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Title: In Kentucky with Daniel Boone
Author: John T. McIntyre
Illustrators: Ralph L. Boyer
A. Edwin Kromer
Release Date: November 12, 2021 [eBook #66720]
Language: English
Produced by: D A Alexander, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was
made using scans of public domain works put online by
Harvard University Library's Open Collections Program.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN KENTUCKY WITH DANIEL
BOONE ***
[Illustration: HIS SWIFT EYES SEARCHED IT FOR THE SIGN]
IN KENTUCKY
WITH
DANIEL BOONE
_By_
JOHN T. McINTYRE
_Illustrations by_
Ralph L. Boyer and A. Edwin Kromer
[Illustration]
THE PENN PUBLISHING
COMPANY PHILADELPHIA
1913
COPYRIGHT
1913 BY
THE PENN
PUBLISHING
COMPANY
[Illustration]
Contents
I. THE GRAY LIZARD SPEAKS 7
II. A COMING STRUGGLE 18
III. DANIEL BOONE, MARKSMAN 33
IV. IN THE WILDERNESS 61
V. CAPTURED BY THE SHAWNEES 70
VI. BOONE IN THE WILDERNESS 93
VII. ATTACKED! 105
VIII. THE THREE BOYS RIDE ON A MISSION 114
IX. DEFENDING A LOG CABIN 125
X. A NIGHT EXPERIENCE 139
XI. THE BATTLE OF POINT PLEASANT 147
XII. THE FORT AT BOONESBOROUGH 164
XIII. CONCLUSION 174
XIV. SKETCH OF BOONE’S LIFE 185
Illustrations
HIS SWIFT EYES SEARCHED IT FOR THE SIGN _Frontispiece_
CLOSELY BOONE STUDIED THE TRAIL 75
THE RIFLES SPOKE THROUGH THE PORT-HOLES 136
HE INCREASED HIS SPEED 159
In Kentucky With Daniel Boone
CHAPTER I
THE GRAY LIZARD SPEAKS
Along the trail which wound along the banks of the Yadkin, in North
Carolina, rode a tall, sinewy man; he had a bronzed, resolute face,
wore the hunting shirt, leggins and moccasins of the backwoods, and
had hanging from one shoulder a long flint-locked rifle. A small buck,
which this unerring weapon of the hunter had lately brought down, lay
across his saddle bow.
Away along the trail, at a place where the river bent sharply, a cloud
of dust arose in the trail; and as the hunter rode forward he kept his
keen eyes upon this.
“Horsemen,” he told himself. “Two of them, I reckon, judging from the
dust.”
Nearer and nearer rolled the cloud; at length the riders within it
could be seen. One was a middle-aged man who rode a powerful black
horse; the other was a boy of perhaps thirteen whose mount was a
long-legged young horse, with a wild eye and ears that were never still.
Catching sight of the hunter, the man on the big black drew rein.
“What, Daniel!” cried he. “Well met!”
“How are you, Colonel Henderson?” replied the backwoodsman. “I didn’t
calculate on seeing you to-day.”
“I rode over for the express purpose of having a talk with you,” said
Colonel Henderson. “I was at your house, but they told me you’d gone
away early this morning to try for some game.”
The hunter glanced down at the buck across his saddle. There was a
discontented frown upon his brow.
“Yes, gone since early morning,” he said. “And this is all I got. The
hunting ain’t so good in the Yadkin country as it was once. As a boy
I’ve stood in the door of my father’s cabin and brought down deer big
enough to be this one’s granddaddy.”
The boy on the long-legged horse bounced up and down in his saddle at
this; the nag felt his excitement and began to rear and plunge.
“Steady, boy, steady,” said Colonel Henderson. “Hold him in.”
“It’s all right, uncle,” replied the lad. “He don’t mean anything by
it.” Then to the hunter, as his mount became quiet: “That was good
shooting, Mr. Boone, wasn’t it? And,” pointing to the carcass of the
buck, “so was that. Right behind the left shoulder; and it left hardly
a mark on him.”
Daniel Boone smiled.
“I always treat my old rifle well,” said he, humorously. “And she never
goes back on me.”
“Some time ago I had a talk with John Finley,” said Colonel Henderson.
“He told me wonderful tales of the hunting country beyond the Laurel
Ridge.”[1]
Daniel Boone’s eyes went toward the northwest where the great mountain
chain reared its peaks toward the sky until they were enveloped in a
blue mist.
“Beyond the Laurel Ridge,” said he, “there is a country such as no man
has ever seen before. Such hills and valleys, such forests and streams
and plains can only be in one place in the world. And there are deer
and bear and fur animals; and buffalo cover the plains. Also,” and a
grim look came into his face, “there are redskins!”
There was a short silence; Colonel Henderson looked at the backwoodsman
very thoughtfully.
“For some time,” said he, “it has seemed to me that these settlements
are not what they should be. The laws enforced by the British governor
Tryon, have sown discontent among the people. New emigrants go to other
places where there are better laws and less taxes.”
Daniel Boone nodded.
“Tax gatherers, magistrates, lawyers and such like live like
aristocrats,” said he, “and the farmers and other settlers are asked to
support them. We are here in the settlements, it seems, for no other
purpose than to give these fellows a soft living. And they take our
money and treat us like servants. A peddler who hucksters among the
Indians is thought a better man than the one who has cut a form out of
the wilderness with his axe.”
There was a bitterness in the man’s tone which seemed to please the
other.
“There are a great many who feel just as you do about it,” said he.
“And it was this very thing that I rode over to speak about.”
Daniel Boone shook his head.
“Signing writings and sending them to Tryon will do no good,” said
he. “He’s a tyrant and understands nothing but oppression.” Then in a
longing tone, his eyes on the distant hills, “I wish I were away from
the Yadkin for good and all. No man can be free here as long as we have
public officers who think of nothing but plunder.”
“As I said before,” said Colonel Henderson, in a satisfied tone, “there
are a great many others who are of the same way of thinking as you. But
they have nowhere to go; if a new country was opened for them, they
would sell their farms, pack their goods upon their horses’ backs and
be gone.”
There was something in the speaker’s tone that took the attention of
the backwoodsman. His keen eyes studied Colonel Henderson’s face; but
he said nothing.
“Ever since I heard Finley talk of the country beyond the ridge,” said
the colonel, resuming after a moment, “I’ve felt that such a rare
region should be opened up for settlement.”
“Right!” cried Daniel Boone and his eyes began to glow.
“But,” said the colonel, “I’ve also felt that it should not be done
until the country was explored further--until it had been penetrated
to its interior, until its streams were worked out on a chart, a trail
made for the passage of emigrants and the most promising places fixed
upon for settlements.”
“Right again,” said Daniel Boone. “I’ve been in the country and so have
Finley and some others; but none of us has studied it. To do that would
take a year or more; and to live a year so far from the settlements a
man would have to make up his mind to troubles from the Indians.”
“The Shawnees claim it,” said the colonel. “If it is what I want, I
will buy it from them.”
“It’s a hunting-ground for Cherokees, Shawnees and Chickasaws,” said
Boone, and he shook his head as he spoke. “So far as I could see, it
belonged to all of them. And it’s a fighting place; when two hunting
parties meet, the hatchet, knife and arrow begin their work.”
Once more the colonel regarded the backwoodsman attentively.
“I never knew the prospect of danger or hard work to hold you back in
anything you wanted to do,” he said.
Boone laughed.
“I’ve always tried not to let them, I reckon,” said he.
“This fall,” and the colonel spoke slowly, “I am going to send an
exploring party into the northwest country; and later, if it’s what I
think it is, I’ll want a party of trail makers and a man to treat with
the Shawnees. How would you like to take charge of this matter for me?”
For a moment Boone sat his horse, staring at the speaker.
“You mean it?” he said, at last.
“I do.”
The backwoodsman held out a strong brown hand; Colonel Henderson
gripped it.
“I’m with you,” said Boone, in a tone of deep satisfaction. “It’s a
thing I’ve been sort of dreaming of for years. That great region,
now given over to the Indian hunters and wild beasts, is calling the
white man. I heard its voice as I stood among the lonely hills, in
the forests, and upon the banks of its rivers. Once there with their
families, their plows and their horses, their cabins built, the settler
will meet----”
“Death!” said a strange voice; and, startled, both Boone and Colonel
Henderson turned their eyes in the direction from which it came.
An Indian stood there--an ancient savage, clad in skins upon which
were painted queer symbols. Strings of amulets, bears’ claws and the
teeth of foxes and wolves hung about him; his face was lined with the
deep wrinkles of great age, his eyes were small, black, and glittered
coldly like those of a snake.
“What, Gray Lizard!” said Boone, in surprise. “Are you here?”
The old Indian advanced a step or two, supporting himself by a long
staff. Keenly the serpent eyes gazed at the three whites.
“Death will meet the paleface,” said he. “He will never build his lodge
in the country beyond the mountains. Let him once pass the great gap,
and he is no more.”
Boone laughed.
“I’ve been through the gap, Gray Lizard,” he said, good-naturedly; “and
so have other white men. And we still live.”
The cold eyes fixed themselves upon the resolute face; one skinny
finger was lifted until it pointed at Boone’s breast.
“You have,” said Gray Lizard. “You have, and you are marked. Let your
rifle once more break the silence of the hills or ring over the waters
of the red man’s rivers, and your death song is sung.”
Then he turned to Colonel Henderson, and continued:
“And you, white chief, take care! The Gray Lizard has known these
many moons of what you mean to do, and now he warns you. If you love
your friends, do not send them beyond the Laurel Ridge. For in the
wilderness their fate awaits them at the hands of the Shawnees.”
He turned and was about to go; then he paused, and added:
“The Gray Lizard is old. He has seen many things. He knew the Yadkin
when the white man was a stranger on its banks. Take warning by his
words: do not venture beyond the blue hills.”
Then, his long staff ringing on the stones, he went limping down the
trail.
CHAPTER II
A COMING STRUGGLE
As the strange figure of the old Cherokee went halting along the river
trail, the eyes of Boone and his companions followed curiously.
“A queer sort of customer,” commented Colonel Henderson. “I don’t
recall ever having seen him before.”
“He’s a wonder worker and medicine man,” said Boone. “And he spends a
good bit of his time on the fringe of the settlements. Sometimes,” and
here a frown came upon his brow, “I’ve thought him more of a spy than
anything else.”
“At any rate he knows how to creep up on one secretly,” said the
colonel, with a laugh. And then, more soberly: “And he seemed rather
earnest in his sayings.”
Daniel Boone nodded his head.
“All these old redskins are crafty,” said he. “They spend their days
and nights finding out ways of imposing on their fellow savages. And
managing to do this without trouble they think they can impose in the
same way upon the white man.”
“I see,” said Colonel Henderson.
“If they can put fear in the hearts of the whites,” continued Boone,
“the whites will not venture into the wilderness. A settler killed now
and then is the common way; but there are others, and I’ve heard a
warning spoken by a prophet hung with totems before to-day.”
The boy who had been staring after the figure of Gray Lizard now spoke.
“I’ve been wondering where I saw him before, and now I’ve remembered,
Uncle Dick,” said he. “Yesterday I rode up the river to visit the camp
of the young braves who are to take part in the games. It was there I
saw him; among the lodges.”
“Ah!” said Boone; “and so the braves have come in for the games, eh?”
“More than a score of them,” replied the lad. “And a fine looking lot
they are, sir,” with admiration.
The backwoodsman nodded.
“They are sure to be,” said he, grimly. “The redskins seldom send any
but the pick of their villages.”
“It’s been three days since they pitched their camp,” said the lad.
“And they’ve been hard at work ever since, practicing with their bows
and rifles, and throwing their hatchets at marks. There’s a good runner
or two among them,” added the boy; “and they have some fine horses.”
“I’ve always been against these games,” said Daniel Boone, as he shook
his head.
Colonel Henderson looked at him in surprise.
“Why,” said he, “how is that? Athletic games always seemed to me to be
good for the youngsters.”
“So they are,” agreed Boone. “Mighty good. But these of ours are a
mistake, because the lads don’t put enough heart in ’em. They don’t
take ’em serious enough.”
The colonel smiled.
“It’s all in the spirit of fun,” said he.
But Boone shook his head.
“That’s where you’re wrong, colonel,” said he, “and that’s where the
boys are also wrong. There ain’t many of us whites on this border; but
over beyond the Laurel Ridge the Indians lie in clouds. And that they
haven’t blotted us out long since is because away down in their hearts
they’ve thought we’re better’n they are, for we’ve always showed we
could give them odds and beat them at anything they cared to do.”
“And now, you think----”
“Our young men are letting them pull out ahead too often; and that’s
not a good thing to have happen. Once let the red man get the notion
that he’s better than the white, and this border’ll be turned into a
wilderness--there won’t be a settlement but won’t feel the tomahawk and
the torch. The white man will be turned back from the west for twenty
years to come.”
“I see.” Colonel Henderson looked thoughtful. “I never thought of that,
Daniel; and now that you put it before me I can see that you are right.”
The boy had listened to what the backwoodsman had to say with much
attention. Now he spoke.
“Eph Taylor was along when I rode up to the Shawnee camp yesterday,”
said he. “And as we went he told me how the young braves crowed over
them last fall, and how they promised to beat them even worse this
year. And when we got to the camp all the young warriors grinned at us
and talked a lot among themselves. Eph knows some of their language and
said it was all about us, and about the games and how they were going
to run away from us in everything we tried.”
Boone looked at Henderson and nodded, grimly.
“Do you see?” said he. “That’s how it will begin. Five years from now
these same young redskins will have a voice in the councils of their
tribe. Let them carry this feeling of being better than us into those
councils, and nothing will hold them back from a bloody war.”
“Well, Noll,” said Colonel Henderson to his nephew, “you see what
you’ve got before you.”
The tone was half laughing; but when Oliver Barclay made reply it was
with all the seriousness in the world.
“Eph and I talked about it as we rode back home,” said he. “And we made
up our minds to give them a hard fight for each match as it came along.
Eph and I are to arrange everything to-day; that’s why I am riding over
to see him.”
“Well,” said Colonel Henderson, “I suppose you may as well go on if
that’s what you are about. I have some business to talk over with
Mr. Boone, and will ride back to his farm with him. Will you be home
to-night?”
Noll shook his head.
“I don’t think so,” he replied. Then with a laugh: “When I get down to
plotting with Eph Taylor there’s no telling when I’ll get through.”
He shook the rein, and the long-legged young horse brandished its heels
in most exuberant fashion. The boy waved his hand to the two men.
“Good-bye,” said he. Then to Boone, “Going to be at the games
to-morrow, Mr. Boone?”
“Maybe,” said the backwoodsman.
“Come along,” suggested Noll. “Maybe something’ll happen that’ll please
you.”
Boone looked at the strong young figure sitting the fiery horse so
easily, the clear eyes, the confident smile. And his bronzed face
wrinkled in a laugh of pleasure.
“Well, Noll,” said he, “I’ll go. But mind you this: I’ll expect
something more than I saw a year ago.”
“I can promise you that, anyhow,” said the boy. “And maybe there’ll be
more. Good-bye.”
And with that he rode forward along the river trail, while Daniel
Boone and Colonel Henderson turned their horses’ heads in the opposite
direction. A mile further on Noll overtook Gray Lizard plodding on with
the help of his long staff. The magician gave the boy a sidelong glance
as he passed; but Noll did not check the lope of his horse, pushing on
until he reached a place where a second trail branched away from the
river, winding among the huge forest trees and losing itself in the
billowing ocean of foliage.
He struck into this, and after an hour’s riding came in sight of a
well-built log house, surrounded by broad fields, from which the crops
had lately been harvested.
Before the cabin door sat a tall, lank boy in a hunting shirt, busily
engaged in cleaning a long flint-locked rifle. At the sound of the
rapid hoof-beats he looked up. Recognizing Oliver, who was still some
distance off, he waved his hand in greeting; then he turned his head
and spoke to some one within the cabin.
Drawing rein before the door, young Barclay threw himself from the
saddle.
“Well, Eph,” said he, as he tied his mount to a post, “I suppose you
all but gave up hope of me.”
Eph Taylor had a long, droll looking face, and as he shook his head he
twisted his countenance into an expression of comic denial.
“No,” said he. “I reckoned you’d be along some time soon. This thing of
ours was too important to let go by.”
He rammed a greased cloth down the barrel of the rifle, and twisting it
about, withdrew it once more.
“I saw Sandy,” added he.
At this Noll Barclay was all eagerness.
“Did you!” exclaimed he. “And what did he say?”
“Suppose I let him speak for himself,” said Eph, with the same comical
twist to his long face. “He came over this afternoon to talk things
over with us. Ho! Sandy! Can you come here for a little?”
