The Last of the Mohicans

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"I like it very much," cried Duncan, who saw that the release of Cora
was the primary object in the mind of the scout; "I like it much. Let it
be instantly attempted."

After a short conference, the plan was matured, and rendered more
intelligible to the several parties; the different signals were
appointed, and the chiefs separated, each to his allotted station.




CHAPTER 32

"But plagues shall spread, and funeral fires increase,
Till the great king, without a ransom paid,
To her own Chrysa send the black-eyed maid."
--Pope.

During the time Uncas was making this disposition of his forces, the
woods were as still, and, with the exception of those who had met in
council, apparently as much untenanted as when they came fresh from
the hands of their Almighty Creator. The eye could range, in every
direction, through the long and shadowed vistas of the trees; but
nowhere was any object to be seen that did not properly belong to the
peaceful and slumbering scenery.

Here and there a bird was heard fluttering among the branches of the
beeches, and occasionally a squirrel dropped a nut, drawing the startled
looks of the party for a moment to the place; but the instant the casual
interruption ceased, the passing air was heard murmuring above their
heads, along that verdant and undulating surface of forest, which spread
itself unbroken, unless by stream or lake, over such a vast region of
country. Across the tract of wilderness which lay between the Delawares
and the village of their enemies, it seemed as if the foot of man had
never trodden, so breathing and deep was the silence in which it lay.
But Hawkeye, whose duty led him foremost in the adventure, knew the
character of those with whom he was about to contend too well to trust
the treacherous quiet.

When he saw his little band collected, the scout threw "killdeer" into
the hollow of his arm, and making a silent signal that he would be
followed, he led them many rods toward the rear, into the bed of a
little brook which they had crossed in advancing. Here he halted, and
after waiting for the whole of his grave and attentive warriors to close
about him, he spoke in Delaware, demanding:

"Do any of my young men know whither this run will lead us?"

A Delaware stretched forth a hand, with the two fingers separated,
and indicating the manner in which they were joined at the root, he
answered:

"Before the sun could go his own length, the little water will be in
the big." Then he added, pointing in the direction of the place he
mentioned, "the two make enough for the beavers."

"I thought as much," returned the scout, glancing his eye upward at the
opening in the tree-tops, "from the course it takes, and the bearings of
the mountains. Men, we will keep within the cover of its banks till we
scent the Hurons."

His companions gave the usual brief exclamation of assent, but,
perceiving that their leader was about to lead the way in person, one
or two made signs that all was not as it should be. Hawkeye, who
comprehended their meaning glances, turned and perceived that his party
had been followed thus far by the singing-master.

"Do you know, friend," asked the scout, gravely, and perhaps with a
little of the pride of conscious deserving in his manner, "that this is
a band of rangers chosen for the most desperate service, and put under
the command of one who, though another might say it with a better face,
will not be apt to leave them idle. It may not be five, it cannot be
thirty minutes, before we tread on the body of a Huron, living or dead."

"Though not admonished of your intentions in words," returned David,
whose face was a little flushed, and whose ordinarily quiet and
unmeaning eyes glimmered with an expression of unusual fire, "your men
have reminded me of the children of Jacob going out to battle against
the Shechemites, for wickedly aspiring to wedlock with a woman of a race
that was favored of the Lord. Now, I have journeyed far, and sojourned
much in good and evil with the maiden ye seek; and, though not a man
of war, with my loins girded and my sword sharpened, yet would I gladly
strike a blow in her behalf."

The scout hesitated, as if weighing the chances of such a strange
enlistment in his mind before he answered:

"You know not the use of any we'pon. You carry no rifle; and believe me,
what the Mingoes take they will freely give again."

"Though not a vaunting and bloodily disposed Goliath," returned David,
drawing a sling from beneath his parti-colored and uncouth attire, "I
have not forgotten the example of the Jewish boy. With this ancient
instrument of war have I practised much in my youth, and peradventure
the skill has not entirely departed from me."

"Ay!" said Hawkeye, considering the deer-skin thong and apron, with a
cold and discouraging eye; "the thing might do its work among arrows, or
even knives; but these Mengwe have been furnished by the Frenchers with
a good grooved barrel a man. However, it seems to be your gift to go
unharmed amid fire; and as you have hitherto been favored--major, you
have left your rifle at a cock; a single shot before the time would be
just twenty scalps lost to no purpose--singer, you can follow; we may
find use for you in the shoutings."

