Hall and the scout, with their captured warrior, proceeded down the
mountain, guided by the smoke from the Indian wigwams, Jarvis beguiling

[figure description] Page 231.[end figure description]

the way, as usual, with his rude humor, and every now and then making the
woods ring with his merriment, but a more inattentive auditor he could
not have selected from the entire encampment. Hall's whole mind and soul
was absorbed with the intensely interesting business on hand—with the
hope, the near prospect of soon beholding and releasing the youthful idol
of his heart. Before they had near descended into the valley, however, night
was approaching; still they pursued their way, invigorated by what Jarvis
drew from the captive warrior, viz: that they would find the pale-faced
squaw in the very encampment to which they were bound. Hall was no
longer oppressed with lethargy. He bounded over the rocks and precipices,
as if he would annihilate both time and space. After several hours
of such running and leaping, our adventurers found themselves at sun-set
in a beautiful valley, watered by one of those sparkling mountain streams,
which gathered its waters from the ravines of the mountain itself—here
receiving a tributary, tumbling in beautiful cascades over its rocky bed,
and there taking up some quiet little brook, which bubbled along its course
in more modest guise. On the banks of the main stream, about half a
mile distant, they could plainly perceive the fires of the savages' encampment.
And here they called a halt, while the scout should reconnoitre
the enemy's position. He was gone about half an hour, which seemed to
Hall an age, so impatient was he to hear tidings of Eugenia. The scout
came back quite chop-fallen, and proposed their instant retreat up the mountain.

The very first piece of information which he communicated, (and Hall
would listen to nothing else until he heard that,) determined the young officer
to proceed at all hazards to himself. It was, that the scout had seen
with his own eyes the object of their search. He stated, moreover, that
the stragglers who had escaped from the battle were pouring into the encampment,
and that the squaws and relations of the slain were already setting up
their hideous lamentations, which indeed they could hear from where they
stood.

Jarvis told him that it would be certain death, and perhaps torture, to present
themselves under such circumstances, and while they were smarting
under defeat and the loss of their kindred. Hall pointed with a confident air
to the white handkerchief, which he was busily fastening to its staff.

“They won't mind it, Squire, to the vally of this,” said the scout, tossing
out of his mouth a huge chew of tobacco.

“Well,” said Hall, “you may return, with or without the prisoner, scout,
but as for me I go forward with this flag of truce, if I were certain that they
would tear me to pieces the next moment with red hot pincers.”

Jarvis seemed irresolute what to do. He did not like to suffer the young
man to go forward by himself, and yet he knew, if he accompanied him, he
would thereby render himself powerless as to all assistance, in case of Hall's
being detained. Besides, he considered the young man, though his superior
officer, as really under his guidance. He scratched his head for full a quarter
of an hour, and thought maturely of all the perilous circumstances surrounding
them. In fact, he considered the responsibility of the adventure upon
his own shoulders. At length he seemed to have formed his plans, and taking
Hall a little distance from his bound captive, still keeping his beagle eye on
him, however, whispered to the young man that he (Hall) had better take
the warrior, and go on to the camp alone; that in case they should detain
him, then he (Jarvis) could make the signal agreed upon with the Governor,
and be at hand moreover to attempt his release, in case they should practice any
of their bloody experiments upon him, before a party could come to the rescue.

This plan, although putting Hall forward into the post of immediate danger,
was by no means desired by the scout, in order to avoid any such thing
himself, but because he knew that it was impracticable to leave his

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companion to wait patiently while he should venture into the camp. He knew that
Hall was not in a proper state of mind for such a thing, and was besides ignorant
of that stealthy and wary mode of watching, necessary to avoid the
Indians and accomplish any thing, in case of the worst. He adopted his plan,
therefore, with a single eye to Hall's ultimate safety, and without the slightest
consideration of self. When the time came for the trial, he walked along
with Hall, as if he intended to bear him company all the way, but soon left
him, carefully concealing his whereabouts from the wary and sly old warrior,
who kept his stealthy eye always upon their movements, as much as he could
without attracting attention.

