The Last of the Mohicans

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CHAPTER 3

"Before these fields were shorn and till'd,
Full to the brim our rivers flow'd;
The melody of waters fill'd
The fresh and boundless wood;
And torrents dash'd, and rivulets play'd,
And fountains spouted in the shade."--Bryant

Leaving the unsuspecting Heyward and his confiding companions to
penetrate still deeper into a forest that contained such treacherous
inmates, we must use an author's privilege, and shift the scene a few
miles to the westward of the place where we have last seen them.

On that day, two men were lingering on the banks of a small but rapid
stream, within an hour's journey of the encampment of Webb, like those
who awaited the appearance of an absent person, or the approach of some
expected event. The vast canopy of woods spread itself to the margin of
the river, overhanging the water, and shadowing its dark current with a
deeper hue. The rays of the sun were beginning to grow less fierce, and
the intense heat of the day was lessened, as the cooler vapors of the
springs and fountains rose above their leafy beds, and rested in
the atmosphere. Still that breathing silence, which marks the drowsy
sultriness of an American landscape in July, pervaded the secluded spot,
interrupted only by the low voices of the men, the occasional and lazy
tap of a woodpecker, the discordant cry of some gaudy jay, or a swelling
on the ear, from the dull roar of a distant waterfall. These feeble and
broken sounds were, however, too familiar to the foresters to draw their
attention from the more interesting matter of their dialogue. While
one of these loiterers showed the red skin and wild accouterments of a
native of the woods, the other exhibited, through the mask of his
rude and nearly savage equipments, the brighter, though sun-burned and
long-faced complexion of one who might claim descent from a European
parentage. The former was seated on the end of a mossy log, in a posture
that permitted him to heighten the effect of his earnest language, by
the calm but expressive gestures of an Indian engaged in debate. His
body, which was nearly naked, presented a terrific emblem of death,
drawn in intermingled colors of white and black. His closely-shaved
head, on which no other hair than the well-known and chivalrous
scalping tuft* was preserved, was without ornament of any kind, with
the exception of a solitary eagle's plume, that crossed his crown,
and depended over the left shoulder. A tomahawk and scalping knife, of
English manufacture, were in his girdle; while a short military rifle,
of that sort with which the policy of the whites armed their savage
allies, lay carelessly across his bare and sinewy knee. The expanded
chest, full formed limbs, and grave countenance of this warrior, would
denote that he had reached the vigor of his days, though no symptoms of
decay appeared to have yet weakened his manhood.

* The North American warrior caused the hair to be plucked
from his whole body; a small tuft was left on the crown of
his head, in order that his enemy might avail himself of it,
in wrenching off the scalp in the event of his fall. The
scalp was the only admissible trophy of victory. Thus, it
was deemed more important to obtain the scalp than to kill
the man. Some tribes lay great stress on the honor of
striking a dead body. These practices have nearly
disappeared among the Indians of the Atlantic states.

The frame of the white man, judging by such parts as were not concealed
by his clothes, was like that of one who had known hardships and
exertion from his earliest youth. His person, though muscular, was
rather attenuated than full; but every nerve and muscle appeared strung
and indurated by unremitted exposure and toil. He wore a hunting shirt
of forest-green, fringed with faded yellow*, and a summer cap of skins
which had been shorn of their fur. He also bore a knife in a girdle of
wampum, like that which confined the scanty garments of the Indian, but
no tomahawk. His moccasins were ornamented after the gay fashion of the
natives, while the only part of his under dress which appeared below the
hunting-frock was a pair of buckskin leggings, that laced at the sides,
and which were gartered above the knees, with the sinews of a deer. A
pouch and horn completed his personal accouterments, though a rifle of
great length**, which the theory of the more ingenious whites had
taught them was the most dangerous of all firearms, leaned against a
neighboring sapling. The eye of the hunter, or scout, whichever he might
be, was small, quick, keen, and restless, roving while he spoke, on
every side of him, as if in quest of game, or distrusting the sudden
approach of some lurking enemy. Notwithstanding the symptoms of habitual
suspicion, his countenance was not only without guile, but at the moment
at which he is introduced, it was charged with an expression of sturdy
honesty.

