James Fenimore Cooper

“ The Mohican now found an opportunity to make a powerful thrust with his knife; Magua suddenly relinquished his grasp, and fell backward, without motion, and seemingly, without life. His adversary leaped on his feet, making the arches of the forest ring with the sounds of his shout of triumph.
"Well done for the Delawares! victory to the Mohican!" cried Hawk-eye, once more elevating the butt of the long and fatal rifle; "a finishing blow from a man without a cross, will never tell against his honour, nor rob him of his right to the scalp!" ”

“ Surely, Duncan, those cruel murders, those terrific scenes of torture, of which we read and hear so much, are never acted in the presence of such as he!"
"This, certainly, is a rare and brilliant instance of those natural qualities, in which these peculiar people are said to excel," he answered. "I agree with you, Alice, in thinking that such a front and eye were formed rather to intimidate than to deceive; but let us not practice a deception on ourselves, by expecting any other exhibition of what we esteem virtue, than according to the fashion of a savage. ”

“ To you, Cora, I will urge no words of idle encouragement; your own fortitude and undisturbed reason, will teach you all that may become your sex; but cannot we dry the tears of that trembling weeper in your bosom."
"I am calmer, Duncan," said Alice, raising herself from the arms of her sister, and forcing an appearance of composure through her tears; "much calmer, now. Surely, in this hidden spot, we are safe, we are secret, free from injury; we will hope every thing from those generous men, who have risked so much already in our behalf." ”

“ After this yell of victory, they tore up the fragrant bed of the cavern, and bore the branches into the chasm, scattering the boughs, as if they suspected them of concealing the person of the man they had so long hated and feared. One fierce and wild looking warrior, approached the chief, bearing a load of the brush, and pointing, exultingly, to the deep red stains with which it was sprinkled, uttered his joy in Indian yells, whose meaning Heyward was only enabled to comprehend, by the frequent repetition of the name of "la Longue Carabine!" ”

“ The Indian laughed tauntingly as he held up his reeking hand, and answered—"It is red, but it comes from white veins!"
"Monster! there is blood, oceans of blood, upon thy soul; thy spirit has moved this scene."
"Magua is a great chief!" returned the exulting savage—"will the dark hair go to his tribe!"
"Never! strike, if thou wilt, and complete thy hellish revenge."
He hesitated a moment; and then catching the light and senseless form of Alice in his arms, the subtle Indian moved swiftly across the plain toward the woods. ”

“ Montcalm!" continued the deeply resentful and less self-restrained scout; "they say a time must come when all the deeds done in the flesh will be seen at a single look; and that by eyes cleared from their mortal infirmities. Woe betide the wretch who is born to behold this plain, with the judgment hanging above his soul! Ha—as I am a man of white blood, yonder lies a red-skin without the hair of his head where nature rooted it! Look to him, Delaware; it may be one of your missing people; and he should have burial like a warrior. ”

“ Magua shook his head, forbidding the repetition of offers he so much despised.
"What would you have?" continued Cora, after a most painful pause, while the conviction forced itself on her mind, that the too sanguine and generous Duncan had been cruelly deceived by the cunning of the savage.
"What a Huron loves—good for good, bad for bad."
"You would then revenge the injury inflicted by Munro, on his helpless daughters. Would it not be more like a man to go before his face, and take the satisfaction of a warrior?"
"The arms of the pale-faces are long, and their knives sharp!" ”

“ The scout laughed in his silent, but heart-felt manner, and shook his head with vast satisfaction, as he continued—
"Ah! you want the flavour that one gets by habit: the time was when I liked it as little as yourself, but I have come to my taste and I now crave it, as a deer does the licks. Your high spiced wines are not better liked than a red-skin relishes this water, especially when his natur is ailing. But Uncas has made his fire, and it is time we think of eating, for our journey is long, and all before us." ”

