her heart rushing again tumultuously to her very temples. "Surely not an hour, Pathfinder?" "Hour!" exclaimed Jasper at the same instant, "no, no, my worthy friend, it is not ten minutes since you left us!" "Well, it may be so; though to me it has seemed to be a day. I begin to think, however, that the happy count time by minutes, and the miserable count it by months. But we will talk no more of this; it is all over now, and many words about it will make you no happier, while they will only tell me what I've lost; and quite likely how much I desarved to lose her. No, no, Mabel, 't is useless to interrupt me; I admit it all, and your gainsaying it, though it be so well meant, cannot change my mind. Well, Jasper, she is yours; and though it's hard to think it, I do believe you'll make her happier than I could, for your gifts are better suited to do so, though I would have strived hard to do as much if I knew myself, I would. I ought to have known better than to believe the sergeant; and I ought to have put faith in what Mabel told me at the head of the lake, for reason and judgment might have shown me its truth; but it is so pleasant to think what we wish, and mankind so easily overpersuade us when we overpersuade ourselves. But what's the use in talking of it, as I said afore? It's true, Mabel seemed to be consenting, though it all came from a wish to please her father, and from being skeary about the savages "Pathfinder!" "I understand you, Mabel, and have no hard feelings, I have n't. I sometimes think I should like to live in your neighborhood that I might look at your happiness; but on the whole it is better I should quit the 55th altogether, and go back to the 60th, which is my natyve rigiment, as it might be. It would have been better, perhaps, had I never left it, though my sarvices were much wanted in this quarter, and I'd been with some of the 55th years agone - Sergeant Dunham, for instance, when he was in another corps. Still, Jasper, I do not regret that I've known you "And me, Pathfinder!" impetuously interrupted Ma bel, "do you regret having known me? - could I think so, I should never be at peace with myself! وو "You, Mabel!" returned the guide, taking the hand of our heroine, and looking up into her countenance with guileless simplicity but earnest affection "how could I be sorry that a ray of the sun came across the gloom of a cheerless day that light has broken in upon darkness, though it remained so short a time? I do not flatter myself with being able to march quite as light-hearted as I once used to could, or to sleep as sound for some time to come; but I shall always remember how near I was to being undesarvedly happy, I shall. So far from blaming you, Mabel, I only blame myself for being so vain as to think it possible I could please such a creatur', — for, sartainly you told me how it was when we talked it over on the mountain, and I ought to have believed you then; for I do suppose it's nat'ral that young women should know their own minds better than their fathers. Ah's me! It's settled now, and nothing remains but for me to take leave of you that you may depart; I feel that Master Cap must be impatient, and there is danger of his coming on shore to look for us all." "To take leave!" exclaimed Mabel. "Leave!" echoed Jasper; "you do not mean to quit us, my friend?" "Tis best, Mabel't is altogether best, Eau-douce; and it's wisest. I could live and die in your company if I only followed feeling; but if I follow reason, I shall quit you here. You will go back to Oswego, and become man and wife as soon as you arrive; for all that is determined with Master Cap, who hankers after the sea again, and who knows what is to happen; while I shall return to the wilderness and my Maker. Come, Mabel," continued Pathfinder, rising and drawing nearer to our heroine with grave decorum, "kiss me. Jasper will not grudge me one kiss; then we 'll part." "Oh, Pathfinder!" exclaimed Mabel, falling into the arms of the guide, and kissing his cheeks again and again, with a freedom and warmth she had been far from manifesting while held to the bosom of Jasper, "God bless you, dearest Pathfinder! You will come to us hereafter. We shall see you again. When old, you will come to our dwelling and let me be a daughter to you?" "Yesthat's it," returned the guide, almost gasping for breath; "I'll try to think of it in that way. You're more befitting to be my daughter than to be my wife, you are. Farewell, Jasper. Now we'll go to the canoe; it's time you were on board.” The manner in which Pathfinder led the way to the shore was solemn and calm. As soon as he reached the canoe, he again took Mabel by the hands, held her at the length of his own arms, and gazed wistfully into her face, until the unbidden tears rolled out of the fountains of