This ended the conversation, and each began to smoke.

  In the evening they landed on an island; the ceremony of supper was gone through, as usual, much to the general satisfaction. The previous night made Captain Pamphile somewhat anxious as to how he was to bear the cold, which, of course, is more intense on an island nearly level with the water than on the wooded mainland. But on unrolling his buffalo-hide he found a woollen blanket inside. Decidedly, Black Snake was not a bad sort of master, and if Captain Pamphile had not already formed some plans for the future, he might have stayed on in his service. But, however pleasant he found it to lie between his blanket and buffalo robe on an island in the River St. Lawrence, he still had the weakness to prefer his berth on board the good ship “Roxelane.” Still, however inferior his temporary couch might be, the Captain slept without waking until daybreak.

  About eleven o’clock on the third day Quebec hove in sight. Captain Pamphile had some hopes that Black Snake would put in at that town; thus, directly he saw the town, he set to work with such vigour at rowing that he gained extra consideration from the great chief, and that he failed to pay as much attention to the Falls of Montmorency as the sight deserved. But he was mistaken in his conjectures. The boat passed by the harbour, doubled Diamond Cape, and went on till they landed opposite the Falls of La Chaudière.

  As it was still daylight, Captain Pamphile had time to admire this magnificent cascade, which falls from a height of one hundred and fifty feet, with a breadth of two hundred and sixty, spreading out like a sheet of snow on a carpet of verdure and running between banks wooded nearly to the edge, while from the forest here and there stand up masses of rock looking like the bald and white foreheads of weather-beaten old men. Supper and night followed as usual.

  The next day the boat was launched at daybreak. Notwithstanding his philosophy, Captain Pamphile began to experience some anxiety. He could not help reflecting that the further he penetrated inland, the greater was his distance from Marseilles, and the more difficult became any attempt at escape. Thus he rowed with more negligence than the great chief had ever remarked in him, but he was forgiven in view of his former alacrity. Suddenly his eyes became fixed on the horizon, and his paddle stopped working, and as the sailor who pulled bow to his stroke continued to row, the canoe swung completely round.

  “What is the matter?” said Black Snake, getting up from the bottom of the boat where he had been lying, and taking his calumet out of his mouth.

  “The matter is,” said Captain Pamphile, pointing to the south, “either I am ignorant of sailor craft, or we are going to have a bit of a gale.”

  “And where does my brother see the sign which shows that God has commanded the tempest to ‘Blow and destroy ‘?”

  “Egad!” said the Captain, “in that cloud which is coming up black as ink.”

  “My brother has the eyes of a mole; what he sees is not a cloud.”

  “You are joking,” said Captain Pamphile.

  “Black Snake has the eye of an eagle,” said the chief; “let the white man wait, and judge for himself.”

  In fact, this cloud advanced with a speed and rush such as Captain Pamphile had never seen in a true cloud, however hard blew the wind which drove it; at the end of three seconds, our worthy mariner, confident as he was of his knowledge, began to feel sundry doubts. At last, before a minute had passed, he saw that he was wrong and Black Snake right. The cloud was nothing but a serried mass of innumerable pigeons taking flight towards the north.

  At first the Captain could not believe his eyes. The birds came with so much noise and in such quantities that it seemed impossible for the pigeons of the whole world united to form so dense a body. The sky, which northwards, still retained its azure blue, was entirely covered to the south as far as the eye could see with a grey sheet, the extremities of which were out of sight. Soon the sheet, intercepting the rays of the sun, blotted it out instantaneously, so that one might suppose twilight was falling on the boatmen. In a moment, a kind of advance guard made up of some thousands of the birds passed over with the rapidity of magic; then, almost immediately, the main body followed, and daylight vanished as if the wings of the tempest had been stretched between sky and earth.

