CHAPTER XI.

The return of Lord H---- without his guide and companion, Captain Brooks, caused some surprise in Mr. Prevost and his daughter, who had not expected to see any of the party before a late hour of the following evening.

Not choosing to explain, in the presence of Edith, the cause of his parting so suddenly from the hunter, the young nobleman merely said that circumstances had led him to conclude that it would be advisable to send Woodchuck in the boat with Walter to Albany; and his words were uttered in so natural and easy a tone, that Edith, unconscious that her presence put any restraint upon his communication with her father, remained seated in their pleasant little parlour till the hour for the evening meal.

"Well, my lord," said Mr. Prevost, after the few first words of explanation had passed, "did you meet with any fresh specimen of the Indian in your short expedition?"

The question might have been a somewhat puzzling one for a man who did not want to enter into any particulars; but Lord H---- replied with easy readiness--

"Only one. Him we saw but for a moment, and he did not speak with us."

"They are a very curious race," observed Mr. Prevost, "and albeit not very much given to ethnological studies, I have often puzzled myself as to whence they sprang, and how they made their way over to this continent."

Lord H---- smiled.

"I fear I cannot help you," he said. "My profession, you know, my dear sir, leads one much more to look at things as they are than to inquire how they came about. It strikes me at once, however, that in mere corporeal characteristics the Indian is very different from any race I ever beheld, if I may judge by the few individuals I have seen. The features are very different from those of any European or Asiatic people that I know of, and the frame seems formed for a combination of grace and power almost perfect. Our friend the Black Eagle, for instance; compare him with a Yorkshire or Somersetshire farmer, and what a contrast you would find! Habits could not have produced the difference, at least if they sprang from an Eastern stock, for the tribes of the desert are as free and unrestrained, as much used to constant exercise and activity; but I should be inclined to fancy that climate may have something to do with the matter, for it has struck me that many of the people I have seen in the provinces have what I may call a tendency toward the Indian formation. There is a length and suppleness of limb, which to my eyes has something Indian about it."

"Bating the grace and dignity," said Edith, gaily, "I do think that what my father would call the finest specimens of the human animal are to be found among the Indians. Look at our dear little Otaitsa, for instance, can anything be more beautiful, more graceful, more perfect, than her whole face and form?"

Lord H---- smiled, and slightly bowed his head, saying,--

"Now, many a fair lady, Miss Prevost, would naturally expect a very gallant reply; and I might make another without a compliment in good cool blood, and upon calm, mature consideration. I am very poorly versed, however, in civil speeches, and therefore I will only say that I think I have seen white ladies as beautiful, as graceful, and as perfect, as your fair young friend, together with the advantage of a better complexion. But, at the same time, I will admit that she is exceedingly beautiful, and not only that, but very charming, and very interesting too. Hers is not exactly the style of beauty I admire the most; but certainly it is perfect in its kind, and my young friend Walter seems to think so too."

A slight flush passed over Edith's cheek, and her eyes instantly turned towards her father. But Mr. Prevost only laughed, saying,--

"If they were not so young, I should be afraid that my son would marry the Sachem's daughter, and, perhaps, in the end, take to the tomahawk and the scalping-knife. But, joking apart, Otaitsa is a very singular little creature. I never can bring myself to feel that she is an Indian--a savage, in short. When I hear her low, melodious voice, with its peculiar song-like intonation, and see the grace and dignity with which she moves, and the ease and propriety with which she adapts herself to every European custom, I have to look at her bead-embroidered petticoat, and her leggins, and her moccassins, before I can carry it home to my mind that she is not some very high-bred lady of the court of France or England. Then she is so fair, too; but that is probably from care, and the lack of that exposure to the sun which may, at first, have given and then perpetuated the Indian tint. To use an old homely expression, she is the apple of her father's eye, and he is as careful of her as of a jewel, after his own particular fashion."

"She is a dear creature," said Edith, warmly; "all soul, and heart, and feeling. Thank God, too, she is a Christian, and you cannot fancy, my lord, what marvellous stores of information the little creature has. She knows that England is an island in the middle of the salt sea; and she can write and read our tongue nearly as well as she speaks it. She has a holy hatred of the French, however; and would not, for the world, speak a word of their language; for all her information, and a good share of her ideas, come from our friend, Mr. Gore, who has carried John Bull completely into the heart of the wilderness, and kept him there perfect in a sort of crystallized state. Had we but a few more men such as himself amongst the Indian tribes, there would be no fear of any wavering in the friendship of the Five Nations. There goes an Indian now past the window. We shall have him in here in a moment, for they stand upon no ceremony--and he is speaking to Antony, the negro boy. How curiously he peeps about him! He must be looking for somebody he does not find."