A short, tow-haired youth appeared at the door of the cabin; he carried
a halter in one hand and a brad-awl in the other. He nodded to Oliver
good-humoredly.
“Glad to see you again,” said he. “How are you?”
His accent was broadly Scotch, and there was a round-bodied heartiness
to him which at once inspired good will.
“I’m in right good health,” said Oliver. “And I’m glad enough to see
you, Sandy.”
Sandy Campbell laughed. He placed a strap of the halter against the
door frame and punctured it with the awl.
“I was mighty taken with your notion,” stated he. “And when I got done
with my work, I rode over to hear more about it.”
Oliver Barclay sat down upon a rough settle which stood beneath a
cottonwood; he looked at the other two boys with earnest eyes.
“What we talked over yesterday, Eph,” said he, “seemed good reason
enough for us to make an attempt to get the best of the Cherokees. But
what I heard this afternoon puts a different face on it altogether.”
Eph Taylor looked up from his rifle in surprise.
“You don’t mean to say that you have changed your mind!” said he.
Oliver shook his head.
“Not a bit of it,” answered he. “Indeed, I’m firmer about it than ever.
But to just make an attempt to best the Indians won’t do now; we must
beat them!”
Both Eph and Sandy looked at him inquiringly.
“You say you heard something,” said Sandy Campbell. “What was it?”
“As I rode down the trail with my uncle,” said Noll, “we met Mr. Boone.”
The face of Eph Taylor took on an expression of interest.
“Oh, it was something he said, was it? Well, then, I allow it was worth
listening to, for Dan’l Boone always talks as the crow flies--in a
straight line.”
And then, while his two friends listened with great attention, Oliver
repeated the words of the backwoodsman. When he had finished, Sandy
nodded his head.
“It sounds much like the truth of the matter,” said he.
“It is the truth!” declared Eph, emphatically. “If we give these
redskins a chance to crow over us in little things, they’ll think they
can do it in big things. To-morrow we must take ’em in hand and give
them a good thrashing--a regular good one that they’ll not forget in a
hurry.”
“I’m all ready for my part of it,” grinned Sandy. “Or, at least I will
be as soon as this halter’s finished. That old Soldier horse couldn’t
have been better for the work if he’d been picked out of a hundred.
He’s got a back as wide as a floor; and I’ve been practicing with him
all summer, never thinking I’d have any use for it.”
“It’s lucky you did,” spoke Eph. “And I reckon the things you do’ll
make the redskins open their eyes. As for me,” and he fondled the long
rifle lovingly, “I got old Jerusha here; and when she begins to talk I
allow there won’t be many Shawnees that’ll use better language.”
Oliver smiled and nodded. To strangers there would have been a boastful
note in the words of young Taylor; but not to those who knew him. The
boy was a wonderful shot at all distances, but it never occurred to him
to take any personal credit for this. Oddly enough he gave it all to
his rifle.
“Nobody with half an eye could miss with her,” he’d frequently
declare. “She’s the greatest old shooting iron ever made.”
Oliver sat smiling and nodding at Eph’s faith in his piece, and while
he did so his eyes went to the spot where the long-legged young horse
was tied. Sandy noticed the look and his glance also went in the same
direction.
“The Hawk will do his share,” said he with an air of expert judgment.
“He has speed and bottom and in a long race he’ll break the hearts of
those Indian nags.”
“Just like his master’ll break the hearts of the Shawnees that’ll run
against _him_,” spoke Eph Taylor, with confidence.
“I’m not so sure of that,” said Oliver; and as he spoke a sound from
across the fields toward the line of forest took their attention. The
sinking sun glanced from the lithe bronze body of a young Indian who
was running swiftly and low, like a hound. “There’s the fellow I’m to
fight it out against,” added the white boy. “And any one who comes in
ahead of him will have speed, indeed.”
Eph Taylor nodded.
“He’s good,” admitted he. “But I count on him, Injun like, only to use
his legs in the race. To beat him, all you’ve got to do is to use your
head as well.”
CHAPTER III
DANIEL BOONE, MARKSMAN
Mounted upon his powerful bay horse, Daniel Boone the following day
rode toward Holman’s Ford. This point was some eight miles from
Hillsboro, and it was here that the young men of the settlement met
each fall for their hardy frontier games.
Keen-sighted youths, bearing long barrelled flint-locks, eagerly
awaited this, the test of their skill; sturdy wrestlers burned to match
their thews against each other; and the runners, both horse and man,
were equally anxious to show their quality.
The sun had reached high noon when the backwoodsman reached the ford,
dismounted and tied his nag to a tree. A long line of wagons, the
horses tied to the wheels, stood on the river bank; the settlers and
their families were gathered beneath the trees. Apart from these were
the athletes of farm and forest, well-grown boys and brawny young men;
they stood about in knots and discussed the probabilities of each
event. A smaller knot than any of the others stood at the foot of a
huge cottonwood; a hail went up from this as Boone went by; and he
paused as he recognized Oliver Barclay, Eph Taylor and Sandy Campbell.
“Well, youngsters,” said the pioneer, “how is it going?”
Eph Taylor grinned.
“There ain’t been much done yet, Mr. Boone,” said he. “And even with
the little we’ve gone through, we’ve had trouble with the redskins.”
The eyes of Boone went to a cleared space among the trees where a
number of lodges had been erected; upon some skins, thrown upon the
ground, lay a half score of keen-looking Shawnees. To the trees near
by were fastened a number of rangy-looking horses.
“What’s wrong?” asked the backwoodsman.
“We’ve had the jumps,” said Eph, “and none of the Indians entered for
them. So Eben Clarke won ’em all. Then there was the throwing of the
stone and big Sam Dutton put it further than any one else, by a good
bit. The first thing the Shawnees took any interest in was the swim. It
was across the river and back, to start at the word and all together. A
slippery little redskin entered for that; he got into the water like a
streak; and he was a real good swimmer. George Collins was off in the
front and the little Shawnee went by him like a fish. Then George began
to stretch out and grab the water in armfuls and pull himself after
him. But he never caught him till they got to the middle of the stream
on the way back. Sandy here was in the race,” and Eph grinned. “He
thinks he’s a swimmer, but he was still on the way over when George and
the redskin were coming back. Just as George caught the Indian they
both ran afoul of Sandy. And because George went ahead from that on and
won the race the Shawnees say the whole consarned thing was a put up
job to beat them out of the race.”
“And it’s not so,” said Sandy, with indignation. “If I interfered with
anybody it was with George Collins. I dived to get out of the Indian’s
way when I saw him coming and I went straight into George.”
“There’s only one of them who understands any English, beside old Gray
Lizard,” said Oliver, “and that’s the tall fellow covered with the
bearskin. We took the trouble to explain the matter to them; but they
just shake their heads and candidly think the worst of us.”
“Injuns,” stated Boone, “can never be got to quite believe the white
man. Maybe it’s because they’ve been beaten so often and in so many
ways that they’ve come to think that he _can’t_ have played fair with
him.”
The wrestling was now going forward, and big Sam Dutton, he of
the “stone throw,” was disposing of opponent after opponent with
ease. There being little interest manifested in this because of its
one-sidedness, the master of ceremonies, a stout, humorous-looking man,
called out:
“I reckon we’ll now have the fancy riders out getting ready.” Then in a
lower tone to those near him, “This is a thing the Injuns always win,
and our boys ought to be ashamed of themselves for letting ’em. Trick
riding ought to be as easy for a white as a redskin.”
This complaint was greeted by a laugh from those at whom it was aimed;
and the laugh was still echoing when a young Shawnee ran out and across
the green. To a tree some distance away he affixed a mark of painted
bark, then he paced off a score of yards, turned, drew a tomahawk and
waved it as though in challenge. Then the sinewy, bronzed arm went back
and the hatchet whizzed through the air; true and fair it struck the
mark, burying itself an inch or more in the tree.
A yell went up from the young braves at this; there were challenging
glances thrown right and left; but as none of the whites appeared
disposed to accept, a fresh mark was put up. Another Shawnee stepped
forward and drew out a heavy-bladed knife. For an instant he balanced
it in his hand, then launched it forward like a lightning flash,
straight to the heart of the mark.
Another whoop arose, and again the triumphant challenging glances went
around from the young savages.
“They reckon there ain’t none of you got it in you to do a thing like
that,” stated the master of ceremonies.
“Just you wait till the shooting,” answered a voice, and a murmur went
up from among the whites. “We’ll show ’em then.”
“Well, you ought to,” answered the stout man. “You’ve lived all your
lives with rifles in your hands, and it’s not much to your credit that
you can shoot. But,” and he waved one pudgy finger at them, “don’t be
too sure of the shooting, even at that. Maybe you ain’t heard that Long
Panther is here to-day! And anybody that’s acquainted with that young
redskin knows a Shawnee with a good eye and a steady hand.”
Here those horsemen entered for the fancy riding galloped out into the
open space. To a man they were Indians, in all the bravery of paint and
plumes.
“Not a single one of you!” exclaimed the fat master of ceremonies,
reproachfully, his gaze going from the array of confident savages to
the circle of lolling young whites. “Not a single one; not a thing do
you know about riding but to get into the saddle and sit there like an
old dame in a rocking-chair. Not a single----”
But there he paused, for just then there rode into the open space a
round-bodied youth with a cheerful, good-natured face, and mounted upon
an ambling white horse, as fat and unlike the fiery brutes bestridden
by the Shawnees as could well be imagined. A roar went up at sight
of this unexpected entry; even the stoical savages grinned in ironic
enjoyment of the situation.
Gravely the master of ceremonies shook the newcomer’s hand.
“Young man,” said he, gratefully, “you may not have much chance, but
you have got pluck. What’s your name and the name of that young animal
you’re a-riding?”
“I’m Sandy Campbell,” replied that good-natured youth, “and this,”
patting the fat white horse on the neck, “is Soldier, a plow horse,
fifteen years old, belonging to the man I work for.”
Another shout went up from the by-standers; but the master of
ceremonies held up his hand.
“It’s not your turn to laugh,” stated he. “He’s making a try; and
that’s something more than any of you have the enterprise to do.”
The word was given; one after another the young braves set their horses
into a gallop; when at full speed they leaped from the backs of their
mounts and, clinging to the streaming manes, ran a dozen or more yards
by their sides; then with agile swings they were astride them once
more. Then with a rush they approached the starting point, bringing
up sharply and in picturesque fashion, the front hoofs of the horses
pawing the air.
All eyes now turned upon Sandy Campbell and the sleek sided Soldier.
Quietly Sandy gave the white horse the word and calmly the placid
beast obeyed. At a stoical gallop he began circling the clearing;
his movements were as regular as those of a rocking-horse; and Sandy
sat him in total unconcern while shouts and laughter greeted them on
every hand. Then Sandy threw his right leg across the horse’s broad
back, sitting him sideways; it looked like an uncouth beginning of the
feat performed by the Shawnees and a titter of expectancy began. This
changed to a roar of derision as the fat boy slid from his perch to the
ground.
But if they had watched keenly, they would have perceived that he
alighted with a soft, practiced accuracy; also that the long comic
bounds which followed at the side of the calmly galloping Soldier were
really as light as those of a rubber ball. Then with one higher than
the others, and never putting a hand upon his horse, he was upon its
back once more; and Soldier drew up, switching his tail and regarding
the green distance with sleepy eyes.
Without waiting for the surprised applause of the settlers to grow to
the height it naturally would have reached, one of the young Shawnees
shook his rein; his nimble steed darted away like the wind, an arrow
flew ahead, performed a graceful arch and stack in the ground. Racing
at full speed the horse swooped down upon it; clinging with one foot
and one hand the brave stooped, caught the feathered shaft, and
recovering, waved it above him triumphantly.
Soldier was at once put into motion; when he had attained his best
speed, Sandy’s hat flew ahead to one side, and a long hunting knife
followed, falling to the other side, but a dozen or more yards further
along. Heading his galloping horse between these, Sandy stooped and
caught the hat; then recovering like a flash, he threw himself to the
opposite side, gripping the shaft of the knife as he sped by.
The shout which greeted this made the echo from across the Yadkin ring
lustily; the settlers now awoke to the fact that the round-faced youth
and his fat plow horse knew what they were about. And so they eagerly
acclaimed and urged them to do their best.
Trick after trick of horsemanship was performed by the Indians, and
all with the ease of experts and the dash of perfect confidence. But
their feats showed little imagination, and in this those of the white
boy were vastly superior. Each time they displayed something new he
duplicated it with an added touch, leaving them open-mouthed and aghast.
At last one of them, and their finest rider by far, broke from the
line and called something to Sandy, a something which was evidently a
defiance. Putting his horse to gallop, he, with much effort, swaying
and uncertainty, got upon his feet and there remained until he had
completed the circle, when he leaped to the ground. While the yells
of the Indians were still greeting this bit of daring, Sandy started
Soldier once more. With perfect ease, and greatly helped by the beast’s
broad back and its rocking-horse motion, the boy got upon his feet;
after making a complete round, he leaped up, turned a somersault,
alighted expertly upon the platform-like back, and once more stood
erect; then standing upon one foot and with the other twiddling in the
air, he galloped around once more.
This was the last straw. The Shawnees could not hope to outdo this, and
so retired. While the whites gathered about Sandy and his steed, Boone
turned to Oliver and Eph.
“I reckon your friend didn’t learn them things in Carolina,” said he.
Oliver laughed, delighted.
“No,” he replied. “At home, in Scotland, he was a rider in a circus;
and he’s been practicing and training the white horse for some time.”
“Friends!” called the master of ceremonies, “the time is drawing on,
and as there are three contests still to be decided, we’d best get at
them. The race for horses is next; riders will line across the trail.”
At this summons, Oliver Barclay sprang from Hawk, his long-legged young
horse, untied and mounted him; and as it happened as he rode to the end
of the forming line, he found himself next the tall young Shawnee whom
they had pointed out to Boone as being able to talk English.
“Umph!” said this personage, his swift eyes running over the points of
the horse. “You ride?”
Oliver nodded. The young brave bestrode a bony, long barreled horse
with small ears and a wicked head. Its bared teeth gleamed as it
snapped viciously at the horses within reach.
“Maybe you run,” ventured the Shawnee. Again Oliver nodded; and a glint
of satisfaction came into the keen black eyes of the brave.
“Heap good!” said he. “Long Panther will beat you in both.”
Oliver smiled.
“The Long Panther is a good rider,” said he. “We have seen him many
times break the wild horse, and manage the swift one. And he can run.
Only yesterday I saw him flying along the trail like a wolf in the
track of an antelope. But,” and the boy shook his head, “to win to-day,
even Long Panther must do his best.”
“White boy shoot?” asked Long Panther; but Oliver shook his head.
“Not enough to match myself against experts,” said he. “But there are a
few who will handle the rifle to-day, Long Panther, whom it will not be
easy to draw away from.”
The Shawnee lifted his head proudly.
“The red man will win,” said he. “His eye is like the eagle’s, his hand
as steady as the head of a rattlesnake before it strikes.”
The glance of the master of ceremonies ran along the line of horsemen.
Then he pointed to a lone tree far down the river trail from which a
flag was flying.
“You ride to that, around it, and back,” said he. “And now, when I drop
my hat, you start.”
Once more the glance went along the line to assure him that all was
still as it should be. Then the hat fell.
With a rush the horses shot forward along the trail; a cloud of dust
overhung them and it was hard to tell who led or who trailed in the
rear. Then little by little the compactness of the mass was lost; the
runners began to stretch out, the swift going to the front, and the
others falling back. At the flag the dust ascended in a great column;
then the riders were seen plunging through it on the way to the finish.
“Long Panther in the lead!” cried Eph Taylor, straining his eyes to
make out the contestants. “And he’s riding like as if he was part of
the horse.”
“I don’t see anything of young Noll,” said Boone.
Sandy Campbell was trying to keep the sun out of his eyes by holding
his outspread hands over them; he searched the dusty cloud as it rolled
toward them.
“I see him!” he shouted, in high excitement. “I see him!”
“Where?” demanded Eph, eagerly.
“He’s about the sixth rider--far back in the dust.”
“Sixth!” cried Eph, and his voice was husky with disappointment.
“But he’s coming along swiftly,” said Sandy. “The Hawk is stretching
over the ground like a rabbit.”
“I see him now!” shouted Eph. “I see him! But he’s not sixth--he’s
fourth!”
“He’s passed two of them since I spoke,” said Sandy, and then with a
whoop, “There goes another to the rear!”
“And still another!” cried Eph, dropping his beloved Jerusha and waving
his long arms. “He’s second!”
“Do you see Long Panther look over his shoulder?” called Sandy. “See
how his teeth show--even at that distance! He looks as vicious as that
ugly brute of a horse of his.”
