University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.

Mahtoree had scarcely given the first intimation
of his real design, before a general discharge from the
borderers proved how well they understood it. The
distance, and the rapidity of the flight however, rendered
their fire perfectly harmless. As a proof how
little he regarded the hostility of their party, the Dahcotah
chieftain answered the report with a yell, and,
flourishing his carabine above his head, he made a circuit
on the plain, followed by his chosen warriors, as
if in very scorn of the impotent attempt of his enemies.
As the main body continued the direct course,
this little band of the elite in returning from its wild
exhibition of savage contempt, took its place in the
rear, with a dexterity and a concert of action that
showed the manœuvre had been contemplated.

Volley swiftly succeeded volley, until the enraged
squatter was reluctantly compelled to abandon the
idea of injuring his enemies by means so feeble. Relinquishing
his fruitless attempt, he commenced a
rapid pursuit, occasionally discharging a rifle, in

order to give the alarm to the garrison, which he had
prudently left under the command of the redoubtable
Esther herself. In this manner the chace was continued
for many minutes, the horsemen gradually
gaining on their pursuers, who maintained the race,
however, with an incredible power of foot.

As the little speck of blue rose against the heavens,
like an island issuing from the deep, the savages
occasionally raised a yell of triumph. But the mists
of evening were already gathering along the whole
of the eastern margin of the prairie, and before the
band had made half of the necessary distance, the
dim outline of the rock had melted into the haze of
the back-ground. Indifferent to this circumstance,
which rather favoured than disconcerted his plans,
Mahtoree, who had again ridden in front, held on his
course with the accuracy of a hound of the truest
scent, merely slackening his steed a little, as the
horses of his party were by this time thoroughly
blown. It was at this stage of the enterprise that the
old man rode up to the side of Middleton, and addressed
him as follows in English—

“Here is likely to be a thieving business, and one
in which I must say I have but a small relish to be a
partner.”

“What would you do? It would be fatal to trust
ourselves in the hands of the miscreants in our rear.”

“Tut, for miscreants, be they red or be they white.
Look ahead, lad, as if ye were talking of our medicines,
or perhaps praising the Teton beasts. For the
knaves love to hear their horses commended, the
same as a foolish mother in the settlements is fond
of hearing the praises of her wilful child. So; pat
the animal and lay your hand on the gew-gaws, with
which the Red-skins have ornamented his mane,
giving your eye as it were to one thing, and your
mind to another. Listen; if matters are managed

with judgment we may leave these Tetons, as the
night sets in.”

“A blessed thought!” exclaimed Middleton, who
retained a painful remembrance of the look of admiration,
with which Mahtoree had contemplated the
loveliness of Inez, as well as of his subsequent presumption
in daring to wish to take the office of her
protector on himself.

“Lord, Lord! what a weak creatur' is man, when
the gifts of natur' are smothered in bookish knowledge
and womanly manners. Such another start would
tell these imps at our elbows that we were plotting
against them, just as plainly as if it were whispered
in their ears by a Sioux tongue. Ay, ay, I know the
devils; they look as innocent as so many frisky fawns,
but there is not one among them all that has not an
eye on our smallest motions. Therefore, what is to
be done is to be do in wisdom, in order to circumvent
their cunning. That is right, pat his neck and
smile, as if you praised the horse, and keep the ear
on my side open to my words. Be careful not to
worry your beast, for though but little skilled in horses,
reason teaches that breath is needful in a hard
push, and that a weary leg makes a dull race. Be
ready to mind the signal, when you hear a whine
from old Hector. The first will be to make ready;
the second, to edge out of the crowd, and the third,
to go—am I understood.”

“Perfectly, perfectly,” said Middleton, trembling
in his excessive eagerness to put the plan in instant
execution, and pressing the little arm, which encircled
his body, to his heart. “Perfectly. Hasten,
hasten.”

