Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 1).djvu/27

 the excess of his violent and somewhat distempered zeal; while the more practised veteran made his arrangements with a deliberation that scorned every appearance of haste; though his sober lineaments and anxious eye sufficiently betrayed that he had no very strong professional relish for the (as yet) untried and dreaded warfare of the wilderness. At length the sun set in a flood of glory behind the distant western hills; and as darkness drew its veil around the secluded spot, the sounds of preparation diminished; the last light finally disappeared from the log-cabin of some officer; the trees cast their deeper shadows over the mounds and the rippling stream; and a silence soon pervaded the camp, as deep as that which reigned in the vast forest by which it was environed.

According to the orders of the preceding night, the heavy sleep of the army was broken by the rolling of the warning drums, whose rattling echoes were heard issuing, on the damp morning air, out of every vista of the woods, just as day began to draw the shaggy outlines of some tall