Deerslayer (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) by James Fenimore Cooper

ought not to be so much here myself, but Jude pulls one way, while the beaver pulls another. More than a hundred Spanish dollars has that creatur’ cost me the last two seasons, and yet I could not forego the wish to look upon her face once more.”
    “Do the redmen often visit this lake, Hurry?” continued Deerslayer, pursuing his own train of thought.
    “Why, they come and go; sometimes in parties, and sometimes singly. The country seems to belong to no native tribe in particular; and so it has fallen into the hands of the Hutter tribe. The old man tells me that some sharp ones have been wheedling the Mohawks for an Indian deed, in order to get a title out of the colony; but nothing has come of it, seeing that no one heavy enough for such a trade has yet meddled with the matter. The hunters have a good life-lease still of this wilderness.”
    “So much the better, so much the better, Hurry. If I was King of England, the man that felled one of these trees without good occasion for the timber, should be banished to a desarted and forlorn region, in which no four-footed animal ever trod. Right glad am I that Chingachgook app’inted our meeting on this lake, for hitherto eye of mine never looked on such a glorious spectacle.”
    “That’s because you’ve kept so much among the Delawares, in whose country there are no lakes. Now, farther north and farther west these bits of water abound; and you’re young, and may yet live to see ’em. But though there be other lakes, Deerslayer, there’s no other Judith Hutter!”
    At this remark his companion smiled, and then he dropped his paddle into the water, as if in consideration of a lover’s haste. Both now pulled vigorously until they got within a hundred yards of the “castle,” as Hurry familiarly called the house of Hutter, when they again ceased paddling; the admirer of Judith restraining his impatience the more readily, as he perceived that the building was untenanted, at the moment. This new pause was to enable Deerslayer to survey the singular edifice, which was of a construction so novel as to merit a particular description.
    Muskrat Castle, as the house had been facetiously named by some waggish officer, stood in the open lake, at a distance of fully a quarter of a mile from the nearest shore. On every other side the water extended much farther, the precise position being distant about two miles from the northern end of the sheet, and near, if not quite, a mile from its eastern shore. As there was not the smallest appearance of any island, but the house stood on piles, with the water flowing beneath it, and Deerslayer had already discovered that the lake was of a great depth, he was fain to ask an explanation of this singular circumstance. Hurry solved the difficulty by telling him that on this spot alone, a long, narrow shoal, which extended for a few hundred yards in a north and south direction, rose within six or eight feet of the surface of the lake, and that Hutter had driven piles into it, and placed his habitation on them, for the purpose of security
    “The old fellow was burnt out three times, atween the Indians and the hunters; and in one affray with the redskins he lost his only son. 1 since which time he has taken to the water for safety No one can attack him here, without coming in a boat, and the plunder and scalps would scarce be worth the trouble of digging out canoes. Then it’s by no means sartain which would whip in such a scrimmage, for old Tom is well supplied with arms and ammunition, and the castle, as you may see, is a tight breastwork ag’in light shot.”
    Deerslayer had some theoretical knowledge of frontier warfare, though he had never yet been called on to raise his hand in anger against a fellow creature. He saw that Hurry did not overrate the strength of this position in a military point of view, since it would not be easy to attack it without exposing the assailants to the fire of the besieged. A good deal of art had also been