ought to
satisfy any reasonable woman.«
    »And may I ask, serjeant, who is the lucky man that you intend to call
son-in-law?«
    »The Pathfinder, your honor.«
    »Pathfinder!«
    »The same, Major Duncan, and in naming him to you, I give you his whole
history. No one is better known on this frontier, than my honest, brave,
true-hearted friend.«
    »All that is true enough, but is he, after all, the sort of person to make a
girl of twenty happy.«
    »Why not, your honor; the man is at the head of his calling. There is no
other guide, or scout, connected with the army that has half the reputation of
Pathfinder, or who deserves to have it, half as well.«
    »Very true, serjeant, but is the reputation of a scout, exactly the sort of
renown to captivate a girl's fancy.«
    »Talking of girls' fancies, sir, is, in my humble opinion, much like talking
of a recruit's judgment. If we were to take the notions of the awkward squad,
sir, as a guide, we should never form a decent line, in battalion, Major
Duncan.«
    »But your daughter has nothing awkward about her, for a genteeler girl of
her class, could not be found in old Albin itself. Is she of your way of
thinking, in this matter, though, I suppose she must be, as you say she is
betrothed.«
    »We have not yet conversed on the subject, your honor, but I consider her
mind as good as made up, from several little circumstances that might be named.«
    »And what are these circumstances, Serjeant?« asked the Major, who began to
take more interest than he had at first felt, in the subject. »I confess a
little curiosity to learn something about a woman's mind, being, as you know, a
bachelor myself.«
    »Why, your honor, when I speak of the Pathfinder to the girl, she always
looks me full in the face; chimes in with every thing I say in his favor, and
has a frank open way with her, which says as much as if she half considered him,
already, as a husband.«
    »Hum - and these signs you think, Dunham, are faithful tokens of your
daughter's feelings?«
    »I do, your honor, for they strike me as natural. When I find