feeling, and trickled down his rugged cheeks in streams. "Bless me, Pathfinder," said Mabel, kneeling reverently at his feet. "Oh, at least bless me before we part." That untutored but noble-minded being did as she desired, — and, aiding her to enter the canoe, seemed to tear himself away as one snaps a strong and obstinate cord. Before he retired, however, he took Jasper by the arm, and led him a little aside, when he spoke as follows: 66 "You're kind of heart, and gentle by natur', Jasper; but we are both rough and wild, in comparison with that dear creatur'. Be careful of her, and never show tho roughness of man's natur' to her soft disposition. You'll get to understand her in time; and the Lord, who governs the lake and the forest alike. who looks upon virtue with a smile, and upon vice with a frown — keep you happy, and worthy to be so!" Pathfinder made a sign for his friend to depart; and he stood leaning on his rifle until the canoe had reached the side of the Scud. Mabel wept as if her heart would break; nor did her eyes once turn from the open spot in the glade, where the form of the Pathfinder was to be seen, until the cutter had passed a point that completely shut out the island. When last in view, the sinewy frame of this extraordinary man was as motionless as if it were a statue set up in that solitary place, to commemorate the scenes of which it had so lately been the witness. CHAPTER XXX. Oh, let me only breathe the air, The blessed air that 's breathed by thee: MOORE: Lalla Rookh. PATHFINDER was accustomed to solitude; but, when the Scud had actually disappeared, he was almost overcome with a sense of his loneliness. Never before had he been conscious of his isolated condition in the world; for his feelings had gradually been accustoming themselves to the blandishments and wants of social life particularly as the last were connected with the domestic affections. Now, all had vanished, as it might be, in one moment; and he was left equally without companions, and without hope. Even Chingachgook had left him, though it was but temporarily; still his presence was missed at the precise instant which might be termed the most critical in our hero's life. Pathfinder stood leaning on his rifle, in the attitude described in the last chapter, a long time after the Scud had disappeared. The rigidity of his limbs seemed permanent; and none but a man accustomed to put hig muscles to the severest proof could have maintained that posture, with its marble-like inflexibility, for so great a length of time. At length he moved away from the spot, the motion of the body being preceded by a sigh that seemed to heave up from the very depths of his bosom. It was a peculiarity of this extraordinary being, that his senses and his limbs, for all practical purposes, were never at fault, let the mind be preoccupied with other interests as much as it might. On the present occasion neither of these great auxiliaries failed him; but, though his thoughts were exclusively occupied with Mabel, her beauty, her preference of Jasper, her tears, and her departure, he moved in a direct line to the spot where June still remained, which was the grave of her husband. The conversation that followed passed in the language of the Tuscaroras, which Pathfinder spoke fluently; but, as that tongue is understood only by the extremely learned, we shall translate it freely into the English; preserving, as far as possible, the tone of thought of each interlocutor, as well as the peculiarities of manner. June had suffered her hair to fall about her face, had taken a seat on a stone that had been dug from the excavation made by the grave, and was hanging over thẻ spot that contained the body of Arrowhead, unconscious of the presence of any other. She believed, indeed, that all had left the island but herself, and the tread of the guide's moccasined foot was too noiseless rudely to ur. deceive her. Pathfinder stood gazing at the woman for several minutes in mute attention. The contemplation of her grief, the recollection of her irreparable loss, and the view of her desolation, produced a healthful influence on his own feelings; his reason telling him how much deeper lay the sources of grief in a young wife, who was suddenly and violently deprived of her husband, than in himself. "Dew-of-June," he said, solemnly, but with an ear nestness that denoted the strength of his sympathy, "you are not alone in your sorrow. Turn, and let your eyes look upon a friend." The "June has no longer any friend!" the woman answered; "Arrowhead has gone to the happy huntinggrounds, and there is no one left to care for June. Tuscaroras would chase her from their wigwams; the Iroquois are hateful in her eyes, and she could not look at them. No!-leave June to starve over the grave of her husband." |