he act led to no advantage, while
it threatened to render the warfare more vindictive than ever, and none
censure motiveless departures from the right more severely than the
mercenary and unprincipled. Still he commanded himself, the captivity
of Deerslayer rendering the arm of the offender of double consequence
to him at that moment. Chingachgook arose, and for a single instant the
ancient animosity of tribes was forgotten, in a feeling of colour;
but he recollected himself in season to prevent any of the fierce
consequences that, for a passing moment, he certainly meditated. Not so
with Hist. Rushing through the hut, or cabin, the girl stood at the side
of Hurry, almost as soon as his rifle touched the bottom of the scow,
and with a fearlessness that did credit to her heart, she poured out her
reproaches with the generous warmth of a woman.

"What for you shoot?" she said. "What Huron gal do, dat you kill him?
What you t'ink Manitou say? What you t'ink Manitou feel? What Iroquois
do? No get honour--no get camp--no get prisoner--no get battle--no get
scalp--no get not'ing at all! Blood come after blood! How you feel, your
wife killed? Who pity you, when tear come for moder, or sister? You big
as great pine--Huron gal little slender birch--why you fall on her and
crush her? You t'ink Huron forget it? No; red-skin never forget! Never
forget friend; never forget enemy. Red man Manitou in dat. Why you so
wicked, great pale-face?"

Hurry had never been so daunted as by this close and warm attack of the
Indian girl. It is true that she had a powerful ally in his conscience,
and while she spoke earnestly, it was in tones so feminine as to deprive
him of any pretext for unmanly anger. The softness of her voice added
to the weight of her remonstrance, by lending to the latter an air of
purity and truth. Like most vulgar minded men, he had only regarded the
Indians through the medium of their coarser and fiercer characteristics.
It had never struck him that the affections are human, that even high
principles--modified by habits and prejudices, but not the less elevated
within their circle--can exist in the savage state, and that the
warrior who is most ruthless in the field, can submit to the softest and
gentlest influences in the moments of domestic quiet. In a word, it
was the habit of his mind to regard all Indians as being only a slight
degree removed from the wild beasts that roamed the woods, and to
feel disposed to treat