and being unusually well proportioned, his strength fully realized
the idea created by his gigantic frame. The face did no discredit
to the rest of the man, for it was both good-humored and handsome.
His air was free, and though his manner necessarily partook of the
rudeness of a border life, the grandeur that pervaded so noble a
physique prevented it from becoming altogether vulgar.

Deerslayer, as Hurry called his companion, was a very different
person in appearance, as well as in character. In stature he stood
about six feet in his moccasins, but his frame was comparatively
light and slender, showing muscles, however, that promised unusual
agility, if not unusual strength. His face would have had little
to recommend it except youth, were it not for an expression that
seldom failed to win upon those who had leisure to examine it, and
to yield to the feeling of confidence it created. This expression
was simply that of guileless truth, sustained by an earnestness of
purpose, and a sincerity of feeling, that rendered it remarkable.
At times this air of integrity seemed to be so simple as to awaken
the suspicion of a want of the usual means to discriminate between
artifice and truth; but few came in serious contact with the man,
without losing this distrust in respect for his opinions and motives.

Both these frontiersmen were still young, Hurry having reached the
age of six or eight and twenty, while Deerslayer was several years
his junior. Their attire needs no particular description, though
it may be well to add that it was composed in no small degree of
dressed deer-skins, and had the usual signs of belonging to those
who pass their time between the skirts of civilized society and the
boundless forests. There was, notwithstanding, some attention to
smartness and the picturesque in the arrangements of Deerslayer's