the next
sun will not dry it on the ground, and his body is more feeble than his
will."

"Man is made thus," rejoined the messenger, sententiously.

The Blackbird continued without noticing the reflection:

"It is some very important message doubtless, since the Spotted Cat has
chosen the fleetest of his runners to carry it?"

"The Spotted Cat will send no more messengers," replied the Indian.
"The lance of a white man has pierced his breast, and the chief now
hunts with his fathers in the land of spirits."

"What matter! he died a conqueror? he saw, before he died, the white
dogs dispersed over the plain?"

"He died conquered; and the Apaches had to fly after losing their chief
and fifty of their renowned warriors."

In spite of his wound, and of the empire that an Indian should exercise
over himself, the Blackbird started up at these words. However, he
restrained himself, and replied gravely, though with trembling lips--

"Who, then, sends you to me, messenger of ill?"

"The warriors, who want a chief to repair their defeat. The Blackbird
was but the chief of a tribe, he is now the chief of a whole people."

Satisfied pride shone in the eye of the Indian, at his augmented
authority.

"If the rifles of the north had been joined to ours, the whites of the
south would have been conquered." But as he recalled to mind the
insulting manner in which the two hunters had rejected his proposal, his
eyes darted forth flames of hatred, and pointing to his wound, he said,
"What can a wounded chief do? His limbs refuse to carry him, and he can
scarcely sit on his horse."

"We can tie him on; a chief is at once a head and an arm--if the arm be
powerless the head will act, and the sight of their chief's blood will
animate our warriors. The council fire was lighted anew after the
defeat, and the warriors wait for the Blackbird to make his voice heard;
his battle-horse is ready--let us go!"

"No," replied the Blackbird, "my warriors encompass, on each bank, the
white hunters whom I wished to have for allies; now they are enemies;
the ball of one of them has rendered useless for six moons, the arm that
was so strong in combat; and were I offered the command of ten nations,
I would refuse it, to await here the hour when the blood that I thirst
for shall flow before my eyes."

The chief then recounted briefly the captivity of Gayferos, his
deliverance by the Canadian, the rejection of his proposals and the vow
of ve