courage.
I am placed here, like a general at the opening of the battle, and it has become my duty to make such use of all my force as, in my judgment, each is best fitted to perform.
If I know these niceties, you will be more serviceable for your countenance just now than in any more stirring exploits.”
“Harkee, old trapper,” shouted Paul, whose patience could no longer maintain itself under the calculating and prolix explanations of the other, “suppose you cut two things I can name, short off. That is to say, your conversation, which is agreeable enough over a well baked buffaloe’s hump, and these damnable thongs of hide, which, according to my experience, can be pleasant nowhere.
A single stroke of your knife would be of more service, just now, than the longest speech that was ever made in a Kentucky court-house.”
“Ay, court-houses are the ‘happy hunting-grounds,’ as a Red-skin would say, for them that are born with gifts no better than such as lie in the tongue.
I was carried into one of the lawless holes myself once, and it was all about a thing of no more value than the skin of a deer.
The Lord forgive them!—the Lord forgive them!—they knew no better, and they did according to their weak judgments, and therefore the more are they to be pitied; and yet it was a solemn sight to see an aged man, who had always lived in the air, laid neck and heels by the law, and held up as a spectacle for the women and boys of a wasteful settlement to point their fingers at!”
“If such be your opinions of confinement, honest friend, you had better manifest the same, by putting us at liberty with as little delay as possible,” said Middleton, who, like his companion, began to find the tardiness of his often-tried companion quite as extraordinary as it was disagreeable.
“I should greatly like to do the same; especially in your behalf, Captain, who, being a soldier, might find not only pleasure but profit in examining, more at your ease, into the circumventions and cunning of an Indian fight.
As to our friend, here, it is of but little matter, how much of this affair he examines, or how little, seeing that a bee is not to be overcome in the same manner as an Indian.”
“Old man, this trifling with our misery is inconsiderate, to give it a name no harsher—”
“Ay, your grand’ther was of a hot and hurrying mind, and one must not expect, that the young of a panther will crawl the ‘arth like the litter of a porcupine.
Now keep you both silent, and what I say shall have the appearance of being spoken concerning the movements that are going on in the bottom; all of which will serve to put jealousy to sleep, and to shut the eyes of such as rarely close them on wickedness and cruelty.
In the first place, then, you must know that I have reason to think yonder treacherous Teton has left an order to put us all to death, so soon as he thinks the deed may be done secretly, and without tumult.”
“Great Heaven! will you suffer us to be butchered like unresisting sheep?”
“Hist, Captain, hist; a hot temper is none of the best, when cunning is more needed than blows.
Ah, the Pawnee is a noble boy! it would do your heart good to see how he draws off from the river, in order to invite his enemies to cross; and yet, according to my failing sight, they count two warriors to his one!
But as I was saying, little good comes of haste and thoughtlessness.
The facts are so plain that any child may see into their wisdom.
The savages are of many minds as to the manner of our treatment.
Some fear us for colour, and would gladly let us go, and other some would show us the mercy that the doe receives from the hungry wolf.