Whirling out of the dust came the bony steed ridden by the Shawnee;
its sweeping stride covered the ground with astonishing speed, its
rider was bent low over its neck, his eagle plumes mingling with the
steed’s flying mane. But if the stride of the Indian’s steed ate up
the distance, the long legs of Hawk devoured it. The eyes of the young
animal fairly flowed with excitement; his wide nostrils showed red; his
flying hoofs made dazzling play as they flashed and reflashed, in and
out, up and down; his sleek hide was flecked with foam.
“One hundred yards to go!” cried Sandy.
“And the Hawk’s nose is at the Injun’s knee!” shouted Eph Taylor, arms
still waving madly.
Lower and still lower bent Long Panther, whiter and whiter gleamed
his teeth; faster and still faster flew the thundering hoofs of the
wicked looking steed. But nothing on four feet could have outstepped
the rush of the flame-eyed Hawk; no one who ever sat in a saddle could
have outdone in determination the boy who bestrode him. In a half dozen
mighty bounds the Hawk was nose and nose with the horse of the Indian;
and then he was ahead, daylight showing between them true and fair;
when he flashed by the finish he was a winner by a good half dozen
yards.
White boy and red slipped from their horses almost side by side as the
roar of applause went up from the crowd. Leaning against the heaving
side of his mount, the Long Panther stood for a moment staring into
the face of Oliver Barclay. Then, without a word, he turned, leaving
his horse standing in the trail and strode toward the lodges among the
trees.
Amid the tumult of shouting the stout master of ceremonies was not
idle. The next event was the shooting at all distances--and with all
weapons; and the targets and marks were set up with all possible speed.
“Yes, friends,” cried the stout man at the top of his voice, addressing
a throng gathered about Oliver and the Hawk, “I know how you feel, for
I feel just that way myself. It’s a good boy and a good colt. But let’s
get ahead with things. Now we have the shooting on our hands--shooting
with rifles or with bows and arrows, the white man and his red brother
to have the use of his favorite weapon. If a white wants to use a bow,
let him do so and the fates prosper him; if a red prefers a rifle, let
him take it by all means and use it to the best of his courage and
eyesight.”
As the riflemen came forward, each with his long weapon in his grip,
the throng followed and formed a sort of half circle behind them.
Several of the Indians also advanced, their long bows tautly strung,
their quivers full of arrows.
One by one the rifles cracked, and the bowstrings sang; mark after
mark was shot away, and marksman after marksman fell back defeated.
Eph Taylor advanced time after time, Jerusha in his hand; fondly he’d
cuddle the smooth stock against his cheek, and when the old weapon’s
sharp voice rang out, it was to announce the planting of a bullet in
the heart of the target.
After three-quarters of an hour the last Shawnee was eliminated; and
the struggle seemed between Eph Taylor and a gray-haired, keen-eyed
hunter from the region toward the ridge. It was nip and tuck between
this pair; neither seemed able to perform a feat which the other could
not duplicate. The ringing of the shots, the spatting of the ball,
the fall of wand or coin, or the snuffing out of candles went on with
monotonous regularity; but at length this was broken by the appearance
of the magician, Gray Lizard. With his amulets of skulls and claws, and
pouches filled with potent charms hanging from him, his staff in his
hand and his ratty old eyes filled with contempt, he advanced to the
place where the riflemen were standing.
“What child’s work!” cried he. “What pastime for the papooses of the
village! Again and again do you repeat what you have done before. And
nothing comes of it. The Shawnee is about to go! but before he goes he
would like to show his white brother what he thinks is a real test of
skill.” Then to the master of ceremonies, “Is it the white man’s will?”
The stout official scratched his head.
“It’s against all the rules that I ever heard tell of,” he announced.
“But I’m for letting them do it. What do you say, lads?”
A shout of assent went up from the settlers; for all were eager to see
what the redskin marksman would do.
The Gray Lizard turned and held up one hand toward the little knot of
savages who stood in a gloomy array at one side.
“Long Panther, by jickety!” said Eph, who had been looking toward the
Indians, curiously.
“I thought he was so tarnal mad at being licked in the hoss race that
he didn’t mean to shoot at all,” said the old hunter who had been
pressing Eph close. “But here he comes, as proud as a she wolf with
seven pups, and a-meaning to outshoot all creation if it can be done
any way at all.”
Long Panther advanced with erect head and a face like bronze, so
utterly devoid of expression was it; but his keen swift eyes were full
of fire and insolent challenge. His manner was that of one who felt
himself master of the situation.
“The Gray Lizard spoke well,” said he. “To shoot at sticks and lights
is work for the papoose, and not for the warrior. I ask but one shot;
and then let any of you do as well, and I am content to say the white
man is better than the Shawnee.”
As he spoke his swift eyes went about among the trees; upon a huge dead
limb of an oak, near to the trunk, sat a gray squirrel, his bushy tail
held erect, his deft forepaws stroking his moustache.
“A live mark!” said Long Panther, as he fitted an arrow to his string.
“I will take it through the skin at the back of its neck and pin it to
the tree.”
Almost before he ceased to speak, the arrow flew upon its mission; and
the next instant the squirrel, pinned exactly as the Shawnee marksman
had said, was struggling for release.
A hush fell upon the crowd; and as a boy nimbly ascended the oak and
liberated the squirrel, the master of ceremonies spoke.
“Men, it was a good shot. And, now, speak up. Can any of you do the
like?”
Eph and the old hunter were shaking their heads when Daniel Boone
stepped forward.
“The brave,” said Boone, slowly, “has made a good shot. No one will
gainsay that. But it was a trick.”
All eyes were upon him; Long Panther gave him a look of fierce disdain.
“The shot,” said the young warrior, “was fair, and was seen by all.”
Boone nodded.
“But for all that it was a trick,” said he. “It was a shot that can
be made only with an arrow. A marksman can’t pin a squirrel to a tree
trunk with a rifle bullet, Long Panther, as you know very well.”
A murmur went up from the whites; there was an eager assent to this way
of looking at the matter.
“But,” continued Boone, coolly, “you said that if any of us could do as
well, you’d admit yourself beaten.” He balanced his heavy rifle in his
strong hands, a smile upon his bronzed face. “Very well. To equal your
trick shot which cannot be done with a rifle, I will do one which can’t
be done with an arrow.”
A huge gum tree reared its mighty head upon the river bank; upon a limb
part way up lay a red squirrel, blinking at the assemblage with his
shrewd little eyes. The heavy rifle began to lift toward this mark.
“Long Panther,” said Boone, quietly, his eyes never leaving the tiny
ball of red fur so high in the air, “if I bring down the little beast,
dead, and with never a mark of the bullet on him, will you admit it as
good a shot as your own?”
“I will!” cried the Shawnee, promptly.
The long rifle cracked, a shower of particles of bark flew up from the
limb directly under the squirrel; the concussion threw the little
animal whirling into the air; it fell to the ground at the foot of the
gum tree--dead.[2]
In an instant it was in the hands of Long Panther; his swift eyes
searched it for the sign that would give him victory.
“Well?” asked Boone, after a moment.
The young warrior lifted his face.
“It is without a mark,” said he. Then as he turned away, he added in a
voice of wonder, “The white man is indeed a mighty hunter.”
And when the foot-racers took their places a few moments later to
decide the question of speed and endurance, Oliver Barclay was one of
them. But there were no Indians among them. Curiously, the boy cast
his eyes about, the words of the Gray Lizard occurring to him. Sure
enough, there were the redskins mounted, their camp equipment upon
the backs of the packhorses. With no thought of triumphing over a
beaten foe, but filled with disappointment at not having the chance
to try himself against the famed runner, Oliver stepped aside to Long
Panther’s horse.
“What! are you going before the race is run?” asked he, astonished.
The young warrior looked down into the face of the white boy long and
intently; then he spoke.
“It may be,” he said, “that the time will come when you and I will
run a race. And if it should, see to it that you are as swift as the
antelope of the plains; for it may be that you will have much at stake.”
And with that Long Panther rode off along the trail after his fellow
braves.
CHAPTER IV
IN THE WILDERNESS
That Boone had in mind an adventure beyond the Laurel Ridge was soon
noised abroad.
“Going on a big hunt,” said one of the settlers to another. “Taking
John Finley, who some years ago led a party to the Louisa River[3]
region, and some others.”
“Means to stay for some time, too, I hear,” said the other.
The first speaker nodded.
“Dan’l’s boys are big enough to look after things now,” said he. “And
I guess they have money enough to last a while. And besides the fun of
the hunt, Boone’ll bring back rich furs, for they say the country he’s
going into just swarms with game.”
But that Boone had any thought other than hunting was not known to
the settlements; that Colonel Henderson contemplated having the
backwoodsman inspect the wilderness as a preliminary to planting
colonies therein was kept a close secret.
It was one fine day in May in the year 1769 that the little party
assembled for the start. Besides Boone and Finley, there were James
Moncey, John Stuart, William Cool and Joseph Holden, hardy woodsmen,
dead shots and men who could be depended upon in any emergency.
Besides the sinewy, deep-winded horses which they rode, they had
a number of pack animals laden with blankets, ammunition and camp
equipment and provisions.
“We need not take much food,” said Boone, and Finley had agreed with
him. “A little meal and salt and such like, that’s all. For the
country into which we’re going, boys, is a paradise for riflemen. The
streams have never been fished except by the wandering Injuns; the
herds of deer and buffalo are endless; the small game, both furred and
feathered, are not to be counted.”
Each of the adventurers had slung across his back the very long,
flint-lock rifle made famous by their breed and generation; they also
carried keen, heavy knives and hatchets; only a few pistols were to be
seen among them. They wore deerskin hunting shirts and tanned leggins
of the same material; their powder-horns and bullet-pouches swung from
their shoulders.
Boone and the others had said good-bye to their families and now sat
their horses in the trail along the Yadkin, having a last word with
Colonel Henderson, who had ridden from Hillsboro to see them off. Noll
Barclay had borne him company, and Eph Taylor, eager and curious, had
journeyed from the forest-encircled farm to hear the latest word.
“I suppose,” Oliver said to his uncle, “that you have reasons, but I
can’t see why Eph and I could not ride with Mr. Boone on this adventure
as well as not.”
“You are too young,” spoke the colonel, after the fashion of a man who
had heard the suggestion in many forms before.
Boone looked at the straight, slight form of the lad, and then at the
lanky Eph. He nodded his agreement with the other.
“Too young,” said he. “There are times, lads, when years count, and
this is one of them. It’s not only your being short of endurance but of
judgment that makes it impossible to take you along this time. You look
at this thing as a bit of fun, and that is just what it is not. In a
year or two, though,” he added, “you’ll both have picked up years and
experience.”
“But in a year or two,” objected Noll, “there may be no trips into the
wilderness.”
Both Boone and Colonel Henderson laughed.
“The wilderness will be there for many years to come,” spoke the
colonel.
“And this, I think, is not the last trip into it by many,” said Daniel
Boone.
Young Barclay had talked over the adventure of the wilderness with both
Eph and Sandy, and while none of them hoped to be taken along on the
expedition, they, like every lad for miles around, longed to have fate
play an unexpected prank in their behalf.
“I don’t expect anything to happen,” Oliver had said, fervently. “But
you can never tell.”
However, it did not happen, and the two boys watched the hardy band
ride along the trail for the river, leading their pack animals, and
plunge into the budding green sea of the forest.
Now began the long hardship of the journey across the mountains. For
some days the going was not so difficult, because ways had been hewn
in the forests by settlers tilling the land round about; but in a
little while they penetrated beyond the settled district and were
voyaging in the trackless wilderness where the foot of the white man
had seldom fallen. They now followed the winding paths made by buffalo
and other large animals as being attended with less labor than pushing
their way through the dense undergrowth and interlacing vines. Through
deep ravines, down roaring mountain streams, descending into wonderful
valleys, fording deep rivers, they held their way across the mountain
ridge which streaked so blue across the sky-line; and at length they
found themselves on the verge of that far country of which they had
been in search.
Here and there in the journey they had come across the tracks of
redskins; once across the tree tops they had seen tall, pale columns of
smoke lifting, which told of a camp of some size. And having no desire
to become better acquainted with the wandering tribesmen, they had
always changed their course and brought into play all those wiles known
to the students of woodcraft to throw off their trail any one who might
stumble upon it.
“It’s always best to be careful,” said Boone, during one of these
sudden shifts in their course. “As far as I know there’s no big party
in this region, because it belongs to no one tribe and is visited only
by the hunters. But never take a chance that can be avoided--that’s the
safe course to follow.”
However, as Daniel Boone had said to Colonel Henderson, the beautiful
land of Kentucky was used, from time to time, as something more than a
hunting-ground. Bands of Chickasaws, Shawnees and Cherokees frequently
met in the heart of the wild, and when they did, savage fighting
followed. So desperate were these conflicts that the region became
known by an Indian name signifying “dark and bloody ground.”
Before the band of white men, as they stood upon an eminence of the
ridge on the day they first sighted Kentucky, was a vast rolling
country, roamed by herds of horned beasts, splendid streams and valleys
which promised a rich yield to the hand which drove the plow through it.
But after a space given to wonder and admiration, Boone noted that the
sun was slipping little by little behind the green rim of the forest.
“I think, boys,” suggested he, “we’d better look for a likely place to
camp for the night. To-morrow we’ll plunge into the new country and
have a close-at-hand look at everything.”
In the mountain-side was a small gorge across which a cottonwood had
fallen and hidden by a dense growth of thicket. Limbs were cut by
hatchet and knife and placed against the fallen tree in such a manner
as to form a sort of roof. Bark was pulled from those trees which gave
it readily, and fitted over the limbs; soft balsam boughs were placed
in the bottom of the gorge for beds; and here the adventurers made a
home in the wilds which they kept until the winter came with its snow
and rigors.
A turkey was roasted above the coals, impaled upon a ramrod; flap-jacks
were baked upon heated stones, and full of the spirit of the thing and
gifted with wonderful appetites the adventurers fell to and made a
hearty meal.
Then, afterward, they stretched out upon the soft boughs and watched
the moon drift across the sky while they talked of what was to come.
All was peace; save for the cry of some night bird, or the stirring of
the breeze among the trees, there was no sound.
Then, without a word of warning, there was a sudden crash from the
black looming forest, and the ring of a rifle-shot went echoing and
reëchoing from level to level until it died away in the stillness.
CHAPTER V
CAPTURED BY THE SHAWNEES
As the ring of the rifle died away, the little band in the hut reached
for their fire-arms; with pieces cocked and ready, they stole out and
crouched close to the ground, silently waiting. But nothing followed;
whoever fired the shot was a long distance away and the firing of the
shot had nothing to do with them.
“It may have been a signal,” said Boone, as he arose on one knee,
his keen eyes searching the great shafts of gray moonlight which lay
trailing on the mountain-side. “But it’s not likely. If we’ve enemies
hereabouts they’d not take that way of getting news of us to each
other. For one thing, we’d hear it; for another, powder is a hard thing
for a redskin to get, at best, and I reckon they’re not in a hurry to
waste any of it.”
“Must have been a shot by some red hunter to stop a catamount that had
come to his camp,” said Finley. “This looks to be a likely country for
critters of that kind.”
The shot, so surprising and unexpected, formed a subject for
conversation during the remainder of the evening; then, posting a guard
outside the hut, the explorers rolled themselves in their blankets and
went quietly to sleep.
After a breakfast of broiled squirrel next morning, Boone, Finley and
Stuart started out, their muskets across their shoulders, to examine
the aspect of the surrounding country. If what they had come through
in crossing the ridge had seemed trackless, this was infinitely more
so; there were myriads of small animals and birds; the deer seemed
merely wondering and possessed no fear of them. Near by was one of the
northern branches of the Louisa, and this they followed for miles; each
day was given to a venture, during the entire summer and the ensuing
fall. Always some of the party remained at the hut in the gorge, while
the others took the buffalo paths in search of new discoveries.
November came with its chilly nights; then fell December with its
sudden frosts, its flurries of snow and its long nights; and it was in
that same month of December that the first mishap befell them.
It was but a few days before Christmas that Boone and Stuart started
off in a direction seldom taken on former occasions. There was a
light snow upon the ground--not enough to impede their progress--but
sufficient to plainly show the tracks of anything that had passed
that way. The timber wolves had grown especially numerous since the
winter had set in, and their prints were scattered all about in the
cane-brakes and through the woods. Once they came upon the clear trace
of a catamount, and nothing would have pleased them better than to have
followed the beast and tried their rifles upon it; however, they were
in the wilderness for more important things than mere hunting, so they
passed the tempting trail and pushed on, intent upon the lay of the
ground, the quality of the soil, the timber and the natural drainage.
They had gone on for some hours in this way when Stuart heard Boone,
who was some yards in advance, give an exclamation of surprise. The
backwoodsman had paused and was bending over, studying something
intently.
