 grass which had been
subject to the dominion of the flames, and was consoling himself for this slight
misfortune, by recording, uninterruptedly, such different vacillations in light
and shadow as he chose to consider phenomena.
    In the mean time, the veteran, on whose experience they all so implicitly
relied for protection, employed himself in reconnoitring objects in the
distance, through the openings which the air occasionally made in the immense
bodies of smoke that, by this time, lay in enormous piles on every part of the
plain.
    »Look you here, lads,« the trapper said, after a long and anxious
examination; »your eyes are young and may prove better than my worthless sight -
though the time has been when a wise and brave people saw reason to think me
quick on a look-out, but those times are gone, and many a true and tried friend
has passed away with them. Ah's me! If I could choose a change in the orderings
of providence - which I cannot, and which it would be blasphemy to attempt,
seeing that all things are governed by a wiser mind than belongs to mortal
weakness - but if I were to choose a change it would be to say, that such as
they who have liv'd long together in friendship and kindness, and who have
proved their fitness to go in company by many acts of suffering and daring in
each other's behalf, should be permitted to give up life at such times, as when
the death of one, leaves the other but little reason to wish to live.«
    »Is it an Indian that you see?« demanded the impatient Middleton.
    »Red-skin or white-skin it is much the same. Friendship and use can tie men
as strongly together in the woods as in the towns - ay, or for that matter,
stronger. Here are the young warriors of the Prairies - Often do they sort
themselves in pairs, and set apart their lives for deeds of friendship, and well
and truly do they act up to their promises. The death blow to one is commonly
mortal to the other! I have been a solitary man much of my time, if he can be
called solitary who has lived for seventy years in the very bosom of natur' and
where he could at any instant open his heart to God, without having to strip it
of the cares and wickednesses of the settlements, but making that allowance,
have I been a solitary man, and yet have I always found that intercourse with my
kind was pleasant, and painful to break off, provided
