om the Spaniards are as
afraid as my people are of them? Two Spaniards can drive fifty
Indians before them, but I hear that a dozen of these Englishmen
can take a ship with a hundred Spaniards on board. It is wonderful.
They look something like our oppressors, but they are fairer, and
their eyes are blue; and they look honest, and have not that air of
pride, and arrogance, which the Spaniard never lays aside.

"I have a boy here."

And as she spoke an Indian boy, of some thirteen years of age,
slipped out from behind her.

"He will show them to the refuge places of the last of my race.
There they will be well received, for I have sent by him a message
to their chiefs; and it may be that these lads, knowing the ways of
white warfare, will be able to assist my countrymen, and to enable
them to resist these dogs of Spaniards.

"The blessing of an old woman be upon you. I have seen many
changes. I have seen my people possessors of this island, save a
small settlement which they had, even then, the folly to allow the
Spaniards to possess. I have seen them swept away by the oppressor,
my husband tortured and killed, my brothers burned alive, all that
I loved slain by the Spaniards. Now, it does my old eyes good to
see two of the race who will, in the future, drive those dogs from
these fair lands, as they have driven my people."

So saying, she returned into the hut.

The boy prepared at once to start, and the lads, wringing the hand
of the black who had been so kind to them, at once followed their
guide into the darkness. For some hours they walked without
intermission, sometimes going at a sling trot, and then easing down
again. Dark as was the night, their guide trod the paths without
hesitation or pause. The boys could scarce see the ground upon
which they trod, but the eyes of the native were keener than
theirs, and to him the way seemed as clear as in broad daylight.

After traversing for some miles a flat, level country, they began
to mount; and for about two hours ascended a mountain, thickly
covered with forest. Then the guide stopped, and motioned to them
that he could now go no further, and must rest for the present.

The boys were surprised at this sudden stop, for their guide had
gone along so quickly and easily that he taxed, to the utmost,
their powers of progression; while he, himself, never breathed any
harder than when walking upon the level ground. They had, however,
no means of interrogating him