In this manner the two went up the path, bearing their senseless burden.  A gesture directed the party with Jamie to precede the two who had been below, and the serjeant did not pause even to breathe, until he had fairly reached the summit of the cliff; then he halted in a place removed from the danger of immediate discovery.  The body was laid reverently on the ground, and Joyce renewed his examination with greater ease and accuracy, until perfectly satisfied that the captain must have ceased to breathe, nearly an hour.

This was a sad and fearful blow to the whole party.  No one, at such a moment, thought of inquiring into the manner in which their excellent master had received his death-blow; but every thought was bent either on the extent of the calamity, or on the means of getting back to the Hut.  Joyce was the soul of the party.  His rugged face assumed a stern, commanding expression; but every sign of weakness had disappeared.  He gave his orders promptly, and the men even started when he spoke, so bent on obtaining obedience did he appear to be.

The rifles were converted into a bier, the body was placed upon it, and the four men then raised the burthen, and began to retrace their footsteps, in melancholy silence.  Nick led the way, pointing out the difficulties of the path, with a sedulousness of attention, and a gentleness of manner, that none present had ever before witnessed in the Tuscarora He even appeared to have become woman, to use one of his own peculiar expressions.

No one speaking, and all the men working with good will, the retreat, notwithstanding the burthen with which it was encumbered, was made with a rapidity greatly exceeding the advance.  Nick led the way with an unerring eye, even selecting better ground than that which the white men had been able to find on their march.  He had often traversed all the hills, in the character of a hunter, and to him the avenues of the forest were as familiar as the streets of his native town become to the burgher.  He made no offer to become one of the bearers; this would have been opposed to his habits; but, in all else, the Indian manifested gentleness and solicitude.  His apprehension seemed to be, and so he expressed it, that the Mohawks might get the scalp of the dead man; a disgrace that he seemed as solicitous to avoid as Joyce himself; the serjeant, however, keeping in view the feelings of the survivors, rather than any notions of military pride.

Notwithstanding the stern resolution that prevailed among the men, that return march was long and weary.  The distance, of itself, exceeded two miles, and there were the inequalities and obstacles of a forest to oppose them.  Per severance and strength, however, overcame all difficulties; and, at the end of two hours, the party approached the point where it became necessary to enter the bed of the rivulet, or expose their sad procession by marching in open view of any who might be straggling in the rear of the Hut.