"U-gooh!" exclaimed the Fighting Nigger, at last so far recovering the power of speech as to be able to force an unspellable interjection through the nose; at the same time scratching his back with the knuckle of his thumb. "Neber seed de like in all my bo'n days. 'Pon my honor, ef dis young varmint don't carry on like a white man: couldn't a done dat thing mo'e ginteel'y myse'f. Burlman Rennuls"--jumping at solutions--"dar's black or white blood in dis young Injun; shore's you bo'n, dar's black or white blood in dis young Injun. Ef dar' wusn't he wouldn't be gwine on dis way like a white man--min', I tell you!" And Burlman Rennuls walked out of the fog; the Fighting Nigger walked out of the fog--out of the fog, into the clear, unmisted light of reason, walked, by a short cut, the entire man of Big Black Burl. Thus satisfied in his own mind that, let the matter be viewed on either side--the black side or the white side--there existed a kindred tie between himself and the young Indian, not to mention the debt of gratitude each owed the other, the Fighting Nigger felt that for once in his life he might, without soiling the skirts of his honor, or lowering the plumes of his dignity, play the familiar and brotherly with the red varmint. So, going up to the young brave, who the while had stood with his bright eyes fixed on some invisible quarter of the morning, our colored hero, with a bland condescension of manner that would have done a white man infinite good to see, shook his captive heartily by the hand. Then, with awkward carefulness, he took the wounded arm of the Indian between his fingers, to ascertain the extent of the injury done by his bullet. No bones were broken, but the flesh-wound inflicted by the ball--flattened and jagged as it was by its passage through the grim savage--was found to be ugly and painful enough. "Betsy Grumbo bites pow'ful hard when she gits a chance," remarked Burl, after inspecting the wound with critical narrowness for a few moments. "Well, jes' wait a bit, an' I'll see what I kin do for you." So saying, he went and divested the dead savage of his ruffled shirt, which he tore up into narrow strips, wherewith to bandage the crippled arm. For Burlman Rennuls, you must know, was quite a dab at surgery; his skill in that line having been called into frequent requisition by the mishaps of old Cornwallis, who seldom got through the unlucky quarters of the moon without snagging his legs; and also by the wounds which the heroic Grumbo had received in hunting and in war.