a tree with a three foot butt. I can lay this tree-top right across you, in ten minutes, by any man's watch, and in less time, too; so be civil—I want no more than what's right."
There was a simple seriousness in the countenance of Natty, that showed he was much in earnest; but it was, also, evident that he was reluctant to shed human blood. He answered the vaunt of the wood-chopper, by saying—
"I know you drop a tree where you will, Billy Kirby; but if you show a hand, or an arm, in doing it, there'll be bones to be set, and blood to stanch, I tell you. If it's only to get into the cave that ye want, wait till a two hour's sun, and you may enter it in welcome; but come in now you shall not. There's one dead body, already, lying on the cold rocks, and there's another in which the life can hardly be said to stay. If you will come in, there'll be dead without as well as within."
The wood-chopper stept out fearlessly from his cover, and cried—
"That's fair; and what's fair, is right. He wants you to stop till it's two hours to sun-down; and I see reason in the thing. A man can give up when he's wrong, if you don't crowd him too hard; but you crowd a man, and he gets to be like a stubborn ox—the more you beat, the worse he kicks."
The sturdy notions of independence maintained by Billy, neither suited the emergency, nor the impatience of Mr. Jones, who was burning with a desire to examine the hidden mysteries of the cave. He, therefore, interrupted this amicable dialogue with his own voice.
"I command you, Nathaniel Bumppo, by my authority, to surrender your person to the law," he cried. "And I command you, gentlemen, to
