ays carry. It is
wonderful, Judith, how all sorts of men; the trappers as well as the
hunters; red-men as well as white; Mingos as well as Delawares do
reverence and fear the Bible!"

"I think you have not the least ground to fear any injury, Hetty,"
answered the sister, "and therefore I shall insist on your going to the
Huron camp with our friend. Your being there can do no harm, not even to
yourself, and may do great good to Deerslayer."

"This is not a moment, Judith, to dispute, and so have the matter your
own way," returned the young man. "Get yourself ready, Hetty, and go
into the canoe, for I've a few parting words to say to your sister,
which can do you no good."

Judith and her companion continued silent, until Hetty had so far
complied as to leave them alone, when Deerslayer took up the subject,
as if it had been interrupted by some ordinary occurrence, and in a very
matter of fact way.

"Words spoken at parting, and which may be the last we ever hear from a
fri'nd are not soon forgotten," he repeated, "and so Judith, I intend
to speak to you like a brother, seein' I'm not old enough to be your
father. In the first place, I wish to caution you ag'in your inimies,
of which two may be said to ha'nt your very footsteps, and to beset your
ways. The first is oncommon good looks, which is as dangerous a foe
to some young women, as a whole tribe of Mingos could prove, and which
calls for great watchfulness--not to admire and praise--but to distrust
and sarcumvent. Yes, good looks may be sarcumvented, and fairly
outwitted, too. In order to do this you've only to remember that they
melt like the snows, and, when once gone, they never come back ag'in.
The seasons come and go, Judith, and if we have winter, with storms and
frosts, and spring with chills and leafless trees, we have summer with
its sun and glorious skies, and fall with its fruits, and a garment
thrown over the forest, that no beauty of the town could rummage out of
all the shops in America. 'Arth is in an etarnal round, the goodness of
God bringing back the pleasant when we've had enough of the onpleasant.
But it's not so with good looks. They are lent for a short time in
youth, to be used and not abused, and, as I never met with a young woman
to whom providence has been as bountiful as it has to you, Judith, in
this partic'lar, I warn you, as it might be with my dyin' breath, to
beware of the inimy--fri'nd, or inimy, as we deal with the gift."

It w