[X.]
A FEAT OF STRENGTH
The warriors and their prisoners start for the Indian country—Boone lightens the journey and puts the captors in good humor—Stephen Halliwell falls ill of a fever—He is in danger of being tomahawked by the savages—Boone undertakes the care of the feeble man—“No Indian shall raise your hair whilst I can raise a hand to prevent it”—Halliwell is doomed to death but Boone stays the executioners—He carries the exhausted man over the last stage of the march—The party arrives at Chillicothe—Boone and others are taken to the British post at Detroit.
The month of February, 1778, was unusually mild. A few inches of snow fell during the night following the capture of Boone and his men but the next day a thaw set in. The condition of the ground rendered walking tiresome and disagreeable and made it difficult to secure a dry bed at night. It also obliterated ordinary traces and almost precluded the possibility of pursuers finding and following the trail of the band of Indians and their prisoners. Boone noted this circumstance with satisfaction. His chief anxiety now was lest the men of Boonesborough should attempt a rescue, which could only end in disaster and might induce the savages to revert to their original design of attacking the fort. Before starting upon the march he instructed his men not to resort to any of the usual devices for creating a trace, such as leaving scraps of clothing on bushes, breaking off twigs, pieces of bark, and so on.
The Indians divided their captives into three equal squads of nine each, and themselves into four bodies of twenty-five warriors, sandwiching the former between the latter, and this order was maintained upon the daily march. The whites had, of course, been deprived of their weapons and could not have made any concerted attack on their captors with the least chance of success. Any individual attempt at escape during daylight must have been even more hopeless.
A consignment of salt having been sent to Boonesborough a few days before the capture, there was but one pack-horse in the camp at the licks when it fell into the hands of the Indians. This animal was loaded with as much of the plunder as it could carry and the heavy rifles were distributed among the Indian ponies, but the arrangement left a large amount of baggage unprovided with carriage and this was distributed among the prisoners. Each had a burden of fifty or sixty pounds, which consisted largely of the blankets and skins with which he was permitted to cover himself at night. Such a load would tire the ordinary man in an hour, but these hardy backwoodsmen could carry it all day and over fifteen miles of heavy ground, not without great fatigue, of course, but without breaking down. Thus they tramped along under the dripping boughs of the silent forest, their moccasins squelching the spongy earth and their long hair hanging wet and stringy about their necks.
At night the camp was pitched in some place that afforded natural protection from the wind, and this was, perhaps, supplemented by a screen of boughs. Game was plentiful that season and they suffered nothing from lack of food. Whilst the Indians naturally retained for themselves the choicest portions, the prisoners received sufficient to satisfy their appetites. In the centre of the camp a large fire was made and around this the twenty-seven white men stretched themselves to sleep, with their feet towards the blazing logs. This group was encircled by a ring of smaller fires at which the hundred savages lay close together, forming a human belt round the encampment.
The arrangement was a sufficiently comfortable one for the captives, but it presented little prospect of escape. The prisoners lay in the full glare of the girdle of flame and could not stir whilst an Indian remained awake without attracting attention. But even though every one of them was sunk in slumber it would be a task of the utmost difficulty to pass through their prostrate ranks undetected, for the savage has the dog-like habit of sleeping with senses on the alert. The slightest sound, a strange smell, the lightest touch, will arouse him to full intelligence in an instant.
No doubt Boone might have effected his escape had he been so minded. He was one of the few frontiersmen who acquired the peculiarly subtle qualities of the savages, and even excelled the craftiest of them in many respects. No redskin could wriggle over the ground more stealthily than he, nor tread the earth with less disturbance. He knew the character of the Indians thoroughly, and this knowledge he turned to account in the several instances that he fell into their hands. From the first moment of capture, he always turned his attention to arousing a desirable condition of mind in his captors, and this will account for the fact that they invariably treated him well.
He knew how to play upon their feelings, how to tickle their sense of humor, how to excite their self esteem, how to allay their suspicions. He would interest them with stories of the white folks. He would entertain them with feats of strength or dexterity. He would gratify them by imparting some bit of useful knowledge or some practical suggestion. Or, mindful of their love of debate, he would lead them into some discussion, taking care, whilst infusing sufficient zest into his contention, to leave his dusky opponents final masters of the argument.