"I thank you, friend," returned David, supplying himself, like his royal
namesake, from among the pebbles of the brook; "though not given to
the desire to kill, had you sent me away my spirit would have been
troubled."

"Remember," added the scout, tapping his own head significantly on that
spot where Gamut was yet sore, "we come to fight, and not to musickate.
Until the general whoop is given, nothing speaks but the rifle."

David nodded, as much to signify his acquiescence with the terms; and
then Hawkeye, casting another observant glance over his followers made
the signal to proceed.

Their route lay, for the distance of a mile, along the bed of the
water-course. Though protected from any great danger of observation by
the precipitous banks, and the thick shrubbery which skirted the stream,
no precaution known to an Indian attack was neglected. A warrior rather
crawled than walked on each flank so as to catch occasional glimpses
into the forest; and every few minutes the band came to a halt, and
listened for hostile sounds, with an acuteness of organs that would be
scarcely conceivable to a man in a less natural state. Their march was,
however, unmolested, and they reached the point where the lesser stream
was lost in the greater, without the smallest evidence that their
progress had been noted. Here the scout again halted, to consult the
signs of the forest.

"We are likely to have a good day for a fight," he said, in English,
addressing Heyward, and glancing his eyes upward at the clouds, which
began to move in broad sheets across the firmament; "a bright sun and a
glittering barrel are no friends to true sight. Everything is favorable;
they have the wind, which will bring down their noises and their smoke,
too, no little matter in itself; whereas, with us it will be first
a shot, and then a clear view. But here is an end to our cover; the
beavers have had the range of this stream for hundreds of years, and
what atween their food and their dams, there is, as you see, many a
girdled stub, but few living trees."

Hawkeye had, in truth, in these few words, given no bad description of
the prospect that now lay in their front. The brook was irregular in its
width, sometimes shooting through narrow fissures in the rocks, and at
others spreading over acres of bottom land, forming little areas that
might be termed ponds. Everywhere along its bands were the moldering
relics of dead trees, in all the stages of decay, from those that
groaned on their tottering trunks to such as had recently been robbed of
those rugged coats that so mysteriously contain their principle of life.
A few long, low, and moss-covered piles were scattered among them, like
the memorials of a former and long-departed generation.

All these minute particulars were noted by the scout, with a gravity and
interest that they probably had never before attracted. He knew that
the Huron encampment lay a short half mile up the brook; and, with
the characteristic anxiety of one who dreaded a hidden danger, he was
greatly troubled at not finding the smallest trace of the presence of
his enemy. Once or twice he felt induced to give the order for a rush,
and to attempt the village by surprise; but his experience quickly
admonished him of the danger of so useless an experiment. Then he
listened intently, and with painful uncertainty, for the sounds of
hostility in the quarter where Uncas was left; but nothing was audible
except the sighing of the wind, that began to sweep over the bosom of
the forest in gusts which threatened a tempest. At length, yielding
rather to his unusual impatience than taking counsel from his knowledge,
he determined to bring matters to an issue, by unmasking his force, and
proceeding cautiously, but steadily, up the stream.

The scout had stood, while making his observations, sheltered by a
brake, and his companions still lay in the bed of the ravine, through
which the smaller stream debouched; but on hearing his low, though
intelligible, signal the whole party stole up the bank, like so many
dark specters, and silently arranged themselves around him. Pointing in
the direction he wished to proceed, Hawkeye advanced, the band breaking
off in single files, and following so accurately in his footsteps, as to
leave it, if we except Heyward and David, the trail of but a single man.

The party was, however, scarcely uncovered before a volley from a dozen
rifles was heard in their rear; and a Delaware leaping high in to the
air, like a wounded deer, fell at his whole length, dead.

"Ah, I feared some deviltry like this!" exclaimed the scout, in English,
adding, with the quickness of thought, in his adopted tongue: "To cover,
men, and charge!"

