and your friend there, will accompany us.—Bless me! to think that he has arrived at manhood, in this country, without entering a dissenting meeting-house!"
"No, no," interrupted the Leather-stocking, "I must away to the wigwam: there's work there, that mus'nt be forgotten, for all your churchings and merry-makings. Let the lad go with you in welcome; he is used to keeping company with ministers, and talking of such matters; so is old John, who was christianized by the Moravians, about the time of the old war. But I am a plain, unlarned man, that has sarved the king and his country, in his day, ag'in the French and savages, but never so much as looked into a book, or larnt a letter of scholarship, in my born days, I've never seen the use of sitch in-door kind of work, though I have lived to be partly bald, and in my time, have killed two hundred beaver in a season, and that without counting the other game.—If you mistrust what I am telling you, you can ask Chingachgook there, for I did it in the heart of the Delaware country, and the old man is knowing to the truth of every word I say."
"I doubt not, my friend, that you have been both a valiant soldier and skilful hunter, in your day," said the divine; "but more is wanting, to prepare you for that end which approaches. You may have heard the maxim, that; young men may die, but that old men must."
"I'm sure I never was so great a fool as to expect to live for ever," said Natty, giving one of his silent laughs: "no man need do that, who trails the savages through the woods, as I have done, and lives, for the hot months, on the lake-streams. I've a strong constitution, I must say that for myself, as is plain to be seen, for I've drank the Onondaga water a hundred times,
