for her being of the most rational. But no matter;
Deerslayer has not misconceived me, when he told you I should be found
at my post. I'll not quit you, Uncle Tom, just now, whatever may be my
feelin's and intentions respecting your eldest darter."

Hurry had a respectable reputation for prowess among his associates,
and Hutter heard this pledge with a satisfaction that was not concealed.
Even the great personal strength of such an aid became of moment, in
moving the ark, as well as in the species of hand-to-hand conflicts,
that were not unfrequent in the woods; and no commander who was hard
pressed could feel more joy at hearing of the arrival of reinforcements,
than the borderer experienced at being told this important auxiliary
was not about to quit him. A minute before, Hutter would have been well
content to compromise his danger, by entering into a compact to act only
on the defensive; but no sooner did he feel some security on this
point, than the restlessness of man induced him to think of the means of
carrying the war into the enemy's country.

"High prices are offered for scalps on both sides." he observed, with a
grim smile, as if he felt the force of the inducement, at the very time
he wished to affect a superiority to earning money by means that the
ordinary feelings of those who aspire to be civilized men repudiated,
even while they were adopted. "It isn't right, perhaps, to take gold for
human blood; and yet, when mankind is busy in killing one another, there
can be no great harm in adding a little bit of skin to the plunder.
What's your sentiments, Hurry, touching these p'ints?"

"That you've made a vast mistake, old man, in calling savage blood human
blood, at all. I think no more of a red-skin's scalp than I do of a pair
of wolf's ears; and would just as lief finger money for the one as for
the other. With white people 't is different, for they've a nat'ral
avarsion to being scalped; whereas your Indian shaves his head
in readiness for the knife, and leaves a lock of hair by way of
braggadocio, that one can lay hold of in the bargain."

"That's manly, however, and I felt from the first that we had only to
get you on our side, to have your heart and hand," returned Tom, losing
all his reserve, as he gained a renewed confidence in the disposition
of his companions. "Something more may turn up from this inroad of the
red-skins than they bargained for. Deerslayer, I conclude you're of
Hurry's way of thin