* The hunting-shirt is a picturesque smock-frock, being
shorter, and ornamented with fringes and tassels. The colors
are intended to imitate the hues of the wood, with a view to
concealment. Many corps of American riflemen have been thus
attired, and the dress is one of the most striking of modern
times. The hunting-shirt is frequently white.

** The rifle of the army is short; that of the hunter is
always long.

"Even your traditions make the case in my favor, Chingachgook," he said,
speaking in the tongue which was known to all the natives who formerly
inhabited the country between the Hudson and the Potomac, and of
which we shall give a free translation for the benefit of the reader;
endeavoring, at the same time, to preserve some of the peculiarities,
both of the individual and of the language. "Your fathers came from the
setting sun, crossed the big river*, fought the people of the country,
and took the land; and mine came from the red sky of the morning, over
the salt lake, and did their work much after the fashion that had been
set them by yours; then let God judge the matter between us, and friends
spare their words!"

* The Mississippi. The scout alludes to a tradition which is
very popular among the tribes of the Atlantic states.
Evidence of their Asiatic origin is deduced from the
circumstances, though great uncertainty hangs over the whole
history of the Indians.

"My fathers fought with the naked red man!" returned the Indian,
sternly, in the same language. "Is there no difference, Hawkeye, between
the stone-headed arrow of the warrior, and the leaden bullet with which
you kill?"

"There is reason in an Indian, though nature has made him with a red
skin!" said the white man, shaking his head like one on whom such an
appeal to his justice was not thrown away. For a moment he appeared to
be conscious of having the worst of the argument, then, rallying again,
he answered the objection of his antagonist in the best manner his
limited information would allow:

"I am no scholar, and I care not who knows it; but, judging from what
I have seen, at deer chases and squirrel hunts, of the sparks below,
I should think a rifle in the hands of their grandfathers was not so
dangerous as a hickory bow and a good flint-head might be, if drawn with
Indian judgment, and sent by an Indian eye."

"You have the story told by your fathers," returned the other, coldly
waving his hand. "What say your old men? Do they tell the young warriors
that the pale faces met the red men, painted for war and armed with the
stone hatchet and wooden gun?"

"I am not a prejudiced man, nor one who vaunts himself on his natural
privileges, though the worst enemy I have on earth, and he is an
Iroquois, daren't deny that I am genuine white," the scout replied,
surveying, with secret satisfaction, the faded color of his bony and
sinewy hand, "and I am willing to own that my people have many ways, of
which, as an honest man, I can't approve. It is one of their customs to
write in books what they have done and seen, instead of telling them
in their villages, where the lie can be given to the face of a cowardly
boaster, and the brave soldier can call on his comrades to witness for
the truth of his words. In consequence of this bad fashion, a man, who
is too conscientious to misspend his days among the women, in learning
the names of black marks, may never hear of the deeds of his fathers,
nor feel a pride in striving to outdo them. For myself, I conclude the
Bumppos could shoot, for I have a natural turn with a rifle, which
must have been handed down from generation to generation, as, our holy
commandments tell us, all good and evil gifts are bestowed; though I
should be loath to answer for other people in such a matter. But every
story has its two sides; so I ask you, Chingachgook, what passed,
according to the traditions of the red men, when our fathers first met?"

A silence of a minute succeeded, during which the Indian sat mute; then,
full of the dignity of his office, he commenced his brief tale, with a
solemnity that served to heighten its appearance of truth.

"Listen, Hawkeye, and your ear shall drink no lie. 'Tis what my fathers
have said, and what the Mohicans have done." He hesitated a single
instant, and bending a cautious glance toward his companion, he
continued, in a manner that was divided between interrogation and
assertion. "Does not this stream at our feet run toward the summer,
until its waters grow salt, and the current flows upward?"

"It can't be denied that your traditions tell you true in both these
matters," said the white man; "for I have been there, and have seen
them, though why water, which is so sweet in the shade, should become
bitter in the sun, is an alteration for which I have never been able to
account."

"And the current!" demanded the Indian, who expected his reply with that
sort of interest that a man feels in the confirmation of testimony, at
which he marvels even while he respects it; "the fathers of Chingachgook
have not lied!"

