Turning to the corses that still lay on the couch of leaves where they expired, Nathan began with little ceremony, and none of the compunction that might have been expected, to rob them of their knives, guns, and ammunition, with which Roland, selecting weapons to his liking, was soon well armed.  The pouches of the warriors, containing strips of dried venison and stores of parched corn, Nathan appropriated in the same way, taking care, from the superabundance, to reward the services of little Peter, who received with modest gratitude, but despatched with energetic haste, the meal which his appearance, as well as his appetite, showed was not a blessing of every-day occurrence.

These preparations concluded, Nathan signified his readiness to conduct the young soldier on his way.  But as he stepped to the edge of the little glade, and turned to take a last look of the dead Indians, the victims of his own warlike hand, a change came over his appearance.  The bold and manly look which he had for a moment assumed, was exchanged for an air of embarrassment and almost timidity, such as marked his visage of old, at the Station.  He hesitated, paused, looked at the bodies again, and then at Roland; and finally muttered aloud, though with doubting accents,—­

“Thee is a man of war, friend,—­a man of war and a soldier! and thee fights Injuns even as the young men of Kentucky fights them; and thee may think it but right and proper, as they do, in such case made and provided, to take the scalps off the heads of these same dead vagabonds!  Truly, friend, if thee is of that mind, truly, I won’t oppose thee!”

“Their scalps? I scalp them!” cried Boland, with a soldier’s disgust; “I am no butcher:  I leave them to the bears and wolves, which the villains in their natures so strongly resembled.  I will kill Indians wherever I can; but no scalping, Nathan, no scalping from me!”

“Truly, it is just as thee thinks proper,” Nathan mumbled out; and without further remark he strode into the wood, following the path which the Piankeshaws had travelled the preceding evening, until, with Roland, he reached the spot where had happened the catastrophe of the keg,—­a place but a few hundred paces distant from the glade.  Along the whole way he had betrayed symptoms of dissatisfaction and uneasiness, for which Roland could not account; and now, having arrived at this spot, he came to a pause, and revealed the source of his trouble.

“Do thee sit down here and rest thee weary limbs, friend,” he said.  “Truly, I have left two Injun guns lying open to the day; and, truly, it doth afflict me to think so; for if other Injuns should chance upon this place, they must needs find them, and perhaps use them in killing poor white persons.  Truly, I will hide them in a hollow tree, and return to thee in a minute.”