“You were fortunate indeed. I presume, then, you discovered no road around the rebel barricades?”
“No,” Ira replied. “They increase rather than diminish in number, and below here a few miles is a huge swamp, which, for some reason, is flooding rapidly. By the time we arrive there I believe it will be well-nigh impassable.”
“What a way in which to fight!” exclaimed the officer in disgust. “If they would only come out in the open and give me a chance I would soon scatter them like chaff before the wind. But here they are blocking the way, exhausting my stores, forcing me to change all my plans of campaign; it is enough to make a saint angry!” and by this time he had worked himself into such a rage that the hearer was glad, on the plea of being tired, to retire to his own quarters.
When he next saw the general the latter was in a better mood. He had sent for the scout, and when Ira entered the tent he found there a young fellow, scarcely older than himself, to whom the officer at once introduced him.
“Master Le Geyt,” he said, “this is Master Bowen, a courier like yourself, which is a bond that ought to make you fast friends. He has come from Quebec bringing me good news. In a short time Colonel St. Leger is to leave that city for Oswego. From there he will march against Fort Stanwix,[4] and, capturing that, sweep down the valley of the Mohawk, driving the rebels before him, until he joins me at Albany. Now how large a force remains at Fort Stanwix?”
Startled as Ira was by these tidings, he nevertheless replied calmly:
“The last I knew, General Burgoyne, there were two hundred men in the fort. Of course I can’t tell you whether any reinforcements have been sent there within a week or two.”
It was the number that caught the general’s ear.
“Do you hear that, Master Bowen?” he cried. “Only two hundred men there, and how large a force did you say St. Leger has?”
“Seven hundred regulars, and one thousand Indians,” the courier answered.