So I set the first watch for the coming night, rolled myself in my blanket, and went to sleep with the lightest heart I had carried in my breast for many a day.
At dawn I was awakened by the noise of horses and cattle and the shouting of the grass-guard, where they were rounding to the half-wild stock from Catharines-town, and our own hoofed creatures which had strayed in the flat-woods.
A great cloud of smoke was belching up above the trees to the northward; and we knew that Catharines-town was on fire, and the last lurking enemy gone.
Long before Lois was astir, I had made my way through our swarming soldiery to Catharines-town, where there was the usual orderly confusion of details pulling down houses or firing them, troops cutting the standing corn, hacking apple-trees, kindling the stacked hay into roaring columns of flame.
Regiment after regiment paraded along the stream, discharged its muskets, filling the forests with crashing echoes and frightening our cattle into flight again; but they were firing only to clean out their pieces, for the last of our enemies had pulled foot before sunset, and the last howling Indian dog had whipped his tail between his legs and trotted after them.
Suddenly in the smoke I saw General Sullivan, mounted, and talking with Boyd; and I hastened to them and reported, standing at salute.
"So that damned Red Sachem escaped you?" said the General, biting his lip and looking now at me, now at Boyd.
Boyd said, glancing curiously at me:
"When we came up we found the entire Tory army here. I must admit, sir, that we were an hour late, having been blocked by the passage of two hundred Hurons and Iroquois who crossed our trail, cutting us from the north."
"What became of them?"