The Deerslayer

“’Twas inconsiderate to pull a trigger, afore we had reconn’itred the shore, and made sartain that no inimies harbored near it,” said the latter, as his companion slowly and reluctantly complied. “This much I have l’arned from the Delawares, in the way of schooling and traditions, even though I’ve never yet been on a war-path. And, moreover, venison can hardly be called in season now, and we do not want for food. They call me Deerslayer, I’ll own, and perhaps I desarve the name, in the way of understanding the creatur’s habits, as well as for some sartainty in the aim, but they can’t accuse me of killing an animal when there is no occasion for the meat, or the skin. I may be a slayer, it’s true, but I’m no slaughterer.”

“’Twas an awful mistake to miss that buck!” exclaimed Hurry, doffing his cap and running his fingers through his handsome but matted curls, as if he would loosen his tangled ideas by the process. “I’ve not done so onhandy a thing since I was fifteen.”

“Never lament it, as the creatur’s death could have done neither of us any good, and might have done us harm. Them echoes are more awful in my ears, than your mistake, Hurry, for they sound like the voice of natur’ calling out ag’in a wasteful and onthinking action.”

“You’ll hear plenty of such calls, if you tarry long in this quarter of the world, lad,” returned the other laughing. “The echoes repeat pretty much all that is said or done on the Glimmerglass, in this calm summer weather. If a paddle falls you hear of it sometimes, ag’in and ag’in, as if the hills were mocking your clumsiness, and a laugh, or a whistle, comes out of them pines, when they’re in the humour to speak, in a way to make you believe they can r’ally convarse.”

“So much the more reason for being prudent and silent. I do not think the inimy can have found their way into these hills yet, for I don’t know what they are to gain by it, but all the Delawares tell me that, as courage is a warrior’s first vartue, so is prudence his second. One such call from the mountains, is enough to let a whole tribe into the secret of our arrival.”

“If it does no other good, it will warn old Tom to put the pot over, and let him know visiters are at hand. Come, lad; get into the canoe, and we will hunt the ark up, while there is yet day.”

Deerslayer complied, and the canoe left the spot. Its head was turned diagonally across the lake, pointing towards the south-eastern curvature of the sheet. In that direction, the distance to the shore, or to the termination of the lake, on the course the two were now steering, was not quite a mile, and, their progress being always swift, it was fast lessening under the skilful, but easy sweeps of the paddles. When about half way across, a slight noise drew the eyes of the men towards the nearest land, and they saw that the buck was just emerging from the lake and wading towards the beach. In a minute, the noble animal shook the water from his flanks, gazed up ward at the covering of trees, and, bounding against the bank, plunged into the forest.

“That creatur’ goes off with gratitude in his heart,” said Deerslayer, “for natur’ tells him he has escaped a great danger. You ought to have some of the same feelin’s, Hurry, to think your eye wasn’t true, or that your hand was onsteady, when no good could come of a shot that was intended onmeaningly rather than in reason.”

“I deny the eye and the hand,” cried March with some heat. “You’ve got a little character, down among the Delawares, there, for quickness and sartainty, at a deer, but I should like to see you behind one of them pines, and a full painted Mingo behind another, each with a cock’d rifle and a striving for the chance! Them’s the situations, Nathaniel, to try the sight and the hand, for they begin with trying the narves. I never look upon killing a creatur’ as an explite; but killing a savage is. The time will come to try your hand, now we’ve got to blows ag’in, and we shall soon know what a ven’son reputation can do in the field. I deny that either hand or eye was onsteady; it was all a miscalculation of the buck, which stood still when he ought to have kept in motion, and so I shot ahead of him.”

“Have it your own way, Hurry; all I contend for is, that it’s lucky. I dare say I shall not pull upon a human mortal as steadily or with as light a heart, as I pull upon a deer.”

“Who’s talking of mortals, or of human beings at all, Deerslayer? I put the matter to you on the supposition of an Injin. I dare say any man would have his feelin’s when it got to be life or death, ag’in another human mortal; but there would be no such scruples in regard to an Injin; nothing but the chance of his hitting you, or the chance of your hitting him.”