“What is it?” asked Stuart, as he hastened forward.
Silently Boone pointed at the snow; there, distinctly printed, was the
trail of many moccasined feet.
“Injuns!” said Stuart, astonished.
Strange as it might seem, the little band of adventurers had not
caught sight of a red man since they had started out in the previous
spring; and this had, somehow, caused the idea to grow among them that
this particular region was being avoided by the Indian hunting parties,
at any rate for the time being.
Closely Boone studied the trail; some peculiarity of the moccasin
imprints struck him.
“They are Shawnees,” said he; “and as far as I can make out, there must
be a score of them.”
“That many, at least,” spoke Stuart, his eyes also examining the trail.
“A hunting party pushing toward the river; maybe in search of fur.”
Boone nodded, but somewhat dubiously. The sudden appearance of a large
band of savages at that precise time disquieted him; he felt in it the
promise of future danger.
[Illustration: CLOSELY BOONE STUDIED THE TRAIL]
“They’ve found meat scarce, I suppose,” suggested Stuart, as they went
on through the forest, “and so they had to go farther away from home.”
“It would have pleased me just as well if they’d taken another
direction, then,” said Boone. “We’re getting on too well with our work
to be disturbed just now.”
Ahead was a dense clump of dark, gloomy pine woods, on the edge of
which was a fringe of dwarf oaks. A heavy growth of bush and climbing
thorns had sprung up among these last; and as the two whites came to
this, their long rifles in the hollow of their arms, there came a
sudden rush, a fierce yell of exultation, and they found themselves
borne to the ground, disarmed and bound with leather thongs.
With their rifles, hatchets and hunting knives in the possession of
their captors, and their hands firmly secured behind their backs, they
were permitted to rise, and found themselves looking into a circle of
grim, copper-colored faces, and being examined by narrow, threatening
eyes.
It was a party of Shawnees, and evidently the same whose tracks they
had come across a short time before. The braves were in their full
panoply of war; they carried bows and scalping knives, quivers of
arrows were on their backs, tomahawks were in their belts; a few
ancient looking rifles were the only fire-arms to be seen among them,
however, and the powder-horns and bullet-pouches were fewer still.
A powerful looking savage, evidently a chief, and the leader of the
band, now spoke.
“The white faces hunt in the hunting-grounds of the Shawnee,” said he,
in very bad English.
But Boone looked at him with cool, humorous eye.
“The great chief is mistaken,” said he. “The white man would not so
wrong his red brother.”
The Shawnee chief said something to his followers, no doubt
interpreting the saying of the backwoodsman; there came a series of
grunts and ejaculations from them; their copper-colored faces grew
grimmer still, their eyes even more threatening than before.
“Yesterday we heard the rifle of the white face,” spoke the Shawnee
leader, turning again to Boone; “to-day we have heard it. We have seen
the remains of deer and buffalo which he has killed; we have seen his
beaver traps in the streams.” There was a moment’s pause, then the
savage added: “What has the white face to say?”
“You might have heard our rifles speak for many days, if you had been
here,” replied Boone. “And that you have seen the carcasses of deer and
other animals which we have killed is quite likely. But what of that?
The country is open to hunters, is it not? Do not the Chickasaws and
the Cherokees hunt their meat and fur in these woods and mountains?
Why, then, do the Shawnees claim it as their own?”
“The Chickasaws and the Cherokees are thieves!” pronounced the Shawnee
chief. “We have taken the war-path against them; we will make a wailing
in their lodges, an emptiness in their villages.”
“You treat your white brother with injustice when you ambush him
and take away his arms. You have suffered no wrong at his hands,”
maintained Boone.
Again the chief translated to his braves, and again came the grunts and
ejaculations. But in spite of the threatening looks and the tightening
of the savage circle, the backwoodsman proceeded fearlessly.
“If any one hunts in this region without right, it is the red man,”
declared he. “The whole of the country below the great river belongs to
the white face. Many moons ago, at the great council at Fort Stanwix,
the league of the Iroquois turned over this land to the colonists. Does
the red brother deny this? Does he not mean to keep faith?”
What Boone said was true, and the Shawnee knew it, but in the southern
tribes the right of the league to cede the territory had always been
denied. So the chief regarded Boone with fierce-eyed anger.
“The white face is as cunning as the snake,” said he, “and his tongue
is as crooked.”
Then turning away from them he gave a signal; the band at once started
off, the two captives in their midst, guarded by a half dozen lean,
hawk-like braves. Some miles away among the hills was the Shawnee camp,
a dozen or more deerskin lodges erected in a sheltered place. Fires
were burning outside the tepees; several young men were cooking strips
of meat upon pointed sticks.
The whites were bound to heavy stakes driven firmly into the ground;
then the band gathered about the fires, and when the meat was cooked
began to eat it in silence.
“Well,” said Stuart, who had said very little since their capture, “it
has a bad look.”
“It might be worse,” replied Boone, coolly, his calm eyes studying the
Shawnees at the camp-fires. “There is a good chance for us yet.”
“To escape?”
Boone nodded.
“But how?”
The calm eyes twinkled as they turned upon the speaker.
“Don’t offer me any puzzles to answer,” said Boone. “I have no more
notion ‘how’ than you have. But the chance will come in some way; and
it will be for us to be ready to take hold of it.”
Though Boone had never been taken captive by the Indians before, he
knew, from talks with those who had, and from his knowledge of savage
ceremony, that in cases like their own, a certain form was always gone
through before torture and death were resorted to.
“They’ll keep us,” he told Stuart, “and try to get us to come into the
tribe. It’s a strange kink in their natures that though they hate the
white, they seldom fail to try to make him one of them by adoption if
they have the chance.”
“You think they’ll try and make Shawnees of us?”
“It’s like as not,” answered Boone.
“Before I’ll be a renegade, I’ll die,” said Stuart, stoutly.
Boone nodded.
“I don’t know as I blame you in that,” spoke he. “A renegade is as mean
a critter as walks the earth. But it’d be just as well if we kept our
feelings on that point from the Shawnees.”
“You mean----”
“That if we’re asked to join the tribe, we’d better not refuse. It’s
life if we can deceive them, and death by horrible torture if we
refuse.”
“I don’t like the notion of even seeming to be an Injun,” spoke Stuart,
who was a brave man and stubborn in his courage. “But whatever you
think best, that I will do.”
That night they were given a couple of bearskins to lie upon, and
their bonds were looked to with much care. They slept fairly well but
were awake at dawn when the savages began to stir about the camp. Some
meat and a sort of porridge made of Indian corn, crushed between two
smooth stones, was given to them; and after they had eaten, the Shawnee
chief approached, followed by the eldest of his warriors. Silently
they sat before their prisoners, seeming to study them with the utmost
attention. After a space the chief spoke.
“The white faces are prisoners; they were taken in war by Black Wolf
and his braves; they are without arms, they are helpless.”
Neither Stuart nor Boone made any reply to this; but the warriors, upon
the words of Black Wolf being interpreted to them, expressed their
approval by nods and throaty murmurs.
“Far away, toward the rising sun, are the friends of the white face,
far away where the morning first touches the forest are his lodges.
Neither friends nor lodges will he ever see again.”
There was another pause; Black Wolf studied the expressions of their
faces intently. But still they made no reply. The chief then resumed:
“You have killed in the hunting-grounds of the Shawnees, and for this
your lives belong to Black Wolf and his braves. But the chief would
spare you; he does not wish to see you die. Rather would he see you,
his brothers, living in the wigwams of the Shawnees and taking to the
war-path against his people’s foes.”
This being repeated in the Shawnee tongue to the elder warriors, was
greeted with a chorus of approving grunts. And then Black Wolf asked:
“What does the white face say?”
“The Shawnee chief is a noble hunter and a warrior whose fame runs
beyond the blue ridge,” said Daniel Boone. “And his words are as
straight as the young birch by the waterside. It is true that the
pale-face’s friends are far away, and that his lodge is many days
across the hills; and for both of these his heart is sore. But he would
not lose his life. Other friends he can make; other lodges he can
build; but he has one life only, and when that is gone he cannot call
it back.”
Black Wolf repeated this to his counselors and again came the chorus of
grunted approval.
“It is well spoken,” praised the Shawnee chief. “Do you, then, give up
your people and will you go to the villages of the Shawnee and make
them your home?”
“To save my life--yes.”
“And you?” asked Black Wolf, his eyes going to Stuart.
“I say the same,” replied that worthy.
“It is well,” said the chief.
He arose, and the elder braves did likewise; turning to them he spoke
briefly and to what he said they apparently agreed with readiness. One
of the warriors took out his knife, approached the captives and severed
the thongs which bound them.
Black Wolf signed for them to get up.
“My young men are about to start upon a hunt,” said he. “It were well
if the white brothers went with them.”
The hunting party was already making ready; and in half an hour or so
it filed out of the camp and along a buffalo track which led toward
the west. The two white men trudged along the track, Boone whistling a
snatch of an old English air, Stuart morose and heavy of brow.
Finally the latter spoke.
“Why are we taken out with a hunting party and provided with no
weapons? It hasn’t a reasonable look!”
Boone stopped his whistling.
“The whole idea of this party is just a little game of the redskins.
It’s not their purpose to hunt,” said he.
“Not their purpose to hunt?” echoed the other.
Boone nodded.
“Just keep your eye peeled,” spoke he. “Do you see how the varmints go
along--careless and never noticing us? Never a look do they give us, so
far as I can see. But,” and he covertly clutched his companion’s arm in
his strong grip, “they’re noticing us, never fear. They see everything
we do, every look we give away from the track we’re following. This is
not a hunt, comrade; it’s a test of our intentions. They are trying us.
And the trial will go on in different ways for days. Some one will
always be watching us; to try and escape will mean death for us.”
“A pleasant outlook,” said Stuart, gloomily.
“But don’t forget,” said Boone, “that this watch upon us will not last
always. Let us make it seem as if we were contented enough. If they lay
little traps for us to fall into, let us step over them. No matter how
good the chance seems for a while, we must not try to get away; for
it will only win us a dozen or so arrows in our backs. After a little
while they’ll grow slack in their watching. If they see us living
quietly as they live, doing the things they do, they’ll come to trust
us more and more. And then our chance will come--and we’ll make the
best of it.”
Keeping up an intent observation of the savages, Stuart gradually came
to the conclusion that what Boone said was true. Not a moment passed
but they found themselves closely watched by the Shawnees. And so he
came to see that his friend’s plan was the solution of their situation.
The gloomy look vanished and the frowns followed; his manner grew as
care-free as could well be imagined; he also whistled a catch now and
then; and more than once he laughed light-heartedly over some small
incident of the march, a thing which was not thrown away upon their red
brothers.
That night they spent in a lodge which Black Wolf gave up to them;
as before, they were not bound and apparently were unguarded. But
both knew that the sharp eyes of the bronze warriors were peering
at the lodge, that lurking forms hung silently in the shadows, and
swift-winged arrows were ready to sing their death song should they
make an attempt to escape.
And so it went one day after another until a full week had passed.
Adventure after adventure did the Shawnees take them upon; at times
they were left apparently alone for hours in the forest; the
temptation was great, but they conquered it; and always were they glad
they had done so, for it was shown afterward that in each case the
savages had been at no great distance, and that the thing had been one
of the traps which Boone had foretold.
Little by little, in the face of this plainly shown content of the
white brothers for their lot, the Shawnees became lax in their
vigilance, and finally upon the seventh night of their captivity, the
active-minded Boone saw their first real chance of escape. All was
still in the redskin camp; the fires smouldered under coverings of
ash; a pale, wintry moon looked down upon the wilderness. It had been
an active day for the savages; it had been thought that a party of
Cherokees had entered the region, and all the warriors of Black Wolf’s
band had been ranging the woods searching for their trail. And so
these braves, whose duty it was to keep a careful eye upon the adopted
whites, grew heavy eyed as the night wore on; their deep breathing
told the wide-awake Boone that all were asleep.
Stuart, also, was asleep; carefully Boone awoke him.
“The time’s come,” he whispered in the ear of the surprised
backwoodsman. “Make no noise; all the critters are as sound as rocks.”
Softly they crept through the opening in the lodge; like cats they
moved among the other wigwams until they gained the shadows. Then Boone
halted.
“What now?” asked Stuart, in a whisper.
“We’ve left our rifles behind. Wait here.”
“You don’t mean to go back!” Stuart was amazed.
“I must. Do you realize what it would mean to be away here in the
wilderness without the means of getting game for food? Man, we’d die.”
Seeing the force of this, Stuart released the hold he had taken upon
Boone’s shoulder. Back into the Indian encampment stole Daniel Boone;
straight to the tepee of Black Wolf he went, and, from his place in the
shadows, Stuart saw the brave pioneer stoop and enter. Then followed
a long pause. The waiting man could hear the heavy throbs of his own
heart. Each moment he expected to hear the war-whoop of the Shawnee,
and to see the camp spring into activity.
But fortune smiled upon the daring Boone, for after a time he appeared,
the two rifles in his hands, and their powder-horns and bullet-pouches
slung upon his shoulders. Silently he recrossed into the shadows;
quietly he gave Stuart his own piece, his own horn and pouch; then
creeping like wild things of the wilderness, they stole away into the
depths where the night would hide them from all hostile eyes.
CHAPTER VI
BOONE IN THE WILDERNESS
All that night the two adventurers pressed steadily away from the
Indian encampment; they made, as far as they could reckon it, in the
general direction of their camp in the gorge. The pale moon filtered
through the bare branches of the trees, the stars twinkled helpfully;
and when morning came dimly above the higher hills they found that they
had judged their direction with singular accuracy. They were not more
than a mile or two from their own camp.
“Pretty good, for going it blind,” said Boone, well pleased. “And now
I suppose we’ll give the boys a surprise. Having been missing for all
this time they’ll reckon we’re gone for good.”
But it was themselves who received the surprise; arriving in sight of
the gorge they saw no friendly morning smoke; hurrying forward they
entered the hut; no one was there; everything of any value was gone.
“Injuns!” cried Boone.
“Or they somehow heard about us being taken by the redskins, and have
gone back to the settlements,” said Stuart.
Just what happened at the camp during the seven days’ captivity of
Boone and Stuart among the Shawnees has never been written. There is no
record in the annals of the time that they returned to civilization;
the confusion of the camp as found by Boone might have meant that it
had been deserted hastily, or that the party therein had been murdered
and robbed. But which was the truth he probably never knew.
For some time the two hardy adventurers remained staring at the remains
of the shelter which had been their home for more than a half year.
“Well,” said Boone, “I reckon they’re gone.”
“Gone they are,” agreed Stuart. “And as we don’t know how or why, it’s
my opinion that this is no safe place for us.”
Rapidly, but thoroughly, they ransacked the camp for ammunition; but
none was to be found; then they made their way into the cane-brakes,
carefully covering their tracks as they went, and took up their camp in
a secluded place where an enemy could not come upon them without their
having due warning of his approach.
From that time on the pair shifted their camp with each day; they
lived much like the wild things of the wilderness about them, seldom
making a move in any direction without studying the prospects and
calculating their chances. But in spite of all this, Boone, with his
usual hardihood, continued to make his inspection of the country;
they extended their explorations in many directions; and though they
lived in constant peril of their lives, and their food was reduced to
the meat they could kill, they were not of the sort to cuddle fear to
their breasts and increase their hardships by complaint. Accustomed to
hard living they took their situation calmly enough; never once did it
occur to them that it would be best to leave their work incompleted and
return home.
“But,” said Boone, one night by their carefully-masked camp-fire, “I’d
like to have powder and ball. There are only a half dozen charges
between us; and every time I let off my rifle I feel that we’re
slipping that much nearer the finish of the whole matter.”
Some weeks went by in this way; and one morning as they followed a
buffalo path they heard a steady, long “clump-clump-clump” advancing
toward them from the direction in which they had come.
“Buffalo?” asked Stuart, puzzled.
Boone listened, then shook his head.
“Horses,” said he. “And horses that are being ridden.”
With one accord they left the track; they took up posts behind the
trees, their rifles held ready for anything which might occur.
In a very little while the hoof-beats became quite close at hand;
then from out of the undergrowth which lined the path rode a couple
of bronzed white men, well armed, and leading a pair of packhorses.
Amazed, Daniel Boone called out:
“Hello, stranger! Who are you?”
The riders checked their steeds and turned their heads in the direction
of the hail.
“Hello!” cried one. “Is that you, Dan’l?”
“White men and friends,” answered they in the customary manner of the
wilderness.
“As I live,” cried Boone, starting forward, “I think it’s my brother,
Squire.”
At this one of the men slid from his horse’s back.
“Dan’l!” he exclaimed.
The two clasped hands, their eyes full of pleasure.
