I turned from her without replying,–I could trust myself no further. Not that I blamed her for hating me,–for she loved her son and I was the shadow across his path,–but she was pressing me further than I had counted on. I snatched up my hat as I ran along the hall and out the great door toward the river. Spring was coming, the trees were shaking out their foliage, along the river the wild flowers were beginning to show their tiny faces, but I saw none of these as I broke my way through the brush along the water’s edge,–for perhaps even now he was asking Dorothy to be his wife, and she was yielding to him. The thought maddened me,–yet why should she do otherwise? What claim had I upon her? And yet I had builded such a different future for her and me.
I had walked I know not how long when I came out suddenly upon the road which wound along the bank and finally dipped to the ferry, and here I sat down upon a log to think. If Dorothy accepted him, I could no longer stay at Riverview. I must go away to Williamsburg and seek employment in the campaign, if only as a ranger. It must soon commence, and surely they would not refuse me in the ranks. As I sat absorbed in bitter thought, I heard the sound of hoof beats up the road and saw a horseman coming. I drew back behind a tree, for I was in no mood to talk to any one, and gloomily watched him as he drew nearer. There seemed something strangely familiar about the figure, and in an instant I recognized him. It was Willoughby Newton. In another moment he had passed, his face a picture of rage and shame. He was riding away from Riverview in anger, and as I realized what that meant, I sprang forward with a great cry of joy. He must have heard me, for he turned in the saddle and shook his whip at me, and for an instant drew rein as though to stop. But he thought better of it, for he settled again in the saddle, and was soon out of sight down the road.
I had not waited so long, for settling my hat on my head, I set off up the road as fast as my legs would carry me. It seemed to me I should never reach the house, and I cursed the folly which had taken me so far away, but at last I ran up the steps and into the hall. As I entered, I caught a glimpse of a well-known gown in the hall above, and in an instant I was up the stairs.
“Dorothy!” I gasped, seizing one of her hands, “Dorothy, tell me, you have told him no?”
I must have been a surprising object, covered with dust and breathless, but she leaned toward me and gave me her other hand.
“Yes, Tom,” she said very softly, “I told him no. I do not love him, Tom, and I could not marry a man I do not love.”
“Oh, Dorothy,” I cried, “if you knew how glad I am! If you knew how I was raging along the river at the very thought that he was asking you, and fearing for your reply; for he is a very fine fellow, Dorothy,” and I realized with amazement that all my resentment and anger against Newton had vanished in an instant. “But when I saw him ride by like a madman, I knew you had said no, and I came back as fast as I could to make certain.”
Somehow, as I was speaking, I had drawn her toward me, and my arm was around her.
“Can you not guess, dear Dolly,” I whispered “why I was so angry with him last night? It was because I knew he was going to ask you, and I feared that you might say yes.”
I could feel her trembling now, and would have bent and kissed her, but that she sprang from me with a little frightened cry, and I turned to see her mother standing in the hall below.
“So,” she said, mounting the steps with an ominous calmness, “my daughter sees fit to reject the addresses of Mr. Newton and yet receive those of Mr. Stewart. I perceive now why he was so deeply concerned in what I had to tell him this morning. May I ask, Mr. Stewart, if you consider yourself a good match for my daughter?”
“Good match or not, madame,” I cried, “I love her, and if she will have me, she shall be my wife!”
“Fine talk!” she sneered. “To what estate will you take her, sir? On what income will you support her? My daughter has been accustomed to a gentle life.”
“And if I have no estate to which to take her,” I cried, “if I have no income by which to support her, remember, madame, that it is from choice, not from necessity!”
I could have bit my tongue the moment the words were out. Her anger had carried her further than she intended going, but for my ungenerous retort there was no excuse.
“Am I to understand this is a threat?” she asked, very pale, but quite composed.
“No, it is not a threat,” I answered. “The words were spoken in anger, and I am sorry for them. I have already told you my intentions in that matter, and have no purpose to change my mind. I will win myself a name and an estate, and then I will come back and claim your daughter. We shall soon both be of age.”
She laughed bitterly.
“Until that day, then, Mr. Stewart,” she said, “I must ask you to have no further intercourse with her. Perhaps at Williamsburg you will find a more congenial lodging while you are making your fortune.”
My blood rushed to my face at the insult, and I could not trust myself to answer.
“Come, Dorothy,” she continued, “you will go to your room,” and she pushed her on before her.
I watched them until they turned into the other corridor, and then went slowly down the stairs. As I emerged upon the walk before the house, I saw a negro riding up, whom I recognized as one of Colonel Washington’s servants. Some message for Dorothy from Betty Washington, no doubt, and I turned moodily back toward the stables to get out my horse, for I was determined to leave the place without delay. But I was arrested by the negro calling to me.
“What is it, Sam?” I asked, as he cantered up beside me.
“Lettah f’um Kuhnal Washin’ton, sah,” he said, and handed me the missive.
I tore it open with a trembling hand.
DEAR TOM [it ran],–I have procured you an appointment as lieutenant in Captain Waggoner’s company of Virginia troops, which are to make the campaign with General Braddock. They are now in barracks at Winchester, where you will join them as soon as possible.
Your friend, G. WASHINGTON.
“Sam,” I said, “go back to the kitchen and tell Sukey to fill you up on the best she’s got,” and I turned and ran into the house. I tapped at the door of my aunt’s room, and her voice bade me enter.
“I have just received a note from Colonel Washington,” I said, “in which he tells me that he has secured me a commission as lieutenant for the campaign, so I will not need to trespass on your hospitality longer than to-morrow morning.”
There was a queer gleam in her eyes, which I thought I could read aright.
“Yes, there are many chances in war,” I said bitterly, “and I am as like as another to fall.”
“I am not quite so bloodthirsty as you seem to think,” she answered coldly, “and perhaps a moment ago I spoke more harshly than I intended. Everything you need for the journey you will please ask for. I wish you every success.”
“Thank you,” I said, and left the room. My pack was soon made, for I had seen enough of frontier fighting to know no extra baggage would be permitted, and then I roamed up and down the house in hope of seeing Dorothy. But she was nowhere visible, and at last I gave up the search and went to bed.
I was up long before daylight, donned my old uniform, saw my horse fed and saddled, ate my breakfast, and was ready to go. I took a last look around my room, picked up my pack, and started down the stairs.
“Tom,” whispered a voice above me, and I looked up and saw her. “Quick, quick,” she whispered, “say good-by.”
“Oh, my love!” I cried, and I drew her lips down to mine.
“And you will not forget me, Tom?” she said. “I shall pray for you every night and morning till you come back to me. Good-by.”
“Forget you, Dolly? Nay, that will never be.” And as I rode away through the bleak, gray morning, the mist rolling up from hill and river disclosed a world of wondrous fairness.
Which brings me back again to the camp at Winchester,–but what a journey it has been! As I look back, nothing strikes me so greatly as the length of the way by which I have come. I had thought that some dozen pages at the most would suffice for my introduction, but memory has led my pen along many a by-path, and paused beside a score of half-forgotten landmarks. Well, as it was written, so let it stand, for my heart is in it.
CHAPTER XIII
LIEUTENANT ALLEN SHOWS HIS SKILL
The days dragged on at Winchester, as days in camp will, and I accepted no more invitations to mess with the officers of the line. Indeed, I received none, and we provincial officers kept to ourselves. Major Washington had returned to Mount Vernon, but I found many of my old friends with the troops, so had no lack of company. There was Captain Waggoner, who had got his promotion eight months before, and Peyronie, recovered of his wound and eager for another bout with the French. He also had been promoted for his gallantry, and now had his own company of rangers. There was Captain Polson, for whom a tragic fate was waiting, and my old captain, Adam Stephen. And there was Carolus Spiltdorph, advanced to a lieutenancy like myself, and by great good fortune in my company. We began to chum together at once,–sharing our blankets and tobacco,–and continued so until the end.
Another friend I also found in young Harry Marsh, a son of Colonel Henry Marsh, who owned a plantation some eight or ten miles above the Frederick ferry, and a cousin of my aunt. Colonel Marsh had stopped one day at Riverview, while on his way home from Hampton, and had made us all promise to return his visit, but so many affairs had intervened that the promise had never been kept. The boy, who was scarce nineteen, had secured a berth as ensign in Peyronie’s company, and he came frequently with his captain to our quarters to listen with all his ears to our stories of the Fort Necessity affair. He was a fresh, wholehearted fellow, and though he persisted in considering us all as little less than heroes, was himself heroic as any, as I was in the end to learn. We were a hearty and good-tempered company, and spent our evenings together most agreeably, discussing the campaign and the various small happenings of the camp. But as Spiltdorph shrewdly remarked, we were none of us so sanguinary as we had been a year before. I have since observed that the more a man sees of war, the less his eagerness for blood.
From Lieutenant Allen I kept aloof as much as possible, and he on his part took no notice whatever of me. Some rumor of my affair with him had got about the camp, but as neither of us would say a word concerning it, it was soon forgot in the press of greater matters. Whatever Allen’s personal character may have been, it is not to be denied that he labored with us faithfully, though profanely, drilling us up and down the camp till we were near fainting in the broiling sun, or exercising us in arms for hours together, putting us through the same movement a hundred times, till we had done it to his satisfaction. We grumbled of course, among ourselves, but at the end of another fortnight the result of his work began to be apparent, and Sir Peter Halket, when he inspected us just before starting for Fort Cumberland, as the fortification at Will’s Creek was named, expressed himself well pleased with the progress we had made.
For the order to advance came at last, and after a two weeks’ weary journey along the road which had been widened for the passage of wagons and artillery, we reached our destination and went into quarters there. The barracks were much better appointed than were the ones at Winchester, for this was to be the rendezvous of the entire force, and the independent companies which Colonel Washington had stationed here the previous summer had been at work all winter clearing the ground and building the fort. They had cleared a wide space in the forest, and on a little hill some two hundred yards from Will’s Creek and four hundred from the Potomac, had erected the stockade. It was near two hundred yards in length from east to west, and some fifty in width, but rude enough, consisting merely of a row of logs set upright in the ground and projecting some twelve feet above it, loopholed, and sharpened at the top. There were embrasures for twelve cannon, ten of which, all four-pounders, were already mounted. Though frail as it could well be, it was deemed sufficient to withstand any attack likely to be brought against it. A great two-storied barrack for the officers of the line had been erected within the stockade, and two magazines of heavy timber. The men were camped about the fort, and half a mile away through the forest a hundred Indians had pitched their wigwams. And here, on the tenth of May, came the Forty-Eighth under Colonel Dunbar, and General Braddock himself in his great traveling chariot, his staff riding behind and a body of light horse on either side. We were paraded to welcome him, the drums rolled out the grenadiers, the seventeen guns prescribed by the regulations were fired, and the campaign was on in earnest.