“I look upon the redmen to be quite as human as we are ourselves, Hurry. They have their gifts, and their religion, it’s true; but that makes no difference in the end, when each will be judged according to his deeds, and not according to his skin.”

“That’s downright missionary, and will find little favor up in this part of the country, where the Moravians don’t congregate. Now, skin makes the man. This is reason; else how are people to judge of each other. The skin is put on, over all, in order when a creatur’, or a mortal, is fairly seen, you may know at once what to make of him. You know a bear from a hog, by his skin, and a gray squirrel from a black.”

“True, Hurry,” said the other looking back and smiling, “nevertheless, they are both squirrels.”

“Who denies it? But you’ll not say that a red man and a white man are both Injins?”

“But I do say they are both men. Men of different races and colors, and having different gifts and traditions, but, in the main, with the same natur’. Both have souls; and both will be held accountable for their deeds in this life.”

Hurry was one of those theorists who believed in the inferiority of all the human race who were not white. His notions on the subject were not very clear, nor were his definitions at all well settled; but his opinions were none the less dogmatical or fierce. His conscience accused him of sundry lawless acts against the Indians, and he had found it an exceedingly easy mode of quieting it, by putting the whole family of redmen, incontinently, without the category of human rights. Nothing angered him sooner than to deny his proposition, more especially if the denial were accompanied by a show of plausible argument; and he did not listen to his companion’s remarks with much composure of either manner or feeling.

“You’re a boy, Deerslayer, misled and misconsaited by Delaware arts, and missionary ignorance,” he exclaimed, with his usual indifference to the forms of speech, when excited. “You may account yourself as a red-skin’s brother, but I hold ’em all to be animals; with nothing human about ’em but cunning. That they have, I’ll allow; but so has a fox, or even a bear. I’m older than you, and have lived longer in the woods—or, for that matter, have lived always there, and am not to be told what an Injin is or what he is not. If you wish to be considered a savage, you’ve only to say so, and I’ll name you as such to Judith and the old man, and then we’ll see how you’ll like your welcome.”

Here Hurry’s imagination did his temper some service, since, by conjuring up the reception his semi-aquatic acquaintance would be likely to bestow on one thus introduced, he burst into a hearty fit of laughter. Deerslayer too well knew the uselessness of attempting to convince such a being of anything against his prejudices, to feel a desire to undertake the task; and he was not sorry that the approach of the canoe to the southeastern curve of the lake gave a new direction to his ideas. They were now, indeed, quite near the place that March had pointed out for the position of the outlet, and both began to look for it with a curiosity that was increased by the expectation of the ark.

It may strike the reader as a little singular, that the place where a stream of any size passed through banks that had an elevation of some twenty feet, should be a matter of doubt with men who could not now have been more than two hundred yards distant from the precise spot. It will be recollected, however, that the trees and bushes here, as elsewhere, fairly overhung the water, making such a fringe to the lake, as to conceal any little variations from its general outline.

“I’ve not been down at this end of the lake these two summers,” said Hurry, standing up in the canoe, the better to look about him. “Ay, there’s the rock, showing its chin above the water, and I know that the river begins in its neighborhood.”

The men now plied the paddles again, and they were presently within a few yards of the rock, floating towards it, though their efforts were suspended. This rock was not large, being merely some five or six feet high, only half of which elevation rose above the lake. The incessant washing of the water for centuries had so rounded its summit, that it resembled a large beehive in shape, its form being more than usually regular and even. Hurry remarked, as they floated slowly past, that this rock was well known to all the Indians in that part of the country, and that they were in the practice of using it as a mark to designate the place of meeting, when separated by their hunts and marches.

“And here is the river, Deerslayer,” he continued, “though so shut in by trees and bushes as to look more like an and-bush, than the outlet of such a sheet as the Glimmerglass.”

Hurry had not badly described the place, which did truly seem to be a stream lying in ambush. The high banks might have been a hundred feet asunder; but, on the western side, a small bit of low land extended so far forward as to diminish the breadth of the stream to half that width.

