—Save you, sir.
—Shakespeare.
The sleep of the fugitives lasted for several hours. The trapper was
the first to shake off its influence, as he had been the last to court
its refreshment. Rising, just as the grey light of day began to
brighten that portion of the studded vault which rested on the eastern
margin of the plain, he summoned his companions from their warm lairs,
and pointed out the necessity of their being once more on the alert.
While Middleton attended to the arrangements necessary to the comforts
of Inez and Ellen, in the long and painful journey which lay before
them, the old man and Paul prepared the meal, which the former had
advised them to take before they proceeded to horse. These several
dispositions were not long in making, and the little group was soon
seated about a repast which, though it might want the elegancies to
which the bride of Middleton had been accustomed, was not deficient in
the more important requisites of savour and nutriment.
“When we get lower into the hunting-grounds of the Pawnees,” said the
trapper, laying a morsel of delicate venison before Inez, on a little
trencher neatly made of horn, and expressly for his own use, “we shall
find the buffaloes fatter and sweeter, the deer in more abundance, and
all the gifts of the Lord abounding to satisfy our wants. Perhaps we
may even strike a beaver, and get a morsel from his tail[17] by way of
a rare mouthful.”
“What course do you mean to pursue, when you have once thrown these
bloodhounds from the chase?” demanded Middleton.
“If I might advise,” said Paul, “it would be to strike a water-course,
and get upon its downward current, as soon as may be. Give me a
cotton-wood, and I will turn you out a canoe that shall carry us all,
the jackass excepted, in perhaps the work of a day and a night. Ellen,
here, is a lively girl enough, but then she is no great race-rider; and
it would be far more comfortable to boat six or eight hundred miles,
than to go loping along like so many elks measuring the prairies;
besides, water leaves no trail.”
“I will not swear to that,” returned the trapper; “I have often thought
the eyes of a Red-skin would find a trail in air.”
“See, Middleton,” exclaimed Inez, in a sudden burst of youthful
pleasure, that caused her for a moment to forget her situation, “how
lovely is that sky; surely it contains a promise of happier times!”
“It is glorious!” returned her husband. “Glorious and heavenly is that
streak of vivid red, and here is a still brighter crimson; rarely have
I seen a richer rising of the sun.
“Rising of the sun!” slowly repeated the old man, lifting his tall
person from its seat with a deliberate and abstracted air, while he
kept his eye riveted on the changing, and certainly beautiful tints,
that were garnishing the vault of Heaven. “Rising of the sun! I like
not such risings of the sun. Ah’s me! the imps have circumvented us
with a vengeance. The prairie is on fire!”
“God in Heaven protect us!” cried Middleton, catching Inez to his
bosom, under the instant impression of the imminence of their danger.
“There is no time to lose, old man; each instant is a day; let us fly.”
“Whither?” demanded the trapper, motioning him, with calmness and
dignity, to arrest his steps. “In this wilderness of grass and reeds,
you are like a vessel in the broad lakes without a compass. A single
step on the wrong course might prove the destruction of us all. It is
seldom danger is so pressing, that there is not time enough for reason
to do its work, young officer; therefore let us await its biddings.”
“For my own part,” said Paul Hover, looking about him with no equivocal
expression of concern, “I acknowledge, that should this dry bed of
weeds get fairly in a flame, a bee would have to make a flight higher
than common to prevent his wings from scorching. Therefore, old
trapper, I agree with the captain, and say mount and run.”
“Ye are wrong—ye are wrong; man is not a beast to follow the gift of
instinct, and to snuff up his knowledge by a taint in the air, or a
rumbling in the sound; but he must see and reason, and then conclude.
So follow me a little to the left, where there is a rise in the ground,
whence we may make our reconnoitrings.”
The old man waved his hand with authority, and led the way without
further parlance to the spot he had indicated, followed by the whole of
his alarmed companions. An eye less practised than that of the trapper
might have failed in discovering the gentle elevation to which he
alluded, and which looked on the surface of the meadow like a growth a
little taller than common. When they reached the place, however, the
stinted grass itself announced the absence of that moisture, which had
fed the rank weeds of most of the plain, and furnished a clue to the
evidence by which he had judged of the formation of the ground hidden
beneath. Here a few minutes were lost in breaking down the tops of the
surrounding herbage, which, notwithstanding the advantage of their
position, rose even above the heads of Middleton and Paul, and in
obtaining a look-out that might command a view of the surrounding sea
of fire.
