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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 ***; 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
*** 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," (FOOTNOTE: 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.
-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."
"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 *** 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.
But Uncas, who had vainly sought him in the melee, bounded forward in pursuit; Hawkeye,
Heyward and David still pressing on his footsteps.
The utmost that the scout could effect, was to keep the muzzle of his rifle a little in
advance of his friend, to whom, however, it answered every purpose of a charmed shield.
Once Magua appeared disposed to make another and a final effort to revenge his
losses; but, abandoning his intention as soon as demonstrated, he leaped into a
thicket of bushes, through which he was
followed by his enemies, and suddenly entered the mouth of the cave already known
to the reader.
Hawkeye, who had only forborne to fire in tenderness to Uncas, raised a shout of
success, and proclaimed aloud that now they were certain of their game.
The pursuers dashed into the long and narrow entrance, in time to catch a glimpse
of the retreating forms of the Hurons.
Their passage through the natural galleries and subterraneous apartments of the cavern
was preceded by the shrieks and cries of hundreds of women and children.
The place, seen by its dim and uncertain light, appeared like the shades of the
infernal regions, across which unhappy ghosts and savage demons were flitting in
multitudes.
Still Uncas kept his eye on Magua, as if life to him possessed but a single object.
Heyward and the scout still pressed on his rear, actuated, though possibly in a less
degree, by a common feeling.
But their way was becoming intricate, in those dark and gloomy passages, and the
glimpses of the retiring warriors less distinct and frequent; and for a moment the
trace was believed to be lost, when a white
robe was seen fluttering in the further extremity of a passage that seemed to lead
up the mountain.
"'Tis Cora!" exclaimed Heyward, in a voice in which horror and delight were wildly
mingled. "Cora!
Cora!" echoed Uncas, bounding forward like a deer.
"'Tis the maiden!" shouted the scout. "Courage, lady; we come! we come!"
The chase was renewed with a diligence rendered tenfold encouraging by this
glimpse of the captive. But the way was rugged, broken, and in
spots nearly impassable.
Uncas abandoned his rifle, and leaped forward with headlong precipitation.
Heyward rashly imitated his example, though both were, a moment afterward, admonished
of his madness by hearing the bellowing of a piece, that the Hurons found time to
discharge down the passage in the rocks,
the bullet from which even gave the young Mohican a slight wound.
"We must close!" said the scout, passing his friends by a desperate leap; "the
knaves will pick us all off at this distance; and see, they hold the maiden so
as to shield themselves!"
Though his words were unheeded, or rather unheard, his example was followed by his
companions, who, by incredible exertions, got near enough to the fugitives to
perceive that Cora was borne along between
the two warriors while Magua prescribed the direction and manner of their flight.
At this moment the forms of all four were strongly drawn against an opening in the
sky, and they disappeared.
Nearly frantic with disappointment, Uncas and Heyward increased efforts that already
seemed superhuman, and they issued from the cavern on the side of the mountain, in time
to note the route of the pursued.
The course lay up the ascent, and still continued hazardous and laborious.
Encumbered by his rifle, and, perhaps, not sustained by so deep an interest in the
captive as his companions, the scout suffered the latter to precede him a
little, Uncas, in his turn, taking the lead of Heyward.
In this manner, rocks, precipices and difficulties were surmounted in an
incredibly short space, that at another time, and under other circumstances, would
have been deemed almost insuperable.
But the impetuous young men were rewarded by finding that, encumbered with Cora, the
Hurons were losing ground in the race.
"Stay, dog of the Wyandots!" exclaimed Uncas, shaking his bright tomahawk at
Magua; "a Delaware girl calls stay!"
"I will go no further!" cried Cora, stopping unexpectedly on a ledge of rock,
that overhung a deep precipice, at no great distance from the summit of the mountain.
"Kill me if thou wilt, detestable Huron; I will go no further."
The supporters of the maiden raised their ready tomahawks with the impious joy that
fiends are thought to take in mischief, but Magua stayed the uplifted arms.
The Huron chief, after casting the weapons he had wrested from his companions over the
rock, drew his knife, and turned to his captive, with a look in which conflicting
passions fiercely contended.
"Woman," he said, "chose; the wigwam or the knife of Le Subtil!"
