'Fire the pile!' cried Tisquantum; and the flames burst up from the dry crackling wood, and threw a broad sheet of light on the dark stream below.
'He is there!' again shouted the infuriated Chieftain. 'I see the white foam that his rapid strokes leave behind him. Send your arrows after him, my brave warriors, and suffer him not to escape. Ha! will Mahneto let him thus avoid my vengeance?'
The bow-strings twanged, and the arrows flew over the water. Where did they fall? Not on Coubitant's struggling form; for he had heard the Sachem's command, and had dived deeply beneath the surface of the water, and changed his course down the stream. When he rose again, it was in a part of the river that the flames did not illuminate; and those who sought his life saw him no more.
'Surely he was wounded, and has sunk, never to rise again!' exclaimed
Henrich. 'His doom has followed him!'
'Mahneto be praised!' cried Tisquantum; 'but I would I had seen him writhing in those flames!' And he turned and left the spot.
Coubitant gained the western shore of the river; and he smiled a strange and ominous smile, as he looked across the waters, and saw the forms of his enemies by the light of that fire which had been intended to consume his quivering flesh, and dismiss from earth his undaunted and cruel spirit.
'I will have vengeance yet!' ha muttered: and then he turned his steps towards the south, and paused not until he had traveled many miles down the river, when he lay down on its margin, and slept as soundly as if no guilt lay on his soul.
CHAPTER XVIII
Out of small beginnings great things have arisen,
and as one small
candle may light a thousand. So the light here kindled hath shone on
many.
GOVERNOR BRADFORDS JOURNAL.
Once more we must leave our Indian friends, and return to New Plymouth, and to comparatively civilized life, with all its cares and anxieties, from so many of which the wild tenants of the woods are free.