Only a thick darkness is there--an endless gloom to which the Mohican hatchets long, long ago dispatched the severed souls they struck! In every trail they stand, these ghosts of the Kanonsi, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga--ghosts of the Tuscarora.

The Mohawk beasts who wear the guise of men are there.
Mayaro spits upon them! And upon their League! And upon their Atotarho the Siwanois spit!" Suddenly his arm shot out and he grasped the hilt of my knife, drew it from my belt, and then slowly returned it.

I drew his knife and rendered it again.
"Brother," he said, "I have this day heard your voice coming to me out of the Northland! I have read the message on the belt you bore and wear; your voice has not lied to my ears; your message is clear as running springs to my eyes.

I can see through to their pleasant depths.
No snake lies hidden under them.

So now--now, I say--if my brother's sight is dimmed on the trail to Catharines-town, Mayaro will teach him how to see under the night-sun as owls see, so that behind us, the steps of many men shall not stumble, and the darkness of the Long House shall become redder than dawn, lighted by the flames of a thousand rifles! "Brother! A Sagamore never lies.