Page:The last of the Mohicans (1826 Volume 2).djvu/157

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THE MOHICANS.
151

and powerful influence. His red associate, however, was superior to such a weakness. He passed the groupes of dead with a steadiness of purpose, and an eye so calm that nothing but long and inveterate practice could enable him to maintain. The sensations produced in the minds of even the white men were different though uniformly sorrowful. One, whose gray locks and furrowed lineaments, blending with a martial air and trade, betrayed, in spite of the disguise of a woodman's rough dress, a man long experienced in scenes of war, was not ashamed to groan aloud whenever a spectacle of more than usual horror came under his view. The young man at his elbow shuddered, but seemed to suppress his feelings in tenderness to his companion. Of them all, the straggler who brought up the rear appeared alone to indulge, without fear of observation or dread of consequences, in the feelings he experienced. But with him the offence seemed rather given to the intellectual than the physical man. He gazed at the most appalling sight with eyes and muscles that knew not