With this preparation, he
proceeded directly to his task. But neither questions, signs, nor prayer,
produced the slightest visible effect. The boy gazed at the rigid and
austere countenance of his interrogator, while the words were issuing from
his lips; but, the instant they ceased, his searching and quick eye rolled
over the different curious faces by which he was hemmed in, as if he
trusted more to the sense of sight than that of hearing, for the
information he naturally sought concerning his future lot. It was found
impossible to obtain from him gesture or sound that should betray either
the purport of his questionable visit, his own personal appellation, or
that of his tribe.
"I have been among the red skins of the Providence Plantations," Eben
Dudley at length ventured to observe; "and their language, though but a
crooked and irrational jargon, is not unknown to me. With the leave of all
present," he continued regarding the Puritan in a manner to betray that
this general term meant him alone, "with the leave of all present, I will
put it to the younker in such a fashion, that he will be glad to answer.
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