thing this tree was blown down but lately, and the leaves and boughs are
so thick on it."

"It was so provided by Tododaho in our great need," said Tayoga.

"Do you mean that we're likely to be besieged while we're still on our
bridge?" asked Robert, and despite himself he could not repress a
shiver.

"Not a siege exactly," replied Willet, "but the warriors may pass on the
farther shore, while we're still in the tree. That's the reason why I
spoke so gratefully of the thick leaves still clinging to it."

"They come even now," said Tayoga, in the lowest of whispers, and the
three, stopping, flattened themselves like climbing animals against the
trunk of the tree, until the dark shadow of their bodies blurred against
the dusk of its bark. They were about halfway across and the distance of
the stream beneath them seemed to Robert to have increased. He saw it
flowing black and swift, and, for a moment, he had a horrible fear lest
he should fall, but he tightened his grasp on a bough and turning his
eyes away from the water looked toward the woods.

"The warriors come," whispered Tayoga, and Robert, seeing, also
flattened himself yet farther against the tree, until he seemed fairly
to sink into the bark. Their likeness to climbing animals increased, and
it would have required keen eyes to have seen the three as they lay
along the trunk, deep among the leaves and boughs thirty feet from
either shore.

Tandakora, De Courcelles and about twenty warriors appeared in the