"The holy Bible is not more true, and that is the truest thing in
nature. They call this up-stream current the tide, which is a thing soon
explained, and clear enough. Six hours the waters run in, and six hours
they run out, and the reason is this: when there is higher water in the
sea than in the river, they run in until the river gets to be highest,
and then it runs out again."

"The waters in the woods, and on the great lakes, run downward
until they lie like my hand," said the Indian, stretching the limb
horizontally before him, "and then they run no more."

"No honest man will deny it," said the scout, a little nettled at the
implied distrust of his explanation of the mystery of the tides; "and I
grant that it is true on the small scale, and where the land is level.
But everything depends on what scale you look at things. Now, on the
small scale, the 'arth is level; but on the large scale it is round. In
this manner, pools and ponds, and even the great fresh-water lakes, may
be stagnant, as you and I both know they are, having seen them; but when
you come to spread water over a great tract, like the sea, where the
earth is round, how in reason can the water be quiet? You might as well
expect the river to lie still on the brink of those black rocks a mile
above us, though your own ears tell you that it is tumbling over them at
this very moment."

If unsatisfied by the philosophy of his companion, the Indian was far
too dignified to betray his unbelief. He listened like one who was
convinced, and resumed his narrative in his former solemn manner.

"We came from the place where the sun is hid at night, over great plains
where the buffaloes live, until we reached the big river. There we
fought the Alligewi, till the ground was red with their blood. From the
banks of the big river to the shores of the salt lake, there was none to
meet us. The Maquas followed at a distance. We said the country should
be ours from the place where the water runs up no longer on this stream,
to a river twenty sun's journey toward the summer. We drove the Maquas
into the woods with the bears. They only tasted salt at the licks; they
drew no fish from the great lake; we threw them the bones."

"All this I have heard and believe," said the white man, observing that
the Indian paused; "but it was long before the English came into the
country."

"A pine grew then where this chestnut now stands. The first pale faces
who came among us spoke no English. They came in a large canoe, when
my fathers had buried the tomahawk with the red men around them. Then,
Hawkeye," he continued, betraying his deep emotion, only by permitting
his voice to fall to those low, guttural tones, which render his
language, as spoken at times, so very musical; "then, Hawkeye, we were
one people, and we were happy. The salt lake gave us its fish, the wood
its deer, and the air its birds. We took wives who bore us children; we
worshipped the Great Spirit; and we kept the Maquas beyond the sound of
our songs of triumph."

"Know you anything of your own family at that time?" demanded the white.
"But you are just a man, for an Indian; and as I suppose you hold their
gifts, your fathers must have been brave warriors, and wise men at the
council-fire."

"My tribe is the grandfather of nations, but I am an unmixed man. The
blood of chiefs is in my veins, where it must stay forever. The Dutch
landed, and gave my people the fire-water; they drank until the heavens
and the earth seemed to meet, and they foolishly thought they had found
the Great Spirit. Then they parted with their land. Foot by foot,
they were driven back from the shores, until I, that am a chief and a
Sagamore, have never seen the sun shine but through the trees, and have
never visited the graves of my fathers."

"Graves bring solemn feelings over the mind," returned the scout, a good
deal touched at the calm suffering of his companion; "and they often aid
a man in his good intentions; though, for myself, I expect to leave my
own bones unburied, to bleach in the woods, or to be torn asunder by the
wolves. But where are to be found those of your race who came to their
kin in the Delaware country, so many summers since?"

"Where are the blossoms of those summers!--fallen, one by one; so all
of my family departed, each in his turn, to the land of spirits. I am on
the hilltop and must go down into the valley; and when Uncas follows in
my footsteps there will no longer be any of the blood of the Sagamores,
for my boy is the last of the Mohicans."

"Uncas is here," said another voice, in the same soft, guttural tones,
near his elbow; "who speaks to Uncas?"

The white man loosened his knife in his leathern sheath, and made
an involuntary movement of the hand toward his rifle, at this sudden
interruption; but the Indian sat composed, and without turning his head
at the unexpected sounds.

At the next instant, a youthful warrior passed between them, with a
noiseless step, and seated himself on the bank of the rapid stream. No
exclamation of surprise escaped the father, nor was any question asked,
or reply given, for several minutes; each appearing to await the moment
when he might speak, without betraying womanish curiosity or childish
impatience. The white man seemed to take counsel from their customs,
and, relinquishing his grasp of the rifle, he also remained silent and
reserved. At length Chingachgook turned his eyes slowly toward his son,
and demanded:

"Do the Maquas dare to leave the print of their moccasins in these
woods?"

