"'Tis the maiden!" shouted the scout, "Courage, lady; we come!--we
come!"

The chase was renewed with a diligence rendered tenfold encouraging by
this glimpse of the captive. But the way was rugged, broken, and in
spots nearly impassable. Uncas abandoned his rifle, and leaped forward
with headlong precipitation. Heyward rashly imitated his example, though
both were, a moment afterwards, admonished of its madness, by hearing
the bellowing of a piece, that the Hurons found time to discharge down
the passage in the rocks, the bullet from which even gave the young
Mohican a slight wound.

"We must close!" said the scout, passing his friends by a desperate
leap; "the knaves will pick us all off at this distance; and see, they
hold the maiden so as to shield themselves!"

Though his words were unheeded, or rather unheard, his example was
followed by his companions, who, by incredible exertions, got near
enough to the fugitives to perceive that Cora was borne along between
the two warriors, while Magua prescribed the direction and manner of
their flight. At this moment the forms of all four were strongly drawn
against an opening in the sky, and they disappeared. Nearly frantic with
disappointment, Uncas and Heyward increased efforts that already seemed
super-human, and they issued from the cavern on the side of the
mountain, in time to note the route of the pursued. The course lay up
the ascent, and still continued hazardous and laborious.

Encumbered by his rifle, and, perhaps, not sustained by so deep an
interest in the captive as his companions, the scout suffered the latter
to precede him a little, Uncas, in his turn, taking the lead of Heyward.
In this manner, rocks, precipices, and difficulties were surmounted in
an incredibly short space, that at another time, and under other
circumstances, would have been deemed almost insuperable. But the
impetuous young men were rewarded, by finding that, encumbered with
Cora, the Hurons were losing ground in the race.

"Stay, dog of the Wyandots!" exclaimed Uncas, shaking his bright
tomahawk at Magua; "a Delaware girl calls stay!"

"I will go no farther," cried Cora, stepping unexpectedly on a ledge of
rocks, that overhung a deep precipice, at no great distance from the
summit of the mountain. "Kill me if thou wilt, detestable Huron; I will
go no farther."

The supporters of the maiden raised their ready tomahawks with the
impious joy that fiends are thought to take in misch