“He did; yes, he did.  He never saw the ocean, and has come by his calling altogether up here on Ontario.  I have often thought he has a nat’ral gift in the way of schooners and sloops, and have respected him accordingly.  As for treason and lying and black-hearted vices, friend Cap, Jasper Western is as free as the most virtuousest of the Delaware warriors; and if you crave to see a truly honest man, you must go among that tribe to discover him.”

“There he comes round!” exclaimed the delighted Cap, the Scud at this moment filling on her original tack; “and now we shall see what the boy would be at; he cannot mean to keep running up and down these passages, like a girl footing it through a country-dance.”

The Scud now kept so much away, that for a moment the two observers on the blockhouse feared Jasper meant to come-to; and the savages, in their lairs, gleamed out upon her with the sort of exultation that the crouching tiger may be supposed to feel as he sees his unconscious victim approach his bed.  But Jasper had no such intention:  familiar with the shore, and acquainted with the depth of water on every part of the island, he well knew that the Scud might be run against the bank with impunity, and he ventured fearlessly so near, that, as he passed through the little cove, he swept the two boats of the soldiers from their fastenings and forced them out into the channel, towing them with the cutter.  As all the canoes were fastened to the two Dunham boats, by this bold and successful attempt the savages were at once deprived of the means of quitting the island, unless by swimming, and they appeared to be instantly aware of the very important fact.  Rising in a body, they filled the air with yells, and poured in a harmless fire.  While up in this unguarded manner, two rifles were discharged by their adversaries.  One came from the summit of the block, and an Iroquois fell dead in his tracks, shot through the brain.  The other came from the Scud.  The last was the piece of the Delaware, but, less true than that of his friend, it only maimed an enemy for life.  The people of the Scud shouted, and the savages sank again, to a man, as if it might be into the earth.

“That was the Sarpent’s voice,” said Pathfinder, as soon as the second piece was discharged.  “I know the crack of his rifle as well as I do that of Killdeer.  ’Tis a good barrel, though not sartain death.  Well, well, with Chingachgook and Jasper on the water, and you and I in the block, friend Cap, it will be hard if we don’t teach these Mingo scamps the rationality of a fight.”