After the scout had left the young man, the latter bethought him of a difficulty
which had not before occurred to him, and that was how he was to communicate
with the enemy. He was in a state of mind, however, not to be
deterred from his purpose by even greater difficulties than this, and he moved
steadily forward, keeping the captive immediately in front—the stream on one
side, and the foot of the mountain but a few yards distant, on the other—
until they arrived immediately opposite the encampment, and separated from
it only by the small creek, upon the surface of which were reflected the
Indian fires and wigwams. He could see the groups of savages as they sat,
and lounged, and stood around the various fires—and the frantic gestures of
those who had lost husbands and sons in the late battle. It was but a few
moments that he took to examine the various attitudes of those with whom
he would so soon have to deal, or who might so soon have to deal with him.
He was nothing daunted by all those sinister portents which had alarmed
the more experienced scout, but loosing his prisoner, pointed across the
stream, an intimation that he was at liberty. He did not require a second
telling, but bounded across the narrow stream like a deer, and soon stood in
the midst of his friends. His arrival was received with many demonstrations
of joy; but when he had exchanged a few words with them, and pointing
and gesticulating all the while in the direction where Hall stood, and
where they had left Jarvis, such a hideous yell as they sent up might well
have appalled a stouter heart than Hall's. The savages immediately seized
their weapons, and some score of them dashed down the stream, where the
scout had been last seen.

Hall saw that now was the time to approach, if at all, and he walked
deliberately across the stream, bearing his flag of truce aloft. Never was
joy, exultation and malignity more manifest than it was in the countenances of
the demoniacs who now crowded around the bearer of that flag, not excepting
even the women and children. Not that they were ignorant of the meaning
attached to a flag of truce. Hall was bewildered—his faculties already
weakened—he was lost in the whirl and excitement of the moment, and he
stood like a statue in the midst of his enemies. His face was pale, but his
eye bright. He made a faint effort to speak at first, but seeing that he was
not understood, and that his late captive was still haranguing his people—gesticulating
all the while, and pointing to him and the flag, and the spot where
he had left the scout, he remained a passive prisoner in their hands. That he
might consider himself a prisoner, he did not doubt for a moment.

When his late prisoner had got through with his harangue or narrative or
whatever it might be, one of the oldest warriors took the flag from his hand
and then calling to a hideous old parchment faced hag placed it in her hands
amidst the peculiar merriment of Indian women and children. He then
proceeded to disarm the young man, and to strip him of his garments. While
these preparations were going forward others of more fearful portent were
also under way. Armsfull of finely split pine wood were in a pile
and some of the squaws and children were already building them into the
peculiar shape required for the immolation of a victim. Luckily Hall was
not familiar with the horrid details of their barbarities and he was, therefore

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spared the dreadful anticipation. When they had stripped him to a state of
nudity, and during a calm and quiet moment, which had succeeded to the
late strong exhibitions of triumph—the wild and solemn scene was disturbed
by a scream which might have waked the dead. Scarcely had its echoes died
away among the solemn forest ere a youthful and beautiful creature, dressed
something after the Indian fashion came bounding like a deer through `the
bushes, dropping one of the rude earthen vessels of the Indians, as she ran,
and clasped the captive in her arms. There she clung like a vine which had
grown to a sturdy oak, but Hall could return no corresponding endearments,
for his hands were already tied behind him. Once or twice she turned her
head partially around and caught glimpses, first, of the grim warriors around,
and next of the fearful pile in the course of construction, and then she would
bury her head in his bosom as if she would seek protection there, exclaiming
in agonized sobs, “Oh Harry, your efforts to save me have destroyed you—
they are going to put you to the torture. Why, oh why, did you come alone?”

