will be deaf.
Then let my father ask for the colt, that has never been ridden, but
which is sleeker than the buck, and swifter than the elk."

"I understand you, boy, I understand you," interrupted the attentive old
man; "and what you say shall be done, ay, and well done too, or I'm but
little skilled in the wishes of a dying Indian."

"And when my young men have given my father the halter of that colt, he
will lead him by a crooked path to the grave of Hard-Heart?"

"Will I! ay, that I will, brave youth, though the winter covers these
plains in banks of snow, and the sun is hidden as much by day as by
night. To the head of the holy spot will I lead the beast, and place him
with his eyes looking towards the setting sun."

"And my father will speak to him, and tell him, that the master, who has
fed him since he was foaled, has now need of him."

"That, too, will I do; though the Lord he knows that I shall hold
discourse with a horse, not with any vain conceit that my words will
be understood, but only to satisfy the cravings of Indian superstition.
Hector, my pup, what think you, dog, of talking to a horse?"

"Let the grey-beard speak to him with the tongue of a Pawnee,"
interrupted the young victim, perceiving that his companion had used an
unknown language for the preceding speech.

"My son's will shall be done. And with these old hands, which I had
hoped had nearly done with bloodshed, whether it be of man or beast,
will I slay the animal on your grave!"

"It is good," returned the other, a gleam of satisfaction flitting
across his features. "Hard-Heart will ride his horse to the blessed
prairies, and he will come before the Master of Life like a chief!"

The sudden and striking change, which instantly occurred in the
countenance of the Indian, caused the trapper to look aside, when
he perceived that the conference of the Siouxes had ended, and that
Mahtoree, attended by one or two of the principal warriors, was
deliberately approaching his intended victim.

CHAPTER XXVI

I am not prone to weeping, as our sex
Commonly are.
--But I have that honourable
Grief lodged here, which burns worse than
Tears drown
--Shakspeare.

When within twenty feet of the prisoners, the Tetons stopped, and their
leader made a sign to the old man to draw nigh. The trapper obeyed,
quitting the