The band dispersed at the word, and before Heyward had well recovered
from his surprise, he found himself standing alone with David. Luckily
the Hurons had already fallen back, and he was safe from their fire. But
this state of things was evidently to be of short continuance; for the
scout set the example of pressing on their retreat, by discharging his
rifle, and darting from tree to tree as his enemy slowly yielded ground.

It would seem that the assault had been made by a very small party of
the Hurons, which, however, continued to increase in numbers, as it
retired on its friends, until the return fire was very nearly, if not
quite, equal to that maintained by the advancing Delawares. Heyward
threw himself among the combatants, and imitating the necessary caution
of his companions, he made quick discharges with his own rifle. The
contest now grew warm and stationary. Few were injured, as both parties
kept their bodies as much protected as possible by the trees; never,
indeed, exposing any part of their persons except in the act of taking
aim. But the chances were gradually growing unfavorable to Hawkeye and
his band. The quick-sighted scout perceived his danger without knowing
how to remedy it. He saw it was more dangerous to retreat than to
maintain his ground: while he found his enemy throwing out men on his
flank; which rendered the task of keeping themselves covered so very
difficult to the Delawares, as nearly to silence their fire. At this
embarrassing moment, when they began to think the whole of the hostile
tribe was gradually encircling them, they heard the yell of combatants
and the rattling of arms echoing under the arches of the wood at the
place where Uncas was posted, a bottom which, in a manner, lay beneath
the ground on which Hawkeye and his party were contending.

The effects of this attack were instantaneous, and to the scout and his
friends greatly relieving. It would seem that, while his own surprise
had been anticipated, and had consequently failed, the enemy, in their
turn, having been deceived in its object and in his numbers, had left
too small a force to resist the impetuous onset of the young Mohican.
This fact was doubly apparent, by the rapid manner in which the battle
in the forest rolled upward toward the village, and by an instant
falling off in the number of their assailants, who rushed to assist in
maintaining the front, and, as it now proved to be, the principal point
of defense.

Animating his followers by his voice, and his own example, Hawkeye then
gave the word to bear down upon their foes. The charge, in that rude
species of warfare, consisted merely in pushing from cover to cover,
nigher to the enemy; and in this maneuver he was instantly and
successfully obeyed. The Hurons were compelled to withdraw, and the
scene of the contest rapidly changed from the more open ground, on which
it had commenced, to a spot where the assailed found a thicket to
rest upon. Here the struggle was protracted, arduous and seemingly of
doubtful issue; the Delawares, though none of them fell, beginning to
bleed freely, in consequence of the disadvantage at which they were
held.

In this crisis, Hawkeye found means to get behind the same tree as that
which served for a cover to Heyward; most of his own combatants being
within call, a little on his right, where they maintained rapid, though
fruitless, discharges on their sheltered enemies.

"You are a young man, major," said the scout, dropping the butt of
"killdeer" to the earth, and leaning on the barrel, a little fatigued
with his previous industry; "and it may be your gift to lead armies,
at some future day, ag'in these imps, the Mingoes. You may here see the
philosophy of an Indian fight. It consists mainly in ready hand, a quick
eye and a good cover. Now, if you had a company of the Royal Americans
here, in what manner would you set them to work in this business?"

"The bayonet would make a road."

"Ay, there is white reason in what you say; but a man must ask himself,
in this wilderness, how many lives he can spare. No--horse*," continued
the scout, shaking his head, like one who mused; "horse, I am ashamed to
say must sooner or later decide these scrimmages. The brutes are better
than men, and to horse must we come at last. Put a shodden hoof on the
moccasin of a red-skin, and, if his rifle be once emptied, he will never
stop to load it again."

* The American forest admits of the passage of horses, there
being little underbrush, and few tangled brakes. The plan of
Hawkeye is the one which has always proved the most
successful in the battles between the whites and the
Indians. Wayne, in his celebrated campaign on the Miami,
received the fire of his enemies in line; and then causing
his dragoons to wheel round his flanks, the Indians were
driven from their covers before they had time to load. One
of the most conspicuous of the chiefs who fought in the
battle of Miami assured the writer, that the red men could
not fight the warriors with "long knives and leather
stockings"; meaning the dragoons with their sabers and
boots.

"This is a subject that might better be discussed at another time,"
returned Heyward; "shall we charge?"

