M. de Lauzon leaned against a tree, and the dull
hours passed rapidly away^ for thought was bus)r
with the past and future. He again trod the green
paths of his boyhood, with his school-mates around
him, beneath the fostering smiles of indulgent pa^
rents. He again received the warm kiss of that
fair sister, with her blue eyes and lightly waving
locks. Again he lived over the high romance of
youth, frought with wild schemes of eagle-winged
ambition, and when he awoke to the dark reality
of the present, and found himself in a foreign land,



I



908 THE VNKMOWN.
ratrocmded hy savage foes, bereft of one child and
in continual danger of still greater evils — his heari
recoiled firom the harsh comparison ; but then again
came the consciousness that, by a singular train of
circumstances^ the almost certain destruction of not
only his own family but of the whole village had.
been prevented by the sanguinary conflict of that
night-— and hb soul arose in humble thankfulness
to Him who mleth the universe.
At length day dawned upon them, and unveiled
the bloody work of the preceding night. The old
chief before mentioned as accompanying Piscaret
had fallen by an arrow from the boy, now the pris-
oner of M . de Lauzon. This chief was the great-
est brave among the followers of Piscaret, and had
been the companion of all his most desperate ex-
ploits. The chief showed signs of grief, but it
was the staid and quiet grief of an Indian warrior,
not expressed by words, those lying beacon-lights



OR LAYS OP THB V0RB8T 200

of the heart, but by the drooping eye, and the stern
rigidity of the curled lip.
