“My father has a great deal of cloth, red, like the blood of a pale face,” pursued the Indian, rather in demand than in observation, as he pointed with his finger to the opposite end of the room.  “When the Ottawa was here last, he did not see it.”

“The great chief of the Ottawas knows that the great father of the Saganaw has a big heart to make presents to the red skins.  The cloth the Ottawa sees there is sufficient to make leggings for the chiefs of all the nations.”

Apparently satisfied with this reply, the fierce Indian uttered one of his strong guttural and assentient “ughs,” and then commenced filling the pipe of peace, correct on the present occasion in all its ornaments, which was handed to him by the Delaware chief.  It was remarked by the officers this operation took up an unusually long portion of his time, and that he frequently turned his ear, like a horse stirred by the huntsman’s horn, with quick and irrepressible eagerness towards the door.

“The pale warrior, the friend of the Ottawa chief, is not here,” said the governor, as he glanced his eye along the semicircle of Indians.  “How is this?  Is his voice still sick, that he cannot come; or has the great chief of the Ottawas forgotten to tell him?”

“The voice of the pale warrior is still sick, and he cannot speak,” replied the Indian.  “The Ottawa chief is very sorry; for the tongue of his friend the pale face is full of wisdom.”

Scarcely had the last words escaped his lips, when a wild shrill cry from without the fort rang on the ears of the assembled council, and caused a momentary commotion among the officers.  It arose from a single voice, and that voice could not be mistaken by any who had heard it once before.  A second or two, during which the officers and chiefs kept their eyes intently fixed on each other, passed anxiously away, and then nearer to the gate, apparently on the very drawbridge itself, was pealed forth the wild and deafening yell of a legion of devilish voices.  At that sound, the Ottawa and the other chiefs sprang to their feet, and their own fierce cry responded to that yet vibrating on the ears of all.  Already were their gleaming tomahawks brandished wildly over their heads, and Ponteac had even bounded a pace forward to reach the governor with the deadly weapon, when, at the sudden stamping of the foot of the latter upon the floor, the scarlet cloth in the rear was thrown aside, and twenty soldiers, their eyes glancing along the barrels of their levelled muskets, met the startled gaze of the astonished Indians.

An instant was enough to satisfy the keen chief of the true state of the case.  The calm composed mien of the officers, not one of whom had even attempted to quit his seat, amid the din by which his ears were so alarmingly assailed,—­the triumphant, yet dignified, and even severe expression of the governor’s countenance; and, above all, the unexpected presence of the prepared soldiery,—­all these at