The redoubted chief of the Nose-ring Indians was decorated in his
war-paint, and in his top-knot was a peacock's feather, which had been
given him out of the head-dress of the beautiful Princess of Lamballe.
His nose, from which hung the ornament from which his ferocious tribe
took its designation, was painted a light-blue, a circle of green and
orange was drawn round each eye, while serpentine stripes of black,
white, and vermilion alternately were smeared on his forehead, and
descended over his cheek-bones to his chin. His manly chest was
similarly tattooed and painted, and round his brawny neck and arms hung
innumerable bracelets and necklaces of human teeth, extracted (one only
from each skull) from the jaws of those who had fallen by the terrible
tomahawk at his girdle. His moccasins, and his blanket, which was draped
on his arm and fell in picturesque folds to his feet, were fringed with
tufts of hair--the black, the gray, the auburn, the golden ringlet of
beauty, the red lock from the forehead of the Scottish or the Northern
soldier, the snowy tress of extreme old age, the flaxen down of
infancy--all were there, dreadful reminiscences of the chief's triumphs
in war. The warrior leaned on his enormous rifle, and faced the King.
"And it was with that carabine that you shot Wolfe in '57?" said Louis,
eying the warrior and his weapon.
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