allusions of the victim himself, to the subject.  Captain Willoughby had been an English soldier, of the school of the last century.  He was naturally a humane and a just man, but he believed in the military axiom that “the most flogging regiments were the best fighting regiments;” and perhaps he was not in error, as regards the lower English character.  It was a fatal error, however, to make in relation to an American savage; one who had formerly exercised the functions, and who had not lost all the feelings, of a chief.  Unhappily, at a moment when everything depended on the fidelity of the Tuscarora, the captain had bethought him of his old expedient for insuring prompt obedience, and, by way of a reminder, he made an allusion to his former mode of punishment.  As Nick would have expressed it, “the old sores smarted;” the wavering purpose of thirty years was suddenly and fiercely revived, and the knife passed into the heart of the victim, with a rapidity that left no time for appeals to the tribunal of God’s mercy.  In half a minute, Captain Willoughby had ceased to breathe.

Such had been the act of the man who now passed through the opening of the palisade, and entered the former habitation of his victim.  A profound stillness reigned in and around the Hut, and no one appeared to question the unexpected intruder.  Nick passed, with his noiseless step, round to the gate, which he found secured.  It was necessary to knock, and this he did in a way effectually to bring a porter.

“Who dere?” demanded the elder Pliny, from within.

“Good friend—­open gate.  Come wid message from cap’in.”

The natural distaste to the Indians which existed among the blacks of the Knoll, included the Tuscarora.  This disgust was mingled with a degree of dread; and it was difficult for beings so untutored and ignorant, at all times to draw the proper distinctions between Indian and Indian.  In their wonder-loving imaginations, Oneidas, Tuscaroras, Mohawks, Onondagas, and Iroquois were all jumbled together in inextricable confusion, a red man being a red man, and a savage a savage.  It is not surprising, therefore, that Pliny the elder should hesitate about opening the gate, and admitting one of the detested race, though a man so well known to them all, in the peculiar situation of the family.  Luckily, Great Smash happened to be near, and her husband called her to the gate by one of the signals that, was much practised between them.

“Who you t’ink out-dere?” asked Pliny the elder of his consort, with a very significant look.

“How you t’ink guess, ole Plin?—­You ’spose nigger wench like Albonny wise woman, dat she see t’rough a gate, and know ebbery t’ing, and little more!”

“Well, dat Sassy Nick.  What you say now?”

“You sartain, ole Plin?” asked Mistress Smash, with a face ominous of evil.

“Sartain as ear.  Talk wid him—­he want to come in.  What you t’ink?”