Chapter XXVI.

by James Fenimore Cooper

　　"Speak on, my dearest father!Thy words are like the breezes of the west."--Milman.

　　It was a mild and soft morning, when Marmaduke and Richard mountedtheir horses and proceeded on the expedition that had so long beenuppermost in the thoughts of the latter; and Elizabeth and Louisaappeared at the same instant in the hall, attired for an excursion onfoot.

　　The head of Miss Grant was covered by a neat little hat of green silk,and her modest eyes peered from under its shade, with the soft languorthat characterized her whole appearance; but Miss Temple trod herfathers wide apartments with the step of their mistress, holding inher hands, dangling by one of its ribbons, the gypsy that was toconceal the glossy locks that curled around her polished fore head inrich profusion.

　　"What? are you for a walk, Bess?" cried the Judge, suspending hismovements for a moment to smile, with a fathers fondness, at thedisplay of womanly grace and beauty that his child presented."Remember the heats of July, my daughter; nor venture further thanthou canst retrace before the meridian. Where is thy parasol, girl?thou wilt lose tine polish of that brow, under this sun and southernbreeze, unless thou guard it with unusual care."

　　"I shall then do more honor to my connections," returned the smilingdaughter. "Cousin Richard has a bloom that any lady might envy. Atpresent the resemblance between us is so trifling that no strangerwould know us to be sisters children. "

　　"Grandchildren, you mean, Cousin Bess," said the sheriff. "But on,Judge Temple; time and tide wait for no man; and if you take mycounsel, sir, in twelve months from this day you may make an umbrellafor your daughter of her camels-hair shawl, and have its frame ofsolid silver. I ask nothing for myself, Duke; you have been a goodfriend to me already; besides, all that I have will go to Bess there,one of these melancholy days, so its as long as its short, whether Ior you leave it. But we have a days ride before us, sir; so moveforward, or dismount, and say you wont go at once."

　　"Patience, patience, Dickon, "returned the Judge, checking his horseand turning again to his daughter. "If thou art for the mountains,love, stray not too deep into the forest. I entreat thee; for, thoughit is done often with impunity, there is sometimes danger."

　　"Not at this season, I believe, sir," said Elizabeth; "for, I willconfess, it is the intention of Louisa and myself to stroll among thehills."

　　"Less at this season than in the winter, dear; but still there may bedanger in venturing too far. But though thou art resolute, Elizabeth,thou art too much like thy mother not to be prudent."

　　The eyes of the parent turned reluctantly from his child, and theJudge and sheriff rode slowly through the gateway, and disappearedamong the buildings of the village.

　　During this short dialogue, young Edwards stood, an attentivelistener, holding in his hand a fishing-rod, the day and the seasonhaving tempted him also to desert the house for the pleasure ofexercise in the air. As the equestrians turned through the gate, heapproached the young females, who were already moving toward thestreet, and was about to address them, as Louisa paused, and said.quickly:

　　"Mr. Edwards would speak to us, Elizabeth."

　　The other stopped also, and turned to the youth, politely but with aslight coldness in her air, that sensibly checked the freedom withwhich he had approached them,

　　"Your father is not pleased that you should walk unattended in thehills, Miss Temple. If I might offer my self as a protector--""Does my father select Mr. Oliver Edwards as the organ of hisdispleasure?" interrupted the lady.

　　"Good Heaven! you misunderstood my meaning; I should have said uneasyor not pleased. I am his servant, madam, and in consequence yours. Irepeat that, with your consent, I will change my rod for a fowling-piece, and keep nigh you on the mountain,"

　　"I thank you, Mr. Edwards; but where there is no danger, no protectionis required. We are not yet reduced to wandering among these freehills accompanied by a body guard. If such a one is necessary therehe is, however.-- Here, Brave--Brave----my noble Brave!"The huge mastif that has been already mentioned, appeared from hiskennel, gaping and stretching himself with pampered laziness; but ashis mistress again called:

　　"Come, dear Brave; once you have served your master well; let us seehow you can do your duty by his daughter"--the dog wagged his tail, asif he understood her language, walked with a stately gait to her side,where he seated himself, and looked up at her face, with anintelligence but little inferior to that which beamed in her ownlovely countenance.

