“If you had waited only a moment longer I know you would not have been so angry with me.  The words I wanted so much to say choked me and I could not speak them.  I love you.  I have loved you from the very first moment, that blessed moment when I looked up over your pony’s head to see the sweetest face the sun ever shone on.  I’ll be the happiest man on earth if you will say you care a little for me and promise to be my wife.

“It was wrong to kiss you and I beg your forgiveness.  Could you but see your face as I saw it last night in the moonlight, I would not need to plead:  you would know that the impulse which swayed me was irresistible.  In that kiss I gave you my hope, my love, my life, my all.  Let it plead for me.

“I expect to return from Ft.  Pitt in about six or eight weeks, but I cannot wait until then for your answer.

“With hope I sign myself,

“Yours until death,

“Alfred.”

Betty read the letter through.  The page blurred before her eyes; a sensation of oppression and giddiness made her reach out helplessly with both hands.  Then she slipped forward and fell on the floor.  For the first time in all her young life Betty had fainted.  Col.  Zane found her lying pale and quiet under the window.

CHAPTER IX.

Yantwaia, or, as he was more commonly called, Cornplanter, was originally a Seneca chief, but when the five war tribes consolidated, forming the historical “Five Nations,” he became their leader.  An old historian said of this renowned chieftain:  “Tradition says that the blood of a famous white man coursed through the veins of Cornplanter.  The tribe he led was originally ruled by an Indian queen of singular power and beauty.  She was born to govern her people by the force of her character.  Many a great chief importuned her to become his wife, but she preferred to cling to her power and dignity.  When this white man, then a very young man, came to the Ohio valley the queen fell in love with him, and Cornplanter was their son.”

Cornplanter lived to a great age.  He was a wise counsellor, a great leader, and he died when he was one hundred years old, having had more conceded to him by the white men than any other chieftain.  General Washington wrote of him:  “The merits of Cornplanter and his friendship for the United States are well known and shall not be forgotten.”

But Cornplanter had not always been a friend to the palefaces.  During Dunmore’s war and for years after, he was one of the most vindictive of the savage leaders against the invading pioneers.

It was during this period of Cornplanter’s activity against the whites that Isaac Zane had the misfortune to fall into the great chief’s power.

We remember Isaac last when, lost in the woods, weak from hunger and exposure, he had crawled into a thicket and had gone to sleep.  He was awakened by a dog licking his face.  He heard Indian voices.  He got up and ran as fast as he could, but exhausted as he was he proved no match for his pursuers.  They came up with him and seeing that he was unable to defend himself they grasped him by the arms and led him down a well-worn bridle-path.