“We came upon your tracks yesterday,” said Squire Boone, who was
Daniel’s junior by some years. “But we had more trouble in following it
than if you’d been a couple of black foxes anxious to save your pelts.”
Daniel and John Stuart looked at each other.
“We took a lot of trouble to cover those tracks up from time to time,”
said Stuart, grimly. “And we did it to save our scalps.”
“Ah!” said Squire. “Injuns?”
“Shawnees!” answered his brother.
The companion of Squire Boone now came forward with the packhorses
and was greeted by the two explorers. This man’s name is not known to
history, but he had ventured much in attempting that long journey over
mountains, across rushing rivers and through the vast forests, and so
he will go down as one of the great unknown pioneers of the great
west--a goodly army and a stout-hearted one.
Just how Squire Boone came to appear so opportunely in the wilderness
at the time he did will perhaps always remain a mystery. Some have
it that he had brooded long over the absence of his brother, finally
concluded that he must be hard put to it across the Laurel Ridge, and
so went to his aid. Others hold the theory that it was all arranged for
at the beginning. If Daniel was not back in the settlements at a given
time, Squire was to set out upon a sort of relief expedition.
But, however that may be, there he was, and with two packs of necessary
things, the more important of which were powder and ball, and flints
for their gun-locks.
A new time set in for the hardy adventurers; in their increased
numbers there was less danger of attack; in their possession of plenty
of ammunition they were better able to make a defense in case the
Shawnees should reappear. However, their vigilance did not relax; they
were but four, after all, and they must be as saving of good black
powder as they could, so they made their camps in the thick of the
cane-brakes and masked their fires and covered their tracks.
But in spite of their continued caution, danger crept upon them
stealthily. While Boone and Stuart were one day in pursuit of game they
came upon an Indian ambuscade. The savages leaped upon them with yells,
firing as they came. Stuart fell, shot through and through; but Boone,
covering his flight by the deadly cracking of his rifle, sped through
the woods and escaped.
That night he rejoined Squire and the other hunter at the place
appointed; and when he told his story a gloom fell upon the little camp
as dark as the fate of poor Stuart.
But the deadly work of the savages was not yet done. Only a few days
after this the man who had accompanied the younger Boone upon the
relief expedition disappeared. For days the brothers searched for him.
They found the moccasin-made tracks of the Shawnee hunters all about,
but no trace of the white man was to be found.
And so Daniel Boone and his brother were left alone in the heart of
that savage country, hundreds of miles from all aid and with the fate
of their companions weighing heavily upon them. But did this break down
their resolution? Did the danger which hemmed them in weaken their
stout spirits? Because the wilderness was hostile, because the red
warriors were relentless, because death hovered over them, did their
hearts misgive them? No! Rather did it add to their purpose. Their
stubborn spirits were not of the sort to accept defeat until it was
beyond humanity to refuse it. And they felt that it was far from that
stage as yet.
So they increased their caution, always held their weapons ready,
lived like the wild things of the woods, never trusting to an
appearance, never taking a sound for granted. Through the whole of the
winter they lived this life of peril. And when spring came, their work
not being done and their provisions and ammunition being low, it was
determined that Squire go back to the settlements for a fresh supply.
“But, Dan,” said the unselfish younger brother, “I don’t care to leave
you here in the midst of danger.”
Daniel placed his hands upon his shoulders, and said, gravely:
“You are doing your share, when all’s said and done. True, there is
peril here; but is there more, lad, than you will face as you press
back across the mountains alone?”
And so Squire mounted a horse, waved a good-bye and set out. Daniel
watched him until the fresh green of the spring growth hid him from
view, and then he turned to face the wilderness alone. But, undaunted,
he pushed his explorations from day to day throughout the months which
followed; more and more complete did his knowledge of the country grow;
firmer and firmer became his conviction that in this region there would
one day grow a great state, with broad farms and populous cities.
The danger from savages was continuous; apparently the Indians saw
in the presence of Boone the first step in the invasion of the white
man, and so were eager to check the movement before it could be fairly
started. At night the lone hunter would steal through the cane-brake
toward his camp; cautiously he would observe it from a distance, and
noting that it had been visited during the day, he would steal away as
silently as a shadow.
Boone was a natural woodsman. In him the craft of the forest and trail
reached perfection; no other man in the annals of the West possessed
the cunning with which he threw the enemy off the trail and baffled
his pursuit.
Toward the end of July Squire Boone returned with horses, meal and
ammunition. Then after a time they pressed on toward the Cumberland
River, or what is now so called, and explored the country in that
direction. More and more beautiful the region grew to Daniel; more and
more he determined that it would be his future home.
“It’s a paradise on earth,” he told Squire. “There never was such a
hunting-ground, such forests or such a chance for farming. If any
man is to find peace anywhere, it is in this country which we have
discovered.”
And filled with this thought they completed their explorations in the
following spring, and then made their way back to the settlements with
the news.
CHAPTER VII
ATTACKED!
With the return of Daniel Boone and his brother to North Carolina the
news of the beautiful country beyond the ridge began to spread. People
were eager to hear of his adventures and of his discoveries; and from
all the region around about the Yadkin they came to listen to him.
A great deal of discontent was abroad in North Carolina. The government
was not at all what it should have been. Tryon was a corrupt,
overbearing official, detested by the settlers; and the hardy spirits
who kept the border were not of the sort to submit to tyranny. So when
Boone came back with the beauties of Kentucky upon his tongue, the
richness of her soil, the size of her streams and woods and the promise
she held out to all who were willing to come to her, he set them all
by the ears.
But the settlements were thin and far between; men were few; conditions
were such that not all could drop their affairs in the north state and
undertake an adventure into the new land. This being so, by the time a
party of settlers was organized to go into and take up homesteads in
Kentucky, several years passed.
Among the first to enlist in this expedition were Oliver Barclay, Eph
Taylor and Sandy Campbell. Eph’s father meant to move his whole family
into the new region, and the man for whom Sandy worked was about to do
the same. Well grown, broad of shoulder and strong as young oaks, the
three made no mean addition to the band.
“A few years make a great difference,” said Boone, as he looked
at them. They were gathered before him by the sides of the horses
upon which they had ridden over to his place. His head was nodding
approvingly. “It’s such lads as you that are needed where there’s
forests to be felled and redskins to be fought.”
The boys listened to his account of his capture with Stuart by
the Shawnees; also to the long months which he spent alone in the
wilderness, enemies ever upon his trail, but persisting in his task in
the face of all. And when, at length, they rode away, their faces were
grave, their eyes shining.
“That was a fine thing to do,” said Eph, in great admiration. “A very
fine thing. I reckon there’s not another in the settlements that would
have stayed to finish up with all those dangers crowding around him.”
“I always knew that Mr. Boone was like that,” said Sandy. “I’d watch
the way he’d ride his horse, or hold his rifle, or speak to any one
who’d meet him. He had a way about him that told you he’d be a hard man
to beat.”
“I think to do what you set out to do is one of the best proofs of
quality in a man,” spoke Oliver. “Sometimes it’s easy, and sometimes
it’s hard to do; but to do it’s the thing, and nothing else will answer
if you mean to be worth anything.”
It was late in September in the year 1774 that Boone started, with his
family, to take up his home in the country beyond the Laurel Ridge.
Squire Boone was with them, and he helped Daniel and his sons to see to
the packhorses, the cattle and the hogs which were taken to stock the
new farm in the wilderness.
Near Powell’s Valley, not many miles distant, the Boones were met by
the Taylors, the family of the farmer for whom Sandy worked, and a
number of other prospective homesteaders. As the expedition now stood
there were some forty hardy, courageous men in its column, armed and
ready for the toil of the march.
Ahead rode Oliver Barclay, Eph Taylor and young Campbell with some of
the younger of the men; in a line came the packhorses and those bearing
the women and children. Boone and the main body of the settlers rode
beside the pack animals, their rifles across their saddle-bows. In the
rear came the cattle in the care of another band of youths who had
undertaken this part of the work under the watchful eye of Boone’s
eldest son.
For a week this formation was kept; at night they camped at sides of
streams with guards set out to watch for the Indian prowlers who might
have trailed them during the day and who might now be waiting for a
murderous opportunity from the underbrush; also the cattle and hogs
were to be kept from the attacks of those stealthy beasts which prowl
the night.
They headed for that break in the mountain chain afterward known as
the Cumberland Gap; never a sight of a redskin was had, never a
sign of his trail anywhere. But there he was, nevertheless, for just
eleven days after the journey began, while they were passing through
a particularly difficult place, there came a sudden murderous volley
of bullets and arrows in the rear, a rush of red robbers, and the
scattering of most of the cattle into the woods. And six of the rear
guard, including Boone’s son, were left dead in the trail.
Instantly, upon the firing of the volley, the column of emigrants
came to a halt; a line of defense was formed and the lightest of the
horsemen began scurrying upon the trail of the savages who fled through
the passes.
But no blows of consequence were struck, and the riders returned.
That night a grave council was held. The women were frightened by the
murderous attack; some of the men began to see visions of constant
fighting ahead with little time for profitable work; and so they lost
heart in the enterprise. They thought it best that they return.
But Boone, his brother, and others of the party were for pushing on.
“Attacks by the Indians are to be expected,” said the pioneer; “they
will always resist the march of the white man. And if we are to settle
the rich country on the other side of the hills, it’s not by weakening
under the first blow they strike. We must press forward; we must strike
back; we must never for a moment show the varmints that we fear them.”
But the bold counsel of Daniel was not listened to. The shock of the
attack, the loss of the cattle, the six youths slain, all in a moment’s
time, hung heavily over the spirits of the emigrants, clouding them
with gloom. It was agreed among them that they would start at sunrise
and head back for the settlements.
On that first spiritless day of the return march, Oliver Barclay found
himself by the side of Boone.
“Heading back for Hillsboro?” he asked.
Boone shook his head.
“No; for the Virginia settlements on the Clinch River,” he replied.
“I’ve been thinking,” said Oliver, whose hopes had received a
shattering blow by the sudden change of front, “that we need not give
the matter up after all.”
Boone looked at him questioningly.
“There are a few who are willing to go on across the mountains.
Suppose, after we leave those who feel that they must return at the
Clinch settlements, we turn about and go with the few we can hold
together.”
Again the backwoodsman shook his head.
“I reckon you don’t quite see just what your uncle, the colonel, wants
done,” he said. “We didn’t start only for the purpose of getting into
the new country. The idea was to plant a colony. And to do that we
must have people.”
“But,” persisted Oliver, with boyish ardor, “there’s your family and
the Taylors. And Mr. Miller told Sandy he’d keep to the original
agreement if any one else would.”
But Boone was fixed in his determination.
“We must plant a colony of some size if we plant any at all. A few
families would always be in danger where enough to supply a couple of
score of fighting men, if needed, would be fairly safe. For Injuns,
youngster, are a careful lot; they seldom attack when there’s any
danger of loss. Another thing, the first lot of emigrants must be
numerous enough to attract others. Men go where men are; it’s only a
few who have a liking for lonely places.”
And so the saddened column pushed toward the Clinch River, and Boone’s
first attempt to settle Kentucky was at an end.
CHAPTER VIII
THE THREE BOYS RIDE ON A MISSION
However, as it chanced, it was just as well that the first attempt of
Daniel Boone to colonize Kentucky failed. For a little later, the first
muttering of that great Indian uprising, called the Dunmore War, began
to be heard, and along the whole border ran the firebrand, the scalping
knife and the tomahawk.
But previous to this outbreak of the tribes, Boone was engaged in
another enterprise which tested his quality as a woodsman and explorer.
Dunmore, the governor of Virginia, had some time before sent a number
of surveyors to the country round about the falls of the Ohio; and now
he desired that these men be guided through the wilderness back to
the settlements. Boone and a man named Stoner were engaged for this
work, and set out heavily armed, but carrying little or no baggage.
The surveying party was found and guided to the settlements according
to contract, and without mishap. The whole journey was of some eight
hundred miles and through hard country; but the two woodsmen managed to
do it in the remarkable time of two months.
Louder and louder grew the muttering of the coming war; closer and
closer pressed the tribes from all points of the compass. Delawares,
Wyandots, Shawnees, Cayugas and Mingos; the forests gave up war parties
in full paint and feathers each day; councils were held, dances were
danced; vengeance was to be had, no matter what the cost, for the wrong
that had been done the great chief Logan by the whites.
The soldiers were everywhere drilling to meet the expected onslaught
of the Indians; the celebrated fighting chiefs, Red Eagle and
Cornstalk, were upon the border, ripe for the struggle; and Dunmore
knew that if once they gave themselves seriously to the work of
revenge, he’d be hard pressed to beat them back.
Soon after his return with the surveying party, Daniel Boone was made
a captain by the governor and given charge of three garrisons. And to
these came Oliver Barclay and his friends Eph and Sandy.
“Do you really think Chief Logan will strike?” asked Oliver, eagerly,
of Boone.
“It looks like it,” answered the backwoodsman. “Logan has been wronged,
and as he’s a man of spirit, even if he is only an Injun, why, he’s up
and ready to avenge it. In my opinion there’ll be a flare along the
whole line that’ll turn many a night into day.”
“What of the settlers in the outlying places?”
“I’ve been passing the word for them to come in. Better lose their
property than their lives.”
“Are they coming in?”
“A good many of them are; others are waiting to make sure that the
redskins will rise.” There was a pause and then Boone proceeded:
“There’s one thing that worries me, though, and that’s the case of
those people at the head of that small branch, to the southwest. The
scouts sent out warned everybody all through that region but them; by
a kind of misunderstanding they were not looked after. As it stands,
nobody is sure if they know how things stand with the Indians or not.”
“You’re going to have them looked after, though,” said Oliver.
Boone looked worried.
“It’s got to be done,” said he. “But I can’t go myself, and just now
there is nobody to send.”
“Eph and I will go,” declared young Barclay, resolutely; “maybe Sandy,
too--it’ll be good sport and some excitement.”
“And mixed in more than a mite of danger--don’t forget that,” said
Boone.
“If there was no danger there would be no excitement,” laughed Oliver,
and away he swung to search out Eph and the Scotch boy.
The latter, in preparation for action of some kind, was whetting the
edge of a huge saber upon a stone which some one had given him. Eph
Taylor sat at his side rubbing carefully at the lock of his much
considered rifle Jerusha.
“She’s in good working order as she stands,” said Eph, by way of
explanation. “And she always shoots true and fair; but then a little
extra looking after won’t hurt her now, for there’s no telling when
I’ll get the next chance to look after her rightly.”
“Now, there you spoke the truth,” said Oliver. “It may be, indeed, some
time, for we’re going to take horse in ten minutes and be off to the
head of the south branch.”
Both Eph and Sandy at once came to their feet.
“What’s happened?” asked the latter, his round, good-natured face all
aglow.
“Has Logan begun the war?” asked Eph.
In a few words Oliver explained the situation; and in a marvelously
short time Eph’s rifle was assembled and loaded; Sandy’s saber was
wiped dry upon a tuft of grass and sheathed; the horses of all three
were saddled and ready to start.
Boone had followed Oliver, and seeing them ready and determined, was
the last man in the world to prevent their showing the quality that was
in them.
“Look for the Baldwins, the McAfees and the Curleys,” said he. “Find
the farm of one and you’ll learn from him the location of the others.
And keep your eyes peeled for Injuns. Don’t trust to anything but
the sight of your eyes and the touch of your hands. And if you find
occasion to shoot, shoot swiftly and to kill, for the redskins are in
no humor to be stopped by anything less than death.”
With a wave of the hand, the three boys were off along the winding
trail which led toward the river; and this they followed all the
remainder of the day. They came to the branch named by Boone toward
nightfall, and went into camp in the midst of a clump of white oaks.
A turkey cock had fallen a few hours before under the deadly glance of
Jerusha and while Sandy and Oliver were engaged in building a fire, Eph
stripped the once proud bird of his feathers and prepared him for the
spit. Sandy had filled his haversack with hard biscuits which had been
made for the militia, and these, with the meat of the nicely browned
turkey, made a bountiful supper.
“It seems to me to be a foolish thing for a great chief like Logan
to do--this war,” said Eph, as he picked a turkey bone with much
satisfaction. “A man like him, knowing how little chance the Injuns
have against the troops of the colony, ought to have some horse sense.”
“They say Dunmore’s soldiers massacred his entire family,” said Oliver.
“Of course, we can’t get the facts just yet, but if any of it is true,
why, Logan, being an Indian, can see nothing else to do.”
“Many an innocent person will suffer for the doings of the hungry
government and the red robbers,” said Sandy with Scottish foresight.
“And it’s always so, I suppose, for they are the least prepared.”
They spent the night among the oaks and were stirring at an early hour
in the morning. The sun was not an hour old when they were in the
saddle once more and were riding along the branch in the direction of
the scattered holdings of the detached settlers.