Hall, in a whisper, informed her that he had borne a flag of truce from the
Governor and that the scout could not be far off, as he had accompanied him
within sight of the camp. While they thus exchanged a few hurried explanations,
a sudden thought seemed to strike the distressed maiden, and she
ran off toward the spring, to which she had been when Hall first made his
appearance. In a few moments she returned, dragging along with feeble
steps our old acquaintance, Wingina. When she had brought her face to
face with the chiefs, she, with the energy and eloquence of despair, bid
Wingina inform her cruel kinsmen of the sacred nature of a flag of truce,
and what signal vengeance the Governor would take upon them if they violated
it. To all this the same old chief before pointed out, answered that
before the Governor was done his breakfast, they would be half way across
the valley, and hence their hasty preparations for the torture. Eugenia
clasped her hands and wrung them in frantic despair, alternately praying, and
wailing in the most distracted and heart-rending appeals. But it all fell
powerless upon the strong hearts of the grim savages who surrounded her.

While they were in the very act of dragging poor Hall to the spot appointed
for his last agonies, a bright light burst upon the scene, followed by another,
and another, encircling the camp at the distance of a quarter of a mile, with
a complete helt; and so rapidly were they kindled that the Indians supposed
themselves surrounded, and stood upon their arms. Poor Eugenia fell upon
her knees and alternately calling upon her earthly friends for help and
returning thanks to her God for the prospect of deliverance. The horrors of
Germana were still rising up vividly before her mental vision with renewed
terrors.

The Indians knew not what to do. They were afraid to move in any
direction, for their enemies seemed to be all around them. Yet the death-like
stillness of the forest was uninterrupted, except by the wailing of the
white maiden, and she was soon effectually silenced by the threatened attitude
of a warrior with uplifted tomahawk. There stood the savages, each warrior
behind a tree—stealthily peeping out every now and then, in the direction of
the fires, and the women and children flat upon the ground, behind logs, if
they could find them, but all as far as possible from their own fires, so that
they did not approach too near the light of those that surrounded them. After
remaining in this position for some twenty minutes, the savages began to
wonder why their enemies did not close in upon them as they at first apprehended
they would. Then one warrior was seen to steal to the hiding place of
another, until they were soon broken into little groups again, still keeping
within the shadows of the trees, and without the light of the fires. Hall, Eugenia
and Wingina, were in bright relief, surrounded with all these dark and
stealthy figures, and for somes minutes the two latter had been consulting
together, the result of which was made manifest in an attempt of Wingina to

[figure description] Page 234.[end figure description]

put out the fire, and Eugenia to loose her lover. The latter movement, was,
alas, discovered instantly, by their enemies, and one of them occupying a tree
nearest to them came out from his hiding place, threw the blazing faggots
again into a heap, and approached with uplifted tomahawk to make short work
with the punishment of Hall and effectually prevent his escape. The glittering
blade was suspended almost over his head, when a deadly messenger
arrested the murderous arm. It was shot from the mountain side. In that
direction there were no fires. Every Indian again darted to his hiding place
and the squaws and papooses who had risen to their knees to see the
savage sport fell prostrate again, and all was as quiet as the grave. Nothing
was heard, but the solemn moaning of the majestic forest, swayed by the
night breeze, as they bent their towering heads to the majesty of the
winds. 'Twas just before dawn—the moon having gone down and a night
to make a savage, even, superstitious, and the mysterious circumstances
surrounding them, added not a little to their terror; for whatever may have
been said or sung to the contrary the aborigines of this country are superstitious
to the last degree. After waiting another half hour, again the attempt
was made to approach the group near the middle of the original encampment
and with the same unerring result, only that the shot came from a different
direction. Hall, Engenia and Wingina, now began to wonder, themselves,
why their friends did not close in upon their enemies, when the former
seemed to have the latter so completely in their power. The same solemn
and mysterious calm again reigned throughout the forest, and this time it
lasted until the suspense to our three sufferers became almost unsupportable.
The savages maintained their position, and the squaws even put their
papooses to sleep as they lay, but they were destined to a fearful wakening.
The measured tramp of troops, apparently at some little distance, was now
distinctly heard, and this again mystified the savages, as well as their captives.
Were they approaching or departing? It was not long left doubtful.
Nearer and nearer approached the glad and welcome harbingers to the prisoners.
The former only waited to ascertain from which direction the sounds
proceeded, when they simultaneously burst from their hiding places, dodging
from tree to tree, as they ran. More than one attempted to wreak his vengeance
upon the captive, before they departed, but the same unerring aim
seemed to be pointed always ready to pick them off. When the whole body
of savages had approached near to the fires in the opposite direction from
that whence the tramp of troops had been heard, they were unexpectedly saluted
with a volley or carbines. Such as escaped the deadly weapons ran back in
the opposite direction, and there met the same welcome. Many of them
escaped, nevertheless, and for many hours, even after daylight the woods rang
with the report of fire arms, that sort of stealthy warfare pecullar to the
American savage, having been kept up.