The frightful prospect added nothing to the hopes of those who had so
fearful a stake in the result. Although the day was beginning to dawn,
the vivid colours of the sky continued to deepen, as if the fierce
element were bent on an impious rivalry of the light of the sun. Bright
flashes of flame shot up here and there, along the margin of the waste,
like the nimble coruscations of the North, but far more angry and
threatening in their colour and changes. The anxiety on the rigid
features of the trapper sensibly deepened, as he leisurely traced these
evidences of a conflagration, which spread in a broad belt about their
place of refuge, until he had encircled the whole horizon.
Shaking his head, as he again turned his face to the point where the
danger seemed nighest and most rapidly approaching, the old man said—
“Now have we been cheating ourselves with the belief, that we had
thrown these Tetons from our trail, while here is proof enough that
they not only know where we lie, but that they intend to smoke us out,
like so many skulking beasts of prey. See; they have lighted the fire
around the whole bottom at the same moment, and we are as completely
hemmed in by the devils as an island by its waters.”
“Let us mount and ride,” cried Middleton; “is life not worth a
struggle?”
“Whither would ye go? Is a Teton horse a salamander that he can walk
amid fiery flames unhurt, or do you think the Lord will show his might
in your behalf, as in the days of old, and carry you harmless through
such a furnace as you may see glowing beneath yonder red sky? There are
Siouxes, too, hemming the fire with their arrows and knives on every
side of us, or I am no judge of their murderous deviltries.”
“We will ride into the centre of the whole tribe,” returned the youth
fiercely, “and put their manhood to the test.”
“Ay, it’s well in words, but what would it prove in deeds? Here is a
dealer in bees, who can teach you wisdom in a matter like this.”
“Now for that matter, old trapper,” said Paul, stretching his athletic
form like a mastiff conscious of his strength, “I am on the side of the
captain, and am clearly for a race against the fire, though it line me
into a Teton wigwam. Here is Ellen, who will—”
“Of what use, of what use are your stout hearts, when the element of
the Lord is to be conquered as well as human men. Look about you,
friends; the wreath of smoke, that is rising from the bottoms, plainly
says that there is no outlet from this spot, without crossing a belt of
fire. Look for yourselves, my men; look for yourselves; if you can find
a single opening, I will engage to follow.”
The examination, which his companions so instantly and so intently
made, rather served to assure them of their desperate situation, than
to appease their fears. Huge columns of smoke were rolling up from the
plain, and thickening in gloomy masses around the horizon. The red
glow, which gleamed upon their enormous folds, now lighting their
volumes with the glare of the conflagration, and now flashing to
another point, as the flame beneath glided ahead, leaving all behind
enveloped in awful darkness, and proclaiming louder than words the
character of the imminent and approaching danger.
“This is terrible!” exclaimed Middleton, folding the trembling Inez to
his heart. “At such a time as this, and in such a manner!”
“The gates of Heaven are open to all who truly believe,” murmured the
pious devotee in his bosom.
“This resignation is maddening! But we are men, and will make a
struggle for our lives! how now, my brave and spirited friend, shall we
yet mount and push across the flames, or shall we stand here, and see
those we most love perish in this frightful manner, without an effort?”
“I am for a swarming time, and a flight before the hive is too hot to
hold us,” said the bee-hunter, to whom it will be at once seen that
Middleton addressed himself. “Come, old trapper, you must acknowledge
this is but a slow way of getting out of danger. If we tarry here much
longer, it will be in the fashion that the bees lie around the straw
after the hive has been smoked for its honey. You may hear the fire
begin to roar already, and I know by experience, that when the flame
once gets fairly into the prairie grass, it is no sloth that can outrun
it.”