  Captain Pamphile saw this phenomenon with astonishment bordering on stupor; while the Indians, on the contrary, accustomed to similar sights every five or six years, gave utterance to cries of joy and got ready their arrows to profit by the winged manna which the Lord had sent them. For his part, Black Snake loaded his gun with a deliberation which proved his faith in the size of the living cloud passing over him. Then, when ready, he leisurely raised the gun to his shoulder and. without troubling to take aim, pulled the trigger. As he fired a sort of opening like that of a well appeared, letting in a ray of light, which again disappeared instantaneously; some fifty pigeons, which had come within the circle formed by the shot, fell like rain into and around the canoe. The Indians picked them all up, to the last bird, greatly surprising Captain Pamphile, who saw no reason for this care, seeing that if one or two more shots had been fired, the canoe itself would have caught sufficient to provision the crew without the trouble of turning her to right or left. But, turning round, he saw that the chief had lain down again, placed his weapon at his side, and resumed his calumet.

  “Has Black Snake finished his sport already? said Captain Pamphile.

  “Black Snake has Silled with one shot as many pigeons as were wanted for his supper and for that of his followers; a Huron is not a white man who destroys to no purpose the creatures of the Great Spirit.”

  “Ah!” said Captain Pamphile, half to himself, “that is not badly reasoned, for a savage; but I would not be sorry to see two or three more holes in this feathered canopy above our heads, if it was only to make certain that the sun was still in its proper place.”

  “Look and make your mind easy,” answered the chief, stretching out his hand to the south.

  In fact, on the southern horizon a golden light began to appear, while in the opposite direction, towards the north, the whole landscape was being plunged into darkness; then the head of the column must at least have reached the mouth of the St. Lawrence. Thus they had obviously covered in a quarter of an hour the distance the boat had just taken four whole days to accomplish. Above, the grey cloth continued to skim over, as if the genii of the Pole were dragging it to them, while the daylight, swift in its turn as had been the darkness, came on at a rapid rate, descending in waves on the mountains, streaming down the valleys and spreading in broad lakes over the meadows. At last, the flying rearguard passed like a mist over the face of the sun, which, the last veil gone, smiled as before on the earth beneath.

  Brave as was Captain Pamphile, and little danger as there was in the phenomenon which he had just witnessed, he had been ill at ease during the time the artificial night reigned. Thus it was with real joy that he welcomed the light, resumed his oar, and began to row, while the rest of Black Snake’s followers plucked the pigeons killed by his gun and by their arrows.

  Next day the boat passed Montreal, as it had passed Quebec, Black Snake showing that he had no intention whatever of stopping in the town. Far from this, he made a sign to the rowers which guided them to the right bank of the river. This was the dwelling-place of the tribe of Cochenonegas Indians, and their chief, sitting and smoking on the shore, exchanged a few words with Black Serpent in a language which the Captain could not understand. A quarter of an hour afterwards they came to the first rapids of the river. Instead of trying to pass them by punting up with the poles kept in the bottom of the canoe, Black Snake ordered the crew to land, and sprang out himself, followed by Captain Pamphile. The boatmen put the canoe on their shoulders, the crew formed themselves into a caravan, and instead of laboriously pushing their bark up the rushing river, they quietly marched along its bank. In a couple of hours the rapids were past, the canoe was afloat once more, and flying over the surface of the stream.

  They had been travelling for about three hours when Captain Pamphile was aroused from his reflections by a joyful cry which came from all except the chief. This exclamation was caused by a new sight, almost as singular as that of the previous day, only this time the miracle was performed, not in the air, but on the water. A band of black squirrels were on the move from east to west, just as the pigeons of the day previous had been emigrating from the south to the north, and were passing across the whole width of the St. Lawrence. Doubtless for some days they had been assembled on the bank and waiting for a favourable wind, for as the stream at this point is over four miles broad, good swimmers though these animals are, they could not possibly have crossed without the help which God had just sent them. In fact, a lovely breeze had been blowing for an hour from the mountain, so that the whole flotilla had started on its voyage, each squirrel spreading its tail as a sail, and only making sufficient use of its feet to keep in the right direction.