　　She resumed her walk, but again paused, after a few steps, and added,in tones of conciliation:

　　"You can be serving us equally, and, I presume, more agreeably toyourself, Mr. Edwards, by bringing us a string of your favorite perchfor the dinner-table,"

　　When they again began to walk Miss Temple did not look back to see howthe youth bore this repulse; but the head of Louisa was turned severaltimes before they reached the gate on that considerate errand.

　　"I am afraid, Elizabeth," she said, " that we have mortified Oliver.He is still standing where we left him, leaning on his rod. Perhapshe thinks us proud."

　　"He thinks justly," exclaimed Miss Temple, as if awaking from a deepmusing; "he thinks justly, then. We are too proud to admit of suchparticular attentions from a young man in an equivocal situation.What! make him the companion of our most private walks! It is pride,Louisa, but it is the pride of a woman."

　　It was several minutes before Oliver aroused himself from theabstracted position in which he was standing when Louisa last saw him;but when he did, he muttered something rapidly and incoherently, and,throwing his rod over his shoulder, he strode down the walk throughthe gate and along one of the streets of the village, until he reachedthe lake-shore, with the air of an emperor. At this spot boats werekept for the use of Judge Temple and his family. The young man threwhimself into a light skiff, and, seizing the oars, he sent it acrossthe lake toward the hut of Leather-Stocking, with a pair of vigorousarms. By the time he had rowed a quarter of a mile, his reflectionswere less bitter; and when he saw the bushes that lined the shore infront of Nattys habitation gliding by him, as if they possessed themotion which proceeded from his own efforts, he was quite cooled inmind, though somewhat heated in body. It is quite possible that thevery same reason which guided the conduct of Miss Temple suggesteditself to a man of the breeding and education of the youth; and it isvery certain that, if such were the case, Elizabeth rose instead offalling in the estimation of Mr. Edwards.

　　The oars were now raised from the water, and the boat shot close in tothe land, where it lay gently agitated by waves of its own creating,while the young man, first casting a cautious and searching glancearound him in every direction, put a small whistle to his mouth, andblew a long, shrill note that rang among the echoing rocks behind thehut. At this alarm, the hounds of Natty rushed out of their barkkennel, and commenced their long, piteous howls, leaping about as ifhalf frantic, though restrained by the leashes of buckskin by whichthey were fastened.

　　"Quiet, Hector, quiet," said Oliver, again applying his whistle to hismouth, and drawing out notes still more shrill than before. No replywas made, the dogs having returned to their kennel at the sound of hisvoice.

　　Edwards pulled the bows of the boat on the shore, and landing,ascended the beach and approached the door of the cabin. Thefastenings were soon undone, and he entered, closing the door afterhim, when all was as silent, in that retired spot, as if the foot ofman had never trod the wilderness. The sounds of the hammers, thatwere in incessant motion in the village, were faintly heard across thewater; but the dogs had crouched into their lairs, satisfied that nonebut the privileged had approached the forbidden ground.

　　A quarter of an hour elapsed before the youth reappeared, when hefastened the door again, and spoke kindly to the hounds. The dogscame out at the well-known tones, and the slut jumped upon his person,whining and barking as if entreating Oliver to release her fromprison. But old Hector raised his nose to the light current of air,and opened a long howl, that might have been heard for a mile."Ha! what do you scent, old veteran of the woods?" cried Edwards. "Ifa beast, it is a bold one; and if a man, an impudent."

　　He sprang through the top of a pine that had fallen near the side ofthe hut, and ascended a small hillock that sheltered the cabin to thesouth, where he caught a glimpse of the formal figure of HiramDoolittle, as it vanished, with unusual rapidity for the architect,amid the bushes.

　　"What can that fellow be wanting here?" muttered Oliver. "He has nobusiness in this quarter, unless it be curiosity, which is an endemicin these woods. But against that I will effectually guard, though thedogs should take a liking to his ugly visage, and let him pass." Theyouth returned to the door, while giving vent to this soliloquy, andcompleted the fastenings by placing a small chain through a staple,and securing it there by a padlock. "He is a pettifogger, and surelymust know that there is such a thing as feloniously breaking into amans house."