“Ay, the beast is no sloth,” continued the trapper
in the Teton language, as if he continued the discourse,
edging cautiously through the dusky throng
at the same time, until he found himself riding at the

side of Paul. He communicated his intentions in
the same guarded manner as before. The high-spirited
and fearless bee-hunter received the intelligence
with delight, declaring his readiness to engage the
whole of the savage band, should it become necessary
to effect their object. When the old man drew
off from the side of this pair also, he cast his eyes
about him to discover the situation occupied by the
naturalist.

The Doctor, with infinite labour to himself and
Asinus, had maintained a position in the very centre
of the Siouxes, so long as there existed the smallest
reason for believing that any of the missiles of Ishmael
might arrive in contact with his person. After
this danger had diminished, or rather disappeared
entirely, his own courage revived while that of his
steed began to droop. To this mutual but very material
change was owing the fact, that the rider and
the ass were now to be sought among that portion of
the band who formed a sort of rear-guard. Hither
then the trapper contrived to turn his steed, without
exciting the suspicions of any of his subtle companions.

“Friend,” commenced the old man, when he
found himself in a situation favourable to discourse—
“Should you like to pass a dozen years among the
savages with a shaved head, and a painted countenance,
with perhaps a couple of wives and five or
six children of the half-breed, to call you father?”

“Impossible!” exclaimed the startled naturalist.
“I am indisposed to matrimony in general, and more
especially to all admixture of the varieties of species,
which only tend to tarnish the beauty and to interrupt
the harmony of nature. Moreover it is a painful
innovation on the order of all nomenclatures.”

“Ay, ay, you have reason enough for your distaste
to such a life, but should these Siouxes get you fairly
into their village, such would be your luck, as certain

as that the sun rises and sets at the pleasure of the
Lord.”

“Marry me to a woman who is not adorned with
the comeliness of the species!” responded the Doctor.
“Of what crime have I been guilty, that so grievous
a punishment should await the offence? To marry a
man against the movements of his will is to do a violence
to human nature!”

“Now, that you speak of natur', I have hopes that
the gift of reason has not altogether deserted your
brain,” returned the old man, with a covert expression
playing about the angles of his deep-set eyes,
which betrayed he was not entirely destitute of humour.
“Nay, they may conceive you a remarkable
subject for their kindness, and for that matter marry
you to five or six. I have known, in my days,
favoured chiefs, who had numberless wives.”

“But why should they meditate this vengeance?”
demanded the Doctor, whose hair began to rise, as if
each fibre was possessed of sensibility; “what evil
have I done?”

“It is the fashion of their kindness. When they
come to learn that you are a great medicine, they
will adopt you in the tribe, and some mighty chief
will give you his name, and perhaps his daughter, or
it may be a wife or two of his own, who have dwelt
long in his lodge, and of whose value he is a judge
by experience.”

“The Governor and Founder of natural harmony
protect me!” ejaculated the Doctor. “I have no
affinity to a single consort; much less to duplicates
and triplicates of the class! I shall certainly essay a
flight from their abodes before I mingle in so violent
a conjunction.”

“There is reason in your words; but why not attempt
the race, you speak of, now?”

The naturalist looked fearfully around him, as if
he had an inclination to make an instant exhibition

of his desperate intention, but the dusky figures, who
were riding on every side of him seemed suddenly
tripled in number, and the darkness, that was already
thickening on the prairie, appeared in his eyes to
possess the glare of high noon.

“It would be premature, and reason forbids it,”
he answered. “Leave me, venerable venator, to
the council of my own thoughts, and when my plans
are properly classed, I will advise you of my resolutions.”

“Resolutions!” repeated the old man, shaking his
head a little contemptuously as he gave the rein to
his horse, and allowed him to mingle with the steeds
of the savages. “Resolution is a word that is talked
of in the settlements and felt on the borders.
Does my brother know the beast on which the Paleface
rides?” he continued, addressing a gloomy looking
warrior in his own tongue, and making a motion
with his arm that at the same time directed his attention
to the naturalist and the meek Asinus.

