noon
After a time she ceased trembling and looked up . But her glance made no account of the steady , old man who had so gently led her from her slough of despond , but rested on the straight , indignant back of the glorious youth who had cast her into it . And Sam Bolton , knowing the ways of a maid , merely sighed , and resumed his methodical paddling . At the noon stop and on portage it was impossible to gauge the feeling of the savages in regard to the matter , but at night the sentiment was strongly enough marked . May-may-gwán herself , much to her surprise , was no further censured , and was permitted to escape with merely the slights and sneers the women were able to inflict on her . Perhaps her masters , possessed of an accurate sense of justice , realised that the latter affair had not been her fault . Or , what is more likely , their race antagonism , always ready in these fierce men of the Silent Places , seized instinctively on this excuse to burst into a definite unfriendliness .