　　Apparently well satisfied with this arrangement, the youth again spoketo the hounds; and, descending to the shore, he launched his boat, andtaking up his oars, pulled off into the lake.

　　There were several places in the Otsego that were celebrated fishing-ground for perch. One was nearly opposite to the cabin, and another,still more famous, was near a point, at the distance of a mile and ahalf above it, under the brow of the mountain, and on the same side ofthe lake with the hut. Oliver Edwards pulled his little skiff to thefirst, and sat, for a minute, undecided whether to continue there,with his eyes on the door of the cabin, or to change his ground, witha view to get superior game. While gazing about him, he saw thelight-colored bark canoe of his old companions riding on the water, atthe point we have mentioned, and containing two figures, that he atonce knew to be Mohegan and the Leather-Stocking. This decided thematter, and the youth pulled, in a very few minutes, to the placewhere his friends were fishing, and fastened his boat to the lightvessel of the Indian.

　　The old men received Oliver with welcoming nods, but neither drew hisline from the water nor in the least varied his occupation. WhenEdwards had secured his own boat, he baited his hook and threw it intothe lake, with out speaking.

　　"Did you stop at the wigwam, lad, as you rowed past?" asked Natty.

　　"Yes, and I found all safe; but that carpenter and justice of thepeace, Mr., or as they call him, Squire, Doolittle, was prowlingthrough the woods. I made sure of the door before I left the hut, andI think he is too great a coward to approach the hounds."

　　"There's little to be said in favor of that man," said Natty, while hedrew in a perch and baited his hook. "He craves dreadfully to comeinto the cabin, and has as good as asked me as much to my face; but Iput him off with unsartain answers, so that he is no wiser than Solomon. This comes of having so many laws that such a man may be calledon to intarpret them."

　　"I fear he is more knave than fool," cried Edwards; "he makes a toolof, that simple man, the sheriff; and I dread that his impertinentcuriosity may yet give us much trouble."

　　"If he harbors too much about the cabin, lad, Ill shoot thecreatur," said the Leather-Stocking, quite simply.

　　"No, no, Natty, you must remember the law," said Edwards, "or we shallhave you in trouble; and that, old man, would be an evil day and soretidings to us all."

　　"Would it, boy? exclaimed the hunter, raising his eyes, with a lookof friendly interest, toward the youth. "You have the true blood inyour veins, Mr. Oliver; and Ill support it to the face of JudgeTemple or in any court in the country. How is it, John? Do I speakthe true word? Is the lad stanch, and of the right blood?"

　　"He is a Delaware," said Mohegan, "and my brother. The Young Eagle isbrave, and he will be a chief. No harm can come."

　　"Well, well," cried the youth impatiently, "say no more about it, mygood friends; if I am not all that your partiality would make me, I amyours through life, in prosperity as in poverty. We will talk ofother matters."

　　The old hunters yielded to his wish, which seemed to be their law.For a short time a profound silence prevailed, during which each manwas very busy with his hook and line, but Edwards, probably feelingthat it remained with him to renew the discourse, soon observed, withthe air of one who knew not what he said:

　　"How beautifully tranquil and glassy the lake is! Saw you it ever morecalm and even than at this moment, Natty?"

　　"I have known the Otsego water for five-and-forty years," saidLeather--Stocking, " and I will say that for it, which is, that acleaner spring or better fishing is not to be found in the land. Yes,yes; I had the place to myself once, and a cheerful time I had of it.The game was plenty as heart could wish; and there was none to meddlewith the ground unless there might have been a hunting party of theDelawares crossing the hills, or, maybe, a rifling scout of themthieves, the Iroquois. There was one or two Frenchmen that squattedin the flats further west, and married squaws; and some of the Scotch-Irishers, from the Cherry Valley, would come on to the lake, andborrow my canoe to take a mess of parch, or drop a line for salmon-trout; but, in the main, it was a cheerful place, and I had but littleto disturb me in it. John would come, and John knows."Mohegan turned his dark face at this appeal; and, moving his handforward with graceful motion of assent, he spoke, using the Delawarelanguage:

　　"The land was owned by my people; we gave it to my brother in council--to the Fire-eater; and what the Delawares give lasts as long as thewaters run. Hawk-eye smoked at that council, for we loved him."

