"Seneca," was the simple answer. The word was uttered in a tone so low and melancholy that it sounded like saddened music. Nothing that Fuller had ever before heard conveyed so much meaning so simply, and in so few syllables. It illuminated the long vista of the past, and cast a gloomy shadow into that of the future, alluding to a people driven from their haunts, never to find another resting-place on earth. That this young warrior so meant to express himself--not in an abject attempt to extort sympathy, but in the noble simplicity of a heart depressed by the fall of his race--Fuller could not doubt; and every generous feeling of his soul was enlisted in behalf of this young Indian. "Seneca," he repeated slowly, dropping his voice to something like the soft, deep tones of the other; "then you are in your own country, here?" "My country," answered the red man, coldly, "no; my FATHER'S country, yes." His English was good, denoting more than a common education, though it had a slightly foreign or peculiar accent. The intonations of his voice were decidedly those of the Indian. "You have come to visit the land of your fathers?" A slight wave of the hand was the reply. All this time the young Seneca kept his eye fastened in one direction, apparently regarding some object in the lake. Fuller could see nothing to attract this nearly riveted gaze, though curiosity induced him to make the effort. "You admire this sheet of water, by the earnest manner in which you look upon it?" observed Fuller. "See!" exclaimed the Indian, motioning toward a point near a mile distant. "He moves! may be he will come here." "Moves! I see nothing but land, water, and sky. What moves?" "The Swimming Seneca. For a thousand winters he is to swim in the waters of this lake. Such is the tradition of my people. Five hundred winters are gone by since he was thrown into the lake; five hundred more must come before he will sink. The curse of the Manitou is on him. Fire will not burn him; water will not swallow him up; the fish will not go near him; even the accursed axe of the settler can not cut him into chips! There he floats, and must float, until his time is finished!" {Swimming Seneca = though I have been unable to discover any genuine Native American origin for this legend, a detailed variation of it can be found in a poem, "Outalissa", by Rev. Ralph Hoyt, published in "Sketches by Rev. Hoyt, Vol. VIII" (New York. C. Shepard, n.d. [ca. 1848] (the Geneva College library copy of which is inscribed "DeLancey" and may have belonged to the family of Cooper's brother-in-law, Episcopal Bishop of Western New York William Heathcote De Lancey (1797-1865), who lived in Geneva)--a somewhat different version forms the Geneva (Hobart) College student legend of Chief Agayentha or "The Floating Chief."} "You must mean the 'Wandering. Jew?'"