exclaimed the
now really anxious girl. "Will you not speak to him, Major Heyward, that
I may hear his tones? Foolish though it may be, you have often heard me
avow my faith in the tones of the human voice!""It would be in vain; and answered, most probably, by an ejaculation.
Though he may understand it, he affects, like most of his people, to be
ignorant of the English; and least of all will he condescend to speak
it, now that war demands the utmost exercise of his dignity. But he
stops; the private path by which we are to journey is, doubtless, at
hand."The conjecture of Major Heyward was true. When they reached the spot
where the Indian stood, pointing into the thicket that fringed the
military road, a narrow and blind path, which might, with some little
inconvenience, receive one person at a time, became visible."Here, then, lies our way," said the young man, in a low voice. "Manifest no distrust, or you may invite the danger you appear to apprehend.""Cora, what think you?" asked the reluctant fair one. "If we journey
with the troops, though we may find their presence irksome, shall we not
feel better assurance of our safety?""Being little accustomed to the practices of the savages, Alice, you
mistake the place of real danger," said Heyward. "If enemies have
reached the portage at all, a thing by no means probable, as our scouts
are abroad, they will surely be found skirting the column where scalps
abound the most. The route of the detachment is known, while ours,
having been determined within the hour, must still be secret.""Should we distrust the man because his manners are not our manners, and
that his skin is dark?" coldly asked Cora.Alice hesitated no longer; but giving her Narragansett[4] a smart cut
of the whip, she was the first to dash aside the slight branches of the
bushes, and to follow the runner along the dark and tangled pathway. The
young man regarded the last speaker in open admiration, and even
permitted her fairer though certainly not more beautiful companion to
proceed unattended, while he sedulously opened the way himself for the
passage of her who has been called Cora. It would seem that the
domestics had been previously instructed; for, instead of penetrating
the thicket, they followed the route of the column; a measure which
Heyward stated had been dictated by the sagacity of their guide, in
order to diminish the marks of their trail, if, haply, the Canadian
savages should be lurking so far in advance of their army. For many
minutes the intricacy of the route admitted of no further dialogue;
after which they emerged from the broad border of underbrush which grew
along the line of the highway, and entered under the high but dark
arches of the forest. Here their progress was less interrupted, and the

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