Though, as I have said, of a great age, he was still nimble and active. He had evidently been one of those tough, active men, who, though small in stature, are a match for any one. There was in my old friend's eyes a sort of dull fiery appearance, which, when anything excited him, or when he recounted some of those numerous battles, onslaughts, massacres, or stormings in which all the active part of his life had been spent, actually seemed to blaze up and give forth real fire. His breast was covered with spear-wounds, and he also had two very severe spear-wounds on his head; but he boasted that no single man had ever been able to touch him with the point of a spear. It was in grand _mêlées_, where he would have sometimes six or eight antagonists, that he had received these wounds. He was a great general, and I have heard him criticize closely the order and conduct of every battle of consequence which had been fought for fifty years before my arrival in the country. On these occasions the old "martialist" would draw on the sand the plan of the battle he was criticizing and describing; and in the course of time I began to perceive that, before the introduction of the musket, the art of war had been brought to great perfection by the natives: and that, when large numbers were engaged in a pitched battle, the order of battle resembled, in a most striking manner, some of the most approved orders of battle of the ancients. Since the introduction of firearms the natives have entirely altered their tactics, and adopted a system better adapted to the new weapon and the nature of the country.