praise be to God, that I see you all safe and well."
"No, no," returned the hunter; "safe we be, but as for well, John can't be called in a good way, unless you'll say that for a man that's taking his last look at the 'arth."
"He speaks the truth!" said the divine, with the holy awe with which he ever approached the dying;—"I have been by too many death-beds, not to see that the hand of the tyrant is laid on this old warrior. Oh! how consoling it is, to know that he has not rejected the offered mercy, in the hour of his strength and of worldly temptations! The offspring of a race of heathens, he has in truth been 'as a brand plucked from the burning.'"
"No, no," returned Natty, who alone stood with him by the side of the dying warrior, "it's no burning that ails him, though his Indian feelings made him scorn to move, unless it be the burning of man's wicked thoughts for near fourscore years; but it's nater giving out in a chase that's run too long. Down with ye, Hector! down, I say!—Flesh isn't iron, that a man can live for ever, and see his kith and kin driven to a far country, and he left to mourn, with none to keep him company."
"John," said the divine, tenderly, "do you hear me? do you wish the prayers appointed by the church, at this trying moment?"
The Indian turned his ghastly face to the speaker, and fastened his dark eyes on him, steadily, but vacantly. No sign of recognition was made; and in a moment he moved his head again slowly towards the vale, and begun to sing, using his own language, in those low, guttural tones, that have been so often mentioned, his notes rising with his theme, till they swelled to fulness, if not to harmony;—