"I see no contradiction to the gifts of any man in passing his breathing
spells in useful reflections," the scout replied. "As to rush, I little
relish such a measure; for a scalp or two must be thrown away in the
attempt. And yet," he added, bending his head aside, to catch the sounds
of the distant combat, "if we are to be of use to Uncas, these knaves in
our front must be got rid of."

Then, turning with a prompt and decided air, he called aloud to his
Indians, in their own language. His words were answered by a shout;
and, at a given signal, each warrior made a swift movement around his
particular tree. The sight of so many dark bodies, glancing before their
eyes at the same instant, drew a hasty and consequently an ineffectual
fire from the Hurons. Without stopping to breathe, the Delawares leaped
in long bounds toward the wood, like so many panthers springing upon
their prey. Hawkeye was in front, brandishing his terrible rifle and
animating his followers by his example. A few of the older and more
cunning Hurons, who had not been deceived by the artifice which had been
practiced to draw their fire, now made a close and deadly discharge of
their pieces and justified the apprehensions of the scout by felling
three of his foremost warriors. But the shock was insufficient to repel
the impetus of the charge. The Delawares broke into the cover with the
ferocity of their natures and swept away every trace of resistance by
the fury of the onset.

The combat endured only for an instant, hand to hand, and then the
assailed yielded ground rapidly, until they reached the opposite
margin of the thicket, where they clung to the cover, with the sort of
obstinacy that is so often witnessed in hunted brutes. At this critical
moment, when the success of the struggle was again becoming doubtful,
the crack of a rifle was heard behind the Hurons, and a bullet came
whizzing from among some beaver lodges, which were situated in the
clearing, in their rear, and was followed by the fierce and appalling
yell of the war-whoop.

"There speaks the Sagamore!" shouted Hawkeye, answering the cry with his
own stentorian voice; "we have them now in face and back!"

The effect on the Hurons was instantaneous. Discouraged by an assault
from a quarter that left them no opportunity for cover, the warriors
uttered a common yell of disappointment, and breaking off in a
body, they spread themselves across the opening, heedless of every
consideration but flight. Many fell, in making the experiment, under the
bullets and the blows of the pursuing Delawares.

We shall not pause to detail the meeting between the scout and
Chingachgook, or the more touching interview that Duncan held with
Munro. A few brief and hurried words served to explain the state of
things to both parties; and then Hawkeye, pointing out the Sagamore to
his band, resigned the chief authority into the hands of the Mohican
chief. Chingachgook assumed the station to which his birth and
experience gave him so distinguished a claim, with the grave dignity
that always gives force to the mandates of a native warrior. Following
the footsteps of the scout, he led the party back through the thicket,
his men scalping the fallen Hurons and secreting the bodies of their own
dead as they proceeded, until they gained a point where the former was
content to make a halt.

The warriors, who had breathed themselves freely in the preceding
struggle, were now posted on a bit of level ground, sprinkled with
trees in sufficient numbers to conceal them. The land fell away rather
precipitately in front, and beneath their eyes stretched, for several
miles, a narrow, dark, and wooded vale. It was through this dense and
dark forest that Uncas was still contending with the main body of the
Hurons.

The Mohican and his friends advanced to the brow of the hill, and
listened, with practised ears, to the sounds of the combat. A few
birds hovered over the leafy bosom of the valley, frightened from their
secluded nests; and here and there a light vapory cloud, which seemed
already blending with the atmosphere, arose above the trees, and
indicated some spot where the struggle had been fierce and stationary.

"The fight is coming up the ascent," said Duncan, pointing in the
direction of a new explosion of firearms; "we are too much in the center
of their line to be effective."

"They will incline into the hollow, where the cover is thicker," said
the scout, "and that will leave us well on their flank. Go, Sagamore;
you will hardly be in time to give the whoop, and lead on the young men.
I will fight this scrimmage with warriors of my own color. You know me,
Mohican; not a Huron of them all shall cross the swell, into your rear,
without the notice of 'killdeer'."

