The trapper drew slowly aside, as if satisfied with the somewhat
incoherent reason Ellen had given why he should retire. When
completely out of ear shot of the earnest and hurried dialogue, that
instantly commenced between the two he had left, the old man again
paused, and patiently awaited the moment when he might renew his
conversation with beings in whom he felt a growing interest, no less
from the mysterious character of their intercourse, than from a
natural sympathy in the welfare of a pair so young, and who, as in the
simplicity of his heart he was also fain to believe, were also so
deserving. He was accompanied by his indolent, but attached dog, who
once more made his bed at the feet of his master, and soon lay
slumbering as usual, with his head nearly buried in the dense fog of
the prairie grass.

It was a spectacle so unusual to see the human form amid the solitude
in which he dwelt, that the trapper bent his eyes on the dim figures
of his new acquaintances, with sensations to which he had long been a
stranger. Their presence awakened recollections and emotions, to which
his sturdy but honest nature had latterly paid but little homage, and
his thoughts began to wander over the varied scenes of a life of
hardships, that had been strangely blended with scenes of wild and
peculiar enjoyment. The train taken by his thoughts had, already,
conducted him, in imagination, far into an ideal world, when he was,
once more suddenly, recalled to the reality of his situation, by the
movements of the faithful hound.

The dog, who, in submission to his years and infirmities, had
manifested such a decided propensity to sleep, now arose, and stalked
from out the shadow cast by the tall person of his master, and looked