Now, the odorous spot which had
attracted the noses of the savages, and near which they had built
their fire, was that where the smallest quantity of the whiskey had
fallen. Le Bourdon reasoned on these circumstances in this wise:--if
half a barrel of the liquor can produce so strong a scent, a barrel
filled ought to produce one still stronger; and I will manifest my
medicine-character, by disregarding for the present moment the spot
on the hill-side, and proceed at once to that at the foot of the
rocks. To this latter point, therefore, did he direct all the
ceremony, as well as his own footsteps, when he yielded to the
solicitations of the Pottawattamies, and undertook to point out the
position of the whiskey spring.
The bee-hunter understood the Indian character too well to forget to
embellish his work with a proper amount of jugglery and acting.
Luckily, he had left in the canoe a sort of frock of mottled colors
that he had made himself, to wear in the woods in the autumn as a
hunting-dress, under the notion that such a covering would conceal
his approach from his game, by blending its hues with those of the
autumn leaf. This dress he now assumed, extorting a good deal of
half-suppressed admiration from the younger warriors, by the gay
appearance he made.
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