My father had been talking about it for quite a month, but our friends at the settlement persuaded him to stay in the quarters that had been rigged up for us, and nothing could have been kinder than the treatment we received.
It was always pointed out by the settlers that at any time the Indians might return, and a fresh expedition be on foot from Florida, though this was looked upon as of little consequence, every one feeling that if the block-house were rebuilt, and the enclosure strengthened, we could laugh any Spanish attack to scorn.
With this in view, and with an eye to the attack of the Indians, very little was done in the way of rebuilding houses and cottages, but the whole strength of the settlement was devoted to the rebuilding of our little fort, and the strengthening of the stockade; and so much energy was thrown into the work by the little white and black population that a stronger building was erected, and left to be finished off afterwards.
I remember well standing with Morgan one day, and seeing the powder-kegs, which had for safety been buried under a heap of sand, disinterred and borne into the new cellar-magazine prepared for them early in the making of the block-house.
Nothing was said for some time, but all at once, as our eyes encountered, Morgan exclaimed—
“There, it’s of no use for you to keep looking at me like that, Master George; I know what you are thinking about.”
“Do you?”
“Yes, I just do; and I teclare to cootness, I feel as if it would have been right. The only thing against it that I can see is, that I was rather in too great a hurry.”
“But it was utter madness,” I said, with a shudder.
“Ah, you say so now, sir, because help came, and we were saved; but how would it have been if the Indians had got the mastery, as they nearly did? There is nothing that they stop at in the way of torture and murder, and it would have been a blessing for an end to have been made of us all at once.”