"Never until that moment had my senses been awakened to the danger which I now suspected to be about me. I returned glance for glance to my companion, and rested well assured that whatever enemies I might have, he was not one of their number. I asked the woman for my watch, wound it up, and under pretense of wishing to see how the weather might probably be on the morrow, took up my gun and walked out of the cabin. I slipped a ball into each barrel, scraped the edges of my flints, renewed the primings, and returning to the hut, gave a favorable account of my observations. I now took a few bearskins, made a pallet of them, and calling my faithful dog to my side, lay down, with my gun close to my body, and in a few minutes was to all appearances fast asleep.
"A short time had elapsed when some voices were heard, and from the corner of my eyes I saw two athletic youths making their entrance, bearing a dead stag on a pole. They disposed of their burden, and asking for whisky, helped themselves freely to it. Observing me and the wounded Indian, they asked who I was, and why that rascal (meaning the Indian, who, they knew, understood not a word of English) was in the house. The mother—for so she proved to be—bade them speak less loudly, made mention of my watch, and took them to a corner, where a conversation took place in a low tone, the purport of which it required little shrewdness in me to guess. I tapped my dog gently; he moved his tail, and with indescribable pleasure I saw his fine eyes alternately fixed on me, and raised toward the trio in the corner. I felt that he perceived danger in my situation. The Indian exchanged a last glance with me.
"The lads had eaten and drunk themselves into such condition that I already looked upon them as hors de combat, and the frequent visits of the whisky bottle to the ugly mouth of their dam I hoped would soon reduce her to a like state. Judge of my astonishment, reader, when I saw this incarnate fiend take a large butcher's knife and go to the grindstone to whet its edge. I saw her pour the water on the turning stone, and watched her working away with the dangerous instrument until the cold sweat covered every part of my body, despite my determination to defend myself to the last. Her task finished, she walked to her reeling sons and said, 'There, that'll soon settle him. Boys, you kill the Indian and then for the watch!'
"I turned, cocked my gunlocks silently, touched my faithful companion, and lay ready to startup and shoot the first that might attempt my life. The moment was fast approaching, and that night might have been my last in this world, had not Providence made preparations for my rescue. All was ready; the infernal hag was advancing slowly, probably contemplating the best way of despatching me whilst her sons should be engaged with the Indian. I was several times on the eve of rising and shooting her on the spot; but she was not to be punished thus. The door was suddenly opened, and there entered two stout travelers, each with a long rifle on his shoulder. I bounced upon my feet, and making them most heartily welcome, told them how well it was for me that they should have arrived at that moment. The tale was told in a minute. The drunken young men were secured, and the woman, in spite of her defense and vociferations, shared the same fate. The Indian fairly danced with joy, and gave us to understand that as he could not sleep for pain, he would watch over us. You may suppose we slept much less than we talked.
"The two strangers gave me an account of their once having been themselves in a somewhat similar situation. Day came, fair and rosy, and with it the punishment of our captives. They were quite sobered. Their feet were unbound, but their arms were still securely tied. We marched them into the woods off the road, and having disposed of them as regulators were wont to treat such wretches, we set fire to the cabin, gave all their skins and implements to the young Indian warrior and proceeded, well pleased, toward the settlements.
"During upward of twenty-five years, when my wanderings extended to all parts of our country, this was the only time at which my life was in danger from my fellow-creatures. Indeed, so little risk do travelers run in the United States that no one born there ever dreams of any to be encountered on the road; and I can only account for the occurrence by supposing that the inhabitants of the cabin were not Americans."
IV. AN HOUR OF TERROR, AND MIDNIGHT FEAST.
The following story, though somewhat similar to the foregoing, had a very different termination:
The year 1812 was one of anxiety and alarm to the frontier settlers of our country, for the Indians, incited by British emissaries, were sullen, and in many portions of the Ohio Valley and on the Canadian border openly hostile to the Americans.
Three families dwelling in a little settlement on the banks of a small stream which emptied into Lake Erie had refrained in every way possible from giving offense to their Indian neighbors, the Miamis of the Lake, whose nearest village was thirty miles distant. However, to be safe, they built a block-house surrounded by a tall stockade, and always had their guns and other weapons ready for use.