The morning of the next day, the general held his first levee in his tent, and all the officers called to pay their respects. He was a heavy-set, red-faced man of some sixty years, with long, straight nose, aggressive, pointed chin, and firm-set lips, and though he greeted us civilly enough, there was a touch of insolence in his manner which he made small effort to conceal, and which showed that it was not upon the Virginia troops he placed reliance. Still, there was that in his heavy-featured face and in his bearing which bespoke the soldier, and I remembered Fontenoy and the record he had made there. In the afternoon, there was a general review, and he rode up and down with his staff in front of the whole force, most gorgeous in gold lace and brilliant accoutrement. Of the twenty-two hundred men he looked at that day, the nine Virginia companies found least favor in his eyes, for he deemed them listless and mean-spirited,–an opinion which he was at no pains to keep to himself, and which had the effect of making the bearing of his officers toward us even more insulting.
As we were drawn up there in line, the orders for the camp were published, the articles of war were read to us, and in the days that followed there was great show of discipline. But it was only show, for there was little real order, and even here on the edge of the settlements, the food was so bad and so scarce that foraging parties were sent to the neighboring plantations to seize what they could find, and a general market established in the camp. To encourage the people to bring in provisions, the price was raised a penny a pound, and any person who ventured to interfere with one bringing provisions, or offered to buy of him before he reached the public market, was to suffer death. These regulations produced some supplies, though very little when compared to our great needs.
A thing which encouraged me greatly to believe in the sagacity of our commander was the pains he took to engage the good offices of the Indians,–such of them, that is, as had not already been hopelessly estranged by the outrages committed upon them by traders and frontiersmen. Mr. Croghan, one of the best known of the traders, had brought some fifty warriors to the camp, together with their women and children, and on the morning of the twelfth, a congress was held at the general’s tent to receive them. All the officers were there, and when the Indians were brought, the guard received them with firelocks rested. There was great powwowing and smoking the pipe, and the general gave them a belt of wampum and many presents, and urged them to take up the hatchet against the French. This they agreed to do, and doubtless would have done, but for the conduct of some of the officers of the line.
The Indian camp, with its bark wigwams and tall totem pole, had become a great place of resort with certain of the officers. They had been attracted first by the dancing and queer customs of the savages, and had they come away when once their curiosity was satisfied, little harm had been done. Unfortunately, after looking at the men they looked at the women, and found some of them not unattractive. So, for want of something better to do, they set about debauching them, and succeeded so well that the warriors finally took their women away from the camp in disgust, and never again came near it. Other Indians appeared from time to time, but after begging all the rum and presents they could get, they left the camp and we never saw them again. Many of them were Delawares, doubtless sent as spies by the French. Another visitor was Captain Jack, the Black Rifle, known and feared by the Indians the whole length of the frontier. He had sworn undying vengeance against them, having come home to his cabin one night to find his wife and children butchered, and had roamed from the Carolinas to the Saint Lawrence, leaving a trail of Indian blood behind him. He would have made a most useful ally, but he took offense at some fancied slight, and one day abruptly disappeared in the forest.
Never during all these weeks did the regulars get over their astonishment at sight of the tall warriors stalking through the camp, painted in red, yellow, and black, and greased from head to foot, their ears slit, their heads shaved save for the scalp-lock with its tuft of feathers; nor did they cease to wonder at their skill in throwing the tomahawk and shooting with the rifle, a skill of which we were to have abundant proof erelong.
It was not until four or five days after his arrival with General Braddock that I had opportunity to see Colonel Washington. I met him one evening as I was returning from guard duty, and I found him looking so pale and dispirited that I was startled.
“You are not ill?” I cried, as I grasped his hand.
“Ill rather in spirit than in body, Tom,” he answered, with a smile. “Life in the general’s tent is not a happy one. He has met with nothing but vexation, worry, and delay since he has been in the colony, and I believe he looks upon the country as void of honor and honesty. I try to show him that he has seen only the darker side, and we have frequent disputes, which sometimes wax very warm, for he is incapable of arguing without growing angry. Not that I blame him greatly,” he added, with a sigh, “for the way the colonies have acted in this matter is inexcusable. Wagons, horses, and provisions which were promised us are not forthcoming, and without them we are stalled here beyond hope of advance.”
He passed his hand wearily before his eyes, and we walked some time in silence.
“‘Tis this delay which is ruining our great chance of success,” he continued at last. “Could we have reached the fort before the French could reinforce it, the garrison must have deserted it or surrendered to us. But now they will have time to send whatever force they wish into the Ohio valley, and rouse all the Indian tribes for a hundred miles around. For with the Indians, the French have played a wiser part than the English, Tom, and have kept them ever their friends, while to-day we have not an Indian in the camp.”
“They will return,” I said. “They have all promised to return.”
Washington shook his head.
“They will not return. Gist knows the Indians as few other white men do, and he assures me that they will not return.”
“Well,” I retorted hotly, “Indians or no Indians, the French cannot hope to resist successfully an army such as ours.”
For a moment Washington said nothing.
“You must not think me a croaker, Tom,” and he smiled down at me again, “but indeed I see many chances of failure. Even should we reach Fort Duquesne in safety, we will scarce be in condition to besiege it, unless the advance is conducted with rare skill and foresight.”
I had nothing to say in answer, for in truth I believed he was looking too much on the dark side, and yet did not like to tell him so.
“How do you find the general?” I asked.
“A proud, obstinate, brave man,” he said, “who knows the science of war, perhaps, but who is ill fitted to cope with the difficulties he has met here and has still to meet. His great needs are patience and diplomacy and a knowledge of Indian warfare. I would he had been with us last year behind the walls of Fort Necessity.”
“He has good advisers,” I suggested. “Surely you can tell him what occurred that day.”
But again Washington shook his head.
“My advice, such as I have ventured to give him, has been mostly thrown away. But his two other aides are good men,–Captain Orme and Captain Morris,–and may yet bring him to reason. The general’s secretary, Mr. Shirley, is also an able man, but knows nothing of war. Indeed, he accepted the position to learn something of the art, but I fancy is disgusted with what knowledge he has already gained. As to the other officers, there is little to say. Some are capable, but most are merely insolent and ignorant, and all of them aim rather at displaying their own abilities than strengthening the hands of the general. In fact, Tom, I have regretted a score of times that I ever consented to make the campaign.”
“But if you had not, where should I have been?” I protested.
“At least, you had been in no danger from Lieutenant Allen’s sword,” he laughed. “I have heard many stories of his skill since I have been in camp, and perhaps it is as well he was in wine that night, and so not at his best. How has he used you since?”
“Why, in truth,” I said, somewhat nettled at his reference to Allen’s skill, “he has not so much as shown that he remembers me. But I shall remind him of our engagement once the campaign is ended, and shall ask my second to call upon him.”
Washington laughed again, and I was glad to see that I had taken his mind off his own affairs.
“I shall be at your service then, Tom,” he said. “Remember, he is one of the best swordsmen in the army, and you will do well to keep in practice. Do not grow over-confident;” and he bade me good-by and turned back to the general’s quarters.
I thought his advice well given, and the very next day, to my great delight, found in Captain Polson’s company John Langlade, the man of whom I had taken a dozen lessons at Williamsburg. He was very ready to accept the chance to add a few shillings to his pay, so for an hour every morning we exercised in a little open space behind the stockade. I soon found with great satisfaction that I could hold my own against him, though he was accounted a good swordsman, and he complimented me more than once on my strength of wrist and quickness of eye.
We were hard at it one morning, when I heard some one approaching, and, glancing around, saw that it was Lieutenant Allen. I flushed crimson with chagrin, for that he guessed the reason of my diligence with the foils, I could not doubt. But I continued my play as though I had not seen him, and for some time he stood watching us with a dry smile.
“Very pretty,” he said at last, as we stopped to breathe. “If all the Virginia troops would spend their mornings to such advantage, I should soon make soldiers of them despite themselves. Rapier play is most useful when one is going to fight the French, who are masters at it. I fear my own arm is growing rusty,” he added carelessly. “Lend me your foil a moment, Lieutenant Stewart.”
I handed it to him without a word, wondering what the man would be at. He took it nonchalantly, tested it, and turned to Langlade.
“Will you cross with me?” he said, and as Langlade nodded, he saluted and they engaged. Almost before the ring of the first parade had died away, Langlade’s foil was flying through the air, and Allen was smiling blandly into his astonished face.
“An accident, I do not doubt,” he said coolly. “Such accidents will happen sometimes. Will you try again?”
Langlade pressed his lips together, and without replying, picked up his foil. I saw him measure Allen with his eye, and then they engaged a second time. For a few moments, Allen contented himself with standing on the defensive, parrying Langlade’s savage thrusts with a coolness which nothing could shake and an art that was consummate. Then he bent to the attack, and touched his adversary on breast and arm and thigh, his point reaching its mark with ease and seeming slowness.
“Really, I must go,” he said at length. “The bout has done me a world of good. I trust you will profit by the lesson, Lieutenant Stewart,” and he handed me back my foil, smiled full into my eyes, and walked away.
We both stared after him, until he turned the corner and was out of sight.
“He’s the devil himself,” gasped Langlade, as our eyes met. “I have never felt such a wrist. Did you see how he disarmed me? ‘Twas no accident. My fingers would have broken in an instant more, had I not let go the foil. Who is he?”
“Lieutenant Allen, of the Forty-Fourth,” I answered as carelessly as I could.
Langlade fell silent a moment.
“I have heard of him,” he said at last. “I do not wonder he disarmed me. ‘Twas he who met the Comte d’Artois, the finest swordsman in the French Guards, in a little wood on the border of Holland, one morning, over some affair of honor. They had agreed that it should be to the death.”
“And what was the result?” I questioned, looking out over the camp as though little interested in the answer.
“Can you doubt?” asked Langlade. “Allen returned to England without a scratch, and his opponent was carried back to Paris with a sword-thrust through his heart, and buried beside his royal relatives at Saint Denis. I pity any man who is called upon to face him. He has need to be a master.”
I nodded gloomily, put up the foils, and returned to my quarters, for I was in no mood for further exercise that morning. What Allen had meant by his last remark I could not doubt. The lesson I was to profit by was that I should stand no chance against him.
CHAPTER XIV
I CHANCE UPON A TRAGEDY
As the first weeks of May passed, we slowly got into shape for the advance, and I began to realize the magnitude of the task before us. Our march to Great Meadows the year before, arduous as it had been, was mere child’s play to this, and I did not wonder that on every hand the general found himself confronting obstacles well-nigh insurmountable. And each day, as though to cover other defects, the discipline grew more exacting. Arms were constantly inspected and overhauled; roll was called morning, noon, and night; each regiment attended divine service around the colors every Sabbath, though neither officers nor men got much good from it that I could see; guard mount occurred each morning at eight o’clock; every man was supplied with twenty-four rounds and extra flints, and also a new shirt, a new pair of stockings and of shoes, and Osnabrig waistcoats and breeches, the heat making the others insupportable, and with bladders for their hats.
On the sixteenth, Colonel Gage, with two companies of the Forty-Fourth and the last division of the train, toiled into camp, very weary and travel-stained, and on this day, too, was the first death among the officers, Captain Bromley, of Sir Peter Halket’s, succumbing to dysentery. Two days later, we all attended his funeral, and a most impressive sight it was. A captain’s guard marched before the coffin, their firelocks reversed, and the drums beating the dead march. At the grave the guard formed on either side, and the coffin, with sword and sash upon it, was carried in between and lowered into place. The service was read by Chaplain Hughes, of the Forty-Fourth, the guard fired three volleys over the grave, and we returned to quarters.
There was a great demonstration next day to impress some Indians that had come into camp. All the guns were fired, and drums and fifes were set to beating and playing the point-of-war, and then four or five companies of regulars were put through their manoeuvres. The Indians were vastly astonished at seeing them move together as one man, and even to us provincials it was a thrilling and impressive sight. And on the twentieth happened one of the pleasantest incidents of the whole campaign.
The great difficulty which confronted our commander from the first was the lack of means of transport. Of the three thousand horses and three hundred wagons promised from the colonies, only two hundred horses and twenty wagons were forthcoming, so that for a time it seemed that the expedition must be abandoned. Small wonder the general raved and swore at provincial perfidy and turpitude, the more so when it was discovered that a great part of the provision furnished for the army was utterly worthless, and the two hundred horses scarce able to stand upon their feet.
Let me say here that I believe this purblind policy of delaying the expedition instead of freely aiding it had much to do with the result. Virginia did her part with some degree of willingness, but Pennsylvania, whence the general expected to draw a great part of his transport and provision, would do nothing. The Assembly spent its time bickering with the governor, and when asked to contribute toward its own defense, made the astounding statement that “they had rather the French should conquer them than give up their privileges.” Some of them even asserted that there were no French, but that the whole affair was a scheme of the politicians, and acted, to use Dinwiddie’s words, as though they had given their senses a long holiday.
Yet, strangely enough, it was from a Pennsylvanian that aid came at last, for just when matters were at their worst and the general in despair, there came to his quarters at Frederick a very famous gentleman,–more famous still in the troublous times which are upon us now,–Mr. Benjamin Franklin, of Philadelphia, director of posts in the colonies and sometime printer of “Poor Richard.” The general received him as his merit warranted, and explained to him our difficulties. Mr. Franklin, as Colonel Washington told me afterward, listened to it all with close attention, putting in a keen question now and then, and at the end said he believed he could secure us horses and wagons from his friends among the Pennsylvania Dutch, who were ever ready to turn an honest penny. So he wrote them a diplomatic letter, and the result was that, beside near a hundred furnished earlier, there came to us at Cumberland on the twentieth above eighty wagons, each with four horses, and the general declared Mr. Franklin the only honest man he had met in America. We, too, had cause to remember him, for all the officers were summoned to the general’s tent, and there was distributed to each of us a package containing a generous supply of sugar, tea, coffee, chocolate, cheese, butter, wine, spirits, hams, tongues, rice, and raisins, the gift of Mr. Franklin and the Philadelphia Assembly.
There was high carnival in our tent that night, as you may well believe. We were all there, all who had been present at Fort Necessity, and not since the campaign opened had we sat down to such a feast. And when the plates were cleared away and only the pipes and wine remained, Peyronie sang us a song in French, and Spiltdorph one in German, and Polson one in Gaelic, and old Christopher Gist, who stuck in his head to see what was toward, was pressed to pay for his entertainment by giving us a Cherokee war-song, which he did with much fire and spirit. We sat long into the night talking of the past and of the future, and of the great things we were going to accomplish. Nor did we forget to draft a letter of most hearty thanks to Mr. Franklin, which was sent him, together with many others, among them one from Sir Peter Halket himself.
The arrival of the wagons had done much to solve the problem of transport, and on the next day preparations for the advance began in earnest. The whole force of carpenters was put to work building a bridge across the creek, the smiths sharpened the axes, and the bakers baked a prodigious number of little biscuits for us to carry on the march. Two hundred pioneers were sent out to cut the road, and from one end of the camp to the other was the stir of preparation.
So two days passed, and on the afternoon of the twenty-fourth, Spiltdorph and myself crossed the creek on the bridge, which was well-nigh completed, and walked on into the forest to see what progress the pioneers were making. We each took a firelock with us in hope of knocking over some game for supper, to help out our dwindling larder. We found that the pioneers had cut a road twelve feet wide some two miles into the forest. It was a mere tunnel between the trees, whose branches overtopped it with a roof of green, but it had been leveled with great care,–more care than I thought necessary,–and would give smooth going to the wagons and artillery. We reached the end of the road, where the axemen were laboring faithfully, and after watching them for a time, were turning back to camp, when Spiltdorph called my attention to the peculiar appearance of the ground about us. We were in the midst of a grove of chestnuts, and the leaves beneath them for rods around had been turned over and the earth freshly raked up.
“What under heaven could have caused that?” asked Spiltdorph.
“Wild turkeys,” I answered quickly, for I had often seen the like under beeches and oaks as well as chestnuts. “Come on,” I added, “perhaps they are not far away.”
“All right,” said Spiltdorph, “a wild turkey would go exceeding well on our table;” and he followed me into the forest. The turkeys had evidently been frightened away by the approach of the pioneers, and had stopped here and there to hunt for food, so that their track was easily followed. I judged they could not be far away, and was looking every moment to see their blue heads bobbing about among the underbrush, when I heard a sharp fusilade of shots ahead.
“Somebody ‘s found ’em!” I cried. “Come on. Perhaps we can get some yet.”
We tore through a bit of marshy ground, up a slight hill, and came suddenly to the edge of a little clearing. One glance into it sent me headlong behind a bush, and I tripped up Spiltdorph beside me.
“Good God, man!” he cried, but I had my hand over his mouth before he could say more.
“Be still,” I whispered “an you value your life. Look over there.”
He peered around the bush and saw what I had seen, a dozen Indians in full war paint busily engaged in setting fire to a log cabin which stood in the middle of the clearing. They were going about the task in unwonted silence, doubtless because of the nearness of our troops, and a half dozen bodies, two of women and four of children, scattered on the ground before the door, showed how completely they had done their work. Even as we looked, two of them picked up the body of one of the women and threw it into the burning house.
“The devils!” groaned Spiltdorph. “Oh, the devils!” and I felt my own blood boiling in my veins.
“Come, we must do something!” I said. “We can kill two of them and reload and kill two more before they can reach us. They will not dare pursue us far toward the camp, and may even run at the first fire.”
“Good!” said Spiltdorph, between his teeth. “Pick your man;” but before I could reply he had jerked his musket to his shoulder with a cry of rage and fired. An Indian had picked up one of the children, which must have been only wounded, since it was crying lustily, and was just about to pitch it on the fire, when Spiltdorph’s bullet caught him full in the breast. He threw up his hands and fell like a log, the child under him. Quick as a flash, I fired and brought down another. For an instant the Indians stood dazed at the suddenness of the attack, and then with a yell they broke for the other side of the clearing. Spiltdorph would have started down toward the house, but I held him back.
“Not yet,” I said. “They will stop so soon as they get to cover. Wait a bit.”
We waited for half an hour, watching the smoke curling over the house, and then, judging that the Indians had made off for fear of being ambushed, we crossed the clearing. It took but a glance to read the story. The women had been washing by the little brook before the cabin, with the children playing about them, when the Indians had come up and with a single volley killed them all except the child we had heard crying. They had swooped down upon their victims, torn the scalps from their heads, looted the house, and set fire to it. We dragged out the body of the woman which had been thrown within, in the hope that a spark of life might yet remain, but she was quite dead. Beneath the warrior Spiltdorph had shot we found the child. It was a boy of some six or seven years, and so covered with blood that it seemed it must be dead. But we stripped it and washed it in the brook, and found no wounds upon it except in the head, where it had been struck with a hatchet before its scalp had been stripped off. The cold water brought it back to life and it began to cry again, whereat Spiltdorph took off his coat and wrapped it tenderly about it.
We washed the blood from the faces of the women and stood for a long time looking down at them. They were both comely, the younger just at the dawn of womanhood. They must have been talking merrily together, for their faces were smiling as they had been in life.
As I stood looking so, I was startled by a kind of dry sobbing at my elbow, and turned with a jerk to find a man standing there. He was leaning on his rifle, gazing down at the dead, with no sound but the choking in his throat. A brace of turkeys over his shoulder showed that he had been hunting. In an instant I understood. It was the husband and father come home. He did not move as I looked at him nor raise his eyes, but stood transfixed under his agony. I glanced across at Spiltdorph, and saw that his eyes were wet and his lips quivering. I did not venture to speak, but my friend, who was ever more tactful than I, moved to the man’s side and placed his hand gently on his shoulder.
“They died an easy death,” he said softly. “See, they are still smiling. They had no fear, no agony. They were dead before they knew that danger threatened. Let us thank God that they suffered no worse.”
The man breathed a long sigh and his strength seemed to go suddenly from him, for he dropped his rifle and fell upon his knees.
“This was my wife,” he whispered. “This was my sister. These were my children. What is there left on earth for me?”
I no longer sought to control the working of my face, and the tears were streaming down Spiltdorph’s cheeks. Great, gentle, manly heart, how I loved you!
“Yes, there is something!” cried the man, and he sprang to his feet and seized his gun. “There is vengeance! Friends, will you help me bury my dead?”
“Yes, we will help,” I said. He brought a spade and hoe from a little hut near the stream, and we dug a broad and shallow trench and laid the bodies in it.
“There is one missing,” said the man, looking about him. “Where is he?”
“He is here,” said Spiltdorph, opening his coat. “He is not dead. He may yet live.”
The father looked at the boy a moment, then fell on his knees and kissed him.
“Thank God!” he cried, and the tears burst forth. We waited in silence until the storm of grief was past. At last he wrapped the coat about the child again, and came to us where we stood beside the grave.
“Friends,” he said, “does either of you know the burial service? These were virtuous and Christian women, and would wish a Christian burial.”
Spiltdorph sadly shook his head, and the man turned to me. Could I do it? I trembled at the thought. Yet how could I refuse?
“I know the service,” I said, and took my place at the head of the grave.
The mists of evening were stealing up from the forest about us, and there was no sound save the plashing of the brook over the stones at our feet. Then it all faded from before me and I was standing again in a willow grove with an open grave afar off.
“‘I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord,'” It was not my voice, but another ringing up to heaven from beside me. And the voice kept on and on until the last amen.
We filled in the shallow grave and covered it with logs and rocks. Night was at hand before we finished.
“You must come with us,” said Spiltdorph to the stranger. “The doctor at the fort will do what he can for the child. If you still think of vengeance, you can march with us against the Indians and the French who set them on.”
He made a gesture of assent, and we set off through the forest.
“Stewart,” asked Spiltdorph, in a low voice, after we had walked some time in silence, “how does it happen you knew the burial service?”
“I have read it many times in the prayer-book,” I answered simply. “Moreover, I heard it one morning beside my mother’s grave, and again beside my grandfather’s. I am not like to forget it.”
He walked on for a moment, and then came close to me and caught my hand in his.
“Forgive me,” he said softly. “You have done a good and generous thing. I can judge how much it cost you,” and we said no more until we reached the fort.
The news that the Indians had pushed hostilities so near the camp created no little uproar, and a party was sent out at daybreak to scour the woods and endeavor to teach the marauders a lesson, but they returned toward evening without discovering a trace of them, and it was believed they had made off to Fort Duquesne. The Indians whom we had killed were recognized as two of a party of Delawares who had been in camp a few days before, and who, it was now certain, had been sent as spies by the French and to do us what harm they could. Wherefore it was ordered that no more Delawares should be suffered to enter the camp.
We turned the child over to Doctor Craik, and took the man, whose name, it seemed, was Nicholas Stith, to our tent with us, where we gave him meat and drink, and did what we could to take his mind from his misfortune. He remained with us some days, until his child died, as it did at last, and then, finding our advance too slow to keep pace with his passion for revenge, secured a store of ball and powder from the magazine, slung his rifle across his back, and disappeared into the forest.
In the mean time our preparations had been hurried on apace. It was no light task to cut a road through near a hundred and fifty miles of virgin forest, over two great mountain ranges and across innumerable streams, nor was it lightly undertaken. Captain Waggoner brought with him to table one night a copy of the orders for the march and for encampment, which were adhered to with few changes during the whole advance, and we discussed them thoroughly when the meal was finished, nor could we discover in them much to criticise.
It was ordered that, to protect the baggage from Indian surprise and insult, scouting parties were to be thrown well out upon the flanks and in front and rear, and every commanding officer of a company was directed to detach always upon his flanks a third of his men under command of a sergeant, the sergeant in turn to detach upon his flanks a third of his men under command of a corporal, these outparties to be relieved every night at retreat beating, and to form the advanced pickets. The wagons, artillery, and pack-horses were formed into three divisions, and the provisions so distributed that each division was to be victualed from the part of the line it covered, and a commissary was appointed for each. The companies were to march two deep, that they might cover the line more effectively. Sir Peter Halket was to lead the column and Colonel Dunbar bring up the rear. An advance party of three hundred men was to precede the column and clear the road.
The form of encampment differed little from that of march. The wagons were to be drawn up in close order, the companies to face out, the flanking parties to clear away the underbrush and saplings, half the company remaining under arms the while, and finally a chain of sentries was to be posted round the camp. Sir Peter Halket, with the Forty-Fourth, was to march with the first division; Lieutenant-Colonel Burton with the independent companies, provincials, and artillery, was to form the second; and Colonel Dunbar, with the Forty-Eighth, the third.
I confess that when I had become acquainted with these orders, they seemed to me most soldier-like. A copy of them lies before me now, and even at this day, when I scan again the plan of march, I do not see how it could be improved. I admit that there are others who know much more of the art of war than I, and to them defects in the system may be at once discernible. But at the time, these orders gave us all a most exalted opinion of our general’s ability, and I remembered with a smile the gloomy prophecies of Colonel Washington. Surely, against such a force, so ably handled, no army the French might muster could avail, and I awaited the event with a confidence and eager anticipation which were shared by all the others.
CHAPTER XV
WE START ON A WEARY JOURNEY
The twenty-ninth of May dawned clear and bright in pleasant contrast to the violent storm which had raged the day before. Long ere daybreak, the camp was alive with hurrying men, for the first detachment was to march under command of Major Campbell, and the sun had scarce risen above the horizon when the gates were thrown open and the troops filed out. Six hundred of them there were, with two fieldpieces and fifty wagons of provision, and very smart they looked as they fell into rank beyond the bridge and set off westward. The whole camp was there to see them go, and cheered them right heartily, for we were all of us glad that the long waiting and delay had come to an end at last.
All day we could see them here and there in the intervales of the forest pushing their way up a steep hill not two miles from the camp, and darkness came before they passed the summit. Three wagons were utterly destroyed in the passage, and new ones had to be sent from camp to replace them, while many more were all but ruined. Spiltdorph and I walked out to the place the next day and found it an almost perpendicular rock, though two hundred men and a company of miners had been at work for near a week trying to make it passable. We could see the detachment slowly cutting its way through the valley below, and I reflected gloomily that, at so slow a rate, the summer would be well-nigh gone before the army could reach its destination. Indeed, I believe it would have gone to pieces on this first spur of the Alleghenies, had not Lieutenant Spendelow, of the seamen, discovered a valley round its foot. Accordingly, a party of a hundred men was ordered out to clear a road there, and worked to such purpose that at the end of two days an extremely good one was completed, falling into the road made by Major Campbell about a mile beyond the mountain.
On the seventh, Sir Peter Halket and the Forty-Eighth marched, in the midst of a heavy storm, and at daybreak the next day it was our turn. Under command of Lieutenant-Colonel Burton, all of the independent companies and rangers left the camp, not, indeed, making so brilliant an appearance as the regulars,–who stood on either side and laughed at us,–but with a clearer comprehension of the work before us and a hearty readiness to do it. It was not until the tenth that the third division under Colonel Dunbar left the fort, and finally, on the eleventh, the general joined the army where it had assembled at Spendelow camp, five miles from the start.
Our tent that night was a gloomy place, for I think most of us, for the first time since the campaign opened, began to doubt its ultimate success. We soon finished with the food, and were smoking in gloomy silence, when Peyronie came in, and after a glance around at our faces, broke into a laugh.
“Ma foi!” he cried, “I thought I had chanced upon a meeting of our Philadelphia friends,–they of the broad hats and sober coats,–and yet I had never before known them to go to war.”
“Do you call this going to war?” cried Waggoner. “I’m cursed if I do!”
Peyronie laughed louder than ever, and Waggoner motioned him to the pipes and tobacco.
“By God, Peyronie!” he said. “I believe you would laugh in the face of the devil.”
Peyronie filled his pipe, chuckling to himself the while, and when he had got it to drawing nicely, settled himself upon a stool.
“Why, to tell the truth,” said he, “I was feeling sober enough myself till I came in here, but the sight of you fellows sitting around for all the world like death-heads at an Egyptian feast was too much for me. And then,” he added, “I have always found it better to laugh than to cry.”
Waggoner looked at him with a grim smile, and there was a gleam in Spiltdorph’s eyes, though he tried to conceal himself behind a cloud of smoke. Peyronie’s good humor was infectious.
“Let me see,” continued the Frenchman, “when was it the first detachment left the fort?”
“The twenty-ninth of May,” answered Waggoner shortly.
“And what day is this?”
“The eleventh of June.”
“And how far have we come?”
“Five miles!” cried Waggoner. “Damn it, man, you know all this well enough! Don’t make me say it! It’s incredible! Five miles in thirteen days! Think of it!”
I heard Spiltdorph choking behind his cloud of smoke.
“Oh, come,” said Peyronie, “that’s not the way to look at it. Consider a moment. It is one hundred and fifty miles to Fort Duquesne, so I am told. At five-thirteenths of a mile a day, we shall arrive there nicely in–in–let me see.”
“In three hundred and ninety days!” cried Spiltdorph.
“Thank you, lieutenant,” and Peyronie bowed toward Spiltdorph’s nimbus. “I was never good at figures. In three hundred and ninety days, then. You see, we shall get to Fort Duquesne very comfortably by the middle of July of next year. Perhaps the French will have grown weary of waiting for us by that time, and we shall have only to march in and occupy the fort.”
Waggoner snorted with anger.
“Come, talk sense, Peyronie,” he said. “What’s to be done?”
Peyronie smiled more blandly than ever.
“I fancy that is just what’s troubling the general,” he remarked. “I met Colonel Washington a moment ago looking like a thunder-cloud, and he said a council of war had been called at the general’s tent.”
“There was need of it,” and Waggoner’s brow cleared a little. “What think you they will do?”
“Well,” said Peyronie deliberately, “if it were left to me, the first thing I should do would be to cut down Spiltdorph’s supply of tobacco and take away from him that great porcelain pipe, which must weigh two or three pounds.”
“I should like to see you do it,” grunted Spiltdorph, and he took his pipe from his lips to look at it lovingly. “Why, man, that pipe has been in the family for half a dozen generations. There’s only one other like it in Germany.”
“A most fortunate thing,” remarked Peyronie dryly; “else Virginia could not raise enough tobacco to supply the market. But, seriously, I believe even the general will see the need of taking some radical action. He may even be induced to leave behind one or two of his women and a few cases of wine, if the matter be put before him plainly.”
“Shut up, man!” cried Waggoner. “Do you want a court-martial?” And we fell silent, for indeed the excesses of the officers of the line was a sore subject with all of us. But Peyronie had made a good guess, as we found out when the result of the council was made known next day.
It was pointed out that we had less than half the horses we really needed, and those we had were so weak from the diet of leaves to which they had been reduced that they could do little work. So the general urged that all unnecessary baggage be sent back to the fort, and that as many horses as possible be given to the public cause. He and his staff set the example by contributing twenty horses, and this had so great effect among the officers that near a hundred were added to the train. They divested themselves, also, of all the baggage they did not need, most of them even sending back their tents, and sharing the soldiers’ tents for the remainder of the campaign. Enough powder and stores were left behind to clear twenty wagons, and all the king’s wagons were returned to the fort as being too heavy. A deprivation which, I doubt not, cost some of the officers more than any other, was that of their women, who were ordered back to the fort, and only two women for each company were allowed to be victualed upon the march, but in this particular the example set by the general was not so commendable as in the matter of the horses. Three hundred lashes were ordered to any soldier or non-commissioned officer who should be caught gaming or seen drunk in camp, but these rigors did not affect those higher up, and the officers still spent half the night over the cards or dice, and on such occasions there was much wine and spirits drunk.
We of Waggoner’s and Peyronie’s companies fared very well, for though we gave up one of our tents, it was only to bunk together in the other. There was no room to spare, to be sure, and Peyronie grumbled that every time a man turned over he disturbed the whole line of sleepers, but we put the best face possible on the situation, and had little cause for complaint, except at the food, which soon became most villainous. I think Spiltdorph had some twinges concerning his pipe, for he was a conscientious fellow, but he could not decide to give it up, and finally kept it with him, arguing artfully that without it he must inevitably fall ill, and so be of no use whatever. Dear fellow, I wonder what warrior, the envy of his tribe, smokes it now in his wigwam beside the Miami?
It took two days to repair our wagons and get our baggage readjusted, and finally, on the thirteenth, the army set in motion again, winding along the narrow road through the forest like some gigantic, parti-colored serpent, with strength barely sufficient to drag its great length along. It was noon of the next day before we reached Martin’s plantation, scarce five miles away. Yet here we had to stay another day, so nearly were the horses spent, but at daybreak on the fifteenth the line moved again, and we toiled up an extremely steep ascent for more than two miles. The horses were quite unable to proceed, so half the troops were ordered to ground arms and assist the wagons. It was weary work, nor was the descent less perilous, and three of the wagons got beyond control and were dashed to pieces at the bottom. So we struggled on over hills and through valleys, until on the eighteenth we reached the Little Meadows. Here the army was well-nigh stalled. The horses had grown every day weaker, and many of them were already dead. Nor were the men in much better case, so excessive had been the fatigues of the journey, for on many days they had been under arms from sunrise till late into the night.
It was here, for the first time since our departure from Fort Cumberland, that I chanced to see Colonel Washington, and I was shocked at the change in his appearance. He was wan and livid, and seemed to have fallen away greatly in flesh. To my startled inquiry, he replied that he had not been able to shake off the fever, which had grown worse instead of better.
“But I will conquer it,” he said, with a smile. “I cannot afford to miss the end. From here, I believe our advance will be more rapid, for the general has decided that he will leave his baggage and push on with a picked body of the troops to meet the enemy.”
I was rejoiced to hear it, though I did not learn until long afterwards that it was by Colonel Washington’s advice that this plan was adopted. A detachment of four hundred men was sent out to cut a road to the little crossing of the Yoxiogeny, and on the next day the general himself followed with about nine hundred men, the pick of the whole command. The Virginia companies were yet in fair condition, but the regulars had been decimated by disease. Yet though our baggage was now reduced to thirty wagons and our artillery to four howitzers and four twelve-pounders, we seemed to have lost the power of motion, for we were four days in getting twelve miles. Still, we were nearing Fort Duquesne, and the Indians, set on by the French, began to harass us, and killed and scalped a straggler now and then, always evading pursuit. On the evening of the nineteenth, the guides reported that a great body of the enemy was advancing to attack us, but they did not appear, though we remained for two hours under arms, anxiously awaiting the event. From that time on, the Indians hung upon our flanks, but vanished as by magic the moment we advanced against them.
In consequence of these alarms, more stringent orders were issued to the camp. On no account was a gun to be discharged unless at an enemy, the pickets were always to load afresh when going on duty, and at daybreak to examine their pans and put in fresh priming, and a reward of five pounds was offered for every Indian scalp. Day after day we plodded on, and it was not until the twenty-fifth of June that we reached the Great Meadows.
I surveyed with a melancholy interest the trenches of Fort Necessity, which were yet clearly to be seen on the plain. Our detachment halted here for a space, and it was while I was walking up and down along the remnants of the old breastwork that I saw an officer ride up, spring from his horse, and spend some minutes in a keen inspection of the fortification. As he looked about him, he perceived me similarly engaged, and, after a moment’s hesitation, turned toward me. He made a brave figure in his three-cornered hat, scarlet coat, and ample waistcoat, all heavy with gold lace. His face was pale as from much loss of sleep, but very pleasing, and as he stopped before me, I saw that his eyes were of a clear and penetrating blue.
“This is the place, is it not,” he asked, “where Colonel Washington made his gallant stand against the French and Indians last year?”
“This is indeed the place, sir,” I answered, my face flushing; “and it warms my heart to know that you deem the action a gallant one.”
“No man could do less,” he said quickly. “He held off four times his number, and at the end marched out with colors flying. I know many a general who would have been glad to do so well. Do I guess aright,” he added, with a smile, “when I venture to say that you were present with him?”
“It was my great good fortune,” I answered simply, but with a pride I did not try to conceal.
“Let me introduce myself,” he said, looking at me with greater interest. “I am Captain Robert Orme, of General Brad dock’s staff, and I have come to admire Colonel Washington very greatly during the month that we have been associated.”
“And I,” I said, “am Lieutenant Thomas Stewart, of Captain Waggoner’s Virginia Company.”
“Lieutenant Stewart!” he cried, and his hand was clasping mine warmly. “I am happy to meet you. Colonel Washington has told me of the part you played.”
“Not more happy than am I, captain, I am sure,” I answered heartily. “Colonel Washington has spoken to me of you and in terms of warmest praise.”
“Now ’tis my turn to blush!” he cried, laughing, and looking at my cheeks which had turned red a moment before, “but my blood has been so spent in this horrible march that I haven’t a blush remaining.”
“And how is Colonel Washington?” I questioned, glad to change the subject. “The last I saw him, he seemed most ill.”
Captain Orme looked at me quickly, “Have you not heard?” he asked, and his face was very grave.
“I have heard nothing, sir,” I answered, with a sinking heart. “Pray tell me.”
“Colonel Washington has been ill almost from the first. His indomitable will kept him on horseback when he should have been in bed. At last, when the fever had wasted him to a mere skeleton, and he spent his nights in sleepless delirium, he broke down utterly. His body was no longer able to obey his will. At the ford of the Yoxiogeny he attempted to mount his horse and fell in a faint. He was carried to a tent and left with two or three guards. So soon as he recovered consciousness, he tried to get up to follow us, and was persuaded to lie still only when the general promised he would send for him in order that he might be present when we meet the French. He is a man who is an honor to Virginia,” concluded Orme, and he turned away hastily to hide his emotion, nor were my own eyes wholly dry.
“Come,” I said, “let me show you, sir, how the troops lay that day,” and as he assented, I led the way along the lines and pointed out the position held by the enemy and how we had opposed them; but my thoughts were miles away with that wasted figure tossing wearily from side to side of a rude camp cot on the bank of the Yoxiogeny, with no other nurses than two or three rough soldiers.
“‘Twas well done,” said Orme, when I had finished. “I see not how it could have been better. And I trust the victory will be with us, not with the French, when we meet before Duquesne.”
“Of that there can be no question!” I cried. “Once we reach the fort, it must fall before us.”
“Faith, I believe so,” laughed Orme. “My only fear is that they will run away, and not stay to give us battle. Our spies have told us that such was their intention,” and he laughed again as he saw my fallen face. “Why, I believe you are as great a fire-eater as the best of us, lieutenant.”
“In truth, sir,” I answered, somewhat abashed at his merriment, “I decided long ago that since I held no station in the world, I needs must win one with my sword, but if I can find no employment for it, I see small hope of advancement.”
“Well, do not repine,” and he smiled as he shook my hand, “for if the French do not wait to meet us here, we shall yet find plenty of fighting before us. This is only the first stage in the journey, and Duquesne once ours, we press forward to join forces with the expeditions which are moving against Canada. If I hear more from Colonel Washington, I shall let you know.”
I thanked him for his kindness, and watched him as he rode away across the plain. When he was out of sight, I turned back to join my company, and I felt that I had made a new friend, and one whom I was proud to have.
CHAPTER XVI
THE END IN SIGHT
The country beyond Great Meadows was exceeding mountainous, and we could proceed only a few miles each day, and that with the greatest difficulty. The horses were by this time well-nigh useless, and at every little hill half the men were compelled to ground arms and take a hand at the wagons. It was work fatiguing beyond description, and our sick list grew larger every day, while those who remained upon their feet were in scarce better plight.
On the evening of the twenty-sixth, we reached the pass through which had come the party of French and Indians to attack us at Fort Necessity. They must have thought for a time to oppose us here, for we came upon traces of a camp just broken up, with embers still glowing in the hollow, over which they had prepared their food. Both French and Indians had been present, for the former had written on the trees many insolent and scurrilous expressions,–which gave me a poorer opinion of them than I had yet entertained,–and the Indians had marked up the number of scalps they had taken, some eight or ten in all. Whatever their intention may have been, the sight of our strength had frightened them away, and we saw no sign of them as we descended into the valley on the other side.
We toiled on all the next day over a road that was painfully familiar to most of us, and in the evening came to Christopher Gist’s plantation. Spiltdorph and I made a circuit of the place that night, and I pointed out to him the dispositions we had made for defense the year before. The French had burned down all the buildings, but the half-finished trenches could yet be seen, and the logs which were to have made the breastwork still littered the ground.
Beyond Gist’s, it was a new country to all of us, and grew more open, so that we could make longer marches. We descended a broad valley to the great crossing of the Yoxiogeny, which we passed on the thirtieth. The general was under much apprehension lest the French ambush us here, and so advanced most cautiously, but we saw no sign of any enemy. Beyond the river was a great swamp, where a road of logs had to be built to support the wagons and artillery, but we won through without accident, and two days later reached a place called Jacob’s cabin, not above thirty miles, as the bird flies, from Fort Duquesne. Here the rumor ran through the camp that we were to be held till Colonel Dunbar’s division could be brought up from the Little Meadows, and there was much savage comment at our mess that evening.
“Why,” cried Peyronie, who voiced the sentiment of all of us, “‘twould take two weeks or more to bring Dunbar up, and what are we to do meantime? Sit here and eat this carrion?” and he looked disgustedly at the mess of unsavory beef on the table, which was, to tell the truth, most odoriferous. “‘Tis rank folly to even think of such a course.”
“So the general believes,” said a pleasant voice, and I turned with a start to see a gallant figure standing by the raised flap of the tent.
“Captain Orme!” I cried, springing to my feet, and I brought him in and presented him to all the others. We pressed him to sit down, and though he laughingly declined to partake of our rations, against which, he said, Peyronie’s remark had somehow prejudiced him, he consented to join us in a glass of wine,–where Waggoner found the bottle I could never guess,–in which we pledged the success of the campaign.
“So we are not to stop here?” asked Peyronie, when the toast was drunk.