Lord H---- rose and went to the window, and, in a minute or two after, the Indian stalked quietly away, and disappeared in the forest.

"What could he want?" said Edith. "It is strange he did not come in. I will ask Antony what he sought here."

And, going to the door, she called the gardener boy up, and questioned him.

"He want Captain Woodchuck, missy," replied the lad. "He ask if he not lodge here last night. I tell him yes; but Woodchuck go away early this morning, and not come back since. He 'quire very much about him, and who went with him. I tell him Massa Walter and de strange gentleman, but both leave him soon--Massa Walter go straight to Albany, strange gentleman come back here."

"Did he speak English?" asked Edith.

"Few word," replied the negro. "I speak few word Indian. So patch 'em together make many, missy."

And he laughed with that peculiar unmeaning laugh with which his race are accustomed to distinguish anything they consider witty.

The whole conversation was heard by the two gentlemen within. On Mr. Prevost it had no effect, but to call a sort of cynical smile upon his lips; but the case was different with Lord H----. He saw that the deed which had been done in the forest was known to the Indians; that its doer had been recognized, and that the hunt was up; and he rejoiced to think that poor Woodchuck was already far beyond pursuit.

Anxious, however, to gain a fuller insight into the character and habits of a people of whom he had as yet obtained only a glimpse, he continued to converse with Mr. Prevost in regard to the aboriginal races; and learned several facts which by no means tended to decrease the uneasiness which the events of the morning; had produced.

"The Indians," said his host, in answer to a leading question, "are, as you say, a very revengeful people; but not more so than many other barbarous nations. Indeed, in many of their feelings and habits they greatly resemble a people I have heard of in central Asia, called Affghans. Both, in common with almost all barbarians, look upon revenge as a duty imperative upon every family and every tribe. They modify their ideas, indeed, in case of war; although it is very difficult to bring about peace after war has commenced; but if any individual of a tribe is killed by another in time of peace, nothing but the blood of the murderer can satisfy the family or the tribe, if he can be caught. They will pursue him for weeks and months, and employ every stratagem which their fertile brains can suggest to entrap him, till they feel quite certain that he is entirely beyond their reach. This perseverance proceeds from a religious feeling; for they believe that the spirit of their dead relation can never enter the happy hunting-grounds till his blood has been atoned by that of the slayer."

"But if they cannot catch the slayer," asked Lord H----, "what do they do then?"

"I used a wrong expression," replied Mr. Prevost. "I should have said the blood of some other victim. It is their duty, according to their ideas, to sacrifice the slayer. If satisfied that he is perfectly beyond their power, they strive to get hold of his nearest relation. If they cannot do that, they take a man of his tribe or nation, and sacrifice him. It is all done very formally, and with all sorts of consideration and consultation; for in these bloody rites they are the most deliberate people in the world, and the most persevering also."

Lord H---- mused gravely for some moments without reply, and then turned the conversation in another direction. It certainly was not gay; but it was, to all appearance, cheerful enough on his side; for this world is a strange teacher of hypocrisy in all its various shades, from that which is the meanest and most detestable of vices to that which is dignified by its motives and its conduct almost to a virtue. God forbid that I should ever, for a moment, support the false and foul axiom that the end can justify the means. But it is with all evil things as with deadly poisons. There are occasions when, in small portions, they may, for certain diseased circumstances, become precious antidotes. Had man remained pure, perfect, and upright, as he came from the bands of his Creator--had he never doubted God's word, disobeyed his commandments, tasted of that which was forbidden--had disobedience never brought pain and death--had blood never stained the face of earth, and pain in all its shapes followed in the footsteps of sin--there would, indeed, have never been any occasion or any circumstances in which it would have been needful, honourable, or kind for man to hide one feeling of his heart from his fellow-beings. But in this dark, corrupted world, where sickness and sorrow, care, distress, and death surround, not only ourselves, but those who are dearest to us, and hem us in on every side, how often is it needful to hide from those, even, whom we love the best and trust the most, the anxieties which imagination suggests, or to which reason and experience give birth; to conceal, for a time, even the sad and painful facts of which we are cognizant; to shut up our sorrow and our dread in our own bosom, till we have armed and steeled the hearts of those we love better than ourselves, to resist or to endure the evil which is preying on our own.

