go to. Now, boys, we'll hide
our canoe here among the bushes, 'cause we're likely to need it again.
We may come back mighty fast, an' it might be the very thing that we
wanted most at that partickler time."

He laughed, and the others laughed, too. The canoe was well hidden among
the bushes, and then the five borderers disappeared in the forest.

CHAPTER XXII

THE SPEECH OF TIMMENDIQUAS

A score of Indian chiefs sat in the center of a little, almost circular,
prairie, about a half mile across. All these chiefs were men of
distinction in their wild forest way, tall, lean, deep-chested, and with
black eyes full of courage and pride. They wore deerskin dress,
supplemented with blankets of bright blue or red, but deerskin and
blankets alike were of finer quality than those worn by the warriors,
many hundreds in number, who surrounded the chiefs, but at a respectful
distance.

However commanding the chiefs were in presence, all yielded in this
particular to one, a young man of great height, magnificent figure, and
a singularly bold and open countenance. He was painted much less than
the others, and the natural nobility of his features showed.
Unconsciously the rest had gathered about him until he was the center of
the group, and the eyes of every man, Red Eagle, Yellow Panther, Captain
Pipe, and all, were upon him. It was the spontaneous tribute to valor
and worth.

Near the group of chiefs, but just a little apart, sat four white men
and one white boy, although the boy was as large as the men. They, too,
looked over the heads of the others at the young chief in the center,
and around both, grouped in a mighty curve, more than fifteen hundred
warriors waited, with eyes fixed on the same target to see what the
young chief might do or to hear what he might say.

There was an extraordinary quality in this scene, something that the
wilderness alone can witness. It was shown in the fierce, eager glance
of every brown face, the rapt attention, and the utter silence, save for
the multiplied breathing of so many. A crow, wheeling on black wings in
the blue overhead, uttered a loud croak, astonished perhaps at the
spectacle below, but no one paid any attention to him, and, uttering
another croak, he flew away. A rash bear at the edge of the wood was
almost overpowered by the human odor that reached his nostrils, but,
recovering his senses, he lurched away in the other direction.

It was Yellow Panther, the veteran