The Teton turned his eyes for a minute on the
animal, but disdained to manifest the smallest portion
of that wonder he had felt, in common with all
his companions, on first viewing so rare a quadruped.
The trapper was not ignorant, that while asses and
mules were beginning to be known to those tribes
who dwelt nearest the Mexicos, they were not usually
encountered so far north as the waters of La
Platte. He therefore managed to read the mute astonishment
that lay so deeply concealed in the tawny
visage of the savage, and took his measures accordingly.

“Does my brother think that the rider is a warrior
of the Pale-faces?” he demanded, when he believed
that sufficient time had elapsed for a full examination
of the pacific mien of the naturalist.

The flash of scorn, which shot across the features

of the Teton was visible even by the dim light of
the stars.

“Is a Dahcotah a fool!” was the answer.

“They are a wise nation, whose eyes are never
shut; much do I wonder, that they have not seen the
great medicine of the Big-knives!”

“Wagh!” exclaimed his companion, suffering the
whole of his amazement to burst out of his dark
rigid countenance at the surprise, like a flash of lightning
illuminating the gloom of midnight.

“The Dahcotah knows that my tongue is not
forked. Let him open his eyes wider. Does he not
see a very great medicine?”

The light was not necessary to recall to the savage
each feature in the really remarkable costume
and equipage of Dr. Battius. In common with the
rest of the band, and in conformity with the universal
practice of the Indians, this warrior, while he
had suffered no gaze of idle curiosity to disgrace his
manhood, had not permitted a single distinctive
mark, which might characterize any one of the strangers
to escape his vigilance. He knew the air, the
stature, the dress and the features, even to the colour
of the eyes and of the hair, of every one of the
Big-knives, whom he had thus strangely encountered,
and deeply had he ruminated on the causes, which
could have led a party, so singularly constituted, into
the haunts of the rude inhabitants of his native
wastes. He had already considered the several physical
powers of the whole party, and had duly compared
their abilities with what he supposed might
have been their intentions. Warriors they were not,
for the Big-knives, like the Siouxes, left their women
in their villages when they went out on the bloody
path. The same objections applied to them as hunters,
and even as traders, the two characters under
which the white men commonly appeared in their

villages. He had heard of a great council, at which
the Menahashah, or Long-knives, and the Washsheomantiqua,
or Spaniards, had smoked together, when
the latter had sold to the former their incomprehensible
rights over those vast regions through which his
nation had roamed, in freedom, for so many ages.
His simple mind had not been able to embrace the
reasons why one people should thus assume a superiority
over the possessions of another, and it will
readily be perceived, that at the hint just received
from the trapper, he was not indisposed to fancy that
some of the hidden subtilty of that magical influence,
of which he was so firm a believer, was about
to be practised by the unsuspecting subject of their
conversation, in furtherance of these mysterious
claims. Abandoning, therefore, all the reserve and
dignity of his manner under the conscious helplessness
of ignorance, he turned to the old man, and
stretching forth his arms, as if to denote how much
he lay at his mercy, he said—

“Let my father look at me. I am a wild man of
the prairies; my body is naked; my hands empty;
my skin red. I have struck the Pawnees, the Konzas,
the Omahaws, the Osages, and even the Longknives.
I am a man amid warriors, but a woman
among the conjurors. Let my father speak: the
ears of the Teton are open. He listens like a deer
to the step of the cougar.”

“Such are the wise and uns'archable ways of one
who alone knows good from evil!” exclaimed the
trapper, in English. “To some he grants cunning,
and on others he bestows the gift of manhood! It is
humbling, and it is afflicting to see so noble a creatur'
as this, who has fou't in many a bloody fray,
truckling before his superstition like a beggar asking
for the bones you would throw to the dogs. The Lord
will forgive me for playing with the ignorance of the

savage, for he knows I do it in no mockery of his
state, or in idle vaunting of my own; but in order
to save mortal life, and to give justice to the wronged,
while I defeat the deviltries of the wicked! Teton,”
speaking again in the language of the listener,
“I ask you, is not that a wonderful medicine? If
the Dahcotahs are wise they will not breathe the air
he breathes, nor touch his robes. They know, that
the Wahconshecheh (bad spirit) loves his own children,
and will not turn his back on him that does
them harm.”