As the bushes hung in the water beneath, and pines that had the stature of church-steeples rose in tall columns above, all inclining towards the light, until their branches intermingled, the eye, at a little distance, could not easily detect any opening in the shore, to mark the egress of the water. In the forest above, no traces of this outlet were to be seen from the lake, the whole presenting the same connected and seemingly interminable carpet of leaves. As the canoe slowly advanced, sucked in by the current, it entered beneath an arch of trees, through which the light from the heavens struggled by casual openings, faintly relieving the gloom beneath.

“This is a nat’ral and-bush,” half whispered Hurry, as if he felt that the place was devoted to secrecy and watchfulness; “depend on it, old Tom has burrowed with the ark somewhere in this quarter. We will drop down with the current a short distance, and ferret him out.”

“This seems no place for a vessel of any size,” returned the other; “it appears to me that we shall have hardly room enough for the canoe.”

Hurry laughed at the suggestion, and, as it soon appeared, with reason; for the fringe of bushes immediately on the shore of the lake was no sooner passed, than the adventurers found themselves in a narrow stream, of a sufficient depth of limpid water, with a strong current, and a canopy of leaves upheld by arches composed of the limbs of hoary trees. Bushes lined the shores, as usual, but they left sufficient space between them to admit the passage of anything that did not exceed twenty feet in width, and to allow of a perspective ahead of eight or ten times that distance.

Neither of our two adventurers used his paddle, except to keep the light bark in the centre of the current, but both watched each turning of the stream, of which there were two or three within the first hundred yards, with jealous vigilance. Turn after turn, however, was passed, and the canoe had dropped down with the current some little distance, when Hurry caught a bush, and arrested its movement so suddenly and silently as to denote some unusual motive for the act. Deerslayer laid his hand on the stock of his rifle as soon as he noted this proceeding, but it was quite as much with a hunter’s habit as from any feeling of alarm.

“There the old fellow is!” whispered Hurry, pointing with a finger, and laughing heartily, though he carefully avoided making a noise, “ratting it away, just as I supposed; up to his knees in the mud and water, looking to the traps and the bait. But for the life of me I can see nothing of the ark; though I’ll bet every skin I take this season, Jude isn’t trusting her pretty little feet in the neighborhood of that black mud. The gal’s more likely to be braiding her hair by the side of some spring, where she can see her own good looks, and collect scornful feelings ag’in us men.”

“You over-judge young women—yes, you do, Hurry—who as often bethink them of their failings as they do of their perfections. I dare to say this Judith, now, is no such admirer of herself, and no such scorner of our sex as you seem to think; and that she is quite as likely to be sarving her father in the house, wherever that may be, as he is to be sarving her among the traps.”

“It’s a pleasure to hear truth from a man’s tongue, if it be only once in a girl’s life,” cried a pleasant, rich, and yet soft female voice, so near the canoe as to make both the listeners start. “As for you, Master Hurry, fair words are so apt to choke you, that I no longer expect to hear them from your mouth; the last you uttered sticking in your throat, and coming near to death. But I’m glad to see you keep better society than formerly, and that they who know how to esteem and treat women are not ashamed to journey in your company.”

As this was said, a singularly handsome and youthful female face was thrust through an opening in the leaves, within reach of Deerslayer’s paddle. Its owner smiled graciously on the young man; and the frown that she cast on Hurry, though simulated and pettish, had the effect to render her beauty more striking, by exhibiting the play of an expressive but capricious countenance; one that seemed to change from the soft to the severe, the mirthful to the reproving, with facility and indifference.

A second look explained the nature of the surprise. Unwittingly, the men had dropped alongside of the ark, which had been purposely concealed in bushes cut and arranged for the purpose; and Judith Hutter had merely pushed aside the leaves that lay before a window, in order to show her face, and speak to them.

CHAPTER 4

“And that timid fawn starts not with fear,

When I steal to her secret bower;

And that young May violet to me is dear,

And I visit the silent streamlet near,

To look on the lovely flower.”

