In a glade of the forest two young girls were cutting wood, wielding hatchets as though well accustomed to their use, and displaying finely formed arms at every movement. For, as a general rule, the hardworking Indian woman is more strongly developed in proportion than her lazy lord. Lounging against a pine close by, was a tall, slender young man, attired in a buffalo skin cloak, of which the head and fore-legs portion hung down with a ragged effect; from under his arm projected an ornamented pipe.
'I think he might work, and the ladies look on,' observed Linda.
She could hardly repress an exclamation as he turned his face towards her. Round his eyes were traced two yellow circles, and his mouth was enclosed by a parenthesis of vermilion; an arabesque pattern adorned each dusky cheek.
'Isn't he a brilliant fellow?' whispered Robert. 'A lover, you may be certain, who has attired himself thus to come out here and display his painted face to these girls.'
'But he does not appear to speak a single word to them.'
'Oh, they do a good deal with the eyes,' he answered, laughing. 'Now that I look at the girls, one of them is quite pretty, and I fancy I can detect a blush through the olive of her cheek.'
'What a hideous custom that painting the face is!'
'I can't agree with you; that young fellow would look much worse if he washed the paint off, and he knows it. You'd regret the change yourself, when you saw him look mean, dirty, and insignificant, as at ordinary times; for rarely he decorates himself thus.'
'Well, I beg you won't carry your liking so far as to practise it, nor Mr. Holt either.' Sam bowed obediently.
Perhaps nothing in the camp amused the European young lady more than the infants, the 'papooses,' in their back-board cradles, buried up to the armpits in moss, and protected overhead by an arch of thin wood, whence hung various playthings for the inmate.