I was not, indeed; I had never seen a man done to death in cold blood. Yet I fought off the sickening faintness that clutched at my heart; and at last the dangling thing hung limp and relaxed, turning slowly round and round in mid-air.
Mount nodded to Murphy and fell to digging with a sharpened stick. Elerson quietly lighted his pipe and aided him, while Murphy shaved off a white square of bark on the maple-tree under the slow-turning body, and I wrote with the juice of an elderberry:
"Daniel Redstock, a child murderer, executed by American Riflemen for his crimes, under order of George Ormond, Colonel of Rangers, August 19, 1777. Renegades and Outlaws take warning!"
When Mount and Elerson had finished the shallow grave, they laid the scalps of the murdered in the hole, stamped down the earth, and covered it with sticks and branches lest a prowling outlaw or Seneca disinter the remains and reap a ghastly reward for their redemption from General the Hon. Barry St. Leger, Commander of the British, Hessians, Loyal Colonials, and Indians, in camp before Fort Stanwix.
As we left that dreadful spot, and before I could interfere to prevent them, the three riflemen emptied their pieces into the swinging corpse--a useless, foolish, and savage performance, and I said so sharply.
They were very docile and contrite and obedient now, explaining that it was a customary safeguard, as hanged men had been revived more than once--a flimsy excuse, indeed!
"Very well," I said; "your shots may draw McCraw's whole force down on us. But doubtless you know much more than your officers--like the militia at Oriskany."
The reproof struck home; Mount muttered his apology; Murphy offered to carry my rifle if I was fatigued.
"It was thoughtless, I admit that," said Elerson, looking backward, uneasily. "But we're close to the patroon's boundary."
"We're within bounds now," said Mount. "Fonda's Bush lies over there to the southeast, and the Vlaie is yonder below the mountain-notch. This wagon-track runs into the Fish-House road."