table Esther herself. In this manner the chase was continued
for many minutes, the horsemen gradually gaining on their pursuers, who
maintained the race, however, with an incredible power of foot.

As the little speck of blue rose against the heavens, like an island
issuing from the deep, the savages occasionally raised a yell of
triumph. But the mists of evening were already gathering along the whole
of the eastern margin of the prairie, and before the band had made half
of the necessary distance, the dim outline of the rock had melted into
the haze of the back ground. Indifferent to this circumstance, which
rather favoured than disconcerted his plans, Mahtoree, who had again
ridden in front, held on his course with the accuracy of a hound of the
truest scent, merely slackening his speed a little, as the horses of his
party were by this time thoroughly blown. It was at this stage of the
enterprise, that the old man rode up to the side of Middleton, and
addressed him as follows in English--

"Here is likely to be a thieving business, and one in which I must say I
have but little wish to be a partner."

"What would you do? It would be fatal to trust ourselves in the hands of
the miscreants in our rear."

"Tut, for miscreants, be they red or be they white. Look ahead, lad,
as if ye were talking of our medicines, or perhaps praising the Teton
beasts. For the knaves love to hear their horses commended, the same as
a foolish mother in the settlements is fond of hearing the praises of
her wilful child. So; pat the animal and lay your hand on the gewgaws,
with which the Red-skins have ornamented his mane, giving your eye as
it were to one thing, and your mind to another. Listen; if matters are
managed with judgment, we may leave these Tetons as the night sets in."

"A blessed thought!" exclaimed Middleton, who retained a painful
remembrance of the look of admiration, with which Mahtoree had
contemplated the loveliness of Inez, as well as of his subsequent
presumption in daring to wish to take the office of her protector on
himself.

"Lord, Lord! what a weak creatur' is man, when the gifts of natur' are
smothered in bookish knowledge, and womanly manners! Such another start
would tell these imps at our elbows that we were plotting against them,
just as plainly as if it were whispered in their ears by a Sioux tongue.
Ay, ay, I know the devils; they look as innocent as so many frisky
fawns, but there is not one among them a