After this victory, the Indians grew bolder than ever, and attacks on the border settlements were increasingly frequent. More than one family was saved from surprise and death by a queer character known as Johnny Appleseed, who travelled through the wilderness planting apple-seeds which in time grew into valuable orchards. The Indians thought him mad and would not harm him.
JOHNNY APPLESEED
A BALLAD OF THE OLD NORTHWEST
A midnight cry appalls the gloom,
The puncheon door is shaken:
"Awake! arouse! and flee the doom!
Man, woman, child, awaken!
"Your sky shall glow with fiery beams
Before the morn breaks ruddy!
The scalpknife in the moonlight gleams,
Athirst for vengeance bloody!"
Alarumed by the dreadful word
Some warning tongue thus utters,
The settler's wife, like mother bird,
About her young ones flutters.
Her first-born, rustling from a soft
Leaf-couch, the roof close under,
Glides down the ladder from the loft,
With eyes of dreamy wonder.
The pioneer flings open wide
The cabin door, naught fearing;
The grim woods drowse on every side,
Around the lonely clearing.
"Come in! come in! nor like an owl
Thus hoot your doleful humors;
What fiend possesses you to howl
Such crazy, coward rumors?"
The herald strode into the room;
That moment, through the ashes,
The back-log struggled into bloom
Of gold and crimson flashes.