“ In plain words, we know not where we are."
"An Indian lost in the woods!" said the scout, shaking his head doubtingly; "when the sun is scorching the tree tops, and the watercourses are full; when the moss on every beach he sees will tell him in which quarter the north star will shine at night! The woods are full of deer paths which run to the streams and licks, places well known to everybody; nor have the geese done their flight to the Canada waters, altogether! 'Tis strange that an Indian should be lost atwixt Horican and the bend in the river! ”

“ Swift as thought, Hawk-eye seized the advantage, and discharged his fatal weapon into the top of the oak. The leaves were unusually agitated; the dangerous rifle fell from its commanding elevation, and after a few moments of vain struggling, the form of the savage was seen swinging in the wind, while he grasped a ragged and naked branch of the tree with his hands clenched in desperation.
"Give him, in pity, give him, the contents of another rifle!" cried Duncan, turning away his eyes in horror from the spectacle of a fellow creature in such awful jeopardy. ”

“ Ha! here will soon be an end of the firing, for yonder comes a fog that will turn day to night, and make an Indian arrow more dangerous than a moulded cannon. Now, if you are equal to the work, and will follow, I will make a push; for I long to get down into that camp, if it be only to scatter some Mingo dogs that I see lurking in the skirts of yonder thicket of birch."
"We are equal!" said Cora, firmly; "on such an errand we will follow to any danger!" ”

“ I am certain Cora will join me in saying, that sleep is necessary to you both!"
"Cora may submit to the justice of your opinion, though she cannot put it in practice," returned the elder sister, who had placed herself by the side of Alice, on a couch of sassafras; "there would be other causes to chase away sleep, though we had been spared the shock of this mysterious noise. Ask yourself, Heyward, can daughters forget the anxiety a father must endure, whose children lodge, he knows not where or how, in such a wilderness, and in the midst of so many perils!" ”

“ Faint and almost despairing as was the prospect of escape, the words of Duncan were not thrown away, for it awakened the powers of the sisters in such a manner, that they awaited the result in silence. A second yell soon followed the first, when a rush of voices was heard pouring down the island, from its upper to its lower extremity, until they reached the naked rock above the caverns, where, after a shout of savage triumph, the air continued full of horrible cries and screams, such as man alone can utter, and he only when in a state of the fiercest barbarity. ”

“ Encouraged and deluded by his success, David exerted all his powers to extend what he believed so holy an influence. The unwonted sounds caught the ears of a distant savage, who flew, raging from group to group, like one who, scorning to touch the vulgar herd, hunted for some victim more worthy of his renown. It was Magua, who uttered a yell of pleasure when he beheld his ancient prisoners again at his mercy.
"Come," he said, laying his soiled hand on the dress of Cora, "the wigwam of the Huron is open. Is it not better than this place?" ”

“ Living masses of the English, to the amount, in the whole, of near three thousand, were moving slowly across the plain, towards the common centre, and gradually approached each other, as they converged to the point of their march, a vista cut through the lofty trees, where the road to the Hudson entered the forest. Along the sweeping borders of the woods hung a dark cloud of savages, eyeing the passage of their enemies, and hovering at a distance, like vultures, who were only kept from stooping on their prey by the presence and restraint of a superior army. ”

“ The savage struggled powerfully to gain the point of safety, and favoured by the glancing water, he was already stretching forth an arm to meet the grasp of his companions, when he shot away again with the whirling current, appeared to rise into the air, with uplifted arms, and starting eye-balls, and then fell, with a sullen plunge, into that deep and yawning abyss over which he hovered. A single, wild, despairing shriek, rose from the cavern, above the dull roar of the cataract, and all was hushed again as the grave. ”

“ Book! what have such as I, who am a warrior of the wilderness, though a man without a cross, to do with books! I never read but in one, and the words that are written there are too simple and too plain to need much schooling; though I may boast that of forty long and hard working years."
"What call you the volume?" said David, misconceiving the other's meaning.
" 'Tis open before your eyes," returned the scout; "and he who owns it is not a niggard of its use. I have heard it said, that there are men who read in books, to convince themselves there is a God! ”

