"Houa!" cried Grand-Loutre, "those were noble and generous words. But my brother has not told me how the Scotch are now friends with the English and fighting against the French."
"With rage in their hearts, the deputies returned to their mountains. At their death-cries, which they uttered at the gate of every town and village to announce the fate of Wallace, every one rushed to arms; and the war between the two nations continued for as many moons as there are grains of sand here in my hand," said Dumais, picking up a handful. "The Scotch were generally beaten by their swarming enemies, and their rivers ran with blood, but they knew not how to yield. The war would have been going on still but for a traitor who warned the English that nine Scotch chiefs, having gathered in a cavern to drink fire-water, had fallen to sleep there like our brother Talamousse."
"The red-skins," said Grand-Loutre, "are never traitors to their own people. They deceive their enemies, but never their friends. Will my brother tell me how it comes that there are traitors among the pale faces?"
Dumais, a little puzzled to answer this question, went on as if he had not heard it.
"The nine chiefs were taken to a great city and condemned to be hung within a month. On this sad news fires were lighted on all the hills of Scotland to summon a grand council of all the warriors. The wise men spoke fine words for three days and three nights, but came to no conclusion. Then they consulted the spirits, and a great medicine-man declared that the Manitou was angry with his children, and that they must bury the hatchet forever. Twenty warriors with blackened faces betook themselves to the chief town of the English, and before the gates they uttered a death-cry for every captive chief. A great council was held, and Ononthio granted peace on condition that they should give hostages, that they should deliver up their strongholds, that the two nations should henceforth be as one, and that the English and Scotch warriors should fight shoulder to shoulder against the enemies of the great Ononthio. A feast was made which lasted three days and three nights, and at which so much brandy was drunk that the women took away all the tomahawks. Had they not done so the war would have broken out anew. The English were so rejoiced that they promised to send the Scotch all the heads, feet, and tails of the sheep which they should kill in the future."
"The English must be generous, indeed," said the Indian.
"My brother must see by this," continued Dumais, "that a Scotch warrior would rather be burned than hung, and he will sell me his share of the prisoner. Let my brother fix his price, and Dumais will not count the cost."
"Grand-Loutre will not sell his share of the prisoner," said the Indian. "He has promised Taoutsi and Katakoui to hand him over to-morrow at Petit-Marigotte, and he will keep his word. The council will be assembled, and Grand-Loutre will speak to the young men. If the young men consent not to burn him, it will then be time to hand him over to D'Haberville."
"My brother knows Dumais," said the Canadian. "He knows that he is rich and a man of his word. Dumais will pay for the prisoner six times as much as Ononthio pays the Indians for every one of his enemies' scalps."
"Grand-Loutre knows," said the Indian, "that his brother speaks the truth, but he will not sell his share of the prisoner."