r wisdom in such
matters, or their capacity to save her husband. Looking back to the
river, as upon a phase of her life already terminated, she saw the canoe
in which she had spent this troublous day already beginning to push out
upon the broad current. Willinawaugh, with an Indian from the other crew
to paddle the craft, had eluded Captain Stuart, who had reached the
water's edge too late for a word with him, and who stood upon the bank,
an effective martial figure, and blandly waved his hand in farewell,
with a jovial outcry, "_Canawlla! Canawlla!_"[C]

The features of the chief were slightly corrugated with those fine lines
of diplomatic thought, and even at this distance he muttered the last
word he had spoken to the corporal as he swiftly got away from
him--"Ingliss!" he said again. "All Ingliss!"

As Odalie turned, the interior of the fort was before her; the broad
parade, the lines of barracks, the heavy, looming block-houses, the
great red-clay wall encircling all, and the high, strong palisades that
even surmounted the rampart. It gave her momentarily the sensation, as
she stood in its shadow, of being down in a populous and very secure
well. There was a pervasive sentiment of good cheer; here and there the
flicker of firelight fluctuated from an open door. Supper was either in
progress or just over, and savory odors gushed out into the air. The
champing of horses and now and then a glad whinny betokened that the
corn-bin was open in the stables somewhere in the dusk. She felt as if
the wilderness was a dream, for surely all this cordial scene of warmth,
and light, and cheer, and activity, could not have existed while she
wandered yonder, so forlorn, and desolate, and endangered; in pity of
it,--surely it was a dream! Now and again groups of fresh-faced soldiers
passed, most of them in full uniform, for there had been a great dress
parade during the afternoon, perhaps to impress the Indians with the
resources and military strength of the fort; perhaps to attach them by
affording that spectacular display, so new to all their experience, so
imposing and splendid. Some of the savage visitors lingered, wistful,
loath to depart, and were being hustled carefully out of the place by a
very vigilant guard, who had kept them under surveillance as a special
charge all the afternoon. A few soldiers of the post coming in laden
with game wore the buckskin leggings, shirt, and coonskin cap usual
among the settlers, for it h