that can do all this, you cannot
find a man with a red-skin natur', let him look ever so valiant, or know
how to read all the books that were ever printed."

"It is the savages only that play each other such hellish tricks,"
said Master Cap, glancing his eyes about him uneasily at the apparently
endless arches of the forest. "No white man is ever condemned to undergo
these trials."

"Nay, therein you are again mistaken," returned the Pathfinder, coolly
selecting a delicate morsel of the venison as his _bonne bouche_; "for
though these torments belong only to the red-skin natur', in the way of
bearing them like braves, white-skin natur' may be, and often has been,
agonized by them."

"Happily," said Cap, with an effort to clear his throat, "none of his
Majesty's allies will be likely to attempt such damnable cruelties on
any of his Majesty's loyal subjects. I have not served much in the royal
navy, it is true; but I have served, and that is something; and, in the
way of privateering and worrying the enemy in his ships and cargoes,
I've done my full share. But I trust there are no French savages on this
side the lake, and I think you said that Ontario is a broad sheet of
water?"

"Nay, it is broad in our eyes," returned Pathfinder, not caring to
conceal the smile which lighted a face which had been burnt by exposure
to a bright red; "though I mistrust that some may think it narrow; and
narrow it is, if you wish it to keep off the foe. Ontario has two ends,
and the enemy that is afraid to cross it will be certain to come round
it."

"Ah! that comes of your d----d fresh-water ponds!" growled Cap, hemming
so loudly as to cause him instantly to repent the indiscretion. "No
man, now, ever heard of a pirate or a ship getting round one end of the
Atlantic!"

"Mayhap the ocean has no ends?"

"That it hasn't; nor sides, nor bottom. The nation which is snugly
moored on one of its coasts need fear nothing from the one anchored
abeam, let it be ever so savage, unless it possesses the art of ship
building. No, no! the people who live on the shores of the Atlantic need
fear but little for their skins or their scalps. A man may lie down at
night in those regions, in the hope of finding the hair on his head in
the morning, unless he wears a wig."

"It isn't so here. I don't wish to flurry the young woman, and therefore
I will be in no way particular, though she seems pretty much listening
to Eau-douce, as we call him; but with