　　"No, no, John," said Natty I was no chief, seeing that I knowednothing of scholarship, and had a white skin. But it was acomfortable hunting-ground then, lad, and would have been so this day,but for the money of Marmaduke Temple, and the twisty ways of thelaw."

　　"It must have been a sight of melancholy pleasure in deed," saidEdwards, while his eye roved along the shores and over the hills,where the clearings, groaning with the golden corn, were cheering theforest with the signs of life, "to have roamed over these mountainsand along this sheet of beautiful water, without a living soul tospeak to, or to thwart your humor."

　　"Havent I said it was cheerful?" said Leather-Stocking. "Yes, yes,when the trees begain to be covered with leaves, and the ice was outof the hake, it was a second paradise. I have travelled the woods forfifty-three years, and have made them my home for more than forty, andI can say that I have met but one place that was more to my liking;and that was only to eyesight, and not for hunting or fishing."

　　"And where was that?" asked Edwards.

　　"Where! why, up on the Catskills. I used often to go up into themountains after wolves skins and bears; once they paid me to get thema stuffed painter, and so I often went. theres a place in themhills that I used to climb to when I wanted to see the carryings on ofthe world, that would well pay any man for a barked shin or a tornmoccasin. You know the Catskills, lad; for you must have seen them onyour left, as you followed the river up from York, looking as blue asa piece of clear sky, and holding the clouds on their tops, as thesmoke curls over the head of an Indian chief at the council fire.Well, theres the High-peak and the Round-top, which lay back like afather and mother among their children, seeing they are far above allthe other hills. But the place I mean is next to the river, where oneof the ridges juts out a little from the rest, and where the rocksfall, for the best part of a thousand feet, so much up and down, thata man standing on their edges is fool enough to think he can jump fromtop to bottom."

　　"What see you when you get there?" asked Edwards,

　　"Creation," said Natty, dropping the end of his rod into the water,and sweeping one hand around him in a circle, "all creation, lad. Iwas on that hill when Vaughan burned Sopus in the last war; and I sawthe vessels come out of the Highlands as plain as I can see that lime-scow rowing into the Susquehanna, though one was twenty times fartherfrom me than the other. The river was in sight for seventy miles,looking like a curled shaving under my feet, though it was eight longmiles to its banks. I saw the hills in the Hampshire grants, thehighlands of the river, and all that God had done, or man could do,far as eye could reach--you know that the Indians named me for mysight, lad ; and from the flat on the top of that mountain, I haveoften found the place where Albany stands. And as for Sopus, the daythe royal troops burnt the town, the smoke seemed so nigh, that Ithought I could hear the screeches of the women."

　　"It must have been worth the toil to meet with such a glorious view."

　　If being the best part of a mile in the air and having mens farms andhouses your feet, with rivers looking like ribbons, and mountainsbigger than the Vision seeming to be hay-stacks of green grass underyou, gives any satisfaction to a man, I can recommend the spot. WhenI first came into the woods to live, I used to have weak spells when Ifelt lonesome: and then I would go into the Catskills, and spend a fewdays on that hill to look at the ways of man; but its now many a yearsince I felt any such longings, and I am getting too old for ruggedrocks. But theres a place, a short two miles back of that very hill,that in late times I relished better than the mountains: for it wasmore covered with the trees, and nateral."

　　"And where was that?" inquired Edwards, whose curiosity was stronglyexcited by the simple description of the hunter.

