ody of Pieskaret should
have been fastened to the raft. It seemed a wanton act of bravado,
which he could not reconcile with the known qualities of Sassacus.
Concealment and not exposure, he thought, should have been the policy,
but on the contrary, the very course had been adopted most likely to
lead to discovery. Why again, he thought, is the chief of a distant
tribe lurking in these woods? He surely can cherish no evil design
against the colony, for there is no misunderstanding betwixt the
English and the Pequots.

His thoughts then dwelt upon the Knight, and upon his connection with
the savage. Who was this man, who, in the flower of his age, and with
all the accomplishments of a gentleman, chose to retire from the
world, and with his sad companion, immure himself in the woods? He was
no sour anchorite, who regarded with displeasure the innocent
enjoyments of life, nor did he appear to be an unprincipled
adventurer, who had fled from restraint in the old world, in order to
give license to his passions in the new. He was evidently a man of
consideration in the colony. He was treated with attention by all,
courted by the whites, and held in high estimation by the Indians.
That such a man as Sir Christopher Gardiner should adopt that wild
life of seclusion, did not indeed strike the mind of Arundel with the
degree of surprise wherewith our own are affected, for it was a time
of adventure and romance; the poetry of life was not bound up
principally in books, but was acted out in deeds; and the occurrence
of daily wonders, while it destroyed their singularity, abated
curiosity on their account. Hence men expressed no astonishment at the
course of life of the Knight; hence, when Arundel became acquainted
with him, he felt none, and it was only upon more intimate
acquaintance--after Sir Christopher began to take an interest in him;
after he had noted the influence exercised by the Knight over the
ambassadors; and after he had discovered, as he supposed, a community
of aims betwixt the Knight and Sassacus, that his curiosity awoke. To
judge from the communication of the Indian chief, it would seem as if
the Knight were a sort of missionary among the natives, to teach them
the arts and practices of civilized life; but nothing that Arundel
himself had noticed, justified any such suspicion. All he knew of Sir
Christopher was, that he was passionately fond of the chase, which
frequently led him deep into the forest, and had be