At noon they halted, allowed their mounts to graze for an hour and ate
a snack themselves. Then into the saddle once more and off again along
the tangled way. The sun was sliding down in the west, growing greater
and redder as it went, and the trees were beginning to cast long
shadows in the bare spaces, when Eph Taylor suddenly drew up his horse.
Holding up a warning hand, he said:
“Listen!”
Like graven figures the boys sat their horses, their faces turned in
the direction of the setting sun.
Sharp and with rending crispness of a sound traveling across a great
silence, there came the unmistakable report of a rifle. A moment later
there came another and still another. A clamor arose above the distant
trees.
“Rifle shots!” cried Eph.
“And the Shawnee war cry!” said Oliver.
As one they inspected the locks of their pieces and their primings.
Again and again came the rifle shots from the westward; and again and
again from above the tree tops came the shrill yells of the redskins.
“We’ve been quite near one of the settlers’ houses without knowing
it,” spoke Sandy Campbell. “And they are being attacked by Shawnees.”
Looking steadily at his two friends he added: “What shall we do?”
“There is but one thing we can do,” replied Oliver.
“And that’s get over there as soon as we can and do our share in
teaching these varmints a lesson,” finished Eph.
And they shook the reins of their good horses and sprang down the bank
toward the brawling branch. There was a ford at no great distance and
this they crossed with a rush, splashing the water high in the air.
Then up the farther bank they sped and across a clearing which they
perceived behind a thin fringe of trees. Swift and soft thudded the
hoofs of their dying horses upon the ground; through the tops of some
ancient oaks they caught the outline of the chimney of a white man’s
dwelling; and between the thick growing trunks they saw the plumes and
war paint of the savages who encircled it.
CHAPTER IX
DEFENDING A LOG CABIN
A swift glance showed Oliver Barclay that there were perhaps twoscore
Indians in the band. Directly in front were about half this number
fighting from behind stumps, logs and tree trunks.
“At them at top speed,” said Oliver, “and each pick an important man if
you can see one. After you fire, shout as loud as you can!”
Like thunderbolts the three lads swept down upon the war party of
Shawnees. Shooting from the saddle, with horse going at top speed, was
one of the tricks of marksmanship cherished and practiced by the youths
at the frontier; and so, as the three long weapons cracked, three
savages sprang into the air with tossing arms and fell dead upon the
ground. Then yelling like demons the lads plunged among the others.
Taken utterly by surprise the redskins were demoralized. Evidently they
thought, judging by the boldness of the attack, that what they saw was
but a part of a large force of whites; so in the panic of the moment
they turned and fled.
Never checking the speed of their horses the boys dashed up to the
cabin which was now in full view. Throwing themselves from their horses
they proceeded to wipe and reload their rifles.
As they were so engaged the door of the cabin was flung open and an old
man with a flowing white beard appeared upon the threshold. He had a
blood-stained bandage about his head, and a rifle was gripped in his
hand. Behind him the boys caught glimpses of a number of anxious faces.
“Glad to see you, lads,” cried the old settler, welcomingly. “How many
of you are there?”
“Just the three,” answered Eph, a grin on his face.
The man with the white beard looked the amazement he felt.
“Only three, and come a-plunging into the critters that way?”
A murmur went up from those behind him.
“I reckon the Shawnees thought we were a regiment, at least, the way
they ran off,” said Oliver, laughing at the recollection.
“Yes, and by this time they’ve seen their mistake and will come----”
“Whizz! Thud!”
The feathered shaft of an arrow quivered from one of the logs just
below Sandy Campbell’s shoulder; a hail of others flew all about them.
“They’ve found it out!” cried a man from within the house. As he spoke
he sprang out and threw open the heavy door of a building adjoining the
cabin. “Quick,” said he. “Drive your horses in here.”
The boys led the horses through the doorway; the man followed them
in and threw a heavy oaken bar into place. The sounds from the cabin
showed that the door there had also been made secure, and then the
siege was once more begun.
There was a doorway leading into the cabin from the building which was
crowded with horses and cattle. Through this came the white-bearded man
and some others.
“We’re obliged to you, young strangers, for what you tried to do for
us. And we are sorry that you’ve run into this danger.”
“We rode this way on the word of Captain Boone that some settlers were
perhaps unwarned of the Indian rising,” said Oliver. “Perhaps you are
one of them, sir.”
“My name,” said the old man, “is Curley.”
“Do you know anything of the McAfees and Baldwins who live hereabout?”
“They are all here,” said Mr. Curley. “They grew suspicious of things
yesterday, and rode over, thinking if the worst came we’d all be
together, and so have a better chance for defense.”
There were at least a dozen grown men gathered in the Curley cabin, and
almost as many boys, some of whom were old enough to take part in the
defense. The wives and daughters of the settlers were, in the main,
courageous and accustomed to the idea of danger; some of them, indeed,
looked capable of taking up a rifle and using it as well as brother
or husband. The heavy timber walls of the house were pierced by small
openings, each of which permitted the barrel of a rifle to be protruded.
At each of these port-holes was stationed a man; keen eyes watched
the movements of the Shawnees upon the edge of the clearing, and now
and then a shot rang out or an arrow whizzed through the air as a red
marksman sought to drive bullet or barb through an opening.
While Oliver talked to Mr. Curley and several of the other settlers
and gave them all the information he possessed as to the state of the
border, Eph Taylor selected an unguarded port-hole and protruded the
eager muzzle of the faithful Jerusha.
“Take care of yourself, youngster,” said a man in buckskins at the next
opening. “Don’t trust too much to your port-hole being narrow; there’s
an Injun there on the edge of the timber who’s doing some almighty good
shooting with the bow; several times he’s put one of his shafts right
on through.”
Keenly, Eph scoured the timber line; from one place or another a rifle
cracked, or a bowstring sang almost constantly. But he was not long in
locating the marksman of whom the settler had spoken. He lay behind
the uprooted butt of a huge tree which had resisted both axe and fire;
a thick growth of weeds had sprung up about it, and it afforded a
splendid vantage place for a marauder with a quick eye and a steady
hand.
Twice Eph saw an arrow speed from behind this shelter and bury itself
in the timbers upon the edge of a port-hole. Then a cry told that a
third shot had flown through and found a mark.
“Through the arm,” said the man who had spoken to Eph. “That varmint
out there has an eye like a hawk.”
Carefully Eph watched the uprooted stump and studied the method of the
savage sharpshooter behind it. Never once did he catch sight of any
part of the Shawnee; not for an instant did even so much as a tip of
a plume show above his breastwork. Satisfying himself as to this, Eph
took to examining other parts about the tree butt. A stirring in the
growth about its largest end took his eye; the movement was of the
slightest, but the eyes of the boy were fixed upon it with all the
eagerness of a practiced hunter.
The shadows from the trees had grown enormously; but the great red sun
sent slanting bars of light through the maze of trunks here and there;
and one of these caught a metal point just as it was steadily poised
for a shot from behind the butt, and the glitter attracted the eye of
Eph. The brain of the boy worked like lightning; from the position of
the arrow-head he calculated the position of the arm that held the bow.
The black eye of Jerusha turned grimly upon the spot in which Eph’s
judgment fixed the Shawnee’s arm; then the rifle spoke. A cry of pain
made answer and an arrow flew wild, burying its point in the ground.
“I reckon that Injun will need some care and considerable rest before
he’s much of a success as a fancy shot in the future,” remarked young
Taylor, with a grin at his neighbor.
“That was a good shot,” said the man. “I sort of felt that Injun was
behind the stump there; but I couldn’t get any signs of him nohow.”
Darkness drew on; supper was cooked and eaten in the cabin; part of the
defenders sat down to the meal while a part manned the port-holes; when
the first lot had satisfied their hunger they changed places with the
watchers. But with the coming of the night the attack of the Shawnees
did not abate; the cracking of their rifles went on, the whizzing of
the arrows continued. Finally there came a flare through the darkness;
it was as though a ball of fire had described an arch, and then fallen
with a thud on the roof.
The faces of the settlers blanched.
“A fire arrow!” said one.
“The varmints are trying to burn the house over our heads,” cried
another.
But old Mr. Curley took the matter coolly enough.
“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “As it happens, friends, the roof is of
new green wood, cut and put on only this summer; so the arrows won’t
set fire to it in a hurry.”
Ball after ball of fire, each attached to a cunningly aimed arrow, fell
upon the roof. But the green wood would not take the fire readily, as
the old settler had prophesied. Seeing this the savages ceased throwing
the fire arrows, and there fell a silence over all outdoors as complete
as the darkness.
“Something is going forward,” spoke Sandy, his eye at a port-hole
endeavoring to pierce the black pall which enveloped everything. “The
villains are not so quiet as that for nothing.”
There was, indeed, something ominous in the silence; the night seemed
crowded with the grotesque forms of fear; a feeling that there was
something--a dreadful something--pressing toward them, settled upon the
defenders.
“Ready all!” said the man in the buckskins. “We’ll have them down on us
in a moment.”
“And remember, lads,” warned old Mr. Curley, “our powder is not too
plentiful. So don’t waste a shot. Be sure of your Injun before you pull
trigger.”
The prediction of the man in buckskin was, a moment later, fulfilled.
Silent as ghosts the Shawnees had formed a complete circle about the
cabin and crept across the clearing toward it. Now they were close
enough for a rush; the war-whoop, that thing of fear on the border,
rang out; the red braves, dusky and but faintly seen, were under the
log walls.
“Be sure of your shots!” cried old Mr. Curley; “pick your redskin,
lads, and don’t waste the good black powder!”
[Illustration: THE RIFLES SPOKE THROUGH THE PORT-HOLES]
With cold precision the rifles spoke through the port-holes, and in
each case a yell told of a warrior hit. But the Shawnees were not idle.
Unseen, they had borne with them great armfuls of dry brush; under the
fire of the rifles they heaped them against the door of the cabin.
Like cats others scaled the walls and gained the roof.
The first flare of the fire when the brush was ignited acted badly for
the Shawnees, however. Apparently they had failed to foresee that they
would be thrown into full relief by the glare; at any rate the deadly
rifles of the whites swept a rain of lead among them, and a dozen fell
to the earth. Enraged, the remainder charged the house, brandishing
tomahawks and scalping knives; bowstrings sang and rifles cracked; the
flames about the door mounted higher and higher.
Calmly the backwoodsmen went about the work of defense; steadily they
loaded and fired; watchfully they peered through the port-holes.
But up to this time all had failed to hear those savages who had
mounted to the roof. Safe out of the fire of the deadly rifles, a half
score braves were here collected, cunningly planning their next move.
At one end of the log house there was a wide-mouthed chimney, built
of green wood and thickly lined with mud. The fire over which the
settlers’ supper had been cooked had died down and peering down the
smooth interior of this shaft, the Shawnees grinned with dreadful
satisfaction.
“That fire outside there is taking hold,” said old Mr. Curley below in
the big room of the cabin. “The timber in the door is heavy, but as dry
as tinder.”
Anxiously the men looked at each other; the faces of the women were
fearful. And in this tense moment there came a scrambling sound, a
cloud of dust arose from the fireplace together with a shower of dull
sparks. A woman screamed as the tufted head of an Indian appeared in
the great fireplace to be followed an instant later by another and
still another.
CHAPTER X
A NIGHT EXPERIENCE
Following the scream of the woman, Eph Taylor turned around. He was the
first of the riflemen to catch sight of the intruders. Like a flash the
eye of Jerusha ceased to stare upon the wild scenes going on outside;
it swept inward and the crack of the good rifle spoke the death of a
Shawnee. Oliver’s piece accounted for another; two more fell in the act
of braining a defender with their hatchets.
Taking warning from the deaths of the more adventurous the Shawnees
upon the roof of the cabin made no more attempts by way of the chimney.
Old Mr. Curley shrewdly judged that the swift fate which had overtaken
their comrades would have this effect, but nevertheless he made sure
there would be no more surprises from that direction.
“Dick,” said he, to one of his sons, a stalwart youth who had been
firing from one of the port-holes with a pair of horseman’s pistols,
“see to the fireplace. Don’t take your eyes off it, and if you catch
sight of a red hide, fill it full of holes.”
Just then the most important thing of all was to scatter the fire from
the door before it did serious harm. The brush was blazing furiously
and that the door was also burning they felt sure, judging from the
jets of smoke and flame that shot between the heavy planks. The man in
buckskin, who was a trapper of the region and not connected with the
little settlement on the fork, now ventured a plan.
“Let one man stand ready to throw open the door, let another have a
pail of water to throw on the outside of it where it is burning, and
two more stand ready to kick away the brush. But before the door is
open we’ll drive the Injuns in front to cover; while they are still
running will be the time to act.”
As this plan was as good as any, they at once proceeded to put it into
operation. The rifles increased their deadly cracking and the Shawnees,
who had continued their charges in order to keep the fire supplied with
fresh brush, were unable to stand up under it. Helter skelter they
fled for cover; the door was thrown open, the brush kicked away and a
drench of water sent streaming over the burning planks. Then the door
was slammed shut before the infuriated redskins had much idea of what
was taking place, the bar dropped into its sockets, and the whites were
permitted to breathe easier, now that all immediate danger from fire
was past.
There followed some scattered volleys from the savages; but after a
time a silence fell; and some distance away camp-fires began to sparkle
in the forest.
“They’ve withdrawn for a while at least,” spoke Mr. Curley. “They
will eat their meat at the fires and the cunning ones among them will
arrange another plan of attack.”
Oliver and his friends during this lull gathered at one end of the
cabin.
“It seems to me,” said young Barclay, “that the Indians mean to take
this house one way or another. Even if they can’t capture it by attack
they can starve us out.”
Eph Taylor nodded his head.
“Yes,” said he. “That’s what it will end with if help doesn’t come, I’m
afraid.”
“With a fresh horse and a clear way through the Shawnees, I could make
Captain Boone’s garrison by noon to-morrow,” said Oliver. “So why wait
on the chance that help will come?”
“Noll!” cried Sandy; “you don’t mean to say that you’ll----”
“In a case like this,” said Oliver, firmly, “waiting is a mistake. Ill
luck is as likely to befall as good. If they’ll let me, I’m going to
venture it.”
In a moment he had left them and was eagerly engaged with Mr. Curley,
the Baldwins and the McAfees. The man in buckskins also entered into
the talk. Earnestly Oliver laid his thought before them; soberly they
considered it; gravely they discussed its merits.
“My horse Hawk is like a cat at night,” said Oliver. “He is absolutely
sure-footed and seems able to see in the dark. If I can win through the
Shawnees he’ll carry me to Boone’s camp like the wind.”
The white-bearded Mr. Curley laid his hand kindly upon his shoulder.
“You are a brave lad,” said he; “and it’s with spirits like yours that
success lies. So if you are eager to undertake this thing, I will not
be one to lift my voice against it; for indeed its carrying out may
mean the lives of us all.”
There was a murmur at this; all seemed to be of the same idea.
Without delay, Oliver went into the building where the horses were
tied. Hawk lifted his head and rubbed his nose upon his young master’s
shoulder. The young horse had gained in power since the day of his race
with the wicked mount of Long Panther; and his increased years had lost
him his coltish tricks. As he stood now he was a swift, intelligent
horse of the sort which can be depended upon.
“Now, old fellow,” spoke the boy as he finished with the saddle and
stood patting Hawk’s neck. “This is going to be a very lively night for
both of us. So do your best for me; more depends on your heels to-night
than ever before in your life.”
Sharply Eph Taylor scoured the clearing before the cabin; other eyes,
equally eager and intent, did the like for the sides and the rear. But
keen as was their vision they could penetrate but a short distance
into the blackness. What was beyond the range of their sight they
could only imagine.
“As far as I can see,” said Eph, “there’s no one to stop you. But,” and
he stroked his long chin, “that’s not very far.”
“When I give the word, open the door very softly,” said Oliver. He
then shook hands with those who pressed about him, wishing him a safe
journey through the night; then he spoke quietly to Eph and Sandy. A
moment later the door had opened and closed behind him.
Cautiously he turned his head from side to side, listening; Hawk stood
as still as a beast of bronze, seeming to understand something of the
danger of which he was a partaker. No sound reached the lad; from off
among the trees he saw the flitting forms of the Indians about the
camp-fires; but none of them seemed nearer. During the time spent at
the port-holes of the Curley cabin, young Barclay had observed the lie
of the land, thinking there might come a time when a dash for liberty
would be their only chance. This served him well now in the darkness;
mounting, he turned his horse’s head in the direction furthest removed
from the Indian camp-fires, and so began his journey.
There was, as he had observed, an opening in the forest growth in this
direction, and he trusted to the “night sight” and instinct of Hawk to
find it.
