Again the time of hunting came, and the same party occupied the fort in the wilderness.  As yet they had been unmolested by the Indians:  they even knew not of their being in the neighbourhood, yet still a form of guarding was kept up, and Silas and a comrade held the night-watch in the block house.  The others had fallen asleep, and Silas, as he sat with half-closed eyes, fancied he saw before him his lost love, Leemah; he started as he thought from a dream, but ’twas real, and ’twas her own cool fingers pressed his brow—­by the clear fire light he saw her cheek was deadly pale, but her eyes were flashing like sepulchral lamps, and a white-browed babe slept upon her bosom.  In a deep thrilling whisper she bade him rise and follow her.  Wondering how she had found entrance, he obeyed, and she led him outside the walls of the fort; a murmuring sound as of leaves stirred by the wind was heard.

’Tis the coming of the Red Eagle, said Leemah, his beak is whetted for the blood draughts; here enter, and if your own life or Leemah’s be dear, keep still;—­as she spoke she parted aside the young shoots which had sprung tip from the root of a tree, and twined like an arbour about it.  Her deep earnestness left no time for speculation; he entered the recess, and hardly had the flexile boughs sprung back to their places, when the fleet footsteps of the Indians came nearer, and the fort was surrounded by them; the building was fired, and then their deadly yell burst forth, while the unfortunate inmates started from sleep at the sound of horror.  Mercy for them there was none; the relentless savage knew it not; but the shout of delight rose louder as they saw the flames dance higher o’er their victims; and Silas looked on all—­but Leemah’s eye was on his—­he knew his slightest movement was death to her as well as to himself.  Like a demon through the flame leaped the ghastly form of the Red Eagle, (he to whom Leemah had been espoused) and with searching glance glared on his victims, but saw not there the one he sought with deeper vengeance than the others—­’twas Silas he looked for; and, with the speed of a winged fiend, he bounded to where Leemah stood, and accused her of having aided in his escape.  She acknowledged she had, and pointed to the far-off forest as his hiding place.  In an instant his glittering tomahawk cleft the hand she raised off at the wrist.  Silas knew no more.  Leemah’s hot blood fell upon his brow, and he fainted through excess of agony, but like Mazeppa, he lived to repay the Red Eagle in after-years for that night of horror—­when his eyes had been blasted with the burning fort, his ears stunned with the shrieks of his murdered friends, and his brain scorched through with Leemah’s life blood.