Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 1).djvu/183

 exclaimed, dropping the useless piece, in bitter disappointment; "the miscreant has struck the rapid, and had we powder, it could hardly send the lead swifter than he now goes!"

As he ended, the adventurous Huron raised his head above the shelter of the canoe, and while it glided swiftly down the stream, waved his hand, and gave forth the shout, which was the known signal of success. His cry was answered by a yell, and a laugh from the woods, as tauntingly exulting as if fifty demons were uttering their blasphemies at the fall of some Christian soul.

"Well may you laugh, ye children of the devil!" said the scout, seating himself on a projection of the rock, and suffering his gun to fall neglected at his feet, "for the three quickest and truest rifles in these woods, are no better than so many stalks of mullen, or the last year's horns of a buck!"

"What, then, is to be done?" demanded Duncan, losing the first feeling of disappointment, in a more manly desire for exertion; "what will become of us?"