In this his confidence was in every way warranted; in a direct line,
apparently, the good horse made for the opening. But scarcely had he
gained the blacker shadows cast by the trees on either side, than the
horse stopped with a snort. At the same instant a number of forms
leaped from the sides of the path, and Oliver was dragged to the
ground.
CHAPTER XI
THE BATTLE OF POINT PLEASANT
Whether he had received a blow upon the head, or had been stunned by
the force of the fall from his horse, Oliver Barclay did not know.
But, in any event, when he recovered consciousness, he found himself
bound hand and foot and securely fastened to a tree in the heart of the
Shawnee camp.
Near him sat a young savage whose left hand was swathed in bandages;
and in the flickering firelight which fell upon this brave’s face,
Oliver recognized Long Panther.
“Well,” said the lad with as much unconcern as he could assume, “you
have me, Long Panther.”
The coppery face of the Shawnee turned toward the white boy; and the
light of the fire was not more deep than the light in his eyes. But
beyond this he showed nothing but the stoical front of his race.
“Yes,” said he, “we have you. And I do not think another will mount and
ride for help to-night.”
“I hope not, if he’s not to have better fortune than I’ve had,” said
Oliver.
“In two suns we could take the cabin of the white man,” said Long
Panther, his burning eyes turning in the direction of the Curley cabin.
“But the time is short. At dawn we must take the trail. The Mingo
chief, Logan, calls, and we go to him that we may strike a harder blow.”
Oliver felt a thrill of gladness at the news that the siege upon the
log house was to be lifted, and that the Shawnees were about to abandon
their purpose.
“If I had only known that,” was his thought, “I might have stayed
comfortably inside and learned in the morning that all danger was past.”
But, as the venture he had made had seemed the best thing to do under
the circumstances, he did not waste any regrets upon it; instead,
he gave up his thoughts entirely to the situation in which he found
himself, and began studying out a plan of escape.
“Many things,” said Long Panther, somberly, “I have suffered at the
hands of the white man. And I have desired vengeance. This,” and he
held up his bandaged left hand, “is the last.”
That Long Panther had been the marksman behind the tree butt now, for
the first time, occurred to Oliver; the bullet from Eph’s rifle had
found a shining mark, indeed.
“It is the hand with which I hold the bow,” mourned the young savage.
“And in the battles that are to come, I cannot do the work that has
been given me. But the white face will pay,” said he, as he arose to
his feet and stood looking down at Oliver. “The white face will pay.”
He turned and stalked away; and as the eyes of the white boy followed
him there seemed to be an ominous something in the very way in which he
bore himself--a threat of reprisal that was to come.
But whatever gloomy fears found a place in young Barclay’s mind, they
were not realized that night at least. He slept where he lay, under
guard of three unwinking redskins. And when morning came he was given
some food, his hands were pinioned behind him, and with a rope tied
about his body, the other end of which was fast to the saddle of a
warrior, he was forced to march in the midst of the band which began
filing through the forest toward the great meeting place of the hostile
tribes.
On the way they were joined by other war parties of their own nation;
and by nightfall of the following day, young Barclay found himself in
the heart of a vast Indian encampment. Far into the night he saw the
council fires burning and saw the chiefs and head men of the nations
gathered in conference. He heard the celebrated Logan. He heard
Cornstalk and his great son Elenipsico as they stood out before the
leaders of the tribes and poured forth their torrents of eloquence.
That he understood little or nothing of the Indian language made
scarcely any difference in the effect the orations had upon the boy.
The manner of the great chiefs, their expressions as they recounted
their grievances, the fierce passion of their appeal to the silent
circle with its iron faces, sent a chill to his heart. He saw that the
coming struggle was to be no mean one, that the frontier was, indeed,
to be a blaze from end to end.
But what was to be done in his own case of course naturally interested
him more than anything else. In a time like this, when open war was
declared and the tribes gathered to defy the forces of the colonies,
prisoners were seldom taken, and when they were, it was for the purpose
of putting them to the torture.
Oliver had heard the grisly tales the old frontiersmen had to tell
of the stake, of the running of the gauntlet, and the various other
barbarities that the savage mind conceived, and visions of these rose
before his eyes. But, for all, he was shrewd enough and clear-sighted
enough to perceive that these things were gone through with at the
Indians’ leisure.
“Just now,” he told himself, “they have much more important matters
before them; I shall get their attention later; and even at that, much
sooner, perhaps, than I want it.”
The Virginia Legislature had called into being an army of something
more than a thousand fighting men, and these were now encamped at a
place called Point Pleasant, not more than a few hours’ ride from the
encampment of Logan and his fellow chiefs.
Oliver drew from his captor’s manner that the day of battle was near;
but that it was to be on the one that was next to break he had no idea
until the dawn brought those preparations which were unmistakable.
Like a great fan the Mingos, the Wyandots, the Cayugas, the Delawares
and the Shawnees spread themselves through the forest; like panthers
stalking their prey they advanced.
And this knowledge put a great hope in his heart, for on the morning
his guards had not bound his arms with their customary care; in their
hurry to be gone they had slighted this duty; and now Oliver knew that
it required only a slight struggle to give him the use of his hands.
However, he made no sign of this, plodding on in the midst of the
Shawnees, apparently dejected and heavy of mind, but in reality keenly
observant and watching like a hawk for any chance that would give him
liberty.
Now as it happened, some of the whites desired fresh meat that morning
and a hunting party of two was in pursuit of deer. These hunters, swift
of foot and eager, were following the deer tracks and, for the time,
never dreaming of the enemy; then they plunged upon the main body of
the Indians and for an instant were so struck with surprise that they
stood motionless and staring. A scattering of rifle shots followed;
one of the men dropped to the earth, the other bounded away into the
thicket and made back toward the encampment of the Virginia army. A
few hours later the still advancing Indians encountered several large
bodies of whites drawn up in military array. Under cover of a flight
of arrows the savages drew back; and the voices of Cornstalk and Logan
were lifted, calling on them to be as cunning as foxes and unyielding
as rocks.
“This day,” said Logan, “shall see the redressing of much wrong, my
children. We shall strike the hand which is lifted over us!”
“Sons of the forest!” cried the really noble savage, Cornstalk, “stand
fast! The white faces are before you. The sun has lifted upon the day
which is to give you victory!”
Having reached a ground which would give them an advantage, the Indians
made a stand and began to rain arrows and lead upon the soldiers of the
colony. In almost the first fire the colonels of the two regiments fell
dead. A confusion seized the troops, and as it spread from rank to rank
they began a retreat full of disorder.
This panic of the whites was seen by Oliver as he stood under guard
among the trees, and the boy’s heart sank at the sight.
“They run!” said a voice beside him, and turning he recognized Long
Panther. “They run like wolves before a forest fire. And you, my white
brother, thought they would strike hard and save you!”
Oliver made no reply; and the young Shawnee spoke to the guard in the
Indian tongue. They seemed pleased at his words and called out to some
others who stood by, not taking part in the attack. Like a flash the
message ran along the line of the Indians; and Oliver, though he did
not dream of what was coming, saw their grim looks turned upon him and
caught a savage satisfaction in them.
“Once,” said Long Panther, “you felt proud of your fleetness; in your
pride you thought you could outrun the Shawnees.” His glowing eyes
fixed themselves upon Oliver, glowing with a deeper fire than ever.
“And I,” went on Long Panther, “told you there might come a day when
the Shawnee’d run you a race. That day has now come.”
“What do you mean?” asked the white boy.
“There are your friends,” and Long Panther pointed toward the
retreating regiments. “We give you permission to go to them if--if you
can outrun the arrows which will follow you.”
Oliver Barclay’s face blanched; but a resolution showed in his
tightening jaw.
“And if I refuse----”
“Worse may befall you.”
For a moment Oliver hesitated; he saw the line of Indians, their
copper-colored faces full of anticipation, the deadly bows in their
hands. But he said, firmly:
“What chance have I? Your brothers will pierce me before I’ve taken a
dozen steps.” His eyes searched the ground ahead, and then he added:
“Give me a start. Let me reach the boulder yonder before you give the
word, and I will run.”
“I agree,” said Long Panther, with savage satisfaction.
He once more spoke to the Shawnees about him and again the word was
passed along the line. And the satisfaction of Long Panther was
reflected in the faces of all.
“When my white brother is ready,” said the maimed bowman looking at
Oliver, “I will speak the word.”
Oliver braced himself for the ordeal.
“I am ready,” said he.
Long Panther cried out a warning to the warriors; then to Oliver he
said:
“Run!”
[Illustration: HE INCREASED HIS SPEED]
With his hands held behind him by the loosened thongs, Oliver started
to run. To the right the Cayugas, the Mingos and the Wyandots were
still pressing after the whites; but directly ahead all was clear.
With his eyes on the boulder the boy ran slowly. This he thought the
better way, as to show a burst of speed might excite the savages, and
they might loose their arrows before the time agreed. As it was, their
merciless natures quickly manifested themselves; when within a little
distance of the rock an arrow whizzed by the boy’s head. Feeling sure
that this would be instantly followed by more, he increased his
speed; with a headlong plunge he was behind the boulder, and a whirring
as of a hundred pairs of wings was all around him, the arrows knocking
up clouds of dust as they struck the ground.
A wild yell went up from the Shawnees as the boy disappeared behind
the rock; at once they saw that he had shrewdly calculated upon this
shelter when he asked that they not fire until he reached it. And with
hatchet, knife and spear, they rushed at him.
Oliver slipped his hands free of the thongs, his quick glance going
about to see what was the next best thing to do. And then as the
savages sped toward him he heard a shout--deep and charged with
victory. A third regiment of whites had advanced to the support of the
panic-stricken ones; their rifle fire was deadly and they came at full
speed. The Mingos, the Wyandots and Cayugas faltered in the face of
this unexpected blow; and they fell back upon the line of Delawares
and Shawnees.
At sight of the cloud of warriors in full retreat, the Shawnees rushing
upon Oliver paused. Here was graver and more earnest work than the
harrying of a single boy and so they turned and hastened to the support
of their friends.
Realizing what had happened, the white boy was off like a shot toward
the lines of the advancing frontiersmen; how he gained this over
a field swept by bullets and arrows he never understood, but gain
it he did and a few minutes later with the rifle, powder-horn and
bullet-pouch of a fallen soldier, he was loading and firing in the
ranks with as much coolness and dispatch as the best of them.
The Indians must have had an advance party on the battle-ground some
time before the main body, for it was now learned that their retreat
was to a line of fortification made of logs, earth and brush. Behind
this they stood firm. The Indians showed that they were possessed of
many rifles and a good store of powder; for hours there was a blaze
of fire from across the breastwork; and the barbed arrows drove like
messengers of death among the whites. Fully fifteen hundred fighting
men were behind the fortification and continually the voices of Red
Eagle, of Cornstalk or Logan could be heard urging them to fight on.
Charge after charge was made upon this strong place by the Virginia
army; General Lewis saw his men falling all about him and realized
after a little time that some other method must be pursued if he was to
save his force from annihilation.
“Try and get a body of troops in their rear,” was a suggestion which
he instantly grasped. As it happened, the bank of the Kanawha River
favored such a movement; three picked companies under three dare-devil
leaders were sent to make the attempt.
There was a small stream called Crooked Creek which flowed into the
Kanawha. The three companies managed to cross this; its banks were
covered with a rank growth of tall weeds; and through this crept the
whites upon the unsuspecting savages.
At a word a deadly volley swept into the dense body of Indians; taken
utterly by surprise, they were thrown into complete confusion. No foe
had been expected from that quarter, and, from the fury of the onset,
they thought it must be a heavy body of reinforcements. Completely
disheartened they gave way; as the sun went down they were retreating
across the Ohio River; and at the fall of night were pressing on
through the forest toward their distant villages.
CHAPTER XII
THE FORT AT BOONESBOROUGH
After the battle of Point Pleasant, which was the most severe
engagement with Indians in the history of Virginia, the tribes sent
messengers to make peace with the governor. In this treaty the Shawnees
gave up all claim to the country beyond the ridge.
As the time for the settlement of this great region was completely
ripe, Colonel Henderson rode to Boone’s place on the Clinch River.
“The Chickasaws we can’t reach,” said he. “But we can the Cherokees.
I want you to visit the chief of that nation and purchase, for my
company, all their rights in the new country.”
Promptly Boone started off on this mission. Penetrating to the
Cherokee country he opened negotiations with the chiefs and head men
of that tribe. Success met him on every hand; the result was that
Colonel Henderson later met the Indians in solemn council at Fort
Wataga; the price was paid and the deed was signed; and thereafter
Kentucky was, of right, free of all Indian claims.
“And now,” said Boone to the colonel, “the next thing to do is to take
possession. And I calculate that the least delay in that, the better
for us.”
To this advice Colonel Henderson gave willing ear.
“As all affairs with the Indian nations are settled,” said he, “I
think what you say is the right thing to do. But to tempt emigrants we
must have a way for them to get into the new country without so much
hardship. Enlist a company of men and cut a way through the wilderness
to the place where you think a colony can be planted.”
This was a tremendous task, but Daniel Boone was the man to undertake
it. The hardy spirits of the border had confidence in his ability, and
when he went among them for volunteers upon this new enterprise, they
responded readily enough. Oliver Barclay was to go with the party in
the interest of his uncle, and Eph and Sandy, full of the desire for
the wilderness, were among the first to offer themselves.
Mounted upon Hawk, for the good horse had escaped the Indians upon the
night of his master’s capture and wandered back to the Curleys’ cabin,
Oliver rode along with Boone over the same trail they had traveled upon
the previous attempt to get beyond the mountains.
“This time,” said Oliver, “we’ll reach the new country. For I suppose
the Indians are fairly well satisfied by the terms they made.”
Boone shook his head; there was a tightening about his mouth, and his
eyes held a look of unbelief.
“The Injuns are queer varmints,” spoke he. “And they don’t regard their
word very highly. Now Cornstalk, Logan and their kind mean what they
say; but the rank and file never give it a second thought if a good
chance comes to them to use their hatchets and scalping knives.”
“Then,” said Eph Taylor, “there may be trouble even now.”
“In this country and for years to come you can surely expect trouble,”
said Boone. “White and red will never live at peace for very long at a
time. There will always be something to stir up a war.”
The band gathered by Boone were good riders, accustomed all their lives
to living in the open; sturdy axemen, men full of the vim and that
perseverance which was so marked in their leader.
The path by which they traveled was well indicated; those who came
after would have no difficulty in following it. The month of March was
drawing toward its close when one day they halted at a small stream
to drink; they had dismounted and for the moment their attention was
relaxed. Suddenly, without a moment’s warning, a volley rang out from a
dense thicket, two of the party fell to the earth--dead--and two others
were wounded.
This attack was much like that on the previous expedition; never for a
moment did the whites suspect that the redskins were near. But there
the similarity ended. This time the pioneers had no women and children
to think of; also they were, in the main, well-trained, crafty Indian
fighters, and not a band of careless boys engaged in driving cattle.
The reports of the Indian rifles had hardly died away when each of the
adventurers had gained a cover, tree, stump or rock; short and sharp
spoke their unerring pieces and the ensuing yells told of braves who
had paid for the attack with their lives.
Seeing that the white men were in no wise daunted by the onslaught and
were determined to make a grim resistance, the Indians, who had little
stomach for this sort of battle, withdrew.
“They are gone,” spoke young Barclay, as he mounted a hillock and saw
the band skirting the forest, almost a mile away.
“For the time,” answered Boone. “They don’t care for a stand-up fight;
but they’ll always be ready for the rifle-shot from ambush. Always
expect them, lads; that’s the only way to get through in safety.”
Warily the pioneers proceeded along the track which afterward became
known as “Boone’s Way”; but in spite of all this caution the guile of
the red man over-matched them; three days after the first ambush, they
fell into another; two more of the party fell dead, and three were
wounded.
But grimly they fought the savages back; resolutely they pressed
forward on their way toward the river.
“Stand by me, lads,” said Boone, “and all the Injuns in the region
won’t drive us back.”
Early in April they reached the Kentucky River; on the south side of
this was a fairly clear space, near a salt lick much used by the forest
creatures. With an eye to all that was needed for a place of defense,
Boone selected this place and at once the work of erecting a fort began.
Scattered through the forest were a number of riflemen whose business
it was to warn the workers of the approach of an enemy; the axemen made
the hills and woods ring with their strokes; the trees came crashing
down to be lopped of their limbs, cut into lengths and fitted into
place. Log upon log the famous fort of Boonesborough, so famous in the
annals of Kentucky and the West, arose in sturdy strength.
“We’ll make her bullet-proof and high enough to keep the redskins
outside,” said Boone, as he labored with his men in their work of
construction.
The fort was two hundred and sixty feet in length and one hundred and
fifty in breadth and was made up of a series of cabins, each of heavy
logs and connected by a high fence of logs, pointed at the top as a
sort of stockade. There was a cabin at each corner of the fort; all the
cabin doors and windows opened inside the stockade. The only egress
was by way of a heavy gate opening toward the river and another which
opened upon the opposite side.
