CHAPTER XXXII. 



MIKE AND TIGER-TAIL PLAY CHESS. 



'' Falstap. These nine in buckram that I told thee of, began to give me ground. 

 Prince Henry. monstrous ! " 



King Henry thk Fourth. 



There are some peculiarities in the Indian character that resemble 

 those of a cat. The Indian is patient, and untiring in pursuit of 

 prey, not seizing it by force but by surprise. He never openly 

 attacks an equal, but waylays him, nor risks a life to take another, 

 though the taking of that other may have been his sole occupation 

 for days. The knowledge of these feline qualities of the savage 

 gives to some backwoodsmen their great success in Indian war- 

 fare, and a reputation that, like Cceur de Lion's, is handed down 

 from generation to generation among nations that never heard of 

 the great Crusader. 



Mike was a philosopher in this lore. A saying of his was, " I 

 know what an Injin 's up to by his paint," meaning that his war- 

 paint, his trappings, the arms he carried, the decoration of his 

 dress, or its freshness, would show the errand on which he was bent. 



So when the savages fell back from the tower Mike methodi- 

 cally loaded his -rifle under the cover of the palmetto-bushes that 

 covered the little islet, measuring the charge of powder in an 

 alligator's tooth that hung at his girdle, and trimming off the spare 

 corners of his greased patch after the ball was fitted as carefully 

 as though he was shooting for a Christmas turkey, and then taking 

 out his store of venison from his hunting-shirt, made his morning 

 meal, as assured of a truce as tnough in his cabin. The islet he 

 was concealed upon was scarcely twenty yards across, and yet so 

 luxuriantly had the palmetto overgrown it that no single bit of 



