0Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One

A not less exciting scene was now going on withinthe council chamber. There, all was confusion anddespair. The shock of such a doom as that which thechiefs had heard pronounced by the people, under theinfluence of the prophet, came upon them like a boltof thunder. For a moment it paralyzed with its terrorsthe hearts of those who had no fear of death. Themere loss of life is always an event of triumph with thebrave of the Indians, for the due ennobling of which,his song of past victories and achievements, carefullychronicled by a memory which has scarcely any otheremployment, is shouted forth in the most acute physicalagony, with a spirit that nothing can bend orconquer. But to deprive him of this memory, toeradicate all the marks of his achievements - to takefrom him the only credential by which he operatesamong his fellows and claims a place in the ranks ofthe illustrious dead - was a refinement upon the terrorsof punishment, which, unfrequently practised,was held as a terror, intended to paralyze, as in thepresent instance, every thing of moral courage whichthe victim might possess. For a moment such wasthe effect in the assembly of the chiefs. The solitaryhowl of despair which their unanimous voices sent upas the first intimation of the decree met their ears,was succeeded by the deepest silence, while theythrew themselves upon their faces, and thetorch-bearers, burying their torches in the clay floor of thebuilding, with something of that hate and horror whichseemed to distinguish the body of the Indians without,rushed forth from the apartment and joined with theassembled people. Their departure aroused thedespairing inmates, and while one of them carefullyagain closed the entrance before the watchful masswithout could avail themselves of the opening, the restprepared themselves with a renewed courage todeliberate upon their situation.

0Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One

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The glance of Bess Matthews at this moment uponher enemy, assured her that the sport of the deadlyreptile was about to cease. She could not now mistakethe fearful expression of its eye. She strove toscream, but her voice died away in her throat. Herlips were sealed - she sought to fly, but her limbs werepalsied - she had nothing left of life but its consciousness;and in despair of escape, with a single scream,forced from her by the accumulated agony, she sunkdown upon the grass before her enemy - her eyes,however, still open, and still looking upon thosewhich he directed for ever upon them. She saw himapproach - now advancing, now receding - nowswelling in every part with something of anger, while hisneck was arched beautifully like that of a wild horseunder the curb; until, at length, tired as it were of play,like the cat with its victim, she saw the neck growinglarger and becoming completely bronzed when aboutto strike - the huge jaws unclosing almost directlyabove her, the long tubulated fang, charged with venom,protruding from the cavernous mouth - and she saw nomore! Insensibility came to her aid, and she layalmost lifeless under the very folds of the monster. Inthat moment the copse parted - and an arrow, piercinghim through and through the neck, bore his head forwardto the ground, alongside of the maiden, while hisspiral extremities, now unfolding in his own agony,were actually, in part, resting upon her person. Thearrow came from the fugitive Occonestoga, who hadfortunately reached the spot, in season, on his way tothe Block House. He rushed from the copse, as thesnake fell, and, with a stick, fearlessly approached himwhere he lay writhing upon the grass. Seeing himadvance, the courageous reptile made an effort toregain his coil, while shaking the fearful rattleviolently at every evolution which he took for thatpurpose; but the arrow, completely passing through hisneck, opposed an unyielding obstacle to the endeavour;and finding it hopeless, and seeing the new enemyabout to assault him, with something of the spirit ofthe white man under like circumstances, he turnedrecklessly round, and striking his charged fangs, sothat they were riveted in the wound they made, intoa susceptible part of his own body, he threw himselfover upon his back with a single convulsion, anda moment after, lay dead upon the person of themaiden.*