During the months of April and May and partly into June of the year
1774, the adventurers hewed and wrought upon their defense; in this
time one man was killed by the hostiles; after that, however, there
was no sight or sound of the enemy. In the middle of June all was
finished.
Colonel Henderson and some members of the company which had purchased
the rights of the Cherokees arrived shortly after this; and with them
came twoscore settlers, a train of packhorses and many things which
made life easier for the pioneers.
It was Colonel Henderson who gave the stronghold the name of
Boonesborough, in honor of the brave woodsman who had dared so much
for the founding of the new commonwealth; and much elated over the
recognition given his service, Boone started back toward the Clinch
River with a few companions.
“We have plenty of men,” said he, “but it will never be a recognized
settlement without families. So I’m going to set an example to others
by bringing out mine.”
It was in October that Daniel Boone turned his back finally upon the
eastern settlements; and with some other hardy adventurers and their
families, he set out once more through the Cumberland Gap and into the
wilderness which they were to make bloom as a garden.
CHAPTER XIII
CONCLUSION
For a time the little settlement on the Kentucky grew and prospered
without much notice from the Indians; but it was not long before the
first rumblings of the Revolution were heard in that far-off place; it
was learned, with alarm, that the colonies were rising in arms against
England.
When the clash came and the colonists began to strike determinedly for
their rights, the English agents in the northwest began operations
which once more lighted the fires of border warfare. They bribed the
savages with gifts, they supplied them with guns and ammunition and bid
them wipe out the little settlements which courage and toil had built
up in the wilderness.
Along the borders of the north and the west the terrible war-whoop once
more rang out, and the tomahawk and scalping knife resumed their deadly
work. But Boonesborough remained calm and unruffled; its settlers
hunted and fished, cleared the land and planted scanty crops of corn.
In the winter of 1776 a man was killed by a swift-moving war party; not
until the summer, about the very time when the Congress at Philadelphia
was giving to the world its first great message of liberty, did the
great war cast its first ominous shadow upon Boonesborough.
The July sun shone upon the bright waters of the Kentucky; the breeze
stirred among the trees. A bark canoe, propelled by the handsome Betsey
Collaway, daughter of a settler, her younger sister Frances, and a
young daughter of Daniel Boone, was darting here and there like a bird.
The girls had decked the little craft with wild flowers, gathered along
the banks, and the ring of their laughter floated across the river in
happy chorus.
Any one listening might have noticed that the joyous sound suddenly
died away. For the canoe, as it drifted under a high bank, shoved its
nose into the mud; and as the girls were about to push it off, they
saw the bushes part almost beside them and a number of Indians, their
fingers upon their lips calling for silence, step to the water’s edge.
Sheer fright kept the girls mute for an instant; and in the next it was
too late to cry out, for the savages had entered the canoe, and were
threatening them with their hatchets.
When they saw them huddled, overcome with terror, at one end of the
canoe, they seized the paddles and drove the craft out into the river;
night was falling and the passage was not noticed from the fort; and so
the Indians gained the other shore. The girls were forced out of the
boat and with the weapons of their merciless captors ever threatening
them they were led away through the forest.
The girls were first missed by the women of their families; a search
showed that they were not within the stockade. Instantly the news
spread; men dropped their tasks and became alert and active.
Questions flew about; and Sandy Campbell, coming from a runlet where he
had been fishing, caught the sense of them.
“Girls!” said he. “Why, I saw them up the river a little way, in a
canoe.”
A half dozen bark crafts were in a very few moments being driven up
and across the stream. The twilight was long and the July day still
persisted, but nothing of the missing ones was to be seen. Long and
loud the men in the canoes shouted; but no sound came in answer. Eph
Taylor, from the craft in which were also Sandy and Oliver, spied
something under a bank.
“A canoe!” he cried.
In a few moments the other searchers were at their sides; all made for
the bank. It was the canoe used by the girls!
“Take care!” warned Boone. “Don’t anybody get ashore!”
From his own canoe the backwoodsman scanned the bank. The daylight was
still strong enough for him to see the imprint of the moccasined feet
in the soft ooze.
“Injuns!” said Boone.
A murmur went up from the settlers; the import of the signs was plain.
“They have made off into the woods!” cried one of the men, excitedly.
“We must not waste a minute; we must take the trail at once!”
Boone pointed grimly at the sun, which was now well down upon the
horizon line.
“In a quarter of an hour it will be dark,” he said. “And no trailer
that ever stepped can follow an Injun track by torch-light. We’ll have
to wait for morning.”
The night was spent in seeing to rifles and pistols and getting some
snatches of sleep. At the first faint sign of dawn the trailing party,
in which was Boone, Oliver and his two friends, took up the signs at
the river brink and followed them off into the woods.
As cunning as foxes the Indians, knowing that they would be swiftly
hunted by the whites, took pains to hide their trail from the very
start. And the methods used threw off the trackers for a short time.
Into a dense cane-brake led the tracks, and then they seemed to
disappear. Keenly, eagerly the hunters sought here and there, but the
wile of the savage baffled them.
“Lads,” said Boone, finally, wiping his brow, and leaning upon his long
rifle, “there’s no use in wasting time. As soon as the varmints got
into the cane they separated and slipped through it like ghosts. And we
might hunt for hours and never pick up the trail.”
“Well?” asked one of the men. “What shall we do?”
Boone led the way to the point at which the footprints ceased.
“Here’s where they separate,” said he, “but the separation is not for
good; they keep the same general direction. And that shows that they
intend to meet somewhere further on when they think we’ve been thrown
off the track completely.”
The woodsmen looked at the tracks once more and nodded their
appreciation.
“Suppose we work on that,” proceeded Boone. “This bit of cane is a big
one; let’s skirt it and run the chance of coming on the trail at the
other side.”
At once this was decided on by the party; with the long, swinging
stride of the hunter they journeyed around the cane; this forced them
to cover some thirty miles, but at the end they found that Boone’s
reasoning had been correct; the Indians had come together somewhere in
the tangle and there lay their trail, plainly read by all.
Trained woodsmen all, with the exception of the three boys, and even
these possessed no mean skill, the settlers looked to Boone for the
word of command.
“From now on, lads,” said the backwoodsman, “we shall have less
trouble. Look, the trail leads directly to a buffalo path; they think
they’ve thrown us off, and they’ve grown careless.”
Softly, swiftly the trailers struck into the path; as Boone had said,
the savages had grown careless; their trail was broad and deep and
could have been followed by the least skilful.
The day was well advanced, and the hardy band had covered a full forty
miles through the tangled wilderness. But they were trained to long
journeys and did not tire.
“We’re gaining,” said Boone, after an hour or so of steady following on
the heavy track. “They passed here no more than a half hour ago.”
The caution of the party increased; they knew the savage nature of the
Indians. Let the latter get a whisper of pursuit and the lives of their
captives would be snuffed out. The long shadows began to fall in the
forest; the patches of sky to be seen through the tree tops grew gray.
Suddenly Boone held up his hand.
“Here they are!” said he.
Through the dense growth he pointed to a party of Indians; a few of
them were dressing freshly killed game; others were engaged in kindling
a fire. Bound to trees near at hand were the three girls.
“Now,” said Boone, as he looked to his rifle, “make your shots count;
and above all don’t allow any of them to get near the girls.”
At the word, the whites rushed forward. At the first crash among the
underbrush the savages grasped their weapons; but the long rifles
cracked before they could act. The conditions under which the “beads”
were drawn made the shots of the trailers difficult; but in spite
of this a number of the Indians were hit; and all fled away into
the woods, leaving the greater part of their arms and all of their
ammunition behind them.
There was the utmost rejoicing in Boonesborough the next day when the
trailers returned bringing the three girls with them, frightened, but
safe and sound.
This incident served as a warning to the settlers on the Kentucky; the
war had finally made its way to their lonely fort. Day after day they
found the tracks of scouting parties all about in the forests; hostile
shots began to ring in the distance. And then began the fights and
sieges for which the sturdy stockade built by Boone and his companions
became famous. Encompassed many times by hundreds of savages, with
the arrows and bullets flying thick as hail about it, the fort stood
strong and untaken. And through it all went Oliver and Eph Taylor and
Sandy Campbell, through it all went the heroic Boone, ever leading,
ever daring the wilderness and its crafty savages, always strong under
reverses, always wise in victory.
And when the great war was done and liberty was achieved by the
colonies, the settlers came in greatly increased numbers, drawn by the
wonder stories of Kentucky and the magic name of Boone.
And as the commonwealth grows strong, its wilderness falls before
the axe of the pioneer, its broad farms smile where the Shawnee once
roamed, the whistles of steamboats sound upon the streams which knew
only the prow of the bark canoe, the thoughts of its sons and daughters
go back to the old days; and they know that the greatness of Kentucky
is founded upon the bold spirit and the long rifle of Daniel Boone.
CHAPTER XIV
SKETCH OF BOONE’S LIFE
Daniel Boone’s ancestors were English, his grandfather, George Boone,
coming to America in 1717. Squire Boone, son of George, was the father
of Daniel.
The Boones purchased a tract of land in what is now Bucks County,
Pennsylvania. Squire Boone, Daniel’s father, married Sarah Morgan;
they had eleven children, Daniel being the fourth and coming into the
world on July 14, 1732. This date is according to the family record
kept by his father’s brother James, who was a schoolmaster. Some of the
biographies give different dates; but it is likely that James Boone
knew the facts as well as any one.
The county of Bucks was then to all intents a frontier settlement; the
Boones lived in a log house; all about them were the woods, which were
running with game, and in which hostile savages were often seen.
Even in his school days, Daniel was known as a hunter; his eye was of
the best and his rifle seldom failed. His passion for the wilderness
was shown in those early times when he’d wander away in the silent
forest and be missing for days. Then they would hunt for him and find
him encamped miles and miles away, perhaps cooking his supper at a
fire of sticks and calmly planning the building of a hut which was to
shelter him for days to come.
A story is told of him which proves his early skill as a hunter. With
some other lads of his own age, he started off for a day’s hunting of
small game. The shades of late afternoon were deepening in the woods,
and the boys were on their way back to the settlement when suddenly one
of them cried out: “Panther! Panther!” Now of all the beasts of the
forests, the lurking panther was held to be the deadliest; and knowing
him for such, the boys ran for their lives. But not so Boone. Steadily
he held his ground, his eye searching for the animal. Yes, there it
was; a panther sure enough, and a big one. Calmly his long rifle came
to his shoulder and his keen eyes drew the “bead.” And with the ringing
crack of the weapon, down fell the panther, shot through and through.
Boone was still a boy when his father concluded he’d get on better
if he went to North Carolina. He took up his homestead on the Yadkin
River; and in this section Daniel grew to manhood, married Rebecca
Bryan, and became the father of nine children.
During the whole of the dreadful Seven Years’ War, the whole frontier
swarmed with hostile redskins; but when this ended, comparative quiet
settled down, and Daniel Boone made the first of his long excursions
into the unknown country beyond the Laurel Ridge or Cumberland
Mountains.
The government of the colony of North Carolina had long been
oppressive; free spirits like that of Boone could not stand the gall
of oppression, and the thought came to him: “What a wonderful place to
plant a new settlement this new country would be.”
And so when Colonel Henderson spoke to him, as it is believed he did,
Boone was ready, and went upon his long exploration of the country of
“Cantuck,” as he called it in one of his letters. Then followed the
events related in this story, which runs very close to historical facts.
After the rescue of the Collaway girls and Boone’s daughter from the
Indians, the savages came in force and attacked the log fort; but they
were driven off. A few months later they returned with two hundred
braves in the band. For two days and nights their attack was continued
and at the end of that time they retreated once more, defeated.
The impossibility of holding any communication with the large
settlements and the stoppage of supplies caused the hardy band at
Boonesborough some suffering. They ran entirely out of salt; and as
this was a thing which they must have, Boone determined to procure a
supply.
Taking thirty men, he proceeded cautiously to Blue Licks with the
intention of making salt from the salt water to be found in that
section. While hunting and alone, Boone fell in with a band of several
hundred Indians who were on their way to make another attack upon
Boonesborough. They made him a prisoner, but following their usual
policy they did him no immediate harm; holding him, possibly, for
future torture.
Craftily Boone began casting about for the best thing to do; the
Indians knew of the presence of his men; to have this huge band fall
upon the thirty might mean death to them all. Boone concluded that to
surrender his command and trust to the future was the best thing to be
done. So the band of whites gave up their arms, and the Indians changed
their plans as to Boonesborough, proceeding instead to their town of
Chillicothe, on the Little Miami.
From here Boone and some of his men were sent to Detroit, where Boone’s
men were turned over to the British. But the savages had conceived
such a liking for Daniel himself that they refused to surrender him,
determining to adopt him into their tribe. So they took him back to
Chillicothe and made him a son of the Shawnee tribe.
Here he remained some months, being treated by the Indians as one of
themselves; then a huge war party organized to march upon Boonesborough
and take it by surprise, and Daniel saw that if the fort was to be
saved, he must escape at once. Slipping from the Indian town in
the early morning, Boone began a desperate journey toward the fort,
one hundred and sixty miles away. It took him five days to make the
journey, and when he reached the fort he was hailed as one returned
from the dead. Indeed, so sure were they that he was dead that his
family had returned to North Carolina.
Boone found the stockade in bad condition, and at once set about
strengthening it. However, the great band did not move against
Boonesborough; the escape of the great backwoodsman must have told them
that the settlers would be awaiting them, and as they had had previous
experiences of this sort they set the attack for a future time.
In August, no enemy presenting himself, Boone and a small party left
the fort and marched against an Indian village on the Scioto. The
braves belonging to this camp were encountered in full war paint, some
distance from the town, and evidently on the march to join some larger
band. The whites fell upon them and routed them, though outnumbered
two to one. Suspecting that a large movement of the savages was
taking place, Boone sent out a couple of scouts to get news. They
soon returned saying that these suspicions were correct; and the
frontiersmen hurried back toward Boonesborough in all haste.
On the day after their arrival at the fort, a great band of Indians,
flying the British colors and commanded by a French-Canadian named
Duquesne, made their appearance out of the forest.
The fort was summoned to surrender, but its defenders refused. They
were sixty and the savages were fully five hundred; but they made up
their minds to fight to the last.
The Indians, directed by their most famous chiefs, and now having the
advantage of Duquesne’s skilled military direction, began their attack.
Never was the marksmanship of the Kentucky riflemen more brilliant
than it was in that battle. Duquesne soon saw that he was the greatest
sufferer by this, as his Indians were falling all around him; so he set
about mining under the river bank, meaning to blow up the fort.
However, Boone discovered this and set his men to countermining,
flinging the freshly dug earth over the walls of the fort. The British
leader saw by this that his plan had failed, and abandoning it began an
attack as before.
This failed because of the unerring aim of the settlers; and then the
attackers became besiegers, sitting down before the fort, out of rifle
range, meaning to starve it into surrender. But in this he also failed;
the defenders had more food than the Indians; and so, there being no
way of feeding so large a band in a protracted siege, Duquesne gave
up the attempt, and marched away, leaving Boonesborough once more
victorious.
This was the last heavy blow aimed at the historic stockade. In spite
of the war, emigrants poured into the new territory; Boone brought back
his family and set to farming his acres like the others.
However, all during the affair with England, Kentucky continued to
merit the name of “the dark and bloody ground.” Fierce battles were
frequent, and the farmer tilled his hard won field with his long rifle
always ready at hand. And even after peace had been declared, the
Indians, under their own chiefs and under the renegade, Simon Girty,
ranged the settled places and strove to stem the tide of immigration.
But the whites were not to be denied; they pressed on and on until the
territory was completely won.
Through a fault in the deeds and grants, the settlements in the new
country were later thrown into disorder. Boone lost all his land, and
moved into Virginia with his family, taking up his home on the Kanawha
near to the place where the great battle was fought in the Dunmore War.
Later he journeyed westward toward Missouri, where he reëstablished
himself. As old age and ill health came on, Boone applied to Congress
to recover his land; a part of it was made over to him. His old age,
and he lived to be well on to ninety, was spent roaming the woods with
his rifle. He died at the home of his son-in-law, Flanders Collaway,
some distance from the city of St. Louis, in September, 1820.
Another Book to this Series is:
IN THE ROCKIES WITH KIT CARSON
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Cumberland Mountains.
[2] This shot is what came to be known later as “barking off.” The
American naturalist, Audubon, in his “Ornithological Biography” speaks
of Boone’s performing the feat a number of times in procuring specimens.
[3] Afterward called the Kentucky River.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN KENTUCKY WITH DANIEL
BOONE ***
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