It was perhaps
lucky for his fortitude that he was ignorant of the artifice of the
trapper in leading them around the citadel of Ishmael, and that he had
imbibed the soothing impression that every inch of prairie he
traversed was just so much added to the distance between his own
person and the detested rock. Notwithstanding the momentary shock he
certainly experienced, when he discovered this error, he now boldly
volunteered to enter the thicket in which there was some reason to
believe the body of the murdered Asa still lay. Perhaps the naturalist
was urged to show his spirit, on this occasion, by some secret
consciousness that his excessive industry in the retreat might be
liable to misconstruction; and it is certain that, whatever might be
his peculiar notions of danger from the quick, his habits and his
knowledge had placed him far above the apprehension of suffering harm
from any communication with the dead.
"If there is any service to be performed, which requires the perfect
command of the nervous system," said the man of science, with a look
that was slightly blustering, "you have only to give a direction to
his intellectual faculties, and here stands one on whose physical
powers you may depend.
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