“Think you,” returned the old man, pointing scornfully at the mazes of
the dry and matted grass which environed them, “that mortal feet can
outstrip the speed of fire, on such a path! If I only knew now on which
side these miscreants lay!”
“What say you, friend Doctor,” cried the bewildered Paul, turning to
the naturalist with that sort of helplessness with which the strong are
often apt to seek aid of the weak, when human power is baffled by the
hand of a mightier being, “what say you; have you no advice to give
away, in a case of life and death?”
The naturalist stood, tablets in hand, looking at the awful spectacle
with as much composure as if the conflagration had been lighted in
order to solve the difficulties of some scientific problem. Aroused by
the question of his companion, he turned to his equally calm though
differently occupied associate, the trapper, demanding, with the most
provoking insensibility to the urgent nature of their situation—
“Venerable hunter, you have often witnessed similar prismatic
experiments—”
He was rudely interrupted by Paul, who struck the tablets from his
hands, with a violence that betrayed the utter intellectual confusion
which had overset the equanimity of his mind. Before time was allowed
for remonstrance, the old man, who had continued during the whole scene
like one much at a loss how to proceed, though also like one who was
rather perplexed than alarmed, suddenly assumed a decided air, as if he
no longer doubted on the course it was most advisable to pursue.
“It is time to be doing,” he said, interrupting the controversy that
was about to ensue between the naturalist and the bee-hunter; “it is
time to leave off books and moanings, and to be doing.”
“You have come to your recollections too late, miserable old man,”
cried Middleton; “the flames are within a quarter of a mile of us, and
the wind is bringing them down in this quarter with dreadful rapidity.”
“Anan! the flames! I care but little for the flames. If I only knew how
to circumvent the cunning of the Tetons, as I know how to cheat the
fire of its prey, there would be nothing needed but thanks to the Lord
for our deliverance. Do you call this a fire? If you had seen what I
have witnessed in the Eastern hills, when mighty mountains were like
the furnace of smith, you would have known what it was to fear the
flames, and to be thankful that you were spared! Come, lads, come; ’tis
time to be doing now, and to cease talking; for yonder curling flame is
truly coming on like a trotting moose. Put hands upon this short and
withered grass where we stand, and lay bare the ’arth.
“Would you think to deprive the fire of its victims in this childish
manner?” exclaimed Middleton.
A faint but solemn smile passed over the features of the old man, as he
answered—
“Your grand’ther would have said, that when the enemy was nigh, a
soldier could do no better than to obey.”
The captain felt the reproof, and instantly began to imitate the
industry of Paul, who was tearing the decayed herbage from the ground
in a sort of desperate compliance with the trapper’s direction. Even
Ellen lent her hands to the labour, nor was it long before Inez was
seen similarly employed, though none amongst them knew why or
wherefore. When life is thought to be the reward of labour, men are
wont to be industrious. A very few moments sufficed to lay bare a spot
of some twenty feet in diameter. Into one edge of this little area the
trapper brought the females, directing Middleton and Paul to cover
their light and inflammable dresses with the blankets of the party. So
soon as this precaution was observed, the old man approached the
opposite margin of the grass, which still environed them in a tall and
dangerous circle, and selecting a handful of the driest of the herbage
he placed it over the pan of his rifle. The light combustible kindled
at the flash. Then he placed the little flame in a bed of the standing
fog, and withdrawing from the spot to the centre of the ring, he
patiently awaited the result.
The subtle element seized with avidity upon its new fuel, and in a
moment forked flames were gliding among the grass, as the tongues of
ruminating animals are seen rolling among their food, apparently in
quest of its sweetest portions.
“Now,” said the old man, holding up a finger, and laughing in his
peculiarly silent manner, “you shall see fire fight fire! Ah’s me! many
is the time I have burnt a smooty path, from wanton laziness to pick my
way across a tangled bottom.”
“But is this not fatal?” cried the amazed Middleton; “are you not
bringing the enemy nigher to us instead of avoiding it?”
“Do you scorch so easily? your grand’ther had a tougher skin. But we
shall live to see; we shall all live to see.”