  As the natives were still fonder of squirrel than they were of pigeon, the crew of the canoe at once prepared to hunt the emigrants; the great chief himself even did not seem to despise this form of recreation. So he took a blow tube, and, opening a small box made of birch-bark beautifully worked with strings of elk hide, took out a score of little arrows scarcely two inches long and fine as steel wire, sharply pointed at one end and having the other end bound with thistle down so as exactly to fit the calibre of the tube from which they were to be propelled. Two Indians prepared similar weapons, two others were told off to row, to Captain Pamphile and the fifth Indian was assigned the duty of collecting the slain and with drawing from their bodies the small missiles with which the Indians hoped to compass their destruction. In ten minutes’ time the boat was brought within range and the sport began.

  Captain Pamphile was struck dumb with astonishment; never had he seen such skill displayed. At thirty or forty paces the Indians struck the animals they aimed at, generally in the breast, so that in ten minutes’ time the river was covered for a fairly wide circle round the boat with dead and wounded. When about sixty had been stretched on the battlefield, Black Snake, true to his principles, gave a signal to stop the slaughter. He was obeyed by his men with an alacrity which would have done credit to the discipline of a Prussian squadron, and the fugitives who by this time did not disclaim the use of their legs as well as of their tails, scurried to land with all speed, without the Indians making any attempt at pursuit.

  In the meanwhile, short as had been the time thus occupied, a storm had crept up without the Indians noticing its approach, and Captain Pamphile was interrupted before he got half through his task by orders to take part in managing the boat; his share was simply to pull at the fourth oar, so as to land, if possible, as Black Snake hoped, before the storm burst. Unfortunately the wind came directly from the shore they wished to reach, and the waves got up so rapidly that they might have thought themselves out in the open sea before they had gone any distance.

  To put a climax to their discomfort, night came on, and the stream was only lit up from time to time by the flashes of lightning; the frail craft was tossed about like a nutshell, first on the top of a wave and then down in the trough, so that it seemed as if every moment she must be swamped. Still they were making some progress, and in spite of the darkness the bank could be seen like a black line, when the canoe, darting forward like an arrow from the crest of a wave, came with a crash on a rock and broke up as if made of glass. Then it was each for himself, and all struggled singly to reach dry land. Black Snake was the first to land; instantly he kindled a fire by rubbing two sticks together, so that his companions might be guided so as to rejoin him. This proved a useful precaution, and in ten minutes the whole company — except Captain Pamphile — was assembled in a circle round the great chief.

  CHAPTER XII

  HOW CAPTAIN PAMPHILE SPENT TWO VERY EVENTFUL NIGHTS, ONE IN A TREE, THE OTHER IN A HUT

  the first night

  THANKS to the care we have taken to explain to our readers that Captain Pamphile was a first-class swimmer, they are not likely to have been much disturbed at seeing him with the rest of his fellow-travellers immersed in the river. In any case, we hasten to reassure them by stating that after a deadly struggle of ten minutes’ duration he found himself safe and sound on the shore. Scarcely had he shaken the wet off, an operation which, thanks to the paucity of his attire, did not take long, before he saw the fiery beacon Black Snake had raised to rally his attendants. His first step was to turn his back on the flame and to get away from it as quickly as possible. In spite of the delicate attentions which the great chief had lavished on him during the six days passed in his company, Captain Pamphile had constantly cherished the hope that one day or another an opportunity might occur for parting company with him; thus for fear that chance might fail to help him a second time, he took instant advantage of the first opportunity offered, and in spite of the darkness and the storm he plunged into the forest, which extends from the margin of the river to the base of the mountains.

  After about two hours’ walking, Captain Pamphile, hoping he had put a sufficient distance between himself and his enemies, decided to make a halt and deliberate as to how he might pass the night in the best manner possible.

