The leader walked quickly out to the parade-ground, and inside of five minutes the bugle sounded and the men came filing out of their bivouacs in silence, forming with a celerity and order that veteran soldiers could not have excelled. They were all well used to night alarms, and expected an Indian attack at least.
When the colonel, in a few brief, nervous words, informed them of the cowardly treachery of their comrades, and called for a party to pursue them, there was a roar of indignation. Every man in camp clamored to go after the “durned ornary skunks,” as they called them, and Clark hastily selected the first score who presented themselves, mounted them on the horses of the deserters, and sent them off with Captain Harrod and the little adjutant, with orders to shoot all who resisted.
Away went the capturing party at full speed across the ford, and the rest of the night was spent in excited discussion, for all were too angry to sleep.
About an hour before noon Harrod’s party returned with seven or eight of the captured deserters, reporting the rest as scattered to the four winds, and the rest of the day was spent in selecting the companies to go to Kaskaskia, while the rest were detailed to go to Kentucky and defend the frontiers during the absence of their comrades.
Then on the next day, the 24th June, 1778, ten bateaux, carrying four strong companies of hardy rangers, dropped down the rapids of the Ohio, and set off on their dangerous expedition to the unknown wilds of the Illinois country; while, as if to appall them with the terrors of superstition, the sun passed into a total eclipse, and darkness covered the heavens at the instant they entered the passage.[3] There let us leave them, on their venturesome way, and turn to the great post which they were trying to reach.
CHAPTER XII.
KASKASKIA.
The Fourth of July is generally a hot day. The Fourth of July, 1778, was a particularly hot day around the town of Kaskaskia, as it basked in the sun on the banks of two rivers, the tin roofs of its quaint old houses shining like mirrors. Kaskaskia, a hundred years ago, was like Quebec to-day, a quaint, rambling town of steep, narrow streets, nominally English, actually French in language and sentiment. Founded two years before Philadelphia, it was at that time the emporium of Indian trade, and far ahead of the infant St. Louis, eighty miles further up.
What changes a century makes! To-day Kaskaskia is a decayed village, and St. Louis a city of palaces.
On a rounded bluff opposite the town stood a handsome stone fort, with rows of bright brass guns trained on the place, and that so closely as to obviate the necessity of walls around the houses.