Bryant, “An Indian Story,” ii.11–15

The ark, as the floating habitation of the Hutters was generally called, was a very simple contrivance. A large flat, or scow, composed the buoyant part of the vessel; and in its centre, occupying the whole of its breadth, and about two thirds of its length, stood a low fabric, resembling the castle in construction, though made of materials so light as barely to be bullet-proof. As the sides of the scow were a little higher than usual, and the interior of the cabin had no more elevation than was necessary for comfort, this unusual addition had neither a very clumsy nor a very obtrusive appearance. It was, in short, little more than a modern canal-boat, though more rudely constructed, of greater breadth than common, and bearing about it the signs of the wilderness, in its bark-covered posts and roof. The scow, however, had been put together with some skill, being comparatively light, for its strength, and sufficiently manageable. The cabin was divided into two apartments, one of which served for a parlor, and the sleeping-room of the father, and the other was appropriated to the uses of the daughters. A very simple arrangement sufficed for the kitchen, which was in one end of the scow, and removed from the cabin, standing in the open air; the ark being altogether a summer habitation.

The “and-bush,” as Hurry in his ignorance of English termed it, is quite as easily explained. In many parts of the lake and river, where the banks were steep and high, the smaller trees and larger bushes, as has been already mentioned, fairly overhung the stream, their branches not unfrequently dipping into the water. In some instances they grew out in nearly horizontal lines, for thirty or forty feet. The water being uniformly deepest near the shores, where the banks were highest and the nearest to a perpendicular, Hutter had found no difficulty in letting the ark drop under one of these covers, where it had been anchored with a view to conceal its position; security requiring some such precautions, in his view of the case. Once beneath the trees and bushes, a few stones fastened to the ends of the branches had caused them to bend sufficiently to dip into the river; and a few severed bushes, properly disposed, did the rest. The reader has seen that this cover was so complete as to deceive two men accustomed to the woods, and who were actually in search of those it concealed; a circumstance that will be easily understood by those who are familiar with the matted and wild luxuriance of a virgin American forest, more especially in a rich soil. The discovery of the ark produced very different effects on our two adventurers.

As soon as the canoe could be got round to the proper opening, Hurry leaped on board, and in a minute was closely engaged in a gay, and a sort of recriminating discourse with Judith, apparently forgetful of the existence of all the rest of the world. Not so with Deerslayer. He entered the ark with a slow, cautious step, examining every arrangement of the cover with curious and scrutinizing eyes. It is true, he cast one admiring glance at Judith, which was extorted by her brilliant and singular beauty; but even this could detain him but a single instant from the indulgence of his interest in Hutter’s contrivances. Step by step did he look into the construction of the singular abode, investigate its fastenings and strength, ascertain its means of defence, and make every inquiry that would be likely to occur to one whose thoughts dwelt principally on such expedients. Nor was the cover neglected. Of this he examined the whole minutely, his commendation escaping him more than once in audible comments. Frontier usages admitting of this familiarity, he passed through the rooms, as he had previously done at the “Castle”, and opening a door issued into the end of the scow opposite to that where he had left Hurry and Judith. Here he found the other sister, employed at some coarse needlework, seated beneath the leafy canopy of the cover.

