That time is needed to cool the meadow, for these unshod Teton beasts are as tender on the hoof as a barefooted girl." Middleton and Paul, who considered this unlooked-for escape as a species of resurrection, patiently awaited the time the trapper mentioned with renewed confidence in the infallibility of his judgment.

The Doctor regained his tablets, a little the worse from having fallen among the grass which had been subject to the action of the flames, and was consoling himself for this slight misfortune by recording uninterruptedly such different vacillations in light and shadow as he chose to consider phenomena.
In the mean time the veteran, on whose experience they all so implicitly relied for protection, employed himself in reconnoitring objects in the distance, through the openings which the air occasionally made in the immense bodies of smoke, that by this time lay in enormous piles on every part of the plain.
"Look you here, lads," the trapper said, after a long and anxious examination, "your eyes are young and may prove better than my worthless sight--though the time has been, when a wise and brave people saw reason to think me quick on a look-out; but those times are gone, and many a true and tried friend has passed away with them.

Ah's me! if I could choose a change in the orderings of Providence--which I cannot, and which it would be blasphemy to attempt, seeing that all things are governed by a wiser mind than belongs to mortal weakness--but if I were to choose a change, it would be to say, that such as they who have lived long together in friendship and kindness, and who have proved their fitness to go in company, by many acts of suffering and daring in each other's behalf, should be permitted to give up life at such times, as when the death of one leaves the other but little reason to wish to live." "Is it an Indian, that you see ?" demanded the impatient Middleton.
"Red-skin or White-skin it is much the same.

Friendship and use can tie men as strongly together in the woods as in the towns--ay, and for that matter, stronger.

Here are the young warriors of the prairies .-- Often do they sort themselves in pairs, and set apart their lives for deeds of friendship; and well and truly do they act up to their promises.
The death-blow to one is commonly mortal to the other! I have been a solitary man much of my time, if he can be called solitary, who has lived for seventy years in the very bosom of natur', and where he could at any instant open his heart to God, without having to strip it of the cares and wickednesses of the settlements--but making that allowance, have I been a solitary man; and yet have I always found that intercourse with my kind was pleasant, and painful to break off, provided that the companion was brave and honest.