t soon regaining his naturally firm
voice, he continued: "His bad fortune is the true reason of my being
here, for it would never do to abandon such a boy to the Hurons. A rare
time the knaves would have of it, could they tie The Bounding Elk and
The Long Carabine, as they call me, to the same stake! Though why they
have given me such a name I never knew, there being as little likeness
between the gifts of 'Killdeer,' and the performance of one of your real
Canada carabynes, as there is between the natur' of a pipe-stone and a
flint!"

"Keep to your tale," said the impatient Heyward; "we know not at what
moment the Hurons may return."

"No fear of them. A conjurer must have his time, like a straggling
priest in the settlements. We are as safe from interruption as a
missionary would be at the beginning of a two hours' discourse. Well,
Uncas and I fell in with a return party of the varlets; the lad was much
too forward for a scout; nay, for that matter, being of hot blood, he
was not so much to blame; and, after all, one of the Hurons proved a
coward, and in fleeing led him into an ambushment."

"And dearly has he paid for the weakness!"

The scout significantly passed his hand across his own throat, and
nodded, as if he said, "I comprehend your meaning." After which he
continued, in a more audible though scarcely more intelligible
language,--

"After the loss of the boy I turned upon the Hurons, as you may judge.
There have been scrimmages atween one or two of their outlyers and
myself; but that is neither here nor there. So, after I had shot the
imps, I got in pretty nigh to the lodges without further commotion. Then
what should luck do in my favor, but lead me to the very spot where one
of the most famous conjurers of the tribe was dressing himself, as I
well knew, for some great battle with Satan--though why should I call
that luck, which it now seems was an especial ordering of Providence! So
a judgmatical rap over the head stiffened the lying impostor for a time,
and leaving him a bit of walnut for his supper, to prevent an uproar,
and stringing him up atween two sapplings, I made free with his finery,
and took the part of the bear on myself, in order that the operations
might proceed."

"And admirably did you enact the character; the animal itself might have
been shamed by the representation."

"Lord, major," returned the flattered woodsman, "I should be but a poor
scholar for one who has studied so long i