Our country is far away." "Do Peigans hunt with _war-arrows ?_" asked Cameron, pointing to their weapons.
This question seemed to perplex them, for they saw that their interrogator knew the difference between a war and a hunting arrow--the former being barbed in order to render its extraction from the wound difficult, while the head of the latter is round, and can be drawn out of game that has been killed, and used again.
"And do Peigans," continued Cameron, "come from a far country to trade with the white men _with nothing ?_" Again the Indians were silent, for they had not an article to trade about them.
Cameron now felt convinced that this party of Peigans, into whose hands Joe Blunt and Henri had fallen, were nothing else than a war party, and that the men now before him were a scouting party sent out from them, probably to spy out his own camp, on the trail of which they had fallen, so he said to them:-- "The Peigans are not wise men; they tell lies to the traders.

I will tell you that you are a war party, and that you are only a few warriors sent out to spy the traders' camp.

You have also two _Pale-face_ prisoners in your camp.

You cannot deceive me.

It is useless to try.