ghth of a mile off, the
conical-shaped wigwams of our enemies. Loud shouts and shrieks reached
our ears; the old men, women, and children had gone out to welcome their
warriors and their unfortunate captive. We could see him in the middle
of them, and the women and children rushing up and hissing at him, and
abusing him, and pinching him, and spitting at him, treating him,
indeed, with every indignity. He stood quiet, as far as we could see,
without flinching. At last he was led on and secured to a tree, close
to one of the principal lodges. There the savages let him remain while
they retired to their homes, and the women set to work to prepare them a
feast.

"We now judged it time to get farther off to take some rest which we so
much needed. We knew that the savages were not likely to put him to
death that night, probably not till the following evening. We chewed
some dried venison, and then fell asleep. It was pitchy dark when we
awoke, but the noise from among the Indian lodges was louder than ever.
Once more we approached the spot, fires were blazing brightly in the
centre of the village, and the savages were dancing madly round them,
leaping, and shrieking, and howling, in the most terrific manner. A
stake had been run into the ground, and poor Noggin, stripped to the
waist, was tied to it. His face was turned towards us; despair sat upon
it, it was already as pale as death, indeed he did not look as if he had
many minutes to live. The cruel savages thought so likewise, and,
afraid of losing their victim, they had resolved at once, it appeared,
to commence that series of tortures which would terminate with his
death. With horrid cries the women approached him, and ran into his
flesh the burning ends of sticks, which they flourished in their hands,
and they hallooed and shouted in his ears, to rouse him up to feel the
more acutely his sufferings. Talk of the noble qualities of savages,
I've seen a good deal of human nature, and to my mind, left to itself
without anything to improve or correct it, there is nothing too bad or
abominably cruel which it will not do."

"There, I have told you enough of the old fellow's story for the
present," exclaimed Dick Onslow, throwing himself back in his chair and
stretching out his legs. "I know that I am very thankful that I had not
to share poor Noggin's fate."

"You are a pretty fellow for a story-teller," cried one of his hearers
(I believe it was I, his humbl