The Indian chief paused another moment to consider the signs of the
contest, which was now rolling rapidly up the ascent, a certain evidence
that the Delawares triumphed; nor did he actually quit the place until
admonished of the proximity of his friends, as well as enemies, by the
bullets of the former, which began to patter among the dried leaves on
the ground, like the bits of falling hail which precede the bursting of
the tempest. Hawkeye and his three companions withdrew a few paces to
a shelter, and awaited the issue with calmness that nothing but great
practise could impart in such a scene.

It was not long before the reports of the rifles began to lose the
echoes of the woods, and to sound like weapons discharged in the open
air. Then a warrior appeared, here and there, driven to the skirts of
the forest, and rallying as he entered the clearing, as at the place
where the final stand was to be made. These were soon joined by others,
until a long line of swarthy figures was to be seen clinging to
the cover with the obstinacy of desperation. Heyward began to
grow impatient, and turned his eyes anxiously in the direction of
Chingachgook. The chief was seated on a rock, with nothing visible but
his calm visage, considering the spectacle with an eye as deliberate as
if he were posted there merely to view the struggle.

"The time has come for the Delaware to strike!" said Duncan.

"Not so, not so," returned the scout; "when he scents his friends, he
will let them know that he is here. See, see; the knaves are getting in
that clump of pines, like bees settling after their flight. By the
Lord, a squaw might put a bullet into the center of such a knot of dark
skins!"

At that instant the whoop was given, and a dozen Hurons fell by a
discharge from Chingachgook and his band. The shout that followed was
answered by a single war-cry from the forest, and a yell passed through
the air that sounded as if a thousand throats were united in a common
effort. The Hurons staggered, deserting the center of their line, and
Uncas issued from the forest through the opening they left, at the head
of a hundred warriors.

Waving his hands right and left, the young chief pointed out the enemy
to his followers, who separated in pursuit. The war now divided, both
wings of the broken Hurons seeking protection in the woods again, hotly
pressed by the victorious warriors of the Lenape. A minute might have
passed, but the sounds were already receding in different directions,
and gradually losing their distinctness beneath the echoing arches of
the woods. One little knot of Hurons, however, had disdained to seek a
cover, and were retiring, like lions at bay, slowly and sullenly up the
acclivity which Chingachgook and his band had just deserted, to mingle
more closely in the fray. Magua was conspicuous in this party, both by
his fierce and savage mien, and by the air of haughty authority he yet
maintained.

In his eagerness to expedite the pursuit, Uncas had left himself nearly
alone; but the moment his eye caught the figure of Le Subtil, every
other consideration was forgotten. Raising his cry of battle, which
recalled some six or seven warriors, and reckless of the disparity of
their numbers, he rushed upon his enemy. Le Renard, who watched the
movement, paused to receive him with secret joy. But at the moment when
he thought the rashness of his impetuous young assailant had left him
at his mercy, another shout was given, and La Longue Carabine was seen
rushing to the rescue, attended by all his white associates. The Huron
instantly turned, and commenced a rapid retreat up the ascent.

There was no time for greetings or congratulations; for Uncas, though
unconscious of the presence of his friends, continued the pursuit with
the velocity of the wind. In vain Hawkeye called to him to respect the
covers; the young Mohican braved the dangerous fire of his enemies, and
soon compelled them to a flight as swift as his own headlong speed. It
was fortunate that the race was of short continuance, and that the white
men were much favored by their position, or the Delaware would soon have
outstripped all his companions, and fallen a victim to his own temerity.
But, ere such a calamity could happen, the pursuers and pursued entered
the Wyandot village, within striking distance of each other.

Excited by the presence of their dwellings, and tired of the chase, the
Hurons now made a stand, and fought around their council-lodge with
the fury of despair. The onset and the issue were like the passage and
destruction of a whirlwind. The tomahawk of Uncas, the blows of Hawkeye,
and even the still nervous arm of Munro were all busy for that passing
moment, and the ground was quickly strewed with their enemies. Still
Magua, though daring and much exposed, escaped from every effort against
his life, with that sort of fabled protection that was made to overlook
the fortunes of favored heroes in the legends of ancient poetry. Raising
a yell that spoke volumes of anger and disappointment, the subtle chief,
when he saw his comrades fallen, darted away from the place, attended
by his two only surviving friends, leaving the Delawares engaged in
stripping the dead of the bloody trophies of their victory.