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They begin to throw their remarks about concerning the salmon, but I trust we shall get through the summer without any serious disturbance on the score of food. The Scotch in the battalion do, indeed, talk more than is prudent of their want of oatmeal, grumbling occasionally of our wheaten bread.”

“Ah! that is human nature, sergeant; pure unadulterated Scottish human nature. A cake, man, to say the truth, is an agreeable morsel, and I often see the time when I pine for a bite myself.”

"If the feeling gets to be troublesome, Major Duncan, — in the men I mean, sir, for I would not think of saying so disrespectful a thing to your honor, — but if the men ever pine seriously for their natural food, I would humbly recommend that some oatmeal be imported, or prepared in this country for them, and I think we shall hear no more of it. A very little would answer for a cure, sir.”

“You are a wag, sergeant; but hang me if I am sure you are not right. There may be sweeter things in this world, after all, than oatmeal. You have a sweet daughter, Dunham, for one."

"The girl is like her mother, Major Duncan, and will pass inspection," said the sergeant, proudly. "Neither was brought up on anything better than good American flour. The girl will pass inspection, sir.”

"That would she, I'll answer for it. Well, I may as well come to the point at once, man, and bring up my reserve into the front of the battle. Here is Davy Muir, the quartermaster, is disposed to make your daughter his wife, and he has just got me to open the matter to you, being fearful of compromitting his own dignity— and I may as well add, that half the youngsters in the fort toast her, and talk of her from morning till night."

"She is much honored, sir," returned the father, stiffly, "but I trust the gentlemen will find something more worthy of them to talk about, ere long. I hope to see her the wife of an honest man, before many weeks, sir."

"Yes, Davy is an honest man, and that is more than can be said of all in the quartermaster's department, I'm thinking, sergeant," returned Lundie, with a slight smile. "Well, then, may I tell the Cupid-stricken youth that the matter is as good as settled?"

"I thank your honor, but Mabel is betrothed to another."

"The devil she is! That will produce a stir in the fort; though I'm not sorry to hear it, either, for to be frank with you, sergeant, I'm no great admirer of unequal matches."

"I think with your honor, and have no desire to see my daughter an officer's lady. If she can get as high as her mother was before her, it ought to satisfy any reasonable woman. 99

"And may I ask, sergeant, who is the lucky man that you intend to call son-in-law?"

"The Pathfinder, your honor."

"Pathfinder!"

"The same, Major Duncan; and in naming him to you, I give you his whole history. No one is better known on this frontier, than my honest, brave, and true-hearted friend."

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All that is true enough; but is he, after all, the sort of person to make a girl of twenty happy?"

'Why not, your honor? the man is at the head of his calling. There is no other guide, or scout, connected with the army, that has half the reputation of Pathfinder, or who deserves to have it half as well."

"Very true, sergeant; but is the reputation of a scout exactly the sort of renown to captivate a girl's fancy?"

"Talking of girls' fancies, sir, is, in my humble opinion, much like talking of a recruit's judgment. If we were to take the movements of the awkward squad, sir, as a guide, we should never form a decent line in battalion, Major Duncan."

"But your daughter has nothing awkward about her; for a genteeler girl, of her class, could not be found in old Albin itself. Is she of your way of thinking, in

this matter?

though I suppose she must be, as you say

she is betrothed."

"We have not yet conversed on the subject, your honor, but I consider her mind as good as made up, from several little circumstances that might be named."

“And what are these circumstances, sergeant?" asked the major, who began to take more interest than he had at first felt in the subject. "I confess a little curiosity to learn something about a woman's mind, being, as you know, a bachelor myself."

"Why, your honor, when I speak of the Pathfinder to the girl, she always looks me full in the face; chimes in with everything I say in his favor, and has a frank, open way with her, which says as much as if she half considered him, already, as a husband."

"Hum! and these signs you think, Dunham, are faithful tokens of your daughter's feelings?"

