aping it attracted no attention for me to dance and leap
also, and I selected, without interference, the boat, the extra paddle,
weapons and ammunition that I wished. Areskoui and Tododaho did the rest.
Do you feel stronger now, Dagaeoga?"

"Aye, I'm still able to handle the paddle. I suppose we'd better seek a
landing. We can't stay out in the lake forever. Tayoga, you've taken the
part of Providence itself. Now did it occur to you in your infinite wisdom,
while you were storing paddles, weapons and ammunition in this boat, to
store food also?"

The Onondaga's smile was wide and satisfying.

"I thought of that, too, Dagaeoga," he replied, "because I knew our
journey, if we should be so fortunate as to have a journey, would take us
out on the lake, and I knew, also, that no matter how many hardships and
dangers Dagaeoga might pass through, the time would come when he would be
hungry. It is always so with Dagaeoga."

He took a heavy knapsack from the bottom of the canoe and opened it.

"It is a French knapsack," he said, "and it contains both bread and meat,
which we will enjoy."

They ate in great content, and their spirits rose to an extraordinary
degree, though Tayoga regretted the absence of clothing which his disguise
had made necessary. Having been educated with white lads, and having
associated with white people so much, he was usually clad as completely as
they, either in their fashion or in his own full Indian costume.

"My infinite wisdom was not so infinite that it told me to take a blanket,"
he said, "and the wind coming down from the Canadian shore is growing
cold."

"I'm surprised to hear you speak of such trifles as that, Tayoga, when
we've been dealing with affairs of life and death."

"We are cold or we are warm, Dagaeoga, and peril and suffering do not alter
it. But lo! the wind is bringing the great mists with it, and we will
escape in them."

They turned the canoe toward a point far to the east of the Indian camp and
began to paddle, not hastily but with long, slow, easy strokes that sent
the canoe over the water at a great rate. The fogs and vapors were thick
and close about them, but Tayoga knew the direction. Robert asked him if he
had heard of Willet, and the Onondaga said he had not seen him, but he had
learned from a Mohawk runner that the Great Bear had reached Waraiyageh
with the news of St. Luc's prospective advance, and Tayoga had also
contrived to get news through to him that he