Cora regarded him not, but dropping on her knees, she raised her eyes and stretched
her arms toward heaven, saying in a meek and yet confiding voice:
"I am thine; do with me as thou seest best!"
"Woman," repeated Magua, hoarsely, and endeavoring in vain to catch a glance from
her serene and beaming eye, "choose!"
But Cora neither heard nor heeded his demand.
The form of the Huron trembled in every fibre, and he raised his arm on high, but
dropped it again with a bewildered air, like one who doubted.
Once more he struggled with himself and lifted the keen weapon again; but just then
a piercing cry was heard above them, and Uncas appeared, leaping frantically, from a
fearful height, upon the ledge.
Magua recoiled a step; and one of his assistants, profiting by the chance,
sheathed his own knife in the *** of Cora.
The Huron sprang like a tiger on his offending and already retreating country
man, but the falling form of Uncas separated the unnatural combatants.
Diverted from his object by this interruption, and maddened by the *** he
had just witnessed, Magua buried his weapon in the back of the prostrate Delaware,
uttering an unearthly shout as he committed the dastardly deed.
But Uncas arose from the blow, as the wounded panther turns upon his foe, and
struck the murderer of Cora to his feet, by an effort in which the last of his failing
strength was expended.
Then, with a stern and steady look, he turned to Le Subtil, and indicated by the
expression of his eye all that he would do had not the power deserted him.
The latter seized the nerveless arm of the unresisting Delaware, and passed his knife
into his *** three several times, before his victim, still keeping his gaze riveted
on his enemy, with a look of
inextinguishable scorn, fell dead at his feet.
"Mercy! mercy!
Huron," cried Heyward, from above, in tones nearly choked by horror; "give mercy, and
thou shalt receive from it!"
Whirling the bloody knife up at the imploring youth, the victorious Magua
uttered a cry so fierce, so wild, and yet so joyous, that it conveyed the sounds of
savage triumph to the ears of those who
fought in the valley, a thousand feet below.
He was answered by a burst from the lips of the scout, whose tall person was just then
seen moving swiftly toward him, along those dangerous crags, with steps as bold and
reckless as if he possessed the power to move in air.
But when the hunter reached the scene of the ruthless massacre, the ledge was
tenanted only by the dead.
His keen eye took a single look at the victims, and then shot its glances over the
difficulties of the ascent in his front.
A form stood at the brow of the mountain, on the very edge of the giddy height, with
uplifted arms, in an awful attitude of menace.
Without stopping to consider his person, the rifle of Hawkeye was raised; but a
rock, which fell on the head of one of the fugitives below, exposed the indignant and
glowing countenance of the honest Gamut.
Then Magua issued from a crevice, and, stepping with calm indifference over the
body of the last of his associates, he leaped a wide fissure, and ascended the
rocks at a point where the arm of David could not reach him.
A single bound would carry him to the brow of the precipice, and assure his safety.
Before taking the leap, however, the Huron paused, and shaking his hand at the scout,
he shouted: "The pale faces are dogs! the Delawares
women!
Magua leaves them on the rocks, for the crows!"
Laughing hoarsely, he made a desperate leap, and fell short of his mark, though
his hands grasped a shrub on the verge of the height.
The form of Hawkeye had crouched like a beast about to take its spring, and his
frame trembled so violently with eagerness that the muzzle of the half-raised rifle
played like a leaf fluttering in the wind.
Without exhausting himself with fruitless efforts, the cunning Magua suffered his
body to drop to the length of his arms, and found a fragment for his feet to rest on.
Then, summoning all his powers, he renewed the attempt, and so far succeeded as to
draw his knees on the edge of the mountain.
It was now, when the body of his enemy was most collected together, that the agitated
weapon of the scout was drawn to his shoulder.
The surrounding rocks themselves were not steadier than the piece became, for the
single instant that it poured out its contents.
The arms of the Huron relaxed, and his body fell back a little, while his knees still
kept their position. Turning a relentless look on his enemy, he
shook a hand in grim defiance.
But his hold loosened, and his dark person was seen cutting the air with its head
downward, for a fleeting instant, until it glided past the fringe of shrubbery which
clung to the mountain, in its rapid flight to destruction.