"You were—what?" stammered Ewen.
"Killed there."
"Killed?"
"Yes, scalped by the Cherokees; dam! don't I speak plain enough?"
"He is mad," thought Ewen.
"I am not mad," said Wooden-leg gruffly.
"I never said so," urged Ewen.
"Thunder and blazes! but you thought it, which is all the same."
Ewen was petrified by this remark, and then Wooden-leg, while fixing his hyæna-like eye upon him, and mixing a fresh can of his peculiar grog, continued thus,—
"Yes, I served in the Warwomans Creek expedition in '60. In the preceding year I had been taken prisoner at Fort Ninety-six, and was carried off by the Indians. They took me into the heart of their own country, where an old Sachem protected me, and adopted me in place of a son he had lost in battle. Now this old devil of a Sachem had a daughter—a graceful, pretty and gentle Indian girl, whom her tribe named the Queen of the Beaver dams. She was kind to me, and loved to call me her pale-faced brother. Ha, ha, ha! Ho, ho, ho! Fire and smoke! do I now look like a man that could once attract a pretty girl's eye,—now, with my wooden-leg, patched face and riddled carcase? Well, she loved me, and I pretended to be in love too, though I did not care for her the value of an old snapper. She was graceful and round in every limb, as a beautiful statue. Her features were almost regular—her eyes black and soft; her hair hung nearly to her knees, while her smooth glossy skin, was no darker than a Spanish brunette's. Her words were like notes of music, for the language of the Cherokees, like that of the Iroquois, is full of the softest vowels. This Indian girl treated me with love and kindness, and I promised to become a Cherokee warrior, a thundering turtle and scalp-hunter for her sake—just as I would have promised anything to any other woman, and had done so a score of times before. I studied her gentle character in all its weak and delicate points, as a general views a fortress he is about to besiege, and I soon knew every avenue to the heart of the place. I made my approaches with modesty, for the mind of the Indian virgin was timid, and as pure as the new fallen snow. I drew my parallels and pushed on the trenches whenever the old Sachem was absent, smoking his pipe and drinking fire-water at the council of the tribe; I soon reached the base of the glacis and stormed the breastworks—dam! I did, comrade.