“No,” and Orme set down the glass. “The suggestion was made by Sir John St. Clair, and a council was held half an hour since to consider it. It was agreed without debate that we could not afford the delay, as the provision is running low, and so we shall press on at once.”
“‘Tis the wiser course,” said Waggoner. “We have men in plenty.”
“So the general thinks,” said Orme. “He has learned that there is only a small garrison at the fort, which can scarce hope to resist us. But ’twas not to talk of the campaign I came here. I had a note this evening from Colonel Washington, which I knew Lieutenant Stewart would wish to see.”
“Oh, yes!” I cried. “What says he, sir?”
Orme glanced about at the circle of attentive faces.
“I see Colonel Washington has many friends here,” he said, with a smile. “He writes that he is improving, and hopes soon to join us, and implores me not to neglect to warn him so that he can be present when we meet the French. I shall not neglect it,” he added.
“Captain Orme,” said Peyronie, after a moment, “I am sure I speak for all these gentlemen when I say we deeply appreciate your kindness in coming here to-night. There is not one of us who does not love Colonel Washington. We thank you, sir,” and Peyronie bowed with a grace worthy of Versailles.
“Nay,” protested Orme, bowing in his turn, “it was a little thing. I, too, think much of Colonel Washington. Good-evening, gentlemen,” and we all arose and saluted him, remaining standing till he was out of sight.
“A gentleman and a soldier, if ever I saw one!” cried Peyronie. “A man whom it is a privilege to know.” And we all of us echoed the sentiment. So, the next morning, the order was given to march as usual, and we made about five miles to a salt lick in the marsh, where we camped for the night. The next day we reached a little stream called Thicketty Run, and here there was a longer halt, until we could gain some further information of the enemy. Christopher Gist, by dint of many gifts and much persuasion, had secured the services of eight Iroquois, lazy dogs, who up to the present time had done little but eat and sleep. But we were now so near the enemy that it was imperative to reconnoitre their position, so, after much trouble, two of the Indians were induced to go forward, and Gist himself was sent after them to see that they really did approach the fort and not try to deceive us. This was the fourth of July, just one year since we had marched away from Fort Necessity. All the next day we remained at Thicketty Run, waiting for the scouts to come in, but they did not appear until the sixth.
The Indians returned early in the morning, bringing with them the scalp of a French officer they had killed near the fort, and stated that they had seen none of the enemy except the one they had shot, and that the French possessed no pass between us and Duquesne, and had seemingly made no preparation to resist us. Gist got back later in the day, having narrowly escaped capture by two Delawares, and confirmed this story. Such carelessness on the part of the French seemed incredible, as the country was very favorable to an ambuscade, and the officers were almost unanimously of the opinion that it was their purpose to abandon the fort at our approach.
These reports once received, we again broke camp and advanced toward the Monongahela. An unhappy accident marked the day. Three or four men who had loitered behind were surprised by some Indians, and killed and scalped, before assistance could be sent them. This so excited our scouting parties that they fired upon a body of our own Indians, notwithstanding the fact that they made the preconcerted signal by holding up a green bough and grounding arms. The son of Chief Monakatuca was killed by the discharge, and it was feared for a time that the Indians would leave in a body. But the general sent for them, condoled with them and made them presents, ordered that Monakatuca’s son be given a military burial, and, in a word, handled them so adroitly that they became more attached to us than ever. Additional scouting parties were thrown out to right and left, and every precaution taken to prevent further mishap.
The next day we endeavored to pass a little stream called Turtle Creek, but found the road impracticable, so turned into the valley of another stream, known as Long Run, and on the night of the eighth encamped within a mile of the Monongahela, and only about ten from the fort. Here General St. Clair, who seems from the first to have feared for the result, advised that a detachment be sent forward to invest the fort, but it was finally judged best to send the detachment from the next camp, from which it could be readily reinforced in case it were attacked. We were to ford the Monongahela at Crooked Run, march along the west bank to the mouth of Turtle Creek, ford it a second time, and advance against the fort. Both fords were described by the guides as very good ones and easy of passage, while if we attempted to advance straight ahead on the east bank of the river, we should encounter a very rough road, beside passing through a country admirably fitted by nature for an ambuscade. Colonel Gage was to march before daybreak to secure both fords, and the men turned in with full assurance that the battle so long deferred and so eagerly awaited was not far distant.
That night it so happened that I was placed in charge of one of the rear pickets, and I sat with my back against a tree, smoking lazily and wondering what the morrow would bring forth, when I heard a horse galloping down the road, and a moment later the sharp challenge of a sentry. I was on my feet in an instant, and saw that the picket had evidently been satisfied that all was well, for he had permitted the rider to pass. As he reached the edge of the camp, he emerged from the shadow of the trees, and I started as I looked at him.
“Colonel Washington!” I cried, and as he checked his horse sharply, I was at his side.
“Why, is it you, Tom?” he asked, and as I took his hand, I noticed how thin it was. “Well, it seems I am in time.”
“Yes,” I said. “The battle, if there be one, must take place to-morrow.”
“Why should there not be one?” he questioned, leaning down from his saddle to see my face more clearly.
“The French may run away.”
“True,” he said, and sat for a moment thinking. “Yet it is not like them to run without striking a blow. No, I believe we shall have a battle, Tom, and I am glad that I am to be here to see it.”
“But are you strong enough?” I asked. “You have not yet the air of a well man.”
He laughed lightly as he gathered up his reins. “In truth, Tom,” he said, “I am as weak as a man could well be and still sit his horse, but the fever is broken and I shall be stronger to-morrow. But I must report to the general. He may have work for me,” and he set spurs to his horse and was off.
I turned back to my station, musing on the iron will of this man, who could drag his body from a bed of sickness when duty called and yet think nothing of it. All about me gleamed the white tents in which the grenadiers and provincials were sleeping, dreaming perchance of victory. Alas, for how many of them was it their last sleep this side eternity!
The hours passed slowly and quietly. Presently the moon rose and illumined the camp from end to end. Here and there I could see a picket pacing back and forth, or an officer making his rounds. At headquarters lights were still burning, and I did not doubt that an earnest consultation was in progress there concerning the orders for the morrow.
At midnight came the relief, and I made the best of my way back to our quarters, crawled into the tent, whose flaps were raised to let in every breath of air stirring, and lay down beside Spiltdorph. I tried to move softly, but he started awake and put out his hand and touched me.
“Is it you, Stewart?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said, “just in from picket. Colonel Washington reached camp an hour ago, to be here for to-morrow’s battle.”
“To-morrow’s battle,” repeated Spiltdorph softly. “Ah, yes, I had forgot. Do you know, Stewart, if I were superstitious, I should fear the result of to-morrow’s battle, for I had a dream about it.”
“What was the dream?” I asked.
“No matter, we are not women,” and he turned to go to sleep again. “Good-night.”
“Good-night,” I said, and in a few moments his deep breathing told me he was again in the land of dreams. It was long before my own eyes closed, and my dreams were not of battle, but of a bench upon the river’s bank, and a figure all in white sitting there beside me.
CHAPTER XVII
THE LESSON OF THE WILDERNESS
“Wake up, man, wake up!” cried a voice in my ear, and I opened my eyes to see Spiltdorph’s kindly face bending over me. “I let you sleep as long as I could,” he added, as I sat up and rubbed my eyes, “for I knew you needed it, but the order has come for us to march.”
“All right,” I said. “I’ll be ready in a minute,” and I ran down to the brook and dipped my hands and face in the cool, refreshing water. A biscuit and a piece of cold beef formed my breakfast. Our company was striking tents and falling in for the march, and the camp was astir from end to end. The sun was just peeping over the tree-tops, for that fateful Wednesday, the ninth of July, 1755, had dawned clear and fair, and all the day rode through a sky whose perfect blue remained unbroken by a cloud.
We were soon ready for the road, and while waiting the word, Captain Waggoner told me that the advance had begun some hours before. At three o’clock. Colonel Gage had marched with two companies of grenadiers and two hundred rank and file to secure both crossings of the river, for it was believed that at the second crossing the French would attack us, unless they intended giving up the fort without a struggle. An hour later, Sir John St. Clair had followed with a working party of two hundred and fifty men, to clear the road for the passage of the baggage and artillery. And at last came the word for us.
The ground sloped gently down to the Monongahela, nearly a mile away. The river here was over three hundred yards in width, and the regulars had been posted advantageously to guard against surprise. The baggage, horses, and cattle were all got over safely, for the water was scarce waist-deep at any point, and then the troops followed, so that the whole army was soon across.
Before us stretched a level bottom, and here we were formed in proper line of march, with colors flying, drums beating, and fifes playing shrilly. The sun’s slant rays were caught and multiplied a thousand times on polished barrel and gold-laced helmet and glittering shoulder-knot. Every man had been instructed to put off the torn and travel-stained garments of Osnabrig he had worn upon the march, and to don his best uniform, and very fresh and beautiful they looked, the Forty-Fourth with its yellow facings, the Forty-Eighth with buff. Nor was the showing made by the Virginia companies less handsome, though perhaps a shade more sober. Nowhere was there visible a trace of that terrible journey through the wilderness. It seemed that this splendent host must have been placed here by some magic hand, alert, vigorous, immaculate, eager for the battle. I have only to close my eyes to see again before me that brilliant and gallant array. The hope of a speedy ending to their struggle through the forest had brought new color to the faces of the men, and a light into their eyes, such as I had not seen there for many days. While we waited, the pieces were newly charged and primed, and the clatter of the cartouch boxes, as they were thrown back into place, ran up and down the lines.
At last came word from Gage that he had secured the second crossing, having encountered only a small party of Indians, who had run away at the first alarm, and that the route was clear. The drums beat the advance, and the army swept forward as though on parade. It was a thrilling sight, and in all that multitude there was not one who doubted the event. I think even Colonel Washington’s misgivings must have melted away before that martial scene. The broad river rolled at our right, and beyond it the hills, crowned with verdure, looked down upon us. I do not doubt that from those heights the eyes of the enemy’s spies were peering, and the sight of our gallant and seemingly invincible army must have startled and disheartened them. And as I looked along the ordered ranks, the barrels gleaming at a single angle, four thousand feet moving to the drum tap, I realized more deeply than ever that without training and discipline an army could not exist.
When we reached the second ford, about one in the afternoon, we found that the bank was not yet made passable for the wagons and artillery, so we drew up along the shingle until this could be done. Pickets were posted on the heights, and half the force kept under arms, in case of a surprise. Spiltdorph and I sauntered together to the water’s edge, and watched the pioneers busy at their work. I saw that my companion was preoccupied, and after a time he ceased to regard the men, but sat looking afar off and pitching pebbles into the stream.
