ir eagerness, and favored by the nature of the ground, they had
anticipated the fog, which was rolling heavily down the lake, and it
became necessary to pause, until the mists had wrapped the camp of the
enemy in their fleecy mantle. The Mohicans profited by the delay, to
steal out of the woods, and to make a survey of surrounding objects.
They were followed at a little distance by the scout, with a view to
profit early by their report, and to obtain some faint knowledge for
himself of the more immediate localities.

In a very few moments he returned, his face reddened with vexation,
while he muttered his disappointment in words of no very gentle import.

"Here has the cunning Frenchman been posting a picket directly in our
path," he said; "red-skins and whites; and we shall be as likely to fall
into their midst as to pass them in the fog!"

"Cannot we make a circuit to avoid the danger," asked Heyward, "and come
into our path again when it is passed?"

"Who that once bends from the line of his march in a fog can tell when
or how to find it again! The mists of Horican are not like the curls
from a peace-pipe, or the smoke which settles above a mosquito fire."

He was yet speaking, when a crashing sound was heard, and a cannon-ball
entered the thicket, striking the body of a sapling, and rebounding to
the earth, its force being much expended by previous resistance.
The Indians followed instantly like busy attendants on the terrible
messenger, and Uncas commenced speaking earnestly and with much action,
in the Delaware tongue.

"It may be so, lad," muttered the scout, when he had ended; "for
desperate fevers are not to be treated like a toothache. Come, then, the
fog is shutting in."

"Stop!" cried Heyward; "first explain your expectations."

"'Tis soon done, and a small hope it is; but it is better than nothing.
This shot that you see," added the scout, kicking the harmless iron with
his foot, "has plowed the 'arth in its road from the fort, and we shall
hunt for the furrow it has made, when all other signs may fail. No more
words, but follow, or the fog may leave us in the middle of our path, a
mark for both armies to shoot at."

Heyward perceiving that, in fact, a crisis had arrived, when acts were
more required than words, placed himself between the sisters, and drew
them swiftly forward, keeping the dim figure of their leader in his eye.
It was soon apparent that Hawkeye had not magnified the power of the
f