Beadle's Dime Novels No. 95 — page 80: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

82 EPH PETHRS. | ' one way in which we may drive away this bad spirit from our camp.” >. “ And ‘does my brother know it ”” “Yes; the spirit is such, that it can only be harmed with fire. It is the same spitit which turned the blade of the ‘Swaying Oak’ against me, and the mind of the maiden toward him, We must bind him to an oak, and.draw a circle about him. Within this circle we must lay fagots of dry ‘wood and pile them as high as his head. Perhaps the spirit, . - which is strong within him, will make him cry out that he will not speak to the maiden any more. We must not heed him, for he will return when he no longer fears the fire.” “Let my brother go on,” said the chief, lifting a brand for his pipe. ; “When we have piled the fagots about him, we must set them on fire. If he is a bad man, he will cry out, and strug- gle, as women would do. If he cries out, we shall know that he is a wicked man, and that the devil is in him still. But when he is quiet, we must scatter the brands, for then the spirit will have gone out of him.” The Indian bowed in silence. It seemed to him no more than proper that he should be the instrument to aid in driving the bad spirit out of the ‘Swaying Oak,’ since his malevolence was doing injury to the Broken Reed. iv . “ Shall we take all the warriors to do this ?” said he. “ No,” replied Jaques; “ six besides yourself. I will stay here.” fa Where is the Swaying Oak ?” “Jaques pointed to the tent, and told him in what part bis” couch lay. The chief said no more, but quietly aroused six of his com- panions—powerful fellows, upon whom he could depend— and they approached the tent in a body, stepping like cats, for they knew that the partisan was sharp-eared, and that any unusual noise about his bed would be heard. Me-to-ne halted them at the tent-door and looked in. The partisan lay upon a couch of skins, in an attitude which showed to good advantage his noble figure. His naked sword lay within reach of his hand, This was not from any suspicion of danger, but his wild life made him cautious, and he was very careful in regard to his arms, re connicloooks.conwe