"I have been on their trail," replied the young Indian, "and know that
they number as many as the fingers of my two hands; but they lie hid
like cowards."

"The thieves are outlying for scalps and plunder," said the white man,
whom we shall call Hawkeye, after the manner of his companions. "That
busy Frenchman, Montcalm, will send his spies into our very camp, but he
will know what road we travel!"

"'Tis enough," returned the father, glancing his eye toward the setting
sun; "they shall be driven like deer from their bushes. Hawkeye, let us
eat to-night, and show the Maquas that we are men to-morrow."

"I am as ready to do the one as the other; but to fight the Iroquois
'tis necessary to find the skulkers; and to eat, 'tis necessary to get
the game--talk of the devil and he will come; there is a pair of the
biggest antlers I have seen this season, moving the bushes below the
hill! Now, Uncas," he continued, in a half whisper, and laughing with a
kind of inward sound, like one who had learned to be watchful, "I will
bet my charger three times full of powder, against a foot of wampum,
that I take him atwixt the eyes, and nearer to the right than to the
left."

"It cannot be!" said the young Indian, springing to his feet with
youthful eagerness; "all but the tips of his horns are hid!"

"He's a boy!" said the white man, shaking his head while he spoke, and
addressing the father. "Does he think when a hunter sees a part of the
creature', he can't tell where the rest of him should be!"

Adjusting his rifle, he was about to make an exhibition of that skill
on which he so much valued himself, when the warrior struck up the piece
with his hand, saying:

"Hawkeye! will you fight the Maquas?"

"These Indians know the nature of the woods, as it might be by
instinct!" returned the scout, dropping his rifle, and turning away like
a man who was convinced of his error. "I must leave the buck to your
arrow, Uncas, or we may kill a deer for them thieves, the Iroquois, to
eat."

The instant the father seconded this intimation by an expressive gesture
of the hand, Uncas threw himself on the ground, and approached the
animal with wary movements. When within a few yards of the cover, he
fitted an arrow to his bow with the utmost care, while the antlers
moved, as if their owner snuffed an enemy in the tainted air. In another
moment the twang of the cord was heard, a white streak was seen glancing
into the bushes, and the wounded buck plunged from the cover, to the
very feet of his hidden enemy. Avoiding the horns of the infuriated
animal, Uncas darted to his side, and passed his knife across the
throat, when bounding to the edge of the river it fell, dyeing the
waters with its blood.

"'Twas done with Indian skill," said the scout laughing inwardly, but
with vast satisfaction; "and 'twas a pretty sight to behold! Though an
arrow is a near shot, and needs a knife to finish the work."

"Hugh!" ejaculated his companion, turning quickly, like a hound who
scented game.

"By the Lord, there is a drove of them!" exclaimed the scout, whose eyes
began to glisten with the ardor of his usual occupation; "if they come
within range of a bullet I will drop one, though the whole Six Nations
should be lurking within sound! What do you hear, Chingachgook? for to
my ears the woods are dumb."

"There is but one deer, and he is dead," said the Indian, bending his
body till his ear nearly touched the earth. "I hear the sounds of feet!"

"Perhaps the wolves have driven the buck to shelter, and are following
on his trail."

"No. The horses of white men are coming!" returned the other, raising
himself with dignity, and resuming his seat on the log with his former
composure. "Hawkeye, they are your brothers; speak to them."

"That I will, and in English that the king needn't be ashamed to
answer," returned the hunter, speaking in the language of which he
boasted; "but I see nothing, nor do I hear the sounds of man or beast;
'tis strange that an Indian should understand white sounds better than a
man who, his very enemies will own, has no cross in his blood, although
he may have lived with the red skins long enough to be suspected! Ha!
there goes something like the cracking of a dry stick, too--now I hear
the bushes move--yes, yes, there is a trampling that I mistook for
the falls--and--but here they come themselves; God keep them from the
Iroquois!"




CHAPTER 4

"Well go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove
Till I torment thee for this injury."--Midsummer Night's Dream.

