Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 1).djvu/56

 It's like the choice ointment,
 * From head to th' beard did go:

Down Aaron's beard, that downward went,
 * His garment's skirts unto."

The delivery of these skilful rhymes was accompanied, on the part of the stranger, by a regular rise and fall of his right hand, which terminated at the descent, by suffering the fingers to dwell a moment on the leaves of the little volume; and on the ascent, by such a flourish of the member, as none but the initiated may ever hope to imitate. It would seem that long practice had rendered this manual accompaniment necessary; for it did not cease until the significant preposition which the poet had so judiciously selected for the close of his verse, had been duly delivered in the fullest dignity of a word of two syllables.

Such an innovation on the silence and retirement of the forest could not fail to enlist the ears of those who journeyed at so short a distance in advance. The Indian muttered a few words in broken English to Heyward, who, in his turn, spoke to