“…On that day,
two men were lingering on the banks of a small but rapid stream, within an
hour's journey of the encampment of Webb, like those who awaited the appearance
of an absent person, or the approach of some expected event. The vast canopy of
woods spread itself to the margin of the river, overhanging the water, and
shadowing its dark current with a deeper hue. The rays of the sun were
beginning to grow less fierce, and the intense heat of the day was lessened, as
the cooler vapors of the springs and fountains rose above their leafy beds, and
rested in the atmosphere. Still that breathing silence, which marks the drowsy sultriness
of an American landscape in July, pervaded the secluded spot, interrupted only
by the low voices of the men, the occasional and lazy tap of a woodpecker, the
discordant cry of some gaudy jay, or a swelling on the ear, from the dull roar
of a distant waterfall.
These feeble and broken sounds were, however, too
familiar to the foresters to draw their attention from the more interesting
matter of their dialogue.
While one of these loiterers showed the red skin and
wild accouterments of a native of the woods, the other exhibited, through the
mask of his rude and nearly savage equipments, the brighter, though sun-burned
and long-faced complexion of one who might claim descent from a European
parentage.