The experience of the trapper was in the right. As the fire gained
strength and heat, it began to spread on three sides, dying of itself
on the fourth, for want of aliment. As it increased, and the sullen
roaring announced its power, it cleared every thing before it, leaving
the black and smoking soil far more naked than if the scythe had swept
the place. The situation of the fugitives would have still been
hazardous had not the area enlarged as the flame encircled them. But by
advancing to the spot where the trapper had kindled the grass, they
avoided the heat, and in a very few moments the flames began to recede
in every quarter, leaving them enveloped in a cloud of smoke, but
perfectly safe from the torrent of fire that was still furiously
rolling onward.
The spectators regarded the simple expedient of the trapper with that
species of wonder, with which the courtiers of Ferdinand are said to
have viewed the manner in which Columbus made his egg stand on its end,
though with feelings that were filled with gratitude instead of envy.
“Most wonderful!” said Middleton, when he saw the complete success of
the means by which they had been rescued from a danger that he had
conceived to be unavoidable. “The thought was a gift from Heaven, and
the hand that executed it should be immortal!”
“Old trapper,” cried Paul, thrusting his fingers through his shaggy
locks, “I have lined many a loaded bee into his hole, and know
something of the nature of the woods, but this is robbing a hornet of
his sting without touching the insect!”
“It will do—it will do,” returned the old man, who after the first
moment of his success seemed to think no more of the exploit; “now get
the horses in readiness. Let the flames do their work for a short half
hour, and then we will mount. That time is needed to cool the meadow,
for these unshod Teton beasts are as tender on the hoof as a barefooted
girl.”
Middleton and Paul, who considered this unlooked-for escape as a
species of resurrection, patiently awaited the time the trapper
mentioned with renewed confidence in the infallibility of his judgment.
The Doctor regained his tablets, a little the worse from having fallen
among the grass which had been subject to the action of the flames, and
was consoling himself for this slight misfortune by recording
uninterruptedly such different vacillations in light and shadow as he
chose to consider phenomena.
In the mean time the veteran, on whose experience they all so
implicitly relied for protection, employed himself in reconnoitring
objects in the distance, through the openings which the air
occasionally made in the immense bodies of smoke, that by this time lay
in enormous piles on every part of the plain.
“Look you here, lads,” the trapper said, after a long and anxious
examination, “your eyes are young and may prove better than my
worthless sight—though the time has been, when a wise and brave people
saw reason to think me quick on a look-out; but those times are gone,
and many a true and tried friend has passed away with them. Ah’s me! if
I could choose a change in the orderings of Providence—which I cannot,
and which it would be blasphemy to attempt, seeing that all things are
governed by a wiser mind than belongs to mortal weakness—but if I were
to choose a change, it would be to say, that such as they who have
lived long together in friendship and kindness, and who have proved
their fitness to go in company, by many acts of suffering and daring in
each other’s behalf, should be permitted to give up life at such times,
as when the death of one leaves the other but little reason to wish to
live.”
“Is it an Indian, that you see?” demanded the impatient Middleton.
“Red-skin or White-skin it is much the same. Friendship and use can tie
men as strongly together in the woods as in the towns—ay, and for that
matter, stronger. Here are the young warriors of the prairies.—Often do
they sort themselves in pairs, and set apart their lives for deeds of
friendship; and well and truly do they act up to their promises. The
death-blow to one is commonly mortal to the other! I have been a
solitary man much of my time, if he can be called solitary, who has
lived for seventy years in the very bosom of natur’, and where he could
at any instant open his heart to God, without having to strip it of the
cares and wickednesses of the settlements—but making that allowance,
have I been a solitary man; and yet have I always found that
intercourse with my kind was pleasant, and painful to break off,
provided that the companion was brave and honest. Brave, because a
skeary comrade in the woods,” suffering his eyes inadvertently to rest
a moment on the person of the abstracted naturalist, “is apt to make a
short path long; and honest, inasmuch as craftiness is rather an
instinct of the brutes, than a gift becoming the reason of a human
man.”
“But the object, that you saw—was it a Sioux?”
