THEY TAKE REFUGE IN A CAVE.

The terror which hastens their movement toward the dreary refuge is but partially allayed by their entrance into it; for it is quite certain that the demoniac pursuer will soon be in their neighbourhood. The mother and children are bestowed in the rude but sufficiently capacious hold. At some distance down an open avenue, by which alone it is accessible, Waban makes a great fire of the dry wood of the brake, to the surprise of Williams at a proceeding just only fitted, as he should think, to betray their hiding place. The sagacious Indian promptly sets him right, by explaining that the deadly enemy knows their retreat perfectly well; and that the fire is for the purpose of exposing him in his approach, as a mark for the arrow. There is a disconsolate yet thankful short repast; and then the two guardians take their posts: Williams in the entrance, behind a partial curtain made by shrubs; Waban concealed on a jutting rock outside.

THE PAWAW AND HIS BLOODHOUND.

Dark night; distant howlings; a fierce beast leaping from the thicket toward the fire, baying and howling, but recalled by a whistle before Waban's arrow could strike it. He exclaims, "The Pawaw! his dog!" and shrinks back so close in his covert as to raise an apprehensive suspicion that his courage is failing. A mass of branches, moving out from the wood, tells who, though not discernible, must be there. The fixed horror of a few moments is broken up by a fearful growl. It is the precursory bloodhound, believed by the savages, and even by Waban, to be the Pawaw's manittoo. William's hatchet cleaves its head. But immediately there is a stirring of the vine, by some hand forcing it aside. An earnest call, "Waban, where art thou!" is repeated as in doubt and reproach. But Waban is just where he should be; and an arrow from his obscure position lays "a giant savage" on the earth, howling in death. Presently there is "another and more fearful yell;" and the reviving blaze of the fire shows a figure advancing, not doubted to be the incarnate fiend himself. Williams springs out to share the peril. The brave Waban's hand and eye are on another shaft, when the bow-string breaks. Instantly he leaps from his rock, darts down the avenue, evades a hatchet hurled with

THE PAWAW AND HIS BLOODHOUND.

535

impetuous force at his head, and closes in mortal conflict. The combat soon passes out of view into the wood, where it is protracted through every variety of ardent, agonistic ferocity; the family listen to the sounds in an ecstasy of terror; Williams runs toward the spot with his axe, prepared to meet what might too possibly be the last extremity for them all. The signs of desperate struggle subside into silence, followed, after an interval, by the wild cry of victory; of which the expression, so intensely demoniac, conveys a fearful presage; he is held in a suspense almost intolerable, till a form issuing from the shade proves to be his champion, bearing a head into the light of the fire, in order to recognise the hideous features. All the savage flames up in his visage and action while, holding it by the long hair, he whirls it round and round, till he sends it bounding into the wood.

WILLIAMS ESTABLISHED IN HIS SETTLEMENT.

"Sire Williams," with his family and brave defender, is re-established in his plantation; where they cheerfully labour; converse over all the trials and perils through which a merciful Providence has conducted them; have an amiable sympathy with all animate and inanimate nature around them; and exult by anticipation in that republic of religious freedom of which they are the hopeful germ. No fell pawaw, now, to break in on their peace.

NEW TROUBLES.-A DEACON AGAIN.

But to his dismay Williams soon found that the same spirit had taken another form, no other than that of "a Plymouth elder." A deacon again comes to announce from authority, with sanctimonious formality, that the recusant shall not stay there to plant and sow his heretical mischief. Even now, if he will repent, recant, and perform penance due, the outcast's doom may be reversed or mitigated. But all in vain; after an animated declamation on the prerogatives of reason and freedom of thought, he represents, indignantly, that the tract he is occupying has been formally and freely conveyed to him in full right of possession, by the chief of the tribe. The deputy of church and state will have him to know, that the domain of that chief is included within the limits of the territory granted in absolute right to the colony,

by the king of England. He will, therefore, continue at his peril on this side the boundary river Seekonk. Beyond that he may betake himself to the Narragansets, or whatever pagan realm he pleases, so that the Holy Land be rid of him. That this tool of intolerance can ever again sit in synod to anathematize schismatics, he owes to Williams's stern repression of the wrath of Waban, who is burning to administer the same quietus as he had to the "black priest."

WILLIAMS'S SECOND PILGRIMAGE.

