own fatal and
avenging weapon; while Tamenund, supported by the elders of his nation,
occupied a high place at hand, whence he might look down on the mute and
sorrowful assemblage of his people.

Just within the inner edge of the circle stood a soldier, in the
military attire of a strange nation; and without it was his war-horse,
in the centre of a collection of mounted domestics, seemingly in
readiness to undertake some distant journey. The vestments of the
stranger announced him to be one who held a responsible situation near
the person of the captain of the Canadas; and who, as it would now seem,
finding his errand of peace frustrated by the fierce impetuosity of his
allies, was content to become a silent and sad spectator of the fruits
of a contest that he had arrived too late to anticipate.

The day was drawing to the close of its first quarter, and yet had the
multitude maintained its breathing stillness since its dawn. No sound
louder than a stifled sob had been heard among them, nor had even a limb
been moved throughout that long and painful period, except to perform
the simple and touching offerings that were made, from time to time, in
commemoration of the dead. The patience and forbearance of Indian
fortitude could alone support such an appearance of abstraction, as
seemed now to have turned each dark and motionless figure into stone.

At length, the sage of the Delawares stretched forth an arm, and leaning
on the shoulders of his attendants, he arose with an air as feeble as if
another age had already intervened between the man who had met his
nation the preceding day, and him who now tottered on his elevated
stand.

"Men of the Lenape!" he said, in hollow tones that sounded like a voice
charged with some prophetic mission; "the face of the Manitou is behind
a cloud! His eye is turned from you; His ears are shut; His tongue gives
no answer. You see Him not; yet His judgments are before you. Let your
hearts be open and your spirits tell no lie. Men of the Lenape! the face
of the Manitou is behind a cloud."

As this simple and yet terrible annunciation stole on the ears of the
multitude, a stillness as deep and awful succeeded as if the venerated
spirit they worshipped had uttered the words without the aid of human
organs; and even the inanimate Uncas appeared a being of life, compared
with the humbled and submissive throng by whom he was surrounded. As the
immediate effect, however, gradually passed awa