“What the world of America is coming to, and where the machinations and
inventions of its people are to have an end, the Lord, he only knows. I
have seen, in my day, the chief who, in his time, had beheld the first
Christian that placed his wicked foot in the regions of York! How much
has the beauty of the wilderness been deformed in two short lives! My
own eyes were first opened on the shores of the Eastern sea, and well
do I remember, that I tried the virtues of the first rifle I ever bore,
after such a march, from the door of my father to the forest, as a
stripling could make between sun and sun; and that without offence to
the rights, or prejudices, of any man who set himself up to be the
owner of the beasts of the fields. Natur’ then lay in its glory along
the whole coast, giving a narrow stripe, between the woods and the
ocean, to the greediness of the settlers. And where am I now? Had I the
wings of an eagle, they would tire before a tenth of the distance,
which separates me from that sea, could be passed; and towns, and
villages, farms, and highways, churches, and schools, in short, all the
inventions and deviltries of man, are spread across the region. I have
known the time when a few Red-skins, shouting along the borders, could
set the provinces in a fever; and men were to be armed; and troops were
to be called to aid from a distant land; and prayers were said, and the
women frighted, and few slept in quiet, because the Iroquois were on
the war-path, or the accursed Mingo had the tomahawk in hand. How is it
now? The country sends out her ships to foreign lands, to wage their
battles; cannon are plentier than the rifle used to be, and trained
soldiers are never wanting, in tens of thousands, when need calls for
their services. Such is the difference atween a province and a state,
my men; and I, miserable and worn out as I seem, have lived to see it
all!”
“That you must have seen many a chopper skimming the cream from the
face of the earth, and many a settler getting the very honey of nature,
old trapper,” said Paul, “no reasonable man can, or, for that matter,
shall doubt. But here is Ellen getting uneasy about the Siouxes, and
now you have opened your mind, so freely, concerning these matters, if
you will just put us on the line of our flight, the swarm will make
another move.”
“Anan!”
“I say that Ellen is getting uneasy, and as the smoke is lifting from
the plain, it may be prudent to take another flight.”
“The boy is reasonable. I had forgotten we were in the midst of a
raging fire, and that Siouxes were round about us, like hungry wolves
watching a drove of buffaloes. But when memory is at work in my old
brain, on times long past, it is apt to overlook the matters of the
day. You say right, my children; it is time to be moving, and now comes
the real nicety of our case. It is easy to outwit a furnace, for it is
nothing but a raging element; and it is not always difficult to throw a
grizzly bear from his scent, for the creatur’ is both enlightened and
blinded by his instinct; but to shut the eyes of a waking Teton is a
matter of greater judgment, inasmuch as his deviltry is backed by
reason.”
Notwithstanding the old man appeared so conscious of the difficulty of
the undertaking, he set about its achievement with great steadiness and
alacrity. After completing the examination, which had been interrupted
by the melancholy wanderings of his mind, he gave the signal to his
companions to mount. The horses, which had continued passive and
trembling amid the raging of the fire, received their burdens with a
satisfaction so very evident, as to furnish a favourable augury of
their future industry. The trapper invited the Doctor to take his own
steed, declaring his intention to proceed on foot.
“I am but little used to journeying with the feet of others,” he added,
as a reason for the measure, “and my legs are a weary of doing nothing.
Besides, should we light suddenly on an ambushment, which is a thing
far from impossible, the horse will be in a better condition for a hard
run with one man on his back than with two. As for me, what matters it
whether my time is to be a day shorter or a day longer! Let the Tetons
take my scalp, if it be God’s pleasure: they will find it covered with
grey hairs; and it is beyond the craft of man to cheat me of the
knowledge and experience by which they have been whitened.”
As no one among the impatient listeners seemed disposed to dispute the
arrangement, it was acceded to in silence. The Doctor, though he
muttered a few mourning exclamations on behalf of the lost Asinus, was
by far too well pleased in finding that his speed was likely to be
sustained by four legs instead of two, to be long in complying: and,
consequently, in a very few moments the bee-hunter, who was never last
to speak on such occasions, vociferously announced that they were ready
to proceed.
