It was but natural I should look toward Sergeant Corney, and surely if there was one man in that clearing who obeyed General Herkimer's command, it was he! A graven image could not have been more stolid; one would have said that the uproar everywhere around was as the rippling of waters to him, and the Indians of less consequence than the dancing shafts of sunlight flickering amid the leaves when they are stirred by the morning breeze.
I question if Jacob realized anything of what was going on around him. All his thoughts were centred upon the one idea of rescuing his father while there was yet time, and the lad waited eagerly for the conference between the leaders regarding the prisoner to be begun, heeding the remainder of the howling gang hardly more than did Sergeant Corney.
Colonel Cox, the cause of all this disturbance, was even more terrified than I, as could be told by the expression on his face, and the finger-nails pressed deeply into the palms of his hands that he might control himself in obedience to orders, while as for the others, I know not how they deported themselves.
At that instant my world was of small dimensions, consisting of only so much earth as that impassive red man and the open-hearted, honest patriot officer stood upon.
Like bees the angry Indians swarmed to and fro between the encampment and our place of meeting, until all were armed with rifles, and it needed but the lightest word to convert that sunlit clearing into a theatre of the bloodiest deed in the history of the tribe whose wildest delight was the shedding of blood.
Not until his followers were in such a frenzied condition that it seemed impossible another's will could restrain them, did Thayendanega speak, and then in a few words of the Indian language, uttered in so low a tone that I could not distinguish a single syllable, he calmed the tempest on the instant, until those who had been howling for our lives became like lambs.
When all was hushed once more, the sachem said to General Herkimer, speaking calmly, almost indifferently:
"The war-path has been opened across the country as far as Esopus, and the Tories of Ulster and Orange will join with the braves of Thayendanega's tribe to quell this revolt against the king, who is their father."
Now it was that General Herkimer spoke earnestly, pleadingly.
"Do not allow so weighty a question to be settled without further consideration, Captain Brant. Why should not you and I discuss it calmly, as we have in the olden days many a matter which was not so grave?"