waited the shock of the coming avalanche! So terrible
did the exasperated Huron appear, that the entire party of Shawnees
paused out of sheer horror of closing in with him. Wounded and
bleeding as he was, they knew that he would carry many of their number
to the earth, before his defiant spirit could be driven out of him.
And at scarcely a dozen feet distant, the craven, cowardly wretches
poured a volley from their rifles upon both him and the kneeling woman
beside him.

[Illustration: So terrible did the exasperated Huron appear, that the
entire party of Shawnees paused out of sheer horror.]

Oonomoo did not leap or yell; but with his eyes still fixed upon his
enemies, and his knife still firmly clutched in his hand, commenced
slowly sinking backward to the earth. The Shawnees saw it, and one of
them sprung forward, as if to claim his scalp, but he fell howling to
the ground, prostrated by a ball from the undaunted Niniotan who still
maintained his place behind his tree. His companions were in the act
of moving forward, to avenge the deaths of hundreds of their comrades,
when the tramp of approaching men was heard, and a clear voice rung
out: "This way, boys! I see the infernal copper-heads through the
trees. Make ready, take aim--God bless me! you fired before the orders
were given."

At the first glimpse of the Shawnees, huddled together in a rushing
body, every one of the border men discharged his piece, without waiting
for the command, right in among them. The destruction was fearful and
the panic complete. Numbers came to the ground, writhing, dying and
dead, while the survivors scattered howling to the woods, and were seen
no more.

Shortly after Captain Prescott and Lieutenant Canfield had started with
their men on the trail of Oonomoo, they came upon an elderly man in the
forest who was hunting. He proved to be Eckman, the Moravian
missionary, who had brought up and educated Fluellina, the wife of
Oonomoo, and to whom she made her stated visits for religious counsel
and encouragement. Upon learning the object of the party, he at once
joined them, as he felt a fatherly affection for the Huron warrior.
Being a skillful backwoodsman, he acted as guide to the men,
proceeding, in spite of his years, at a rate which cost them
considerable effort to equal. They had not gone a great distance, when
the shout of Oonomoo was heard, and the missionary understood its
significance. Bounding forward, the men