| As soon as Deerslayer's eye caught a glimpse of the rushes, of which there were many growing in the water a hundred feet from the shore, he arrested the motion of the canoe, and anchored his boat by holding fast to the delicate but tenacious stem of one of the drooping plants. Here he remained, awaiting, with an intensity of suspense that can be easily imagined, the result of the hazardous enterprise. It would be difficult to convey to the minds of those who have never witnessed it, the sublimity that characterizes the silence of a solitude as deep as that which now reigned over the Glimmerglass. In the present instance, this sublimity was increased by the gloom of night, which threw its shadowy and fantastic forms around the lake, the forest, and the hills. It is not easy, indeed, to conceive of any place more favorable to heighten these natural impressions, than that Deerslayer now occupied. The size of the lake brought all within the reach of human senses, while it displayed so much of the imposing scene at a single view, giving up, as it might be, at a glance, a sufficiency to produce the deepest impressions. | Лишь только его глаза различили в темноте заросли колыхавшихся тростников, которые тянулись в ста футах от берега, он остановил пирогу. Здесь он и остался, ухватившись за гибкий, но прочный стебель тростника, поджидая с легко понятным волнением исхода рискованного предприятия, затеянного его товарищами. |
| As has been said, this was the first lake Deerslayer had ever seen. | Как мы уже говорили, Зверобой впервые в жизни попал на озеро. |
| Hitherto, his experience had been limited to the courses of rivers and smaller streams, and never before had he seen so much of that wilderness, which he so well loved, spread before his gaze. | Раньше ему приходилось видеть лишь реки и небольшие ручьи, и никогда еще столь обширное пространство лесной пустыни, которую он так любил, не расстилалось перед его взором. |
| Accustomed to the forest, however, his mind was capable of portraying all its hidden mysteries, as he looked upon its leafy surface. | Однако, привыкнув к жизни в лесу, он догадывался о всех скрытых в нем тайнах, глядя на лиственный покров. |
| This was also the first time he had been on a trail where human lives depended on the issue. | К тому же он впервые участвовал в деле, от которого зависели человеческие жизни. |
| His ears had often drunk in the traditions of frontier warfare, but he had never yet been confronted with an enemy. | Он часто слышал рассказы о пограничных войнах, но еще никогда не встречался с врагами лицом к лицу. |
| The reader will readily understand, therefore, how intense must have been the expectation of the young man, as be sat in his solitary canoe, endeavoring to catch the smallest sound that might denote the course of things on shore. | Итак, читатель легко представит себе, с каким напряжением молодой человек в своей одинокой пироге старался уловить малейший шорох, по которому он мог судить, что творится на берегу. |
| His training had been perfect, so far as theory could go, and his self-possession, notwithstanding the high excitement, that was the fruit of novelty, would have done credit to a veteran. | Зверобой прошел превосходную предварительную подготовку, и, несмотря на волнение, естественное для новичка, его выдержка сделала бы честь престарелому воину. |
