The pioneer walked very swiftly until he came to a little stream which prattled down to the big river.

Here he slipped off his boots and leggings, and waded down it with his companions for half a mile or so.
"They will follow our tracks when they find him," said he, "but this will throw them off, for it is only on running water that an Iroquois can find no trace.

And now we shall lie in this clump until nightfall, for we are little over a mile from Port Poitou, and it is dangerous to go forward, for the ground becomes more open." And so they remained concealed among the alders whilst the shadows turned from short to long, and the white drifting clouds above them were tinged with the pink of the setting sun.

Du Lhut coiled himself into a ball with his pipe between his teeth and dropped into a light sleep, pricking up his ears and starting at the slightest sound from the woods around them.

The two Americans whispered together for a long time, Ephraim telling some long story about the cruise of the brig _Industry_, bound to Jamestown for sugar and molasses, but at last the soothing hum of a gentle breeze through the branches lulled them off also, and they slept.