“Do you know, Stewart,” he said at last, “I am becoming timid as a girl. I told you I had a dream last night, and ‘t was so vivid I cannot shake it off.”
“Tell me the dream,” I said.
“I dreamed that we met the French, and that I fell. I looked up, and you were kneeling over me. But when I would have told you what I had to tell, my voice was smothered in a rush of blood.”
“Oh, come!” I cried, “this is mere foolishness. You do not believe in dreams, Spiltdorph?”
“No,” he answered. “And yet I never had such a dream as this.”
“Why, man,” I said, “look around you. Do you see any sign of the French? And yet their fort is just behind the trees yonder.”
He looked at me in silence for a moment, and made as if to speak, but the tap of the drum brought us to our feet.
“Come,” he said, “the road is finished. We shall soon see what truth there is in dreams.”
We took our places and the advance began again. First the Forty-Fourth was passed over and the pickets of the right. The artillery, wagons, and carrying horses followed, and then the provincial troops, the Forty-Eighth, while the pickets of the left brought up the rear. At the end of an hour the entire force was safe across, and as yet no sign of the enemy. Such good fortune seemed well-nigh unbelievable, for we had been assured there was no other place between us and the fort suited for an ambuscade.
Our company halted near a rude cabin which stood upon the bank. It was the house of Fraser, the trader, where Washington and Gist had found shelter after their perilous passage of the Allegheny near two years before. We had been there but a few minutes when Colonel Washington himself rode up.
“Captain Waggoner,” he said, “you will divide your company into four flank parties, and throw them well out to the left of the line, fifty yards at least. See that they get to their places at once, and that they keep in touch, lest they mistake each other for the enemy.”
He was off as Waggoner saluted, and I heard him giving similar orders to Peyronie’s company behind us. It was certain that the general was taking no chance of ambuscade, however safe the road might seem. We were soon in place, Captain Waggoner himself in command of one party, Spiltdorph of the second, I of the third, and Lieutenant Wright of the fourth. As we took our places, I could see something of the disposition of our force and the contour of the ground. The guides and a few light horse headed the column, followed by the vanguard, and the advance party under Gage. Then came St. Clair’s working party, two fieldpieces, tumbrels, light horse, the general’s guard, the convoy, and finally the rear guard. Before us stretched a fertile bottom, covered by a fair, open walnut wood, with very little underbrush, and rising gradually to a higher bottom, which reached to a range of hills two or three hundred feet in height. Here the forest grew more closely, the underbrush became more dense, and a great thicket of pea-vines, wild grape, and trailers completely shut off the view.
So soon as the line was formed, the drums beat the forward, and the head of the column was soon out of sight among the trees, St. Clair’s working party cutting the road as they advanced. We were nearing the tangle of underbrush, which I thought marked the course of a stream, when there came suddenly a tremendous burst of firing from the front, followed by a great uproar of yells. My heart leaped, for I knew the French were upon us.
“Close up, men!” shouted Waggoner. “Bring your party up here, Stewart!”
I obeyed the order, and the other two parties joined us in a moment. Scarcely had they done so, when the thicket in front of us burst into flame, and three or four men fell. The others, well used, for the most part, to this kind of fighting, took at once to the trees, and we gradually worked our way forward, keeping up a spirited fire till we reached the shelter of a huge log, which lay at the edge of the ravine. As I looked over it, I saw that the gully swarmed with Indians, firing at the main body of the troops, who seemed wedged in the narrow road. I could see no French, and so judged they were attacking on the other side.
“We’ve got ’em now!” yelled Waggoner. “Give it to ’em, men!” and we poured a well-directed volley into the yelling mob.
Fifteen or twenty fell, and the others, affrighted at the unexpected slaughter, threw down their guns and started to run. We were reloading with feverish haste, when from the woods behind us came a tremendous volley. We faced about to receive this new attack, for we thought the French were upon us. But we saw with horror that we were being fired at by the regulars, who had taken us for the enemy in their madness, and were preparing to fire again.
“You fools!” screamed Waggoner. “Oh, you fools!” and white with rage, he gave the order to retreat.
A moment later, as I looked around, I saw that Spiltdorph was not with us.
“Where is he?” I asked. “Where is Spiltdorph?”
Waggoner motioned behind us.
“He was hit,” he said. “He was killed by those cowardly assassins.”
“Perhaps he is not dead!” I cried, and before he could prevent me, I ran back to the log. Not less than twenty dead lay near it, and in an instant I saw my friend. I dropped beside him, and tore away his shirt. He had been hit in the side by two bullets, and as I saw the wounds, I cursed the insensate fools who had inflicted them. I tried to stanch the blood, and as I raised his head, saw his eyes staring up at me.
“The dream!” he cried. “The dream! Stewart, listen. There is a girl–at Hampton”–A rush of blood choked him. He tried to speak, clutched at my sleeve, and then his head fell back, a great sigh shook him, and he was dead.
The Indians were pouring back into the ravine, and I knew I could stay no longer. So I laid him gently down, and with my heart aching as it had not ached since my mother died, made my way back to my company. “There is a girl,” he had said, “at Hampton.” What was it he had tried to tell? Well, if God gave me life, I would find out.
But every other thought was driven from my mind in my astonishment and horror at the scene before me. Gage’s advance party had given way almost at the first fire, just as Burton was forming to support them, and the two commands were mingled in hopeless confusion. The officers spurred their horses into the mob, and tried in vain to form the men in some sort of order. The colors were advanced in different directions, but there was none to rally to them, for the men remained huddled together like frightened sheep. And all around them swept that leaden storm, whose source they could not see, mowing them down like grain. They fired volley after volley into the forest, but the enemy remained concealed in the ravines on either side, and the bullets flew harmless above their heads.
At the moment I joined my company, General Braddock rode up, cursing like a madman, and spurred his horse among the men. I could see him giving an order, when his horse was hit and he barely saved himself from falling under it. Another horse was brought, and in a moment he was again raving up and down the lines.
“What means this?” he screamed, coming upon us suddenly, where we were sheltering ourselves behind the trees and replying to the enemy’s fire as best we could. “Are you all damned cowards?”
“Cowards, sir!” cried Waggoner, his face aflame. “What mean you by that?”
“Mean?” yelled Braddock. “Damn you, sir, I’ll show you what I mean! Come out from behind those trees and fight like men!”
“Ay, and be killed for our pains!” cried Waggoner.
“What, sir!” and the general’s face turned purple. “You dare dispute my order?” and he raised his sword to strike, but his arm was caught before it had descended.
“These men know best, sir,” cried Washington, reining in his horse beside him. “This is the only way to fight the Indians.”
The general wrenched his arm away and, fairly foaming at the mouth, spurred his horse forward and beat the men from behind the trees with the flat of his sword.
“Back into the road, poltroons!” he yelled. “Back into the road! I’ll have no cowards in my army!”
Washington and Waggoner watched him with set faces, while the men, too astounded to speak, fell slowly back into the open. Not until that moment did I comprehend the blind folly of this man, determined to sacrifice his army to his pride.
We fell back with our men, and there in the road found Peyronie, with the remnant of his company, his face purple and his mouth working with rage. All about us huddled the white-faced regulars,–the pride of the army, the heroes of a score of battles!–crazed by fright, firing into the air or at each other, seeing every moment their comrades falling about them, killed by an unseen foe. I turned sick at heart as I looked at them. Hell could hold no worse.
Hotter and hotter grew the fire, and I realized that it was not the French attacking us at all, but only their Indian allies. Not half a dozen Frenchmen had been seen. It was by the savages of the forest that the best troops in Europe were being slaughtered. Sir Peter Halket was dead, shot through the heart, and his son, stooping to pick him up, fell a corpse across his body. Shirley was shot through the brain. Poison was dead. Totten, Hamilton, Wright, Stone, were dead. Spendelow had fallen, pierced by three bullets. The ground was strewn with dead and wounded. Horses, maddened by wounds, dashed through the ranks and into the forest, often bearing their riders to an awful death. The Indians, growing bolder, stole from the ravines, and scalped the dead and wounded almost before our eyes. I began to think it all a hideous nightmare. Surely such a thing as this could not really be!
Colonel Burton had succeeded in turning some of his men about to face a hill at our right, where the enemy seemed in great number, and we of Waggoner’s company joined him. A moment later, Colonel Washington, who alone of the general’s aides was left unwounded, galloped up and ordered us to advance against the hill and carry it. With infinite difficulty, a hundred men were collected who would still obey the order. As we advanced, the enemy poured a galling fire upon us. A ball grazed my forehead and sent a rush of blood into my eyes. I staggered forward, and when I had wiped the blood away and looked about me, I saw with amazement that our men had faced about and were retreating. I rushed after them and joined two or three other officers who were trying to rally them. But they were deaf to our entreaties and would not turn.
As I glanced back up the slope down which we had come, I saw a sight which palsied me. Colonel Burton had fallen, seemingly with a wound in the leg, and was slowly dragging himself back toward the lines. Behind him, an Indian was dodging from tree to tree, intent on getting his scalp. Burton saw the savage, and his face grew livid as he realized how rapidly he was being overtaken. In an instant I was charging up the slope, and ran past Burton with upraised sword. The Indian saw me coming, and waited calmly, tomahawk in air. While I was yet ten or twelve paces from him, I saw his hand quiver, and sprang to one side as the blade flashed past my head. With a yell of disappointment, the Indian turned and disappeared in the underbrush. I ran back to Burton, and stooped to raise him.
“Allow me to aid you, Lieutenant Stewart,” said a voice at my elbow, and there stood Harry Marsh, as cool as though there were not an Indian within a hundred miles. “I saw you turn back,” he added, “and thought you might need some help.”
I nodded curtly, for the bullets were whistling about us in a manner far from pleasing, and between us we lifted Burton and started back toward the lines.
“My left leg seems paralyzed,” he said. “The bullet must have struck a nerve. If I could get on horseback, I should be all right again.”
And then he staggered and nearly fell, for Marsh lay crumpled up in a heap on the ground.
“He is dead,” said Burton, as I stared down in horror at what an instant before had been a brave, strong, hopeful human being. “A man never falls like that unless he is dead. He was doubtless shot through the heart. He was a brave boy. Did you know him?”
“His name was Marsh,” I answered hoarsely. “He was my cousin.”
“I shall not forget it,” said Burton, and we stood a moment longer looking down at the dead.
But it was folly to linger there, and we continued on, I helping Burton as well as I could. And a great loathing came over me for this game called war. We reached the lines in safety, where Burton was taken to the rear and given surgical attention. His wound was not a bad one, and half an hour later, I saw that he had made good his assertion that he would be all right once he was on horseback.