The old man delivered this opinion in an ominous
and sententious manner, and then rode apart as if he
had said enough. The result justified his expectations.
The warrior, to whom he had addressed himself,
was not slow to communicate his important
knowledge to the rest of the rear-guard, and, in a
very few moments the naturalist was the object of
general observation and reverence. The trapper,
who understood that the natives often worshipped,
with a view to propitiate the evil spirit, awaited the
workings of his artifice, with the coolness of one
who had not the smallest interest in its effects. It
was not long before he saw one dark figure after
another, lashing his horse and gallopping ahead into
the centre of the band, until Weucha alone remained
nigh the persons of himself and Obed. The very
dulness of this grovelling-minded savage, who continued
gazing at the supposed conjuror with a sort
of stupid admiration, opposed now the only obstacle
to the complete success of his artifice.

Thoroughly understanding the character of this
Indian, the old man lost no time in getting rid of
him also. Riding to his side he said, in an affected
whisper—

“Has Weucha drunk of the milk of the Big-knives
to-day?”

“Hugh!” exclaimed the surprised savage, every
dull thought being instantly recalled from heaven to
earth by the question—

“Because the great captain of my people, who
rides in front, has a cow that is never empty. I
know it will not be long before he will say, are any
of my red brethren dry?”

The words were scarcely uttered, before Weucha,
in his turn, quickened the gait of his beast, and was
soon blended with the rest of the dark groupe, who
were riding, at a more moderate pace, a few rods in
advance. The trapper, who knew how fickle and
sudden were the changes of a savage mind, did not
lose a moment in profiting by this advantage. He
loosened the reins of his own impatient steed, and in
an instant he was again at the side of Obed.

“Do you see the twinkling star, that is, may be,
the length of four rifles above the prairie; hereaway,
to the North I mean.”

“Ay, it is of the constellation—”

“A tut for your constellations, man; do you see
the star I mean? Tell me in the English of the
land, yes or no.”

“Yes.”

“The moment my back is turned, pull upon the
rein of your ass, until you lose sight of the savages.
Then take the Lord for your dependance, and yonder
star for your guide. Turn neither to the right
hand nor to the left, but make diligent use of your
time, for your beast is not quick of foot, and every
inch of prairie you gain, is a day added to your liberty
or to your life.”

Without waiting to listen to the queries, which
the naturalist was about to put, the old man again
loosened the reins of his horse, and presently he too
was blended with the groupe in front.

Obed was now alone. Asinus willingly obeyed the
hint which his master soon gave, rather in desperation

than with any very collected understanding of the
orders he had received, and checked his pace accordingly.
As the Tetons however rode at a hand-gallop,
but a moment of time was necessary, after the ass began
to walk, to remove them effectually from before
the vision of his rider. Without plan, expectation,
or hope of any sort, except that of escaping from his
dangerous neighbours, the Doctor first feeling, to assure
himself that the package, which contained the
miserable remnants of his specimens and notes was
safe at his crupper, turned the head of the beast in
the required direction, and kicking him with a species
of fury, he soon succeeded in exciting the speed
of the patient animal into a smart run. He had barely
time to descend into a hollow and ascend the adjoining
swell of the prairie, before he heard, or fancied
he heard, his name shouted in good English from
the throats of twenty Tetons. The delusion gave a
new impulse to his ardour, and no professor of the
saltant art ever applied himself with greater industry
than the naturalist now used his heels on the ribs of
Asinus. The conflict endured for several minutes
without interruption, and to all appearances it might
have continued to the present moment, had not the
meek temper of the beast also become unduly excited.
Borrowing an idea from the manner in which
his master exhibited his agitation, Asinus so far changed
the application of his own heels, as to raise them
simultaneously with a certain indignant flourish into
the air, a measure that instantly decided the controversy
in his favour. Obed took leave of his seat, as
of a position no longer tenable, continuing however
the direction of his flight, while the ass like a conqueror
took possession of the field of battle, beginning
to crop the dry herbage, as the fruits of his
victory.

