for the wilderness, from harm, and that without hope of
any other recompense but such as God always gives to upright dealings.
First, you must promise two things, both in your own name and for your
friends, or without serving you we shall only injure ourselves!"

"Name them."

"The one is, to be still as these sleeping woods, let what will happen
and the other is, to keep the place where we shall take you, forever a
secret from all mortal men."

"I will do my utmost to see both these conditions fulfilled."

"Then follow, for we are losing moments that are as precious as the
heart's blood to a stricken deer!"

Heyward could distinguish the impatient gesture of the scout, through
the increasing shadows of the evening, and he moved in his footsteps,
swiftly, toward the place where he had left the remainder of the
party. When they rejoined the expecting and anxious females, he briefly
acquainted them with the conditions of their new guide, and with the
necessity that existed for their hushing every apprehension in instant
and serious exertions. Although his alarming communication was not
received without much secret terror by the listeners, his earnest and
impressive manner, aided perhaps by the nature of the danger, succeeded
in bracing their nerves to undergo some unlooked-for and unusual trial.
Silently, and without a moment's delay, they permitted him to assist
them from their saddles, and when they descended quickly to the water's
edge, where the scout had collected the rest of the party, more by the
agency of expressive gestures than by any use of words.

"What to do with these dumb creatures!" muttered the white man, on whom
the sole control of their future movements appeared to devolve; "it
would be time lost to cut their throats, and cast them into the river;
and to leave them here would be to tell the Mingoes that they have not
far to seek to find their owners!"

"Then give them their bridles, and let them range the woods," Heyward
ventured to suggest.

"No; it would be better to mislead the imps, and make them believe they
must equal a horse's speed to run down their chase. Ay, ay, that will
blind their fireballs of eyes! Chingach--Hist! what stirs the bush?"

"The colt."

"That colt, at least, must die," muttered the scout, grasping at the
mane of the nimble beast, which easily eluded his hand; "Uncas, your
arrows!"

"Hold!" exclaimed the proprietor of the condemned animal, aloud, without
regard t