"I do, your honor, for they strike me as natural. When I find a man, sir, who looks me full in the face, while he praises an officer-for, begging your honor's pardon, the men will sometimes pass their strictures on their betters and when I find a man looking me in the eyes as he praises his captain, I always set it down that the fellow is honest, and means what he says."

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"Is there not some material difference in the age of the intended bridegroom and that of his pretty bride, sergeant?"

"You are quite right, sir; Pathfinder is well advanced towards forty, and Mabel has every prospect of happiness that a young woman can derive from the certainty of possessing an experienced husband. I was quite forty myself, your honor, when I married her mother."

"But will your daughter be as likely to admire a green hunting-shirt, such as that our worthy guide wears, with a fox-skin cap, as the smart uniform of the 55th?"

"Perhaps not, sir; and therefore she will have the merit of self-denial, which always makes a young woman wiser and better."

"And are you not afraid that she may be left a widow

while still a young woman ? What between wild beasts and wilder savages, Pathfinder may be said to carry his life in his hand."

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"Every bullet has its billet," Lundie," for so the major was fond of being called, in his moments of condescension, and when not engaged in military affairs, "and no man in the 55th can call himself beyond, or above, the chances of sudden death. In that particular, Mabel would gain nothing by a change. Besides, sir, if

I may speak freely on such a subject, I much doubt if ever Pathfinder dies in battle, or by any of the sudden chances of the wilderness."

"And why so, sergeant?" asked the major, looking at his inferior with the sort of reverence which a Scot of his day was more apt than at present to entertain for mysterious agencies. "He is a soldier, so far as danger is concerned, and one that is much more than usually exposed; and, being free of his person, why should he expect to escape, when others do not?"

"I do not believe, your honor, that the Pathfinder considers his own chances better than any one's else, but the man will never die by a bullet. I have seen him so often, handling his rifle with as much composure as if it were a shepherd's crook, in the midst of the heaviest showers of bullets, and under so many extraordinary circumstances, that I do not think Providence means he should ever fall in that manner. And yet, if there be a man in his Majesty's dominions who really deserves such a death, it is Pathfinder!"

"We never know, sergeant," returned Lundie, with a countenance that was grave with thought, "and the less we say about it, perhaps, the better. But will your daughter Mabel, I think you call her will Mabel be as willing to accept one, who, after all, is a mere hanger-on of the army, as to take one from the service

1 [That is, Only those are killed whose death Providence has decreed. Billet means resting-place or destination. In military parlance, billet is an official order requiring the person to whom it is addressed to provide board and lodging for the soldier bearing it.]

itself? There is no hope of promotion for the guide, sergeant!"

"He is at the head of his corps already, your honor. In short, Mabel has made up her mind on this subject, and, as your honor has had the condescension to speak to me about Mr. Muir, I trust you will be kind enough to say that the girl is as good as billeted for life."

"Well, well, this is your own matter, and now Sergeant Dunham!"

“Your honor," said the other, rising, and giving the customary salute.

"You have been told it is my intention to send you down among the Thousand Islands, for the next month. All the old subalterns have had their tours of duty in that quarter-all that I like to trust, at least - and it has, at length, come to your turn. Lieutenant Muir, it is true, claims his right, but being quartermaster, I do not like to break up well-established arrangements. Are the

men drafted?"

"Everything is ready, your honor. The draft is made, and I understood that the canoe which got in last night brought a message, to say that the party already below is looking out for the relief."

"It did, and you must sail the day after to-morrow, if not to-morrow night. It will be wise, perhaps, to sail in the dark."

"So Jasper thinks, Major Duncan, and I know no one more to be depended on, in such an affair, than young Jasper Western."

"Young Jasper Eau-douce!" said Lundie, a slight smile gathering around his usually stern mouth. "Will that lad be of your party, sergeant?"

"Your honor will remember that the Scud never quits port without him."

"True, but all general rules have their exceptions. Have I not seen a seafaring person about the fort within the last few days?"

"No doubt, your honor; it is Master Cap, a brotherin-law of mine, who brought my daughter from below."

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