Accompanied by war-songs from the warriors and hoots and yells from the squaws and fiendish children, the unfortunate men were being brought across the river in triumph, and then a deep hush fell upon our garrison, as every person within the walls bent forward anxiously to get a glimpse of those who were being carried to the theatre of a terrible death.
The unfortunate prisoners were yet too far away for me to distinguish their features, when a soldier standing near by, a man whom I recognized as one of those who had howled most loudly for surrender, cried with a groan as of mortal agony:
"There is Seth Morton!"
This was the name of one of the deserters, and there was no longer any hope but that the savages were ready to show us how our own people could die.
At this moment the party with whom Sergeant Corney had gone to the commandant for permission to attempt a rescue came up, and but one glance at their faces was needed to show that the request had been denied.
"He wouldn't let you go?" I whispered, as the old man stood by my side.
"No, lad, an' we should have had better sense than to ask him. A commandant who would agree to sich a plan has no right to expect his troops can rely upon his showin' good judgment in a tight fix."
"What did he say?"
"He talked like a gentleman who speaks with his friends. Instead of roarin' out that we were all kinds of idjuts, as another commander might have done, he told us exactly what would be the result if any of us attempted to leave the fort, an' wound up by sayin' that if his own brother was in the hands of the red devils, he would not consider it doin' justice by the garrison even to let one man venture forth. He only told us the truth, an' I'm not sorry I went to him, even though nothin' came of it, for it ain't cheerful to stand still without makin' a little bit of a try while sich work as that yonder is goin' on."
When the prisoners had been taken across the stream the savages lost no time in setting about their terrible work, and, although so many years have elapsed since then, I cannot bring myself to set down that which I know was done.