No sooner was the original encampment cleared, however, than Jarvis
stood beside the bound captive, and with one stroke of his knife severed the
thongs which pinioned him in his painful position. In the very act of freeing
his late companion and fellow-adventurer, the same low guttural chuckle was
heard. “You may think it strange,” said he, “that I larf at such a thing as
this, but by the long chase I cant help it, just to think that I, one, by myself
one, surrounded a whole camp of the yaller niggers. Let no body tell me
arter to night, that they ain't cowards, and fools to boot.”

“You dont mean to say,” enquired Hall, in surprise, “that you were alone?”

“I am dad shamed if I dont mean to say jist that same thing. For two
long hours I sot yonder on the hill and popped off the rascals as they started
up at you. I kindled the fires you know, 'case that was the signal agreed upon
with the Governor, and as we were to mark the route they took by the fires,
I thought like as not if I kindled one all round, even the old codger would
know what it meant, and sure enough he did too, know more than I thought

[figure description] Page 235.[end figure description]

for, 'case he must a started the boys long before he seed these fires from the
top of the mountain. Lord, Mr. Hall, with a leetle, jist a leetle more practice,
he'd be the very devil among these Ingins. He suspicioned 'em, he
did. He warnt a going to trust you and that dilicate young thing there with
nothing but a flag o' truce over your heads. He knowed a devilish sight
better nor that. A flag o' truce to an Ingin!! Why, Mr. Hall, you mout
as well whistle jigs to a mile stone, or sing psalms to a dead horse. But
mercy on us, do jist see how that little sweet-heart of you'rn is a takin on
when the danger's all over—she'll cry her eyes out. What! larfin and cryin
at the same time? Well, I'm smoked up a holler tree if that aint woman all
over. I have seed a man—even a man, cry in my time, but I never seed a
man cry and larf too at the same time. It looks exactly like rain when the
sun's a shinin'. Come go to her Squire, I guess she's about the prettiest
squaw you ever seed with moccasins and leggins on, while I have a word or
too with this tother one, and she's a real squaw sure enough. No larfin and
cryin' there Squire.” Saying which, the scout snubbed Wingina with his
thumb, by way of a friendly salutation.

We will leave him to advance his suit as best he might, and Hall to resume
his clothes, while we inform our readers of Eugenia Elliot's costume and
how she looked in it.

She was dressed partly in the Indian and partly in the European style.
She wore the leggins and moccasins of the former, while the remainder of
her dress was made up of such articles as she had preserved from Indian
cupidity. About her person was an old riding dress—the skirts cut short,
while her hair floated in natural ringlets, about her neck. Every ornament,
with which she was wont to confine it, had been either purloined or given by
her as peace offerings to her captors. As long as none but savage eyes rested
upon her, she felt neither shame nor embarrassment, but no sooner did she
find herself alone with her lover, even in that strange wild scene, than all her
conventional feelings returned.

It may be conceived how interesting was the conversation between the
lovers—how much they had to tell—yet she every now and then cast her eyes
over her strange appearance, and then covered her face with her hands.