When Doctor Battius had recovered his feet and
rallied his faculties, which were in a good deal of disorder

from the hurried manner in which he had abandoned
his former situation, he returned in quest of
his specimens and of his ass. Asinus displayed
enough of magnanimity to render the interview amicable,
and thenceforth the naturalist continued the
required route with very commendable industry, but
with a much more tempered discretion.

In the mean time, the old trapper had not lost
sight of the important movements that he had undertaken
to control. Obed had not been mistaken in
supposing that he was already missed and sought,
though his imagination had corrupted certain savage
cries into the well-known sounds that composed his
own latinized name. The truth was simply this.
The warriors of the rear-guard had not failed to apprise
those in front of the mysterious character, with
which it had pleased the trapper to invest the unsuspecting
naturalist. The same untutored admiration,
which on the receipt of this intelligence had driven
those in the rear to the front, now drove many of the
front to the rear. The Doctor was of course absent,
and the outcry was no more than the wild yells,
which were raised in the first burst of savage disappointment.

But the authority of Mahtoree was prompt to aid
the ingenuity of the trapper in suppressing these dangerous
sounds. When order was restored, and the
former was made acquainted with the reason why his
young men had betrayed so strong a mark of indiscretion,
the old man, who had taken a post at his
elbow, saw, with alarm, the gleam of keen distrust
that flashed into his swarthy visage.

“Where is your conjuror?” demanded the chief,
turning suddenly to the trapper, as if he meant to
make him responsible for the re-appearance of Obed.

“Can I tell my brother the number of the stars?
the ways of a great medicine are not like the ways
of other men.”

“Listen to me, gray-head, and count my words,”
continued the other, bending on his rude saddle-bow,
like some chevalier of a more civilized race, and
speaking in the haughty tones of absolute power;
“the Dahcotahs have not chosen a woman for their
chief; when Mahtoree feels the power of a great
medicine, he will tremble, until then he will look with
his own eyes without borrowing sight from a Pale-face.
If your conjuror is not with his friends in the
morning, my young men shall look for him. Your
ears are open. Enough.”

The trapper was not sorry to find that so long a
respite was granted. He had before found reason to
believe, that the Teton partisan was one of those
bold spirits, who overstep the limits which use and
education fix to the opinions of man in every state of
society, and he now saw plainly that he must adopt
some artifice to deceive him, different from that which
had succeeded so well with his followers. The sudden
appearance of the rock, however, which hove
up a bleak and ragged mass out of the darkness ahead,
put an end for the present to the discourse, Mahtoree
giving all his thoughts to the execution of his designs
on the rest of the squatter's moveables. A murmur
ran through the band, as each dark warrior caught a
glimpse of the desired haven, after which the nicest
ear might have listened in vain to catch a sound louder
than the rustling of feet among the tall grass of
the prairie.

But the vigilance of Esther was not easily deceived.
She had long listened anxiously to the suspicious
sounds, which approached the rock across the naked
waste, nor had the sudden outcry been unheard by
the unwearied sentinels of the rock. The savages,
who had dismounted at some little distance, had not
time to draw around the base of the hill, in their customary
silent and insidious manner, before the voice

of the Amazon was raised in the stillness of the place,
fearlessly demanding—

“Who is beneath? answer, for your lives? Siouxes
or devils, I fear ye not!”

No answer was given to this challenge, every warrior
halting where he stood, confident that his dusky
form was blended with the shadows of the plain. It
was at this moment that the trapper determined to
escape. He had been left with the rest of his friends,
under the surveillance of those who were assigned
to the duty of watching the horses, and as they all
continued mounted, the moment appeared favourable
to his project. The attention of the guards was
drawn to the rock, and a heavy cloud driving above
them at that instant, obscured even the feeble light
which fell from the stars. Leaning on the neck of
his horse, the old man muttered—

“Where is my pup? Where is it—Hector—where
is it dog?”

