ft the place without delay. He followed the crowd,
which drew nigh the lodges, gloomy and sullen, like any other multitude
that had been disappointed in an execution. Curiosity, or perhaps a
better feeling, induced him to approach the stranger. He found him,
standing with one arm cast about the protecting post, and breathing
thick and hard, after his exertions, but disdaining to permit a single
sign of suffering to escape. His person was now protected by immemorial
and sacred usage, until the tribe in council had deliberated and
determined on his fate. It was not difficult, however, to foretell the
result, if any presage could be drawn from the feelings of those who
crowded the place.

There was no term of abuse known to the Huron vocabulary that the
disappointed women did not lavishly expend on the successful stranger.
They flouted at his efforts, and told him, with bitter scoffs, that his
feet were better than his hands; and that he merited wings, while he
knew not the use of an arrow or a knife. To all this the captive made no
reply; but was content to preserve an attitude in which dignity was
singularly blended with disdain. Exasperated as much by his composure as
by his good-fortune, their words became unintelligible, and were
succeeded by shrill, piercing yells. Just then the crafty squaw, who had
taken the necessary precaution to fire the piles, made her way through
the throng, and cleared a place for herself in front of the captive. The
squalid and withered person of this hag might well have obtained for her
the character of possessing more than human cunning. Throwing back her
light vestment, she stretched forth her long skinny arm, in derision,
and using the language of the Lenape, as more intelligible to the
subject of her gibes, she commenced aloud--

"Look you, Delaware!" she said, snapping her fingers in his face; "your
nation is a race of women, and the hoe is better fitted to your hands
than the gun. Your squaws are the mothers of deer; but if a bear, or a
wild cat, or a serpent were born among you, ye would flee. The Huron
girls shall make you petticoats, and we will find you a husband."

A burst of savage laughter succeeded this attack, during which the soft
and musical merriment of the younger females strangely chimed with the
cracked voice of their older and more malignant companion. But the
stranger was superior to all their efforts. His head was immovable; nor
did he betray the slightest consciou