LEATHERSTOCKING TALES – Complete Collection. Джеймс Фенимор Купер

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      Chapter XXIII

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      “The winde is great upon the highest hilles;

       The quiet life is in the dale below;

       Who tread on ice shall slide against their willes;

       They want not cares, that curious arts should know.

       Who lives at ease and can content him so,

       Is perfect wise, and sets us all to schoole:

       Who hates this lore may well be called a foole.”

      —Thomas Churchyard, “Shore’s Wife,” xlvii

      The meeting between Deerslayer and his friends in the Ark was grave and anxious. The two Indians, in particular, read in his manner that he was not a successful fugitive, and a few sententious words sufficed to let them comprehend the nature of what their friend had termed his ‘furlough.’ Chingachgook immediately became thoughtful, while Hist, as usual, had no better mode of expressing her sympathy than by those little attentions which mark the affectionate manner of woman.

      In a few minutes, however, something like a general plan for the proceedings of the night was adopted, and to the eye of an uninstructed observer things would be thought to move in their ordinary train. It was now getting to be dark, and it was decided to sweep the Ark up to the castle, and secure it in its ordinary berth. This decision was come to, in some measure on account of the fact that all the canoes were again in the possession of their proper owners, but principally, from the security that was created by the representations of Deerslayer. He had examined the state of things among the Hurons, and felt satisfied that they meditated no further hostilities during the night, the loss they had met having indisposed them to further exertions for the moment. Then, he had a proposition to make; the object of his visit; and, if this were accepted, the war would at once terminate between the parties; and it was improbable that the Hurons would anticipate the failure of a project on which their chiefs had apparently set their hearts, by having recourse to violence previously to the return of their messenger. As soon as the Ark was properly secured, the different members of the party occupied themselves in their several peculiar manners, haste in council, or in decision, no more characterizing the proceedings of these border whites, than it did those of their red neighbors. The women busied themselves in preparations for the evening meal, sad and silent, but ever attentive to the first wants of nature. Hurry set about repairing his moccasins, by the light of a blazing knot; Chingachgook seated himself in gloomy thought, while Deerslayer proceeded, in a manner equally free from affectation and concern, to examine ‘Killdeer’, the rifle of Hutter that has been already mentioned, and which subsequently became so celebrated, in the hands of the individual who was now making a survey of its merits. The piece was a little longer than usual, and had evidently been turned out from the work shops of some manufacturer of a superior order. It had a few silver ornaments, though, on the whole, it would have been deemed a plain piece by most frontier men, its great merit consisting in the accuracy of its bore, the perfection of the details, and the excellence of the metal. Again and again did the hunter apply the breech to his shoulder, and glance his eye along the sights, and as often did he poise his body and raise the weapon slowly, as if about to catch an aim at a deer, in order to try the weight, and to ascertain its fitness for quick and accurate firing. All this was done, by the aid of Hurry’s torch, simply, but with an earnestness and abstraction that would have been found touching by any spectator who happened to know the real situation of the man.

      “Tis a glorious we’pon, Hurry!” Deerslayer at length exclaimed, “and it may be thought a pity that it has fallen into the hands of women. The hunters have told me of its expl’ites, and by all I have heard, I should set it down as sartain death in exper’enced hands. Hearken to the tick of this lock — a wolf trap has’n’t a livelier spring; pan and cock speak together, like two singing masters undertaking a psalm in meetin’. I never did see so true a bore, Hurry, that’s sartain!”

      “Ay, Old Tom used to give the piece a character, though he wasn’t the man to particularize the ra’al natur’ of any sort of fire arms, in practise,” returned March, passing the deer’s thongs through the moccasin with the coolness of a cobbler. “He was no marksman, that we must all allow; but he had his good p’ints, as well as his bad ones. I have had hopes that Judith might consait the idee of giving Killdeer to me.”

      “There’s no saying what young women may do, that’s a truth, Hurry, and I suppose you’re as likely to own the rifle as another. Still, when things are so very near perfection, it’s a pity not to reach it entirely.”

      “What do you mean by that?— Would not that piece look as well on my shoulder, as on any man’s?”

      “As for looks, I say nothing. You are both good-looking, and might make what is called a good-looking couple. But the true p’int is as to conduct. More deer would fall in one day, by that piece, in some man’s hands, than would fall in a week in your’n, Hurry! I’ve seen you try; yes, remember the buck t’other day.”

      “That buck was out of season, and who wishes to kill venison out of season. I was merely trying to frighten the creatur’, and I think you will own that he was pretty well skeared, at any rate.”

      “Well, well, have it as you say. But this is a lordly piece, and would make a steady hand and quick eye the King of the Woods!”

      “Then keep it, Deerslayer, and become King of the Woods,” said Judith, earnestly, who had heard the conversation, and whose eye was never long averted from the honest countenance of the hunter. “It can never be in better hands than it is, at this moment, and there I hope it will remain these fifty years.

      “Judith you can’t be in ‘arnest!” exclaimed Deerslayer, taken so much by surprise, as to betray more emotion than it was usual for him to manifest on ordinary occasions. “Such a gift would be fit for a ra’al King to make; yes, and for a ra’al King to receive.”

      “I never was more in earnest, in my life, Deerslayer, and I am as much in earnest in the wish as in the gift.”

      “Well, gal, well; we’ll find time to talk of this ag’in. You mustn’t be down hearted, Hurry, for Judith is a sprightly young woman, and she has a quick reason; she knows that the credit СКАЧАТЬ