　　"Why, theres a fall in the hills where the water of two little ponds.that lie near each other, breaks out of their bounds and runs over therocks into the valley. The stream is, maybe, such a one as would turna mill, if so useless thing was wanted in the wilderness. But thehand that made that Leap never made a mill. There the water comescrooking and winding among the rocks, first so slow that a trout couldswim in it, and then starting and running like a creatur that wantedto make a far spring, till it gets to where the mountain divides, likethe cleft hoof of a deer, leaving a deep hollow for the brook totumble into. The first pitch is nigh two hundred feet, and the waterlooks like flakes of driven snow afore it touches the bottom; andthere the stream gathers itself together again for a new start, andmaybe flutters over fifty feet of flat rock before it falls foranother hundred, when it jumps about from shelf to shelf, firstturning this-away and then turning that-away, striving to get out ofthe hollow, till it finally comes to the plain."

　　"I have never heard of this spot before; it is not mentioned in thebooks."

　　"I never read a book in my life," said Leather-Stocking; "and howshould a man who has lived in towns and schools know anything aboutthe wonders of the woods? No, no, lad; there has that little stream ofwater been playing among the hills since He made the world, and not adozen white men have ever laid eyes on it. The rock sweeps likemason-work, in a half-round, on both sides of the fall, and shelvesover the bottom for fifty feet; so that when Ive been sitting at thefoot of the first pitch, and my hounds have run into the cavernsbehind the sheet of water, theyve looked no bigger than so manyrabbits. To my judgment, lad, its the best piece of work that Ivemet with in the woods; and none know how often the hand of God is seenin the wilderness, but them that rove it for a mans life,"

　　"What becomes of the water? In which direction does it run? Is it atributary of the Delaware?"

　　"Anan!" said Natty.

　　"Does the water run into the Delaware?"

　　"No, no; its a drop for the old Hudson, and a merry time it has tillit gets down off the mountain. Ive sat on the shelving rock many along hour, boy, and watched the bubbles as they shot by me, andthought how long it would be before that very water, which seemed madefor the wilderness, would be under the bottom of a vessel, and tossingin the salt sea. It is a spot to make a man solemnize. You go rightdown into the valley that lies to the east of the High Peak, where, inthe fall of the year, thousands of acres of woods are before youreyes, in the deep hollow, and along the side of the mountain, paintedlike ten thousand rainbows, by no hand of man, though without theordering of Gods providence."

　　"You are eloquent, Leather-Stocking," exclaimed the youth.

　　"Anan!" repeated Natty.

　　"The recollection of the sight has warmed your blood, old man. Howmany years is it since you saw the place?"

　　The hunter made no reply; but, bending his ear near the water, he satholding his breath, and listening attentively as if to some distantsound. At length he raised his head, and said:

　　"If I hadnt fastened the hounds with my own hands, with a fresh leashof green buckskin, Id take a Bible oath that I heard old Hectorringing his cry on the mountain."

　　"It is impossible," said Edwards; "it is not an hour since I saw himin his kennel."

　　By this time the attention of Mohegan was attracted to the sounds;but, notwithstanding the youth was both silent and attentive, he couldhear nothing but the lowing of some cattle from the western hills. Helooked at the old men, Natty sitting with his hand to his ear, like atrumpet, and Mohegan bending forward, with an arm raised to a levelwith his face, holding the forefinger elevated as a signal forattention, and laughed aloud at what he deemed to be imaginary sounds.

　　"Laugh if you will, boy," said Leather-Stocking, " the hounds be out,and are hunting a deer, No man can deceive me in such a matter. Iwouldnt have had the thing happen for a beavers skin. Not that Icare for the law; but the venison is lean now, and the dumb things runthe flesh off their own bones for no good. Now do you hear thehounds?"

　　Edwards started, as a full cry broke on his ear, changing from thedistant sounds that were caused by some intervening hill, to confusedechoes that rang among the rocks that the dogs were passing, and thendirectly to a deep and hollow baying that pealed under the forestunder the Lake shore. These variations in the tones of the houndspassed with amazing rapidity; and, while his eyes were glancing alongthe margin of the water, a tearing of the branches of the alder anddogwood caught his attention, at a spot near them and at the nextmoment a noble buck sprang on the shore, and buried himself in thelake. A full-mouthed cry followed, when Hector and the slut shotthrough the opening in the bushes, and darted into the lake also,bearing their breasts gallantly against the water