In it we meet a cross-section of the settlement’s comic characters and Leatherstocking, the wizened 70-year-old who lives apart from society in a hut in the woods with his devoted Indian friend, Chingachgook, now known as ‘Indian John’, also 70 or so years old and feeling his age. The first in the series, The Pioneers, is an essentially comic novel set in a small settler village in upstate New York at Christmas 1793 and then through the year of 1794. The Last of The Mohicans is the second in James Fenimore Cooper’s series of ‘Leatherstocking’ novels, so called because they all feature the tall, honest frontiersman and friend of the Indians, Nathaniel ‘Natty’ Bumppo, also known as Leatherstocking, Hawkeye and the Deerslayer, among other nicknames. “Hold!” shrieked Cora, following wildly on his footsteps “release the child! wretch! what is’t you do?” (Chapter 17) “Never! strike if thou wilt, and complete thy revenge.” He hesitated a moment, and then catching the light and senseless form of Alice in his arms, the subtle Indian moved swiftly across the plain toward the woods. “Magua is a great chief!” returned the exulting savage, “will the dark-hair go to his tribe?” “Monster! there is blood, oceans of blood, upon thy soul thy spirit has moved this scene.” The Indian laughed tauntingly, as he held up his reeking hand, and answered: “It is red, but it comes from white veins!”
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