The words were still in the mouth of the scout, when the leader of the
party, whose approaching footsteps had caught the vigilant ear of the
Indian, came openly into view. A beaten path, such as those made by the
periodical passage of the deer, wound through a little glen at no great
distance, and struck the river at the point where the white man and his
red companions had posted themselves. Along this track the travelers,
who had produced a surprise so unusual in the depths of the forest,
advanced slowly toward the hunter, who was in front of his associates,
in readiness to receive them.

"Who comes?" demanded the scout, throwing his rifle carelessly across
his left arm, and keeping the forefinger of his right hand on the
trigger, though he avoided all appearance of menace in the act. "Who
comes hither, among the beasts and dangers of the wilderness?"

"Believers in religion, and friends to the law and to the king,"
returned he who rode foremost. "Men who have journeyed since the rising
sun, in the shades of this forest, without nourishment, and are sadly
tired of their wayfaring."

"You are, then, lost," interrupted the hunter, "and have found how
helpless 'tis not to know whether to take the right hand or the left?"

"Even so; sucking babes are not more dependent on those who guide them
than we who are of larger growth, and who may now be said to possess the
stature without the knowledge of men. Know you the distance to a post of
the crown called William Henry?"

"Hoot!" shouted the scout, who did not spare his open laughter, though
instantly checking the dangerous sounds he indulged his merriment at
less risk of being overheard by any lurking enemies. "You are as much
off the scent as a hound would be, with Horican atwixt him and the deer!
William Henry, man! if you are friends to the king and have business
with the army, your way would be to follow the river down to Edward, and
lay the matter before Webb, who tarries there, instead of pushing into
the defiles, and driving this saucy Frenchman back across Champlain,
into his den again."

Before the stranger could make any reply to this unexpected proposition,
another horseman dashed the bushes aside, and leaped his charger into
the pathway, in front of his companion.

"What, then, may be our distance from Fort Edward?" demanded a new
speaker; "the place you advise us to seek we left this morning, and our
destination is the head of the lake."

"Then you must have lost your eyesight afore losing your way, for the
road across the portage is cut to a good two rods, and is as grand a
path, I calculate, as any that runs into London, or even before the
palace of the king himself."

"We will not dispute concerning the excellence of the passage," returned
Heyward, smiling; for, as the reader has anticipated, it was he. "It is
enough, for the present, that we trusted to an Indian guide to take
us by a nearer, though blinder path, and that we are deceived in his
knowledge. In plain words, we know not where we are."

"An Indian lost in the woods!" said the scout, shaking his head
doubtingly; "When the sun is scorching the tree tops, and the water
courses are full; when the moss on every beech he sees will tell him in
what quarter the north star will shine at night. The woods are full
of deer-paths which run to the streams and licks, places well known to
everybody; nor have the geese done their flight to the Canada waters
altogether! 'Tis strange that an Indian should be lost atwixt Horican
and the bend in the river! Is he a Mohawk?"

"Not by birth, though adopted in that tribe; I think his birthplace was
farther north, and he is one of those you call a Huron."

"Hugh!" exclaimed the two companions of the scout, who had continued
until this part of the dialogue, seated immovable, and apparently
indifferent to what passed, but who now sprang to their feet with an
activity and interest that had evidently got the better of their reserve
by surprise.

"A Huron!" repeated the sturdy scout, once more shaking his head in
open distrust; "they are a thievish race, nor do I care by whom they are
adopted; you can never make anything of them but skulls and vagabonds.
Since you trusted yourself to the care of one of that nation, I only
wonder that you have not fallen in with more."

"Of that there is little danger, since William Henry is so many miles
in our front. You forget that I have told you our guide is now a Mohawk,
and that he serves with our forces as a friend."

"And I tell you that he who is born a Mingo will die a Mingo," returned
the other positively. "A Mohawk! No, give me a Delaware or a Mohican
for honesty; and when they will fight, which they won't all do, having
suffered their cunning enemies, the Maquas, to make them women--but
when they will fight at all, look to a Delaware, or a Mohican, for a
warrior!"

"Enough of this," said Heyward, impatiently; "I wish not to inquire into
the character of a man that I know, and to whom you must be a stranger.
You have not yet answered my question; what is our distance from the
main army at Edward?"