The hound caught the well-known sounds, and
answered by a whine of friendship, which threatened
to break out into one of his piercing howls. The
trapper was in the act of raising himself from this
successful exploit, when he felt the hand of Weucha
grasping his throat, as if determined to suppress his
voice by the very unequivocal process of strangulation.
Profiting, by the circumstance, he raised another
low sound, as in the natural effort of breathing,
which drew a second responsive cry from the faithful
hound. Weucha instantly abandoned his hold of
the master in order to wreak his vengeance on the
dog. But the voice of Esther was again heard, and
every other design was abandoned in order to listen.

“Ay, whine and deform your throats as you may,
ye imps of darkness,” she said, with a cracked but
scornful laugh; “I know ye; tarry, and ye shall have
light for your misdeeds. Put in the coal, Phœbe;
put in the coal; your father and the boys shall see

that they are wanted at home to welcome their
guests.”

Even as she spoke, a strong light, like that of a
brilliant star was seen on the very pinnacle of the
rock; and then followed a forked flame, which curled
for a moment amid the windings of an enormous
pile of brush, and flashing upward in an united sheet,
it wavered to and fro, in the passing air, shedding a
bright glare on every object within its influence. A
taunting laugh was heard from the height, in which
the voices of all ages mingled, as though they triumphed
at having so successfully exposed the treacherous
intentions of the Tetons.

The trapper looked about him to ascertain in what
situations he might find his friends. True to the signals,
Middleton and Paul had drawn a little apart,
and now stood ready, by every appearance, to commence
their flight at the third repetition of the cry.
Hector had escaped his savage pursuer and was again
crouching at the heels of his master's horse. But
the broad circle of light was gradually increasing in
extent and power, and the old man, whose eye and
judgment so rarely failed him, patiently awaited a
more propitious moment for his enterprise.

“Now Ishmael, my man, if sight and hand ar' true
as ever, now is the time to work upon these Red-skins,
who claim to own all your property, even to
wife and children! Now, my good man, prove both
breed and character!”

A distant shout was heard in the direction of the
approaching party of the squatter, assuring the female
garrison that succour was not far distant. Esther
answered to the grateful sounds by a cracked cry of
her own, lifting her form, in the first burst of exultation,
above the rock in a manner to be visible to all
below. Not content with this dangerous exposure of
her person, she was in the act of tossing her arms in
triumph, when the dark figure of Mahtoree shot into

the light and pinioned them to her side. The forms
of three other warriors glided across the top of the
rock, looking like naked demons flitting among the
clouds. The air was filled with the brands of the
beacon, and then a heavy darkness succeeded, not
unlike that of the appalling instant, when the last rays
of the sun are excluded by the intervening mass of
the moon. A yell of triumph burst from the savages
in their turn, and was rather accompanied than followed
by a long, loud whine from Hector.

In an instant the old man was between the horses
of Middleton and Paul, extending a hand to the bridle
of each, in order to check the impatience of
their riders.

“Softly, softly,” he whispered, “their eyes are as
marvellously shut for the minute, as though the Lord
had stricken them blind; but their ears are open.
Softly, softly; for fifty rods, at least, we must move
no faster than a walk.”

The five minutes of doubt that succeeded appeared
like an age to all but the trapper. As their sight was
gradually restored, it seemed to each as if the momentary
gloom, which followed the extinction of the
beacon, was to be replaced by as broad a light as that
of noon-day. Gradually the old man, however, suffered
the animals to quicken their steps, until they
had gained the centre of one of the prairie bottoms.
Then laughing in his quiet manner he released the
reins and said—

“Now, let them give play to their legs; but keep
on the old fog to deaden the sounds.”

It is needless to say how cheerfully he was obeyed.
In a few more minutes they ascended and crossed a
swell of the land, after which the flight was continued
at the top of their horses' speed, keeping the indicated
star in view, as the labouring bark steers for the
light which points the way to a haven and security.