As Deerslayer’s examination was by this time ended, he dropped the butt of his rifle, and, leaning on the barrel with both hands, he turned towards the girl with an interest the singular beauty of her sister had not awakened. He had gathered from Hurry’s remarks that Hetty was considered to have less intellect than ordinarily falls to the share of human beings, and his education among Indians had taught him to treat those who were thus afflicted by Providence with more than common tenderness. Nor was there any thing in Hetty Hutter’s appearance, as so often happens, to weaken the interest her situation excited. An idiot she could not properly be termed, her mind being just enough enfeebled to lose most of those traits that are connected with the more artful qualities, and to retain its ingenuousness and love of truth. It had often been remarked of this girl, by the few who had seen her, and who possessed sufficient knowledge to discriminate, that her perception of the right seemed almost intuitive, while her aversion to the wrong formed so distinctive a feature of her mind, as to surround her with an atmosphere of pure morality; peculiarities that are not infrequent with persons who are termed feeble-minded; as if God had forbidden the evil spirits to invade a precinct so defenceless, with the benign purpose of extending a direct protection to those who had been left without the usual aids of humanity. Her person, too, was agreeable, having a strong resemblance to that of her sister’s, of which it was a subdued and humble copy. If it had none of the brilliancy of Judith’s, the calm, quiet, almost holy expression of her meek countenance seldom failed to win on the observer, and few noted it long that did not begin to feel a deep and lasting interest in the girl. She had no color, in common, nor was her simple mind apt to present images that caused her cheek to brighten, though she retained a modesty so innate that it almost raised her to the unsuspecting purity of a being superior to human infirmities. Guileless, innocent, and without distrust, equally by nature and from her mode of life, providence had, nevertheless shielded her from harm, by a halo of moral light, as it is said “to temper the wind to the shorn lamb.”

“You are Hetty Hutter,” said Deerslayer, in the way one puts a question unconsciously to himself, assuming a kindness of tone and manner that were singularly adapted to win the confidence of her he addressed. “Hurry Harry has told me of you, and I know you must be the child?”

“Yes, I’m Hetty Hutter,” returned the girl in a low, sweet voice, which nature, aided by some education, had preserved from vulgarity of tone and utterance— “I’m Hetty; Judith Hutter’s sister; and Thomas Hutter’s youngest daughter.”

“I know your history, then, for Hurry Harry talks consider-able, and he is free of speech when he can find other people’s consarns to dwell on. You pass most of your life on the lake, Hetty.”

“Certainly. Mother is dead; father is gone a-trapping, and Judith and I stay at home. What’s your name?”

“That’s a question more easily asked than it is answered, young woman, seeing that I’m so young, and yet have borne more names than some of the greatest chiefs in all America.”

“But you’ve got a name—you don’t throw away one name, before you come honestly by another?”

“I hope not, gal—I hope not. My names have come nat’rally, and I suppose the one I bear now will be of no great lasting, since the Delawares seldom settle on a man’s ra’al title, until such time as he has an opportunity of showing his true natur’, in the council, or on the warpath; which has never behappened me; seeing firstly, because I’m not born a red-skin and have no right to sit in their councillings, and am much too humble to be called on for opinions from the great of my own color; and, secondly, because this is the first war that has befallen in my time, and no inimy has yet inroaded far enough into the colony, to be reached by an arm even longer than mine.”

“Tell me your names,” added Hetty, looking up at him artlessly, “and, maybe, I’ll tell you your character.”

“There is some truth in that, I’ll not deny, though it often fails. Men are deceived in other men’s characters, and frequently give ’em names they by no means desarve. You can see the truth of this in the Mingo names, which, in their own tongue, signify the same things as the Delaware names,—at least, so they tell me, for I know little of that tribe, unless it be by report,—and no one can say they are as honest or as upright a nation. I put no great dependence, therefore, on names.”

“Tell me all your names,” repeated the girl, earnestly, for her mind was too simple to separate things from professions, and she did attach importance to a name; “I want to know what to think of you.”

“Well, sartain; I’ve no objection, and you shall hear them all. In the first place, then, I’m Christian, and white-born, like yourself, and my parents had a name that came down from father to son, as is a part of their gifts. My father was called Bumppo; and I was named after him, of course, the given name being Nathaniel, or Natty, as most people saw fit to tarm it.”

“Yes, yes—Natty—and Hetty,” interrupted the girl quickly, and looking up from her work again, with a smile: “you are Natty, and I’m Hetty—though you are Bumppo, and I’m Hutter. Bumppo isn’t as pretty as Hutter, is it?”

“Why, that’s as people fancy. Bumppo has no lofty sound, I admit; and yet men have bumped through the world with it. I did not go by this name, howsoever, very long; for the Delawares soon found out, or thought they found out, that I was not given to lying, and they called me, firstly, ‘Straight-tongue.’”