o leave the place through
the avenue by which Duncan had approached, when a growl caught his ear,
and caused him to hesitate. The figure of the bear appeared in the door,
where it sat, rolling from side to side in its customary restlessness.
Magua, like the father of the sick woman, eyed it keenly for a moment,
as if to ascertain its character. He was far above the more vulgar
superstitions of his tribe, and so soon as he recognized the well-known
attire of the conjurer, he prepared to pass it in cool contempt. But a
louder and more threatening growl caused him again to pause. Then he
seemed as if suddenly resolved to trifle no longer, and moved resolutely
forward. The mimic animal, which had advanced a little, retired slowly
in his front, until it arrived again at the pass, when rearing on its
hinder legs it beat the air with its paws, in the manner practised by
its brutal prototype.

"Fool!" exclaimed the chief, in Huron, "go play with the children and
squaws; leave men to their wisdom."

He once more endeavored to pass the supposed empiric, scorning even the
parade of threatening to use the knife, or tomahawk, that was pendent
from his belt. Suddenly the beast extended its arms, or rather legs, and
inclosed him in a grasp that might have vied with the far-famed power of
the "bear's hug" itself. Heyward had watched the whole procedure, on the
part of Hawkeye, with breathless interest. At first he relinquished his
hold of Alice; then he caught up a thong of buckskin, which had been
used around some bundle, and when he beheld his enemy with his two arms
pinned to his side by the iron muscles of the scout, he rushed upon him,
and effectually secured them there. Arms, legs, and feet were encircled
in twenty folds of the thong, in less time than we have taken to record
the circumstance. When the formidable Huron was completely pinioned, the
scout released his hold, and Duncan laid his enemy on his back, utterly
helpless.

Throughout the whole of this sudden and extraordinary operation, Magua,
though he had struggled violently, until assured he was in the hands of
one whose nerves were far better strung than his own, had not uttered
the slightest exclamation. But when Hawkeye, by way of making a summary
explanation of his conduct, removed the shaggy jaws of the beast, and
exposed his own rugged and earnest countenance to the gaze of the Huron,
the philosophy of the latter was so far mastered as to permit him to
utter the