Nor were its effects less potential upon Nathan and Ralph, who, having first washed from their hands and faces the stains of battle, now drew nigh, snuffing the perfume of a dinner with as much ardour as they could have bestowed on the scent of battle.

The haunch, cooked to their hands, was straightway removed to a convenient place, where all, drawing their knives, fell foul with an energy of appetite and satisfaction that left them oblivious of most sublunary affairs.

The soldier forgot his sorrows, and Nathan forgot little Peter,--though little Peter, by suddenly creeping out of the bushes on the hill, and crawling humbly to the table, and his master's side, made it apparent he had not forgot himself.

As for the captain of horse-thieves, he forgot everything save the dinner itself, which he attacked with an appetite well nigh ravenous, having, as he swore, by way of grace over the first mouthful, eaten nothing save roots and leaves for more than three days.

It was only when, by despatching at least twice his share of the joint, he began to feel, as he said, "summat like a hoss and a gentleman," that the others succeeded in drawing from him a full account of the circumstances which had attended his solitary inroad into the Indian country and his fall into the clutches of the Shawnee party.
But little had the faithful fellow to impart, beyond what he had already told.