THE wife of Granger soon provided refreshmentsfor the young savage, of which he ate sparingly,though without much seeming consciousness of whathe was doing. Harrison did not trouble him muchwith remark or inquiry, but busied himself in lookingafter some of the preparations for defence of thebuilding; and for this purpose, Hector and himselfoccupied an hour in the apartment adjoining that inwhich the household concerns of Granger were carriedon. In this apartment Hector kept Dugdale, a famousblood-hound, supposed to have been brought from theCaribbees, which, when very young, Harrison hadbought from a Spanish trader. This dog is a peculiarbreed, and resembled in some leading respects theIrish wolf-hound, while, having all the thirst and appetitefor blood which distinguished the more ancientSlute or Sleuth-hound of the Scots. It is a mistake tosuppose that the Spaniards brought these dogs toAmerica. They found them here, actually in use bythe Indians and for like purposes, and only perfectedtheir training, while stimulating them in the pursuit ofman. The dog Dugdale had been partially trainedafter their fashion to hunt the Indians, and even underhis present owner, it was not deemed unbecomingthat he should be prepared for the purposes of war uponthe savages, by the occasional exhibition of a stuffedfigure, so made and painted as to resemble a nakedIndian, around whose neck a lump of raw andbleeding beef was occasionally suspended. This was shownhim while chained, - from any near approach he waswithheld, until his appetite had been so wrought upon,that longer restraint would have been dangerous andimpossible. The training of these dogs, as known tothe early French and Spanish settlers, by both ofwhom they were in common use for the purpose ofwar with the natives, is exceeding curious; and sofierce under this form of training did they become inprocess of time, that it was found necessary to restrainthem in cages while thus stimulated, until the call tothe field, and the prospect of immediate strife shouldgive an opportunity for the exercise of their unallayedrapacity. In the civil commotions of Hayti, the mostformidable enemies known to the insurrectionists werethe fierce dogs which had been so educated by theFrench. A curious work, found in the CharlestonLibrary, devoted to the history of that time andprovince, is illustrated with several plates which show thetraining common with the animal. The dog of Harrisonhad not however been greatly exercised by his presentowner after this fashion. He had been simply requiredto follow and attend upon his master, under the conductof Hector, for both of whom his attachments had beensingularly strong. But the early lessons of his Spanishmasters had not been forgotten by Dugdale, who, in thewar of the Carolinians with the Coosaws, following hismaster into battle, proved an unlooked-for auxiliar ofthe one, and an enemy whose very appearance struckterror into the other. So useful an ally was not to beneglected, and the stuffed figure which had formed a partof the property of the animal in the sale by his Spanishmaster, was brought into occasional exercise and use,under the charge of Hector, in confirming Dugdale'swarlike propensities. In this exercise, with the figureof a naked Indian perched against one corner, and apart of a deer's entrails hanging around his neck,Hector, holding back the dog by a stout rope drawnaround a beam, the better to embarrass him at pleasure,was stimulating at the same time his hunger andferocity.

To hear was to obey; and half dead with fear, yetrejoiced that he had not gone himself, she proceededto tumble about the skins, with ready compliance, andan air of industry, the most praiseworthy in an Indianwoman. Her labour was lengthened, so Sanuteeseemed to think, somewhat beyond the time necessaryto enumerate a lot of skins not exceeding fifteen ortwenty in number, and with some little sternness atlast he demanded of her the cause of the delay.Apprehensive that he would yet rise, and seek forhimself a solution of the difficulty, she determined,as she had not yet ascertained, to guess at the fact,and immediately replied in a representation which didnot at all accord with the calculation of the chief'sown memory on the subject. The impatience ofOcconestoga, in the meantime, was not less than thatof Sanutee. He worried his mother not a little in hisrestlessness while she moved about him; and once asshe bent over him, removing this, and replacing that, heseized upon her hand, and would have spoken, but thatso dangerous an experiment she would not permit. Butshe saw by his glance, and the settled firmness withwhich he grasped his hatchet, that his thought wasthat of defiance to his father and a desire to throwaside his restraining cover and assert his manhood.She drew away from him rapidly, with a fingeruplifted as if in entreaty, while with one hand shethrew over him a huge bearskin, which nearlysuffocated him, and which he immediately, in part, threwaside. Sanutee in the meantime seemed veryimperfectly satisfied with the representation which shehad made, and manifesting some doubt as to thecorrectness of her estimate, he was about to rise and lookfor himself into the matter. But, in some trepidation,the wary Matiwan prevented him.

And handling the old man with a strength beyondhis power to contend with, he aimed the deadly strokedirectly at the eyes of his father. But the song andthe speech had aroused the yet conscious but sufferingMatiwan, and starting up from the ground where shehad been lying, almost between the feet of thecombatants, with uplifted hands she interposed, just as thefell direction had been given to the weapon of herson. The piercing shriek of that fondly cherishingmother went to the very bones of the young warrior.Her interposition had the effect of a spell upon him,particularly as, at the moment - so timely for Sanuteehad been her interposition - he who gave the blowcould with difficulty arrest the impulse with which ithad been given, and which must have made it a blowfatal to her. The narrow escape which she had made,sent through the youth an unnerving chill and shudder.The deadly instrument fell from his hand, and nowrushing upon him, the crowd drew him to the ground,and taking from him every other weapon, pinioned hisarms closely behind him. He turned away withsomething of horror in his countenance as he met thesecond gaze of his father, and his eyes rested with apainful solicitude upon the wo-begone visage ofMatiwan, who had, after her late effort, again sunkdown at the feet of Sanutee. He looked fondly, butsadly upon her, and with a single sentence addressedto her, he offered no obstacle while his captors ledhim away. 041b061a72