On the horrors of the massacre at Germana, and her father's cruel murder,
and her own subsequent sufferings, Hall would not suffer her to dwell. He
barely listened to a short and abbreviated narrative, because he saw that it
was necessary for her to disburden her distracted thoughts. Then he led
her gently to more hopeful themes—to the bright prospect which was still
left to them. He told her of Lee's free pardon, the news of which he had
the happiness to be the first to bring over. After two hours of conversation
upon such interesting matters, he succeeded in restoring her to something
like hope and composure. Her fitful moods of crying and laughing—which
had excited Jarvis's special wonder—were now supplanted by a gentle and
winning melancholy. She walked about the encampment, her hand clasped
in her lover's, with the fondness of a child. She seemed to dread the separation
of a moment, and was even yet startled at the continued but distant report
of fire-arms.

At the suggestion of Hall, she took Wingina as a guide, and went about
among the tents to collect such pieces of her wardrobe as the squaws had
left in the hurry of their flight, and of which they had previously robbed her.
They found Jarvis seated on the ground beside the Indian girl, apparently not
having made much progress in his suit, for they were conversing in a sharp
and rather angry mood. The fact was, Wingina had been rather effectually
spoiled for Jarvis's purpose—in other words, her notions were too high for the
poor scout, and he could not exactly comprehend it. The home-thrusts which
he gave her towards the conclusion of their conversation, about her loss of
easte, and all that, it would not be exactly proper for us to repeat in his

[figure description] Page 236.[end figure description]

homely and rude phraseology. Suffice it to say, that when they were separated
by the approach of Hall and Eugenia, they were thoroughly angered
with each other.

Eugenia was compelled to forego the protection of her lover's hand for a
time, while she and Wingina rummaged the tents, and while Hall turned his
attention once more to his military duties.

He soon found, however, that one superior in command to himself had headed
the party to whose timely interference he owed his life, and the rescue of his
mistress. Bernard Moore met them as they were making the rounds of the
camp, and the three proceeded on together, to call in the scattered troops. Jarvis's
tongue was in no measure silenced by the presence of the commander of the
scouting party. He had been too much exasperated and disappointed for that.
While Moore and Hall conversed together upon other matters, the scout would
break out into a soliloquy, after the following fashion:

“The pampered heifer, to turn up her yaller nose at an honest man's son
like me. I reckon there's as good fish in the sea as ever was cotched. And
she to tell me—the likes of her—to tell me, that she was the daughter of a
King! I reckon she wants for to come for to go to marry Mr. Lee, or Mr.
Moore, or Mr. Hall, at the very least.”

“What's that, scout?” said both, as they turned round, upon hearing their
names mentioned.

“Oh, it's nothin' worth talking about gents—I was only arguin' the matter
betwixt that sassy little yaller baggage and me. She curls up her royal
nose so high at me, that you would a thought I had just come in from a skunk
huntin'. I reckon an honest white man's as good as an Ingin—whew—fal,
lal de liddle”—and here he cut a few fandangoes to his own music, and
snapped his fingers; after which, he continued:—“I reckon I am as well
out of the scrape as she is—if it war'nt for Bill, and Ikey, and them fellers
to Williamsburg, a larfin at me, I would'nt care a chew tabacco. What a
fool I was to go and balb the thing beforehand.”

The troops were by this time dropping in from pursuit of the enemy, and
such as had been wounded or killed in the skirmish were borne into camp,
upon rude litters. Moore's attention was now required to his military duties,
and Hall, being relieved, he returned once more to the presence of her
whom he had followed to the wilderness. She clung to him like a frightened
bird, and all night long they sat by the camp-fire and conversed of the past,
and sometimes, too, of the brighter future. Truth to say, however, her young
life had suffered a blight in its first morning bloom, which was not to be dispelled
in an hour, even by one who was now all in all to her. There was a
shade of melancholy cast over her most cheerful glimpses of the future, and
there was that constant looking forward to, and dread of, some new horror,
about to be enacted, so common to those who have suffered appalling disasters.