they
occurred.
    The trapper had remained nearly motionless for an hour. His eyes, alone, had
occasionally opened and shut. When opened his gaze seemed fastened on the clouds
which hung around the western horizon, reflecting the bright colours and giving
form and loveliness to the glorious tints of an American sunset. The hour - the
calm beauty of the season - the occasion all conspired to fill the spectators
with solemn awe. Suddenly, while musing on the remarkable position in which he
was placed, Middleton felt the hand which he held, grasp his own, with
incredible power, and the old man, supported on either side by his friends, rose
upright to his feet. For a moment, he looked about him, as if to invite all in
presence to listen, (the lingering remnant of human frailty) and then, with a
fine military elevation of the head, and with a voice that might be heard in
every part of that numerous assembly he pronounced the word -
    »Here!«
    A movement so entirely unexpected, and the air of grandeur and humility
which were so strikingly united in the mien of the trapper, together with the
clear and uncommon force of his utterance, produced a short period of confusion
in the faculties of all present. When Middleton and Hard-Heart, each of whom
involuntarily extended a hand to support the form of the old man, turned to him
again, they found that the subject of their interest, was removed forever beyond
the necessity of their care. They mournfully placed the body in its seat, and Le
Balafré arose to announce the termination of the scene, to the tribe. The voice
of the old Indian, seemed a sort of echo from that invisible world to which the
spirit of the honest trapper had just departed.
    »A valiant, a just, and a wise warrior has gone on the path which will lead
him to the blessed grounds of his people!« he said. »When the voice of the
Wahcondah called him, he was ready to answer. Go: my children; remember the just
chiefs of the Pale-faces, and clear your own tracks from briars.«
    The grave was made beneath the shade of some noble oaks. It has been
carefully watched to the present hour by the Pawnees of the Loup, and is often
shown, to the traveller and the trader, as a spot where a just white-man sleeps.
In due time the stone was placed at its head, with the simple inscription, which
the trapper had himself requested. The only liberty taken by Middleton, was to
add, »May