  The position was anything but comfortable. The fugitive found himself with his beaver skin for his sole article of clothing, and it was, moreover, to serve him besides for both bed and bedding. He was shivering beforehand in anticipation of the night he was likely to have, when he heard, from three or four different directions, distant howls which quickly aroused him from this first preoccupation to the thought of another prospect still less to his taste. For in these howls Captain Pamphile could recognize the voices of hungry wolves, which are so common in the forests of North America, that at times, when they are short of food, they will even come out into the streets of Portland or of Boston.

  He had not time to form a plan before fresh howls resounded still nearer him; there was not a moment to lose. Captain Pamphile, whose gymnastic education had been sedulously cultivated, included among his talents an aptitude for climbing a tree like a squirrel. He therefore selected an oak of moderate size, embraced its trunk as if to tear it up by the roots, and reached its lowest branches just as the cries which had first warned him sounded for the third time at a distance of less than thirty steps from where he was. The Captain had made no mistake; a pack of wolves, who had been spread over a circle a league in circumference, had scented him and were galloping back towards the centre, where they hoped to find their supper. They arrived too late; Captain Pamphile was on his perch.

  Notwithstanding this, the wolves did not consider themselves beaten; nothing is more persevering than an empty stomach; they collected round the tree and began to howl so plaintively that Captain Pamphile, brave as he was, could not, while listening to their mournful, long-drawn cry, help feeling some degree of fear, although he was, as a matter of fact, quite free from all immediate danger. The night was dark, but still not so dark that he could not see through the gloom the brown backs of his enemies, like the waves of a heaving sea: moreover, each time one of them raised its head, Captain Pamphile saw two live coals shining through the darkness, and as the disappointment was general, there were moments when the whole ground below him seemed spangled with flashing carbuncles which, crossing each other as they moved, formed weird and diabolical figures.... But soon, from gazing constantly at the same point, his vision became confused; fantastic shapes took the place of the actual forms beneath; his mind, somewhat shaken by the effect of a sensation never before experienced, ceased to remember the real danger while dreaming of supernatural terrors. A crowd of beings, who were neither men nor beasts, took the place of the familiar quadrupeds surging below him; he seemed to see demons springing up with flaming eyes, holding hands and dancing round and round in a hellish ring. Astride on his branch, like a witch on her broomstick, he saw himself in the middle of an infernal revel in which he, too, was called to take his part.

  The Captain felt by instinct that vertigo was dragging him down, and that if he gave in to it, he was lost; with a last effort of will he gathered all the strength of body and mind left to him and lashed himself to the trunk of the tree with the rope which fastened the beaver’s skin to his waist, and clasping his hands together around the branch above him, he laid his head back and shut his eyes.

  Then insanity and delirium mastered him completely. Captain Pamphile first felt his tree moving, bending and swaying like the mast of a ship in a heavy sea. Then it seemed as if the tree was trying to drag its roots out of the ground, as a man endeavours to free his feet when caught in a quicksand; after some moments of violent effort the oak succeeded, and from the wound thus made in the earth bubbled up a fountain of blood, which the wolves lapped up greedily. The tree took advantage of their rush round the blood to get away from them, but staggering blindly and moving much as a cripple might hop on his wooden leg. Soon, their thirst assuaged, the wolves, the demons, the vampires, from whom the brave Captain had fancied himself freed, again started in pursuit of him. They were led by an old woman who kept her face hidden and carried a huge knife. The whole hunt went at a mad gallop.

  At last the tree, tired, panting, gasping for breath, seemed completely exhausted, and threw itself down like a man utterly spent with fatigue; then the wolves and demons, still headed by the old woman, came fiercely on with their blood-stained tongues and their glowing eyes. The Captain gave a shout of terror and tried to stretch out his arms, but before he could move there came a hissing sound behind him, an icy terror passed over him, he seemed bound by the links of a cold chain which was suffocating him; and then gradually the pressure seemed to relax, the phantoms faded, the howls became stilled, the tree was shaken two or three times more, and then all was once more darkness and silence.