A few days earlier, Lord H---- might plainly and openly have told all the occurrences of the morning in the ears of Edith Prevost; but sensations had been springing up in his breast, which made him more tender of her feelings, more careful of creating alarm and anxiety; and he kept his painful secret well till after the evening meal was over, and she had retired to her chamber. Then, however, he stopped Mr. Prevost just as that gentleman was raising a light to hand to his guest, and said--

"I am afraid, my good friend, we cannot go to bed just yet. I have something to tell you, which, from all I have heard since it occurred, appears to me of much greater importance than at first. Whether anything can be done to avert the evil consequences or not, I cannot tell; but, at all events, it is as well that you and I should talk the matter over."

He then related to Mr. Prevost all the events of the morning, and was sorry to perceive that gentleman's face assuming a deeper and deeper gloom as he proceeded.

"This is most unfortunate indeed," said Mr. Prevost at length. "I quite acquit our poor friend Brooks of any evil intent; but to slay an Indian at all so near our house, and especially an Oneida, was most unlucky. That tribe, or nation, as they call themselves, has, from the strong personal regard, I suppose, which has grown up accidentally between their chief and myself, always shown the greatest kindness and friendship towards myself and my family. Before this event, I should have felt myself, in any of their villages, as much at home as by my own fireside, and I am sure that each man felt himself as secure on any part of the lands granted to me as if he were in his own lodge. But now their blood has stained my very mat, as they will call it, and the consequences no one can foresee. Woodchuck has himself escaped. He has no relations or friends on whom they can wreak their vengeance."

"Surely," exclaimed Lord H----, "they will never visit his offence on you or yours."

"I trust not," replied Mr. Prevost, after a moment's thought; "yet I cannot feel exactly sure. They will take a white man for their victim--an Englishman--one of the same nation as the offender. Probably it may not matter much to them who it is; and the affectionate regard which they entertain towards us may turn the evil aside. But these Indians have a sort of fanaticism in their religion, as well as we have in ours; the station and the dignity of the victim which they offer up enters into their consideration--they like to make a worthy and an honourable sacrifice, as they consider it; and, just as this spirit moves them or not, they may think that any one will do for their purpose, or that they are required by their god of vengeance to immolate some one dear to themselves, in order to dignify the sacrifice."

"This is, indeed, a very sad view of the affair, and one which had never struck me," replied Lord H----. "It may be well to consider, my dear sir, what is the best and safest course. I must now tell you one of the objects which made me engage your son to carry my despatches to Albany. It seemed to me, from all I have learned during my short residence with you, especially during my conference with Sir William Johnson, that the unprotected state of this part of the country left Albany itself, and the settlements round it, unpleasantly exposed. We know that on a late occasion it was Dieskau's intention, if he had succeeded in defeating Sir William and capturing Fort George, to make a dash at the capital of the province. He was defeated; but there is reason to believe that Montcalm--a man much his superior both in energy and skill--entertained the same views, although we know not what induced him to retreat so hastily after his black and bloody triumph at Fort William Henry. He may seize some other opportunity; and I can perceive nothing whatsoever to oppose his progress, or delay him for an hour, if he can make himself master of the few scattered forts which lie between Carrillon or Ticonderoga. In these circumstances, I have strongly urged that a small force should be thrown forward to a commanding point on the river Hudson, not many miles from this place, which I examined as I came hither--with an advanced post or two, still nearer to your house. My own regiment I have pointed out as better fitted for the service than any other; and I believe that if my suggestions are adopted, as I doubt not they will be, we can give you efficient protection. Still I think," continued the nobleman, speaking more slowly and emphatically, "that, with two young people so justly dear to you--with a daughter so beautiful, and every way so charming; and so gallant and noble a lad as Walter, whose high spirit and adventurous character will expose him continually to any snare that may be set for him, it will be much better for you to retire with them both to Albany; at least till such time as you know that the spirit of Indian vengeance has been satisfied, and that the real peril has passed."

Mr. Prevost mused for several minutes, and then replied:--

"The motives you suggest are certainly very strong, my lord; but I have strange ways of viewing such subjects, and I must have time to consider whether it is fair and right to my fellow-countrymen, scattered over this district, to withdraw from my share of the peril which all who remain would have to encounter. Do not argue with me upon the subject to-night. I will think over it well; and doubt not that I shall view the plan you have suggested with all the favour that paternal love can afford. I will also keep my mind free to receive any further reasons you may have to produce. But I must first consider quietly and alone. There is no need of immediate decision; for these people, according to their own code, are bound to make themselves perfectly sure that they cannot get possession of the actual slayer before they choose another victim. It is clear from what the Indian said to the negro boy, that they know the hand that did the deed, and they must search for poor Brooks first, and practise every device to allure him back before they immolate another. Let us both think over the matter well, and confer to-morrow."

Thus saying, he shook hands with Lord H----, and they retired to their several chambers with very gloomy and apprehensive thoughts.