ista opened to the skies from the little glade,
a prey to despair, made so much more poignant by disappointment and
self-reproach. Why had he not taken advantage of his temporary release
from the cords, to attempt escape by open flight, when the drunkenness of
the old Piankeshaw would have increased the chances of success? He had
lost his best ally in the cask of liquor; but he resolved,--if the
delirious plans of a mind tossed by the most frenzied passions could be
called resolutions,--a second day should not pass by without an effort
better becoming a soldier, better becoming the only friend and natural
protector of the hapless Edith.

In the meanwhile, the night passed slowly away, the moon, diminished to a
ghastly crescent, rose over the woods, looking down with a sickly smile
upon the prisoner,--an emblem of his decayed fortunes and waning hopes;
and a pale streak, the first dull glimmer of dawn, was seen stealing up
the skies. But neither moon nor streak of dawn yet threw light upon the
little glade. The watch-fire had burned nearly away, and its flames no
longer illuminated the scene. The crackling of the embers, with an
occasional echo from the wood hard by, as of the rustling of a rabbit, or
other small animal, drawn by the unusual appearance of fire near his
favourite fountain, to satisfy a timorous curiosity, was the only sound
to be heard; for the Indians were in the dead sleep of morning, and their
breathing was no longer audible.

The silence and darkness together were doubly painful to Roland, who had
marked the streak of dawn, and longed with fierce impatience for the
moment when he should be again freed from his bonds, and left to attempt
some of those desperate expedients which he had been planning all the
night long. In such a frame of mind, even the accidental falling of a
half-consumed brand upon the embers, and its sudden kindling into flame,
were circumstances of an agreeable nature; and the ruddy glare thrown
over the boughs above his head was welcomed as the return of a friend,
bringing with it hope, and even a share of his long lost tranquillity.

But tranquillity was not fated to dwell long in his bosom. At that very
moment, and while the blaze of the brand was brightest, his ears were
stunned by an explosion bursting like a thunderbolt at his very head, but
whether coming from earth or air, from the hands of Heaven or the
firelock of a human being, he knew not; and immediately after there
s