the white hunter presently, still lay far ahead and above, near the summit of Unaka; but there was a spot near at hand where they might rest and spend the night in comfort, then push on towards their goal before dawn.
King George's Commissioner, flat on his back in the shade, gave a great sigh of relief when this news was imparted to him. He was too weary to move, and his heart was pounding like a hammer. They would remain where they were, he proposed, until the sun sank lower, then seek their sleeping place. The view from the spot where he lay entranced him; and the crimson and gold of a mountain sunset, painting the billowy clouds and bathing all the wooded peaks and valleys in magic light, held him there until dusk had fallen. Hence it was black night when the Raven, turning aside from the trail, led the way through the deep woods around a shoulder of the mountain to the place where they would find shelter.
A narrow ledge traversed the face of a great rockmass at the head of a small ravine. Presently the ledge widened, forming a broad, level shelf; and behind this shelf a long, horizontal cleft, ten feet high at the entrance, struck deep into the rock. Kindling a fire, they roasted two ruffed grouse which the Raven had brought down with light cane arrows on the way up the mountain. Then the King's