“Now look off yonder to the East,” said the old man, as he began to
lead the way across the murky and still smoking plain; “little fear of
cold feet in journeying such a path as this: but look you off to the
East, and if you see a sheet of shining white, glistening like a plate
of beaten silver through the openings of the smoke, why that is water.
A noble stream is running thereaway, and I thought I got a glimpse of
it a while since; but other thoughts came, and I lost it. It is a broad
and swift river, such as the Lord has made many of its fellows in this
desert. For here may natur’ be seen in all its richness, trees alone
excepted. Trees, which are to the ’arth, as fruits are to a garden;
without them nothing can be pleasant, or thoroughly useful. Now watch
all of you, with open eyes, for that stripe of glittering water: we
shall not be safe until it is flowing between our trail and these sharp
sighted Tetons.”
The latter declaration was enough to ensure a vigilant look out for the
desired stream, on the part of all the trapper’s followers. With this
object in view, the party proceeded in profound silence, the old man
having admonished them of the necessity of caution, as they entered the
clouds of smoke, which were rolling like masses of fog along the plain,
more particularly over those spots where the fire had encountered
occasional pools of stagnant water.
They travelled near a league in this manner, without obtaining the
desired glimpse of the river. The fire was still raging in the
distance, and as the air swept away the first vapour of the
conflagration, fresh volumes rolled along the place, limiting the view.
At length the old man, who had begun to betray some little uneasiness,
which caused his followers to apprehend that even his acute faculties
were beginning to be confused, in the mazes of the smoke, made a sudden
pause, and dropping his rifle to the ground, he stood, apparently
musing over some object at his feet. Middleton and the rest rode up to
his side, and demanded the reason of the halt.
“Look ye, here,” returned the trapper, pointing to the mutilated
carcass of a horse, that lay more than half consumed in a little hollow
of the ground; “here may you see the power of a prairie conflagration.
The ’arth is moist, hereaway, and the grass has been taller than usual.
This miserable beast has been caught in his bed. You see the bones; the
crackling and scorched hide, and the grinning teeth. A thousand winters
could not wither an animal so thoroughly, as the element has done it in
a minute.”
“And this might have been our fate,” said Middleton, “had the flames
come upon us, in our sleep!”
“Nay, I do not say that, I do not say that. Not but that man will burn
as well as tinder; but, that being more reasoning than a horse, he
would better know how to avoid the danger.”
“Perhaps this then has been but the carcass of an animal, or he too
would have fled?”
“See you these marks in the damp soil? Here have been his hoofs,—and
there is a moccasin print, as I’m a sinner! The owner of the beast has
tried hard to move him from the place, but it is in the instinct of the
creatur’ to be faint-hearted and obstinate in a fire.”
“It is a well-known fact. But if the animal has had a rider, where is
he?”
“Ay, therein lies the mystery,” returned the trapper, stooping to
examine the signs in the ground with a closer eye. “Yes, yes, it is
plain there has been a long struggle atween the two. The master has
tried hard to save his beast, and the flames must have been very
greedy, or he would have had better success.”
“Harkee, old trapper,” interrupted Paul, pointing to a little distance,
where the ground was drier, and the herbage had, in consequence, been
less luxuriant; “just call them two horses. Yonder lies another.”
“The boy is right! can it be, that the Tetons have been caught in their
own snares? Such things do happen; and here is an example to all
evil-doers. Ay, look you here, this is iron; there have been some white
inventions about the trappings of the beast—it must be so—it must be
so—a party of the knaves have been skirting in the grass after us,
while their friends have fired the prairie, and look you at the
consequences; they have lost their beasts, and happy have they been if
their own souls are not now skirting along the path, which leads to the
Indian heaven.”
“They had the same expedient at command as yourself,” rejoined
Middleton, as the party slowly proceeded, approaching the other
carcass, which lay directly on their route.
“I know not that. It is not every savage that carries his steel and
flint, or as good a rifle-pan as this old friend of mine. It is slow
making a fire with two sticks, and little time was given to consider,
or invent, just at this spot, as you may see by yon streak of flame,
which is flashing along afore the wind, as if it were on a trail of
powder. It is not many minutes since the fire has passed here away, and
it may be well to look at our primings, not that I would willingly
combat the Tetons, God forbid! but if a fight needs be, it is always
wise to get the first shot.”
