Slowly the Indian looked up, then rose like a spectre from his sombre blanket and fixed his sad eyes on Dunmore.
There was a faint movement, a rustle from the throng on floor and gallery, then dead silence, as from the old warrior's throat burst the first hollow, heart-sick word:
"Brother!"
Oh, the grim sadness of that word!—the mockery of its bitterness!—the desolate irony of despair ringing through it! Brother! That single word cursed the silence with an accusation so merciless that I saw Connolly's heavy visage grow purple, and Gibson turn his eyes away. Only my Lord Dunmore sat immovable, with the shadow of a sneer freezing on his painted face.
Logan slowly raised his arm:—
"Through that thick night which darkens the history of our subjugation, through all the degradation and reproach which has been heaped upon us, there runs one thread of light revealing our former greatness, pleading the causes of our decay, illuminating the pit of our downfall, promising that our dead shall live again! Not in the endless darkness whither priests and men consign us is that thread of light to be lost; but from the shadowy past it shall break out in brilliancy, redeeming a people's downfall, and wringing from you, our subjugators, the greeting—Brothers!
"Fathers: For Logan, that light comes too late. Death darkens my lodge; my door is closed to sun and moon and stars. Death darkens my lodge. All within lie dead. Logan is alone. He, too, is blind and sightless; like the quiet dead his ears are stopped, he hears not; nor can he see darkness or light.
"For Logan, light or darkness comes too late."
The old man paused; the silence was dreadful.