Mohegan dropped his head in his blanket, and sat in silence. Miss Temple knew not what to say. She wished to draw the thoughts of the old warrior from his gloomy recollections, but there was a dignity in his sorrow, and in his fortitude, that repressed her efforts to speak again, for some time. After a long pause, however, she renewed the discourse, by asking

"Where is the Leather-stocking, John? this canister of powder I have brought at his request; but he is nowhere to be seen. Will you take charge of it, and see it delivered?"

The Indian raised his head slowly, and looked earnestly at the gift of the heiress, which she put in his hand.

"This is the great enemy of my nation. Without this, when could the white men drive the Delawares! Daughter, the Great Spirit gave your fathers to know how to make guns and powder, that they might sweep the Indians from the land. There will soon be no red-skin in the country. When John has gone, the last will leave these hills, and all his family will be dead." The aged warrior stretched his body forward, leaning his elbow on his knee, and appeared to be taking a parting look at the objects of the vale, which were still visible through the misty atmosphere; though the air seemed to thicken at each moment around Miss Temple, who became conscious of an increased difficulty of respiration. The eye of Mohegan changed gradually from its sorrowful expression to a look of wildness, that might be supposed to border on the inspiration of a prophet, as he continued "But he will go to the country where his fathers have met. The game shall be plenty as the fish in the lakes. No woman shall cry for meat. No Mingo can ever come. The chase shall

be for children, and all just red-men shall live together as brothers."

"John! this is not the heaven of a Christian!" cried Miss Temple; " you deal now in the superstition of your forefathers."

"Fathers! sons!" said Mohegan with firmness "all gone-all gone!-I have no son but the Young Eagle, and he has the blood of a white man." "Tell me, John," said Elizabeth, willing to draw his thoughts to other subjects, and at the same time yielding to her own secret interest in the youth; "who is this Mr. Edwards? why are you so fond of him, and whence does he come ?"

The Indian started at the question, which evidently recalled his recollection to the earth, and, taking her hand, he drew Miss Temple to a seat beside him, and pointed to the country beneath them, before he answered

"See, daughter," he said, directing her looks towards the north; " as far as your young eyes can see, was the land of his”

But immense volumes of smoke at that moment rolled over their heads, and, whirling in the eddies formed by the mountains, interposed a barrier to their sight, while he was speaking. Startled by this circumstance, Miss Temple sprung on her feet, and turning her eyes toward the summit of the mountain, she beheld it covered by a similar canopy, while a roaring sound was heard in the forest above her, like the rushing of furious winds.

we

"What means it, John!" she exclaimed; are enveloped in smoke, and I feel a heat like the glow of a furnace."

Before the Indian could reply, a voice was heard, crying in the woods, with a painful anxiety

"John! where are you, old Mohegan! the

woods are on fire, and you have but a few minutes for escape."

The chief put his hand before his mouth, and making it play on his lips, produced the kind of noise that had attracted Elizabeth to the place, when a quick and hurried step was heard dashing through the dried underbrush and bushes, and presently Edwards rushed to his side, with horror painted in every feature.

CHAPTER XVIII.

"Love rules the court, the

camp, the grove."
Lay of the Last Minstrel.

"It would have been sad indeed, to lose you in such a manner, my old friend," said Oliver, catching his breath for utterance. Up and away! even now we may be too late; the flames are circling round the point of the rock below, and, unless we can pass there, our only chance must be over the precipice. Away! away! shake off your apathy, John, for now is the time of need."

Mohegan pointed towards Elizabeth, who, forgetting her danger, had shrunk back to a projection of the rock, so soon as she recognised the sounds of Edward's voice, and said with something like awakened animation

"Her! whom mean you?" cried the youth, turning quickly to the place the other indicated; -but when he saw the figure of Elizabeth, bending toward him in an attitude that powerfully spoke her terror, blended with her reluctance to meet him in such a place, the shock for a moment deprived him of speech.

"Miss Temple !" he cried, when he found words; "you here! is such a death reserved for you!"

"No, no, no-no death, I hope, for any of us, Mr. Edwards," she replied, endeavouring to speak calmly, and rallying her thoughts for the emergen

cy.

"There is smoke, but still no fire to harm us. Let us endeavour to retire."

"Take my arm," said Edwards; "there must be an opening in some direction for your retreat. Are you equal to the effort ?"

Certainly. You surely magnify the danger, Mr. Edwards. Lead me out the way you came."

“I will—I will," cried the youth, with a kind of hysterical utterance. "No, no-there is no danger-I have alarmed you unnecessarily."

"But shall we leave the Indian-can we leave him here, as he says, to die?"

An expression of painful emotion crossed the face of the young man, who stopped, and cast a longing look at Mohegan; but, dragging his companion after him, even against her will, he pursued his way, with enormous strides, toward the pass by which he had just entered the circle of flame.

"Do not regard him," he said, in those horrid tones that denote a desperate calmness; "he is used to the woods, and such scenes; he will escape up the mountain-over the rock-or he can remain where he is in safety."

"You thought not so this moment, Edwards!— Do not leave him there to meet with such a death," cried Elizabeth, fixing a look on the countenance of her conductor, that seemed to distrust his sanity.

"An Indian burn! who ever heard of an Indian dying by fire? an Indian cannot burn; the idea is ridiculous. Hasten, hasten, Miss Temple, or the smoke may incommode you."

"Edwards! your look, your eye, terrifies me!