“A wise plan,” said Tayoga.

In another hour their deerskins were dry, and reclothing themselves they returned the canoe to the lake, the Hurons still being invisible.  Then they crossed in haste, reached the cove that Willet had seen, and plunged into the deep woods, taking the canoe with them, and hiding their trail carefully.  When they had gone a full three miles they came to rest in a glade, and every one of the three felt that it was time.  Muscles and nerves alike were exhausted, and they remained there all the rest of the day and the following night, except that after dark Tayoga went back to the lake and saw the long canoe going northward.

“I don’t think we’ll be troubled by that band of Hurons any more,” he reported to his comrades.  “They will surely think we have been drowned, and tomorrow we can continue our own journey to the south.”

“And on the whole, we’ve come out of it pretty well,” said Willet.

“With the aid of Manitou, who so generously sent us the second storm,” said Tayoga.

They brought the canoe back to the lake at dawn, and hugging the western shore made leisurely speed to the south, until they came to the neighborhood of the French works at Carillon, when they landed again with their canoe, and after a long and exhausting portage launched themselves anew on the smaller but more splendid lake, known to the English as George and to the French as Saint Sacrement.  Now, though, they traveled by night and slept and rested by day.  But Lake George in the moonlight was grand and beautiful beyond compare.  Its waters were dusky silver as the beams poured in floods upon it, and the lofty shores, in their covering of dark green, seemed to hold up the skies.

“It’s a grand land,” said Robert for the hundredth time.

“It is so,” said Tayoga.  “After Manitou had practiced on many other countries he used all his wisdom and skill to make the country of the Hodenosaunee.”

The next morning when they lay on the shore they saw two French boats on the lake, and Robert was confirmed in his opinion that the prevision of the French leaders would enable them to strike the first blow.  Already their armed forces were far down in the debatable country, and they controlled the ancient water route between the British colonies and Canada.

On the second night they left the lake, hid the canoe among the bushes at the edge of a creek, and began the journey by land to the vale of Onondaga.  It was likely that in ordinary times they would have made it without event, but they felt now the great need of caution, since the woods might be full of warriors of the hostile tribes.  They were sure, too, that Tandakora would find their trail and that he would not relinquish the pursuit until they were near the villages of the Hodenosaunee.  The trail might be hidden from the Ojibway alone, but since many war parties of their foes were in the woods he would learn of it from some of them.  So they followed the plan they had used on the lake of traveling by night and of lying in the bush by day.