第4章

"No Tuscarora -- no Oneida -- no Mohawk -- pale-face fire.""The devil it is? Well, Magnet, this surpasses a seaman's philosophy: we old sea-dogs can tell a lubber's nest from a mate's hammock; but I do not think the oldest admiral in his Majesty's fleet can tell a king's smoke from a collier's."The idea that human beings were in their vicinity, in that ocean of wilderness, had deepened the flush on the blooming cheek and brightened the eye of the fair crea-ture at his side; but she soon turned with a look of sur-prise to her relative, and said hesitatingly, for both had often admired the Tuscarora's knowledge, or, we might almost say, instinct, --"A pale-face's fire! Surely, uncle, he cannot know _that_?""Ten days since, child, I would have sworn to it; but now I hardly know what to believe.May I take the lib-erty of asking, Arrowhead, why you fancy that smoke, now, a pale-face's smoke, and not a red-skin's?""Wet wood," returned the warrior, with the calmness with which the pedagogue might point out an arithmetical demonstration to his puzzled pupil."Much wet -- much smoke; much water -- black smoke.""But, begging your pardon, Master Arrowhead, the smoke is not black, nor is there much of it.To my eye, now, it is as light and fanciful a smoke as ever rose from a captain's tea-kettle, when nothing was left to make the fire but a few chips from the dunnage.""Too much water," returned Arrowhead, with a slight nod of the head; "Tuscarora too cunning to make fire with water! pale-face too much book, and burn anything;much book, little know."

"Well, that's reasonable, I allow," said Cap, who was no devotee of learning: "he means that as a hit at your read-ing, Magnet; for the chief has sensible notions of things in his own way.How far, now, Arrowhead, do you make us, by your calculation, from the bit of a pond that you call the Great Lake, and towards which we have been so many days shaping our course?"The Tuscarora looked at the seaman with quiet superi-ority as he answered, "Ontario, like heaven; one sun, and the great traveller will know it.""Well, I have been a great traveller, I cannot deny;but of all my v'y'ges this has been the longest, the least profitable, and the farthest inland.If this body of fresh water is so nigh, Arrowhead, and so large, one might think a pair of good eyes would find it out; for apparently every-thing within thirty miles is to be seen from this look-out."

"Look," said Arrowhead, stretching an arm before him with quiet grace; "Ontario!""Uncle, you are accustomed to cry 'Land ho!' but not 'Water ho!' and you do not see it," cried the niece, laugh-ing, as girls will laugh at their own idle conceits.

"How now, Magnet! dost suppose that I shouldn't know my native element if it were in sight?""But Ontario is not your native element, dear uncle;for you come from the salt water, while this is fresh.""That might make some difference to your young mar-iner, but none to the old one.I should know water, child, were I to see it in China.""Ontario," repeated Arrowhead, with emphasis, again stretching his hand towards the north-west.

Cap looked at the Tuscarora, for the first time since their acquaintance, with something like an air of contempt, though he did not fail to follow the direction of the chief's eye and arm, both of which were directed towards a vacant point in the heavens, a short distance above the plain of leaves.

"Ay, ay; this is much as I expected, when I left the coast in search of a fresh-water pond," resumed Cap, shrugging his shoulders like one whose mind was made up, and who thought no more need be said."Ontario may be there, or, for that matter, it may be in my pocket.Well, I suppose there will be room enough, when we reach it, to work our canoe.But Arrowhead, if there be pale-faces in our neighborhood, I confess I should like to get within hail of them."The Tuscarora now gave a quiet inclination of his head, and the whole party descended from the roots of the up-torn tree in silence.When they reached the ground, Arrowhead intimated his intention to go towards the fire, and ascertain who had lighted it; while he advised his wife and the two others to return to a canoe, which they had left in the adjacent stream, and await his return.

"Why, chief, this might do on soundings, and in an offing where one knew the channel," returned old Cap;"but in an unknown region like this I think it unsafe to trust the pilot alone too far from the ship: so, with your leave, we will not part company.""What my brother want?" asked the Indian gravely, though without taking offence at a distrust that was suffi-ciently plain.

"Your company, Master Arrowhead, and no more.I will go with you and speak these strangers."The Tuscarora assented without difficulty, and again he directed his patient and submissive little wife, who seldom turned her full rich black eye on him but to ex-press equally her respect, her dread, and her love, to pro-ceed to the boat.But here Magnet raised a difficulty.

Although spirited, and of unusual energy under circum-stances of trial, she was but woman; and the idea of being entirely deserted by her two male protectors, in the midst of a wilderness that her senses had just told her was seem-ingly illimitable, became so keenly painful, that she ex-pressed a wish to accompany her uncle.

"The exercise will be a relief, dear sir, after sitting so long in the canoe," she added, as the rich blood slowly re-turned to a cheek that had paled in spite of her efforts to be calm; "and there may be females with the strangers.""Come, then, child; it is but a cable's length, and we shall return an hour before the sun sets."With this permission, the girl, whose real name was Mabel Dunham, prepared to be of the party; while the Dew-of-June, as the wife of Arrowhead was called, pas-sively went her way towards thie canoe, too much accus-tomed to obedience, solitude, and the gloom of the forest to feel apprehension.