In the mean time, affairs had gone from bad to worse, and the men were wholly unnerved. Those who were serving the artillery were picked off, and the pieces had been abandoned. A desperate effort was made to retake them, but to no avail. The Indians had extended themselves along both sides of the line, and had sharply attacked the baggage in the rear. The men were crowded into a senseless, stupefied mob, their faces blanched with horror and dripping with sweat, too terrified, many of them, to reload their firelocks. The general rode up and down the line, exposing himself with the utmost recklessness, but the men were long past the reach of discipline. After all, human nature has its depths which no drill-master can touch. Four horses were shot under him, and even while I cursed his folly, I could not but admire his courage. Nor was the conduct of his officers less gallant. Throwing themselves from the saddle, they formed into platoons and advanced against the enemy, but not even by this desperate means could the regulars be got to charge. So many officers fell that at last it was as difficult to find any to give orders as to obey them, and when, as a last desperate resort, the general, putting his pride in his pocket, yielded to Washington’s advice, and directed that the troops divide into small parties and advance behind the trees to surround the enemy, there was none to execute the manoeuvre, which, earlier in the action, would have saved the day.
It was plain that all was lost, that there was nothing left but to retreat. We had no longer an army, but a mere mob of panic-stricken men. The hideous yelling of the savages, as they saw the slaughter they were doing and exulted in it, the rattle of the musketry, the groans and curses of the wounded who fell everywhere about us, the screams of the maddened horses, combined into a bedlam such as I hope never to hear again. Toward the last, the Virginia troops alone preserved any semblance of order. Away off to the right, I caught a glimpse of Peyronie rallying the remnant of his company, and I looked from them to the trembling regulars, and remembered with a rush of bitterness how they had laughed at us a month before.
Of a sudden there was a dash of hoofs beside me, and I saw the general rein up beneath a tree and look up and down the field. Colonel Washington was at his side, and seemed to be unwounded, though he had been ever where the fight was thickest.
“This is mere slaughter!” the general cried at last. “We can do no more. Colonel Washington, order the retreat sounded.”
And as the drums rolled out the dismal strain which meant disgrace for him and the blighting of all his hopes, he sat his horse with rigid face and eyes from which all life had fled. He had been taught the lesson of the wilderness.
CHAPTER XVIII
DEFEAT BECOMES DISHONOR
But there was worse to follow, for scarce had the first tap of the drums echoed among the trees, when the mob of regulars became a mere frenzied rabble. The officers tried to withdraw them from the field in some semblance of order, but the men seemed seized with mad, blind, unreasoning terror, and were soon beyond all hope of control. They rushed from the field, sweeping their officers before them, and carrying with them the provincial troops, who would have stood firm and behaved as soldiers should. I was caught in one edge of the mob, as I tried to restrain the men about me, and flung aside against a tree with such force that I stood for a moment dazed by the blow, and then I saw I was beneath the tree where Washington and Braddock sat their horses, watching with grim faces the frenzied crowd sweep past. The soldiers flung away their guns and accoutrements, their helmets, even their coats, that they might flee the faster, and I saw one strike down a young subaltern who tried to stay them. They jostled and fell over one another as sheep pursued by dogs. I saw a horseman, his head bandaged in a bloody cloth, trying to make way toward us against this cursing torrent, and recognized Captain Orme. But he was dashed aside even as I had been, and for a moment I thought he had been torn from his horse and trodden underfoot. Torn from his horse he was, indeed, but escaped the latter fate, for some moments later he came to us on foot through the trees.
“Come, sir,” he cried to the general, as he gained his side, “you must leave the field. There is no hope of getting a guard from among these cowards or persuading them to make a stand.”
Braddock turned to answer him, but as he did so, threw up his hands and fell forward into the arms of his aide. I sprang to Orme’s assistance, and between us we eased him down. His horse, doubtless also struck by a ball, dashed off screaming through the wood.
“They have done for me!” he groaned, as we placed his back against a tree. “Curse them, they have done for me.”
Washington, who had left his horse the instant he saw the general fall, knelt and rested the wounded man’s head upon his knee, and wiped the bloody foam from off his lips.
“Where are you hit?” he asked.
“Here,” and the general raised his left hand and touched his side. “‘Tis a mortal hurt, and I rejoice in it. I have no wish to survive this day’s disgrace.”
He cast his bloodshot eyes at the rabble of fleeing men.
“And to think that they are soldiers of the line!” he moaned, and closed his eyes, as though to shut out the sight.
“We must get him out of this,” said Orme quietly, and he turned away to call to some of the Forty-Eighth who were rushing past. But they did not even turn their heads. With an oath, Orme seized one by the collar.
“A purse of sixty guineas!” he cried, dangling it before his eyes, but the man threw him fiercely off, and continued on his way. Orme turned back to us, his face grim with anger and despair.
“‘Tis useless,” he said. “We cannot stop them. The devil himself could not stop them now.”
The general had lain with his eyes closed and scarce breathing, so that I thought that he had fainted. But he opened his eyes, and seemed to read at a glance the meaning of Orme’s set face.
“Gentlemen,” he said, more gently than I had ever heard him speak, “I pray you leave me here and provide for your own safety. I have but a little time to live at best, and the Indians will be upon us in a moment. Leave them to finish me. You could not do a kinder thing. I have no wish that you should sacrifice your lives so uselessly by remaining here with me. There has been enough of sacrifice this day.”
Yes, he was a gallant man, and whatever of resentment had been in my heart against him vanished in that instant. We three looked into each other’s eyes, and read the same determination there. We would save the general, or die defending him. But the situation was indeed a desperate one.
At that moment, a tumbrel drawn by two maddened horses dashed by. One wheel caught against a tree, and before the horses could get it free or break from the harness, I had sprung to their heads.
“Quick!” I cried, “I cannot hold them long.”
They understood in a moment, and, not heeding the general’s entreaties and commands that he be left, lifted him gently into the cart. Washington sprang in beside him, Orme to the front, and in an instant I was clinging to the seat and we were tearing along the road. It was time, for as I glanced back, I saw the Indians rushing from the wood, cutting down and scalping the last of the fugitives. I saw that Orme was suffering from his wound, which seemed a serious one, and so I took the lines, which he relinquished without protest, and held the horses to the road as well as I was able. The tumbrel thundered on, over rocks and stumps of trees, over dead men,–ay, and living ones, I fear,–to the river-bank, where a few of the Virginia troops, held together by Waggoner and Peyronie, had drawn up. It did my heart good to see them standing there, so cool and self-possessed, while that mob of regulars poured past them, frenzied with fear. And the thought came to me that never hereafter would a blue coat need give precedence to a red one.
We splashed down into the water and across the river without drawing rein, since it was evident that no chance of safety lay on that side. Waggoner seemed to understand what was in the cart, for he formed his men behind us and followed us across the river. Scarcely had we reached the other bank, when the Indians burst from the trees across the water, but they stopped there and made no further effort at pursuit, returning to the battleground to reap their unparalleled harvest of scalps and booty. About half a mile from the river, we brought the horses to a stop to see what would best be done.
“The general commands that a stand be made here,” cried Washington, leaping from the cart, and Orme jumped down beside him, while I secured the horses.
“He is brave and determined as ever,” said Washington in a low tone, “though suffering fearfully. The ball has penetrated his lung, I fear, for he can breathe only with great agony, and is spitting blood.”
Colonel Burton joined us at that moment, and between us we lifted the general from the cart and laid him on a bed of branches on the ground.
“Rally the men here,” he said, setting his teeth to keep back the groan which would have burst from him. “We will make a stand, and so soon as we can get our force in shape, will march back against the enemy. We shall know better how to deal with them the second time.”
We turned away to the work of rallying the fugitives, but the task was not a light one, for the men seemed possessed with the fear that the savages were on their heels, and ran past us without heeding our commands to halt. At last we got together above a hundred men, posted sentries, and prepared to spend the night. Darkness was already coming on, and finally Captain Orme and Colonel Washington, after having searched in vain for Doctor Craik, themselves washed the general’s wound and dressed it as best they could. They found that the ball had shattered the right arm, and then passed into the side, though how deeply it had penetrated they had no means of telling.
Despite his suffering, he thought only of securing our position, and so soon as his wound was dressed, he ordered Captain Waggoner and ten men to march to our last camp and bring up some provisions which had been left there. He directed Colonel Washington to ride at once to Colonel Dunbar’s camp, and order up the reinforcements for another advance against the French. He dictated a letter to Dinwiddie calling for more troops, which Washington was to take with him, and forward by messenger from Dunbar’s camp. Though so shaken in body he could scarce sit upright in the saddle, Washington set off cheerfully on that frightful journey. Orme and I watched him until he disappeared in the gloom.
“A gallant man,” he said, as we turned back to the rude shelter which had been thrown up over the place where the general lay. “I do not think I have ever seen a braver. You could not see as I could the prodigies of valor he performed to-day. And he seems to bear a charmed life, for though his coat was pierced a dozen times and two horses were killed under him, he has escaped without a scratch.”
We walked on in silence until we reached headquarters, where Colonel Burton was also sitting, suffering greatly from his wound now he was no longer on horseback.
“Lieutenant Stewart,” he said to me, “I place you in charge of the sentries for the night. Will you make the rounds and see that all is well? I know the men are weary, but I need hardly tell you that our safety will depend upon their vigilance. Guard especially against a surprise from the direction of the river.”
I saluted, and started away to make the round. The sun had long since sunk behind the trees in a cloud of blood-red vapor, which seemed to me significant of the day. All about us through the forest arose the chorus of night sounds, and afar off through the trees I could catch the glinting of the river. What was happening beyond it, I dared not think. And then I came to a sudden stop, for I had reached the spot where the first sentry had been posted, but there was none in sight.
I thought for a moment that in the darkness I must have missed the place, but as I looked about me more attentively, I saw that could not be. I walked up and down, but could find no trace of him. Could it be that the Indians had stolen upon him and killed him with a blow of knife or tomahawk before he could cry out? Yet if that had happened, where was the body?
I hurried on toward the spot where the next sentry had been posted, and as I neared it, strained my eyes through the gloom, but could see no trace of him. I told myself that I was yet too far away, and hurried forward, but in a moment I had reached the place. There was no sentry there. With the perspiration starting from my forehead, I peered among the trees and asked myself what mysterious and terrible disaster threatened us. The third sentry was missing like the others–the fourth had disappeared–I made the whole round of the camp. Not a single sentry remained. And then, of a sudden, the meaning of their absence burst upon me.
I hurried back to the camp, passing the spot where we had quartered the men whom we had rallied, but who were not placed on sentry duty.
As I expected, not one was there.