“This has been a strange beast, old man,” said Paul, who had pulled the
bridle, or rather halter of his steed, over the second carcass, while
the rest of the party were already passing, in their eagerness to
proceed; “a strange horse do I call it; it had neither head nor hoofs!”
“The fire has not been idle,” returned the trapper, keeping his eye
vigilantly employed in profiting by those glimpses of the horizon,
which the whirling smoke offered to his examination. “It would soon
bake you a buffaloe whole, or for that matter powder his hoofs and
horns into white ashes. Shame, shame, old Hector: as for the captain’s
pup, it is to be expected that he would show his want of years, and I
may say, I hope without offence, his want of education too; but for a
hound, like you, who have lived so long in the forest afore you came
into these plains, it is very disgraceful, Hector, to be showing your
teeth, and growling at the carcass of a roasted horse, the same as if
you were telling your master that you had found the trail of a grizzly
bear.”
“I tell you, old trapper, this is no horse; neither in hoofs, head, nor
hide.”
“Anan! Not a horse? Your eyes are good for the bees and for the hollow
trees, my lad, but—bless me, the boy is right! That I should mistake
the hide of a buffaloe, scorched and crimpled as it is, for the carcass
of a horse! Ah’s me! The time has been, my men, when I would tell you
the name of a beast, as far as eye could reach, and that too with most
of the particulars of colour, age, and sex.”
“An inestimable advantage have you then enjoyed, venerable venator!”
observed the attentive naturalist. “The man who can make these
distinctions in a desert, is saved the pain of many a weary walk, and
often of an enquiry that in its result proves useless. Pray tell me,
did your exceeding excellence of vision extend so far as to enable you
to decide on their order, or genus?”
“I know not what you mean by your orders of genius.”
“No!” interrupted the bee-hunter, a little disdainfully for him, when
speaking to his aged friend; “now, old trapper, that is admitting your
ignorance of the English language, in a way I should not expect from a
man of your experience and understanding. By order, our comrade means
whether they go in promiscuous droves, like a swarm that is following
its queen-bee, or in single file, as you often see the buffaloes
trailing each other through a prairie. And as for genius, I’m sure that
is a word well understood, and in every body’s mouth. There is the
congress-man in our district, and that tonguey little fellow, who puts
out the paper in our county, they are both so called, for their
smartness; which is what the Doctor means, as I take it, seeing that he
seldom speaks without some considerable meaning.”
When Paul finished this very clever explanation he looked behind him
with an expression, which, rightly interpreted, would have said—“You
see, though I don’t often trouble myself in these matters, I am no
fool.”
Ellen admired Paul for anything but his learning. There was enough in
his frank, fearless, and manly character, backed as it was by great
personal attraction, to awaken her sympathies, without the necessity of
prying into his mental attainments. The poor girl reddened like a rose,
her pretty fingers played with the belt, by which she sustained herself
on the horse, and she hurriedly observed, as if anxious to direct the
attentions of the other listeners from a weakness, on which her own
thoughts could not bear to dwell—
“And this is not a horse, after all?”
“It is nothing more, nor less, than the hide of a buffaloe,” continued
the trapper, who had been no less puzzled by the explanation of Paul,
than by the language of the Doctor; “the hair is beneath; the fire has
run over it as you see; for being fresh, the flames could take no hold.
The beast has not been long killed, and it may be that some of the beef
is still hereaway.”
“Lift the corner of the skin, old trapper,” said Paul, with the tone of
one, who felt, as if he had now proved his right to mingle his voice in
any council; “if there is a morsel of the hump left, it must be well
cooked, and it shall be welcome.”
The old man laughed, heartily, at the conceit of his companion.
Thrusting his foot beneath the skin, it moved. Then it was suddenly
cast aside, and an Indian warrior sprang from its cover, to his feet,
with an agility, that bespoke how urgent he deemed the occasion.
[17] The American hunters consider the tail of the beaver the most
nourishing of all food.