Certain that the mandate will be enforced, our ultra-exile prepares to abandon, with poignant regret, the scene of his labours, where his plants, his hopes, and his family, are all smiling and flourishing around him, and where he has contracted an almost affectionate relation with every object. But he resumes his fortitude to console Mary and the young ones, whose distress at this breaking up of what was to have been their delightful home, and the apparently interminable doom to destitution and wandering, is described in a touching manner. His reliance on Providence here receives a confirmation, by a more express recurrence to his memory of a circumstance of which he has sometimes been transiently reminded, but without due reflection; namely, that the mysterious and perhaps superhuman visitant, at whose dictate he made an instant flight from Salem, intimated his probable reappearance to the refugee at the place appointed for his ultimate asylum; and told him that the sign of his having attained it should be the greeting, "Whatcheer! Whatcheer!" from a tribe of Indians. No such tokens have been given him in his present situation. Human injustice therefore is only the unwitting signification of the Divine will.

The particulars of the departure; the adieu to the scene so much loved by both parents and children; Mary's pious but sorrowful endeavour to respond to her husband's faith in Providence the last sight of the forsaken dwelling, as they are rowed and steered by Waban in his slight canoe round a projection of the land; the stern aspect of the desert solitude as they coasted along; the appearance of wild animals disturbed or attracted by their passage; are traced in picturesque description.

ARRIVAL AND SETTLEMENT AT A SPOT OF RELIGIOUS

LIBERTY.

It is not a very prolonged voyage that brings them in sight of wreaths of smoke, rising from behind a cape. A little further, and they hear sounds which betray the presence of a multitude in a state of excitement; too probably, surmises our adventurer, some grand assembling in preparation for war. But he is soon undeceived by Waban's information, obtained from incidental intelligence, that it is a joyous celebration of peace, that very peace which had been effected by his intermediation. A short labour more of the vigorous rower presents to the assembly the unknown pale-faces, Mary's complexion additionally blanched at the formidable spectacle. The sudden appearance arrests their games, and brings them, all but the haughty chiefs, to the strand, gazing in silence, and not without menacing glances and gestures. There is a somewhat critical pause before their white brother has the resolution to stand up and bare his "manly forehead;" when he is recognised by some of the chiefs, who instantly hail him with the exclamation, "Whatcheer!" which is speedily repeated in shouts by the universal multitude.

This wild chorus is to our exile the voice of heaven. Here at last he obtains the reward of his constancy to his principles. Here is the destined spot for planting, under the auspices of a savage nation, the religious liberty which cannot grow on Christian ground, on one side of the Atlantic or the other.

Our heroic exile is welcomed, privileged, and revered by the Indian tribe; adores the Providence that has conducted and guarded him through so many perils; and looks with faith and exultation to the future ever-growing prosperity of that establishment of religious freedom of which he is to be honoured as the patriarch.

In conclusion we will only observe that the narration is consecutive, and is kept in a direct forward progress toward the ultimate event, without violent transgressions of probability. Indeed the author assures us he has adhered in a great measure to historical documents, including one written by Williams himself.

[On the subject of the preceding graphic and very interesting sketch, see Mr. Foster's Letter to Dr. Price, Life, vol. ii. pp. 156—7.]

GENERAL DEPRAVITY OF THE HUMAN RACE.* It would seem a little strange that our curiosity to know more of the human race, whether historically or geographically, should not be at all repressed by the certainty before hand, and the often renewed experience of the fact, of our finding in the acquirement just so much additional manifestation of the depravity and wretchedness of that race.

Let a previously unknown, or very imperfectly known, section of it be clearly brought into view, and though it should appear under the most degraded aspect of human existence, exhibiting the most odious moral and intellectual deformities, accompanied by physical and economical circumstances the most repulsive to our taste, we nevertheless gladly receive the information, and thank the man whose adventures and researches have supplied it as a kind of benefactor.

CURIOSITY INHERENT IN MAN.

If there were to come to us a slight rumour of a tribe or nation, existing perhaps in the hitherto absolute terra incognita of Africa under or near the line, reported as more hideous in barbarism and turpitude than any yet known, we should be so much the more, for that peculiarity, eager to have them brought into our acquaintance. If an explorer had dared the peril of such a scene, and escaped to tell us what he had beheld, we should demand from him a most full and particular report; and nothing would fret us more than if he should say, that there were some things which, for the credit of humanity, or even to save himself a probable imputation on his veracity, he judged it best to pass over in silence. We should want, of all things, to have a confidential personal communication with him, in order to get at those concealed treasures of knowledge.

IMPROBABILITY OF DISCOVERING AN UTOPIA.

In the indulgence of that passion for geographical discovery which has distinguished the age, we never dream

New Zealand: being a Narrative of Travels and Adventures during a Residence in that Country between the Years 1831 and 1837. By J. S. Polack, Esq., Member of the Colonial Society of London. Two vols. 8vo. 1838.