“ Smothered voices were next heard, as though men called to each other in the bowels of the earth, when a sudden light flashed upon the vision of those without, and laid bare the much prized secret of the place.
At the farther extremity of a narrow, deep cavern in the rock, whose length appeared much extended by the perspective and the nature of the light by which it was seen, was seated the scout, holding a blazing knot of pine. ”

“ But when le Renard raised his voice in a long and intelligible whoop, it was answered by a spontaneous yell from the mouth of every Indian within hearing of the sound. The clamorous noises again rushed down the island, and before Duncan had time to recover from the shock, his feeble barrier of brush was scattered to the winds, the cavern was entered at both its extremities, and he and his companions were dragged from their shelter, and borne into the day, where they stood surrounded by the whole band of the triumphant Hurons. ”

“ For many minutes Duncan succeeded in keeping his senses on the alert, and alive to every moaning sound that arose from the forest. His vision became more acute, as the shades of evening settled on the place, and even after the stars were glimmering above his head, he was able to distinguish the recumbent forms of his companions, as they lay stretched on the grass, and to note the person of Chingachgook, who sat upright and motionless as one of the trees, which formed the dark barrier on every side of them. ”

“ They then drew warily back, keeping their eyes rivetted on the ruin, as if they expected to see the apparitions of the dead issue from its silent walls, until having reached the boundary of the area, they moved slowly into the thicket, and disappeared.
Hawk-eye dropped the breech of his rifle to the earth, and drawing a long, free breath, exclaimed, in an audible whisper—
"Ay! they respect the dead, and it has this time saved their own lives, and it may be, the lives of better men too!" ”

“ Let him go—let him go; 'tis but one man, and he without either rifle or bow, many a long mile from his French commerades; and, like a rattler that has lost his fangs, he can do no farther mischief until such time as he, and we too, may leave the prints of our moccasins over a long reach of sandy plain. See, Uncas," he added, in Delaware, "your father is flaying the scalps already! It may be well to go round and feel the vagabonds that are left, or we may have another of them loping through the woods and screeching like any jay that has been winged!" ”

“ No perceptible emotion could be discovered in the Mohicans during this critical moment, their rigid features expressing neither hope nor alarm; but the scout again turned his head, and laughing in his own silent manner, he said to Heyward—
"The knaves love to hear the sounds of their pieces; but the eye is not to be found among the Mingoes that can calculate a true range in a dancing canoe! You see the dumb devils have taken off a man to charge, and by the smallest measurement that can be allowed, we move three feet to their two!" ”

“ Then raising his voice to its highest tones, he poured out a strain so powerful as to be heard, even amid the din of that bloody field. More than one savage rushed towards them, thinking to rifle the unprotected sisters of their attire, and bear away their scalps; but when they found this strange and unmoved figure rivetted to his post, they paused to listen. Astonishment soon changed to admiration, and they passed on to other and less courageous victims, openly expressing their satisfaction at the firmness with which the white warrior sung his death song. ”

“ Renard smiled with cold contempt as he answered:—
"When the white man dies, he thinks he is at peace; but the red men know how to torture even the ghosts of their enemies. Where is his body? Let the Hurons see his scalp!"
"He is not dead, but escaped."
Magua shook his head incredulously, and added—
"Is he a bird, to spread his wings; or is he a fish, to swim without looking at the sun! The white chief reads in his books, and believes the Hurons are fools!" ”

“ It seemed as if they had profited by the short truce, to devote an instant to the purest and best affections: the daughters forgetting their fears, and the veteran his cares, in the stillness and security of the moment. Of this scene, Duncan, who in his eagerness to report his arrival, had entered unannounced, stood many moments an unobserved and a delighted spectator. But the quick and dancing eyes of Alice soon caught a glimpse of his figure, reflected from a glass, and she sprang blushing from her father's knee, exclaiming aloud in her surprise—
"Major Heyward!" ”