"It is true," he said. "I have been told no little of that most cruel and ferocious warfare waged by your savage enemies. I myself know the fearsomeness of the raids of our equally ferocious Apaches and Yaquis. Therefore I do not wonder that the men and the sons of the men who met their painted enemies in this gloomy wilderness should have become not only hard, but rude and harsh in their manners."
"Given that and the prevailing craze for raw whiskey, and we have—what we have. Yet they are the men whose fathers met the Indian on his own ground; who themselves have met the ravaging war parties, and who will doubtless again meet them,—though I trust not again on the banks of the Ohio."
"May the Virgin grant that your trust is well founded!" returned the señor, with deep earnestness. "Yet the British soldiers still hold your lake forts, and it is rumored that the British agents are ever at work conspiring with the Northern tribes against the interests of your people. Let me predict that unless Britain is humbled by the great Emperor, she will make excuse of your many differences to crush your Republic and regain these lost colonies."
"Let her try!" I cried. "Let her turn loose her savage allies upon us, and we will hurl them back into the lakes! We will cross over and drive redcoats and redskins alike down the St. Lawrence into the sea! Even the abject people of the seaboard, who now lick the foot that spurns them, will remember their fathers of the Revolution, and strike the enemy as Paul Jones and his fellows struck them,—on the sea."
The señor met my enthused glance with unmoved gravity. "I have heard mention of what is called President Jefferson's mosquito fleet."
Our arrival at the shipyards gave me welcome excuse to change the subject. I pointed to the scores of river craft, afloat in the stream or in course of construction. "Had you in mind, señor, to take a bateau or a flat?"
"Bateau?—flat?" he repeated. "Your pardon, doctor, but the terms—?"
"A bateau is a boat of flat bottom but with keel. A flat is a great scow without keel, and often provided with deal cabins."
"I had been told how to proceed, but left all to that rascal of a seaman. Immediately upon our arrival, he told me, with many foul oaths, that he intended to make no ventures on fresh water, and to show his contempt for the saltless fluid, has sat ever since in the taproom of the inn, guzzling whiskey."
"You are better off without the fellow," I said. "There are scores of men to be hired here who are well used to river travel. Is it your intention to hire passage, or to purchase your own boat?"