The Oswego, just at that place, was a deep dark stream of no great width, its still, gloomy-looking current wind-ing its way among overhanging trees, which, in particular spots, almost shut out the light of the heavens.Here and there some half-fallen giant of the forest lay nearly across its surface, rendering care necessary to avoid the limbs;and most of the distance, the lower branches and leaves of the trees of smaller growth were laved by its waters.The picture so beautifully described by our own admirable poet, and which we have placed at the head of this chapter, was here realized; the earth fattened by the decayed vegetation of centuries, and black with loam, the stream that filled the banks nearly to overflowing, and the "fresh and boundless wood," being all as visible to the eye as the pen of Bryant has elsewhere vividly presented them to the imagination.In short, the entire scene was one of a rich and benevolent nature, before it had been subjected to the uses and desires of man; luxuriant, wild, full of promiSe, and not without the charm of the picturesque, even in its rudest state.It will be remembered that this was in the year 175-, or long before even speculation had brought any portion of western New York within the bounds of civili-zation.At that distant day there were two great channels of military communication between the inhabited por-tion of the colony of New York and the frontiers which lay adjacent to the Canadas, -- that by Lakes Champlain and George, and that by means of the Mohawk, Wood Creek, the Oneida, and the rivers we have been describ-ing.Along both these lines of communication military posts had been established, though there existed a blank space of a hundred miles between the last fort at the head of the Mohawk and the outlet of the Oswego, which em-braced most of the distance that Cap and Mabel had jour-neyed under the protection of Arrowhead.
"I sometimes wish for peace again," said the Pathfinder, "when one can range the forest without searching for any other enemy than the beasts and fishes.Ah's me! many is the day that the Sarpent, there, and I have passed hap-pily among the streams, living on venison, salmon, and trout without thought of a Mingo or a scalp! I some-times wish that them blessed days might come back, for it is not my real gift to slay my own kind.I'm sartain the Sergeant's daughter don't think me a wretch that takes pleasure in preying on human natur'?"As this remark, a sort of half interrogatory, was made, Pathfinder looked behind him; and, though the most partial friend could scarcely term his sunburnt and hard features handsome, even Mabel thought his smile attrac-tive, by its simple ingenuousness and the uprightness that beamed in every lineament of his honest countenance.
"I do not think my father would have sent one like those you mention to see his daughter through the wilder-ness," the young woman answered, returning the smile as frankly as it was given, but much more sweetly.
"That he wouldn't; the Sergeant is a man of feeling, and many is the march and the fight that we have had -- stood shoulder to shoulder in, as _he_ would call it -- though I always keep my limbs free when near a Frencher or a Mingo.""You are, then, the young friend of whom my father has spoken so often in his letters?""His _young_ friend -- the Sergeant has the advantage of me by thirty years; yes, he is thirty years my senior, and as many my better.""Not in the eyes of the daughter, perhaps, friend Path-finder;" put in Cap, whose spirits began to revive when he found the water once more flowing around him."The thirty years that you mention are not often thought to be an advantage in the eyes of girls of nineteen."Mabel colored; and, in turning aside her face to avoid the looks of those in the bow of the canoe, she encountered the admiring gaze of the young man in the stern.As a last resource, her spirited but soft blue eyes sought refuge in the water.Just at this moment a dull, heavy sound swept up the avenue formed by the trees, borne along by a light air that hardly produced a ripple on the water.
"That sounds pleasantly," said Cap, pricking up his ears like a dog that hears a distant baying; "it is the surf on the shores of your lake, I suppose?""Not so -- not so," answered the Pathfinder; "it is merely this river tumbling over some rocks half a mile below us.""Is there a fall in the stream?" demanded Mabel, a still brighter flush glowing in her face.
"The devil! Master Pathfinder, or you, Mr.Eau-douce"(for so Cap began to style Jasper), "had you not better give the canoe a sheer, and get nearer to the shore? These waterfalls have generally rapids above them, and one might as well get into the Maelstrom at once as to run into their suction.""Trust to us, friend Cap," answered Pathfinder; "we are but fresh-water sailors, it is true, and I cannot boast of being much even of that; but we understand rifts and rapids and cataracts; and in going down these we shall do our endeavors not to disgrace our edication.""In going down!" exclaimed Cap."The devil, man!
you do not dream of going down a waterfall in this egg shell of bark!""Sartain; the path lies over the falls, and it is much easier to shoot them than to unload the canoe and to carry that and all it contains around a portage of a mile by hand."Mabel turned her pallid countenance towards the young man in the stern of the canoe; for, just at that moment, a fresh roar of the fall was borne to her ears by a new current of the air, and it really sounded terrific, now tlnat the cause was understood.
