Le Bourdon, when his dialogue with the Chippewa was over, and after
a few words of explanation with Margery, took his own canoe, and
paddled through the rice-plants into the open water of the river, to
reconnoitre. The breadth of the stream induced him to float down
before the wind, until he reached a point where he could again
command a view of the hut. What he there saw, and what he next did,
must be reserved for a succeeding chapter.
CHAPTER VIII.
The elfin cast a glance around,
As he lighted down from his courser toad,
Then round his breast his wings he wound,
And close to the river's brink he strode;
He sprang on a rock, he breathed a prayer,
Above his head his arm he threw,
Then tossed a tiny curve in air,
And headlong plunged in the water blue.
DRAKE.
An hour had intervened between the time when le Bourdon had removed
the canoes of the Pottawattamies, and the time when he returned
alone to the northern side of the river. In the course of that hour
the chief of the savages had time to ascertain all the leading
circumstances that have just been related, and to collect his people
in and around the hut, for a passing council.
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