silent but attentive observer of their progress.
As tree after tree came whistling down, he cast his eyes upward at the
vacancies they left in the heavens, with a melancholy gaze, and finally
turned away, muttering to himself with a bitter smile, like one who
disdained giving a more audible utterance to his discontent. Pressing
through the group of active and busy children, who had already lighted
a cheerful fire, the attention of the old man became next fixed on
the movements of the leader of the emigrants and of his savage looking
assistant.

These two had, already, liberated the cattle, which were eagerly
browsing the grateful and nutritious extremities of the fallen trees,
and were now employed about the wagon, which has been described
as having its contents concealed with so much apparent care.
Notwithstanding this particular conveyance appeared to be as silent,
and as tenantless as the rest of the vehicles, the men applied their
strength to its wheels, and rolled it apart from the others, to a dry
and elevated spot, near the edge of the thicket. Here they brought
certain poles, which had, seemingly, been long employed in such a
service, and fastening their larger ends firmly in the ground, the
smaller were attached to the hoops that supported the covering of the
wagon. Large folds of cloth were next drawn out of the vehicle, and
after being spread around the whole, were pegged to the earth in such
a manner as to form a tolerably capacious and an exceedingly convenient
tent. After surveying their work with inquisitive, and perhaps jealous
eyes, arranging a fold here, and driving a peg more firmly there, the
men once more applied their strength to the wagon, pulling it, by its
projecting tongue, from the centre of the canopy, until it appeared
in the open air, deprived of its covering, and destitute of any other
freight, than a few light articles of furniture. The latter were
immediately removed, by the traveller, into the tent with his own
hands, as though to enter it, were a privilege, to which even his bosom
companion was not entitled.

Curiosity is a passion that is rather quickened than destroyed by
seclusion, and the old inhabitant of the prairies did not view these
precautionary and mysterious movements, without experiencing some of
its impulses. He approached the tent, and was about to sever two of its
folds, with the very obvious intention of examining, more closely, into
the nature of its contents, when