“That’s how I came to this country, an’ when I laid by me red coat I thought this a bonny place to bide in. I got me a good team an’ was makin’ a tidy bit cartin’ supplies ower the mountains when the war broke oot. I drove me team with Braddock’s army an’ afterward joined the militia.”
“Father was a soldier under Braddock. I’ve heard him tell how brave some of the teamsters were in the midst of the panic and how cowardly were some of the others.”
“Same old story; all kinds o’ folks to make a world. I mind well the grit o’ one o’ them, Daniel Morgan was his name. We drove our teams ower Braddock’s grave in the road so’s to hide it from the redskins. Morgan’s a mon as belongs at the head o’ the column. He fears naught on the face o’ the earth, an’ such men lead oot in this country where courage an’ skill at war are more account than any ither place i’ all the world. Morgan an’ I were teaming supplies to Fort Chiswell i’ the summer of 1756. One o’ the British officers got mad at him an’ struck him wi’ the 40 flat o’ his sword when Morgan he oop-ended the officer’s person wi’ a smart crack o’ his feest. That was fat i’ the fire you may be sure. Insubordination don’t go i’ the army an’ they tied Morgan to his cart wheel an’ laid five hundred lashes on his bare back. ’Twas a wicked sight, the flesh o’ him hung i’ strips, an’ he as cool as a cowcumber an’ countin’ every stroke. He always declared they missed a stroke. A braw lad be that same Dan Morgan.”
“I should have thought it would have killed him.”
“Keel him! Lad, ye don’t know the stuff o’ which such men are made. Why, after he’d gone into the service he was ambushed by the savages an’ was shot i’ the neck, the bullet comin’ oot the mouth an’ takin’ the teeth o’ one side along wi’ it.”
“What became of him?”
“He settled doon i’ Winchester, which was then weel nigh the jumpin’ off place, licked every mon in town as wanted a fight, an’ then married a fine woman an’ bided there as respectable as ye please. I sure thought, tho’, he would go to the dogs. I’m o’ the opeenion that wife will be the makin’ o’ him. What the boats ahead doin’, lad?”
“They are landing at the mouth of the little creek, there.”
“I have it; ’tis nigh sundown an’ I reckon they hope to shoot something fer supper,” saying which he began to sing in a rollicking voice the following, which may be presumed to be of his own composition: