“Wha,” cried he, “wha eber yierry Injan peak plain—plain so? hen!” and he shook his head mysteriously. “But wha,” following out his reflections, “dey want we fo tap foo—tell dem we no da sell fish, ya; let dem come sho.”
“Will you stop, there—ho?” again cried the man from the stern of the pursuing canoe.
“We cannot stop,” replied the master, “if you wish to buy fish, come ashore. Pull boys,” addressing himself to his men; “those seem to be strange customers.” Jack Jimmy and the other boatman bent on their oars.
As soon as the little fishing-boat was put in a more rapid movement, ten Indians simultaneously sprung as if it were by magic from the bottom of the canoe, and ranged themselves at its sides, paddle in hand.
“Wha, look dey!” cried Jack Jimmy, pointing tremblingly to the canoe, “pull,” addressing himself to his companion, “pull, me tell you:” and he himself drew his oar with all the energy and vigour which fear alone can impart. “Pull, me tell you,” continued he, every moment, to exhort his companion; “pull, me tell you.” Under these efforts the little shell boat skipped like a feather over the water: but it was no match for the canoe, propelled as it was by the vigorous paddles of twelve stout men.
Like an arrow from an Indian bow, or like the noiseless course of a serpent, through the lake it drew on the little fishing boat. Jack Jimmy and his companion exerted themselves to the utmost; the master too, plied his paddle strongly and continuously, but nearer and nearer the canoe approached. When at last it came opposite the pursued, the man at the stern dexterously threw his paddle on the other side, a rapid movement was made through the water, and the head of the canoe was at once athwart the little fishing boat.
Jack Jimmy could bear it no longer; as soon as the boat was boarded, with a convulsive spring, he plunged into the gulf; while the syllables of his interjected “Garamighty” bubbled up after him as he disappeared. But the first impulse of the master was to draw his knife from the side of the boat, where it was stuck in a chink of the boards, and with a deep-mouthed “carajo” was going to plunge it into the nearest Indian, but his arm was no sooner raised than it was paralized by a blow dealt him with his paddle by a man at the stern, and the knife fell from his grasp into the water.
“Fool,” cried the man who had thus struck him, “what is the use of your resistance: do you not see we number more than you? Get into this canoe immediately, you and your man, and see if you can save that strange creature that is capering on the water there;” and he pointed to Jack Jimmy, who had now come again to the surface, and in the extremity of his fear, with his mouth wide open, and his white eye-balls glaring, was swimming most furiously out to sea. The sight was too ridiculous even for the occasion; the whole of the Indians burst into a fit of laughter at poor Jack Jimmy, who was fatiguing himself at such a rate that his strength would probably not have lasted more than two minutes.
“Paddle to that poor fellow,” said the man at the stern, and the order was obeyed. But Jack Jimmy would not be taken; he dived several times to escape, to the no small amusement of the Indians: his strength however began to fail, and he was at last captured.
They took him into the canoe, when he was almost exhausted, and he was laid at the bottom of it, where he kept his eyes closed and stretched himself stiffly out, to pretend that he was dead. The Indians seemed highly amused by him. At last, however, he ventured to open his eyes, when, seeing some cutlasses and pikes that lay by his side at the bottom of the canoe, he closed them abruptly again and cried, “Oh La-a-r-rd, me dead!”