tal absence of the Knight saved him from the indignity
to which his household was subjected. Well were the measures of his
enemies taken, and the time chosen, for it was reasonable to suppose,
that after so long a journey, he would certainly be found at his
domicile the first night. His erratic habits were well known, and it
was this knowledge which induced the choice of the time for the
arrest, and indeed had assisted to deepen suspicions, in a suspicious
community, against him. It would not have suited the purposes of
Spikeman to wait, and thus afford the Knight an opportunity to present
himself in town. He chose to bring in Sir Christopher as a criminal,
knowing that having committed his associates thus far, to an act of
violence, they would not be likely to rest until they had expelled Sir
Christopher from the colony.

At the time Spikeman was rifling his house, and injuriously treating
its inmates, the Knight, unsuspicious of harm, was lying in the wigwam
of Sassacus, which was distant but a mile or two from his own
residence. Lying on his side, with his head supported on one hand by
the elbow resting on the ground, he was addressing the Sagamore, who,
seated in Indian fashion, with the soothing pipe at his lips, was
listening to his discourse. A flickering fire sent up now and then a
bright flame, by means of which the two became ever and anon more
distinctly discernible to each other, while in the intervals, there
was only light enough to distinguish the outlines of their persons.
Even through the studied apathy of the Pequot, it was obvious that the
subject possessed considerable interest for him, for occasionally he
would remove his pipe from his mouth, and gaze fixedly on the ground,
as if lost in profound thought.

"Wonderful, O chief," he said, after the Knight had ceased speaking,
"are the things which thou hast told, and I believe, because the white
men are very strange, and I have never caught thee in a lie. Truly, as
thou sayest, are the red men children, and the white men exceed them
in wisdom, even as the beaver the wolf. The wise beaver is warm in his
lodge, when the wolf howls for hunger and cold in the forest. The
white man is the beaver, and the red man the wolf. The Great Spirit
made them so, for so it pleased him, and so they must remain."

"Nay," said the Knight. "There was a time when the white race was like
thine own, without that knowledge which makes them so powerful."

"And can the chie