Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 3).djvu/220

 warriors, who caught the gleams of anger that shot from the eyes of the young chief, in passing, followed him to the place he had selected for his meditations. After which, Tamenund and Alice were removed, and the women and children were ordered to disperse. During the momentous hour that succeeded, the encampment resembled a hive of troubled bees, who only awaited the appearance and example of their leader, to take some distant and momentous flight.

A young warrior, at length, issued from the lodge of Uncas, and moving deliberately with a sort of grave march, towards a dwarf pine, that grew in the crevices of the rocky terrace, he tore the bark from its body, and then returned whence he came, without speaking. He was soon followed by another, who stripped the sapling of its branches, leaving it a naked and "blazed" trunk. A third coloured the posts with stripes of a dark red paint; all which indications of a hostile design in the leaders of the nation, were received by the men without in a gloomy and ominous silence. Finally, the Mohican himself re-