 when they might easily be
overtaken. In order to prevent any wandering savage from using them, by swimming
off and getting possession, a possible but scarcely a probable event, all the
paddles were retained.
    No sooner had he set the recovered canoe adrift, than Deerslayer turned the
bows of his own towards the point on the shore that had been indicated by Hurry.
So light was the movement of the little craft, and so steady the sweep of its
master's arm, that ten minutes had not elapsed ere it was again approaching the
land, having in that brief time passed over fully half a mile of distance. As
soon as Deerslayer's eye caught a glimpse of the rushes, of which there were
many growing in the water a hundred feet from the shore, he arrested the motion
of the canoe, and anchored his boat by holding fast to the delicate but
tenacious stem of one of the drooping plants. Here he remained, awaiting with an
intensity of suspense that can be easily imagined, the result of the hazardous
enterprise.
    It would be difficult to convey to the minds of those who have never
witnessed it, the sublimity that characterizes the silence of a solitude as deep
as that which now reigned over the Glimmerglass. In the present instance, this
sublimity was increased by the gloom of night, which threw its shadowy and
fantastic forms around the lake, the forest, and the hills. It is not easy,
indeed, to conceive of any place more favorable to heighten these natural
impressions than that Deerslayer now occupied. The size of the lake brought all
within the reach of human senses, while it displayed so much of the imposing
scene at a single view, giving up, as it might be, at a glance, a sufficiency to
produce the deepest impressions. As has been said, this was the first lake
Deerslayer had ever seen. Hitherto his experience had been limited to the
courses of rivers and smaller streams, and never before had he seen so much of
that wilderness, which he so well loved, spread before his gaze. Accustomed to
the forest, however, his mind was capable of portraying all its hidden
mysteries, as he looked upon its leafy surface. This was also the first time he
had been on a trail, when human lives depended on the issue. His ears had often
drunk in the traditions of frontier warfare, but he had never yet been
confronted with an enemy.
    The reader will readily understand, therefore, how intense must have been
the expectation of the young man, as he sat in his solitary canoe, endeavoring
to catch the smallest
