s of his hosts. But his ingenuity availed
him little, against the cold artifices of the people he had encountered.
The chiefs in front scarce cast a glance at his person, keeping their
eyes on the ground, with an air that might have been intended for
respect, but which it was quite easy to construe into distrust. The men
in the shadow were less reserved. Duncan soon detected their searching,
but stolen, looks which, in truth, scanned his person and attire inch by
inch; leaving no emotion of the countenance, no gesture, no line of the
paint, nor even the fashion of a garment, unheeded, and without comment.

At length one whose hair was beginning to be sprinkled with gray, but
whose sinewy limbs and firm tread announced that he was still equal to
the duties of manhood, advanced out of the gloom of a corner, whither he
had probably posted himself to make his observations unseen, and
spoke. He used the language of the Wyandots, or Hurons; his words were,
consequently, unintelligible to Heyward, though they seemed, by the
gestures that accompanied them, to be uttered more in courtesy than
anger. The latter shook his head, and made a gesture indicative of his
inability to reply.

"Do none of my brothers speak the French or the English?" he said, in
the former language, looking about him from countenance to countenance,
in hopes of finding a nod of assent.

Though more than one had turned, as if to catch the meaning of his
words, they remained unanswered.

"I should be grieved to think," continued Duncan, speaking slowly, and
using the simplest French of which he was the master, "to believe that
none of this wise and brave nation understand the language that the
'Grand Monarque' uses when he talks to his children. His heart would be
heavy did he believe his red warriors paid him so little respect!"

A long and grave pause succeeded, during which no movement of a limb,
nor any expression of an eye, betrayed the expression produced by his
remark. Duncan, who knew that silence was a virtue among his hosts,
gladly had recourse to the custom, in order to arrange his ideas. At
length the same warrior who had before addressed him replied, by dryly
demanding, in the language of the Canadas:

"When our Great Father speaks to his people, is it with the tongue of a
Huron?"

"He knows no difference in his children, whether the color of the skin
be red, or black, or white," returned Duncan, evasively; "though chiefly
is he satisfie