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"Ugh!" grunted the savage, his stern fea-¡ tures brightening up as with a last hope. "Spose come with Injin ?"

For a moment or two the Corporal hesitated whether or not to put the man across, but when he reflected on the singular manner of his advent, and other circumstances connected with his appearance among them, his customary prudence came to his aid, and, while avoiding all ground for offence by his mode of refusal, he gave him peremptorily to understand that there was an order against his suffering the boat to leave its present station.

Again the countenance of the Indian fell, even while his quick eye rolled everywhere. "You no give 'em boat, Injin swim," he at length remarked.

"Just as you please," answered Corporal Nixon. "By and by soger go to the Fort, take Injin with 'em."

"No, Injin cross here;" and, as he spoke, he sprung again to the bow of the boat, and with one bound, cleared the intervening space to the

very stern.

Several heavy splashes in the water-a muttered curse from the Corporal-some confusion among his men-and the savage was seen nearly half-way across the river, swimming like

an eel to the opposite shore.

"The awkward brute!" exclaimed the Corporal angrily. "How many muskets are there overboard, Jackson ?"

"Only three-and two cartouch boxes."

"Only three, indeed!-I wish the fellow had been at Old Nick, instead of coming here to create all this confusion. Is the water deep at

the stern?"

"Nearly a fathom, I reckon," was the reply.

"Then, my lads, you must bob for other fish to-day. Jackson, can you see the muskets at the bottom ?"

"Not a sign of them," answered the man, as, lying flat on the boat, he peered intently into the water; "the bottom is covered with weeds, and I can just see the tails of two large pikes wriggling among them. By Gemini, I think I could take them both if I had my rod here."

"Never mind them," resumed the Corporal, again delivering himself of a little wit. "Muskets will be of far more use to us just now than pikes. We must fish them up, or there will be the deuce to pay if we go home without them."

"Then there's no other way than diving for them," pursued Jackson, still looking downwards; "not even the glitter of a barrel can I They must have buried themselves in the weeds. I say, Weston," slightly raising his

see.

head and turning his face to the party named, "you're a good diver?"

"Yes, and Collins better than myself."

"Well then, here's at it," resumed Jackson, rising, commencing to strip himself. "It's only by groping and feeling that we can find the arms, and when once we have tumbled on 'em, it will be easy enough to get them up with one hand while we swim with the other. Here, we must plunge from the stern," he added, as the men just named jumped on board and commenced undressing themselves.

"How come the Indian to knock the muskets overboard, Corporal?" inquired one of the party who had not yet spoken—a fat, portly man, with a long hooked nose and a peaked

chin.

"I'm dashed if I can tell myself, though I was looking at him as he jumped from one end of the boat to the other. All I know is that

the firelocks were propped against the stern of the boat as we placed them, with the belts of the cartouch boxes slung between the ramrods and the barrels; and I suppose, for I don't know how else it could be done, that, instead of

lighting on the seat, he must have passed it

and put his foot on the muzzles, and with the

weight of his body, as he fell, tipped them

heels over head into the water."

"Corporal," ventured Collins, as he removed his last garment, " 'you asked that painted chap if he saw anything green in your eye. Now that is as the case may be, but hang me, wasn't it a little green to take him for a Pottawatomie?"

watomie-who made you a judge of Indian "And how do you know he wasn't a Pottaflesh?" retorted the Corporal, with an air of dissatisfaction. "Didn't he say he was, and didn't he wear a chief's medal?"

"Say! yes, I'll be bound he'd say and wear anything to gull us, but I'm sure he's no Pottawatomie. I never saw a Pottawatomie of that build. fellows, while this chap was square, stout, They are tall, thin, skinny, bony broad-shouldered, and full of muscle."

half-convinced, but would not acknowledge Corporal Nixon pondered a little,. because that he could have been mistaken. "Are you all ready?" he at length inquired, anxious, like most men, when driven into a corner on one topic, to introduce another.

"All ready," answered Jackson, taking the first plunge in the direction in which he knew the muskets must have fallen.

Before following his example, the others waited for his report. This was soon given. He had got hold of one of the muskets and partly lifted it from its bed, but the network of strong weeds above it opposing too much resistance, he had been compelled to quit his

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hold, and come to the surface of the water for came in contact with his naked breast. Now air.

"Here's for another trial," said Collins, as he made his own plunge in the same direction. In a few minutes he too reappeared, bearing in his right hand, not a firelock, but two of the missing cartouch boxes with their belts.

"I think, my lads, if two of you were to separate the weeds with your hands, so as to clear each musket, the other might easily bring it up."

The suggestion of the Corporal was at once acted upon, but it was not until after several attempts had been made to liberate the arms from their weblike canopy, that two were finally brought up and placed in the boat. The third they groped for in vain, until at length the men, dispirited and tired, declared it was utterly useless to prosecute the search, and that the other musket must be given up for lost.

This, however, did not suit the views of the correct Corporal. He said pointedly, that he would almost as soon return to the Fort without his head as without his arms, and that the day having been thus far spent without the accomplishment of the object for which they were there, he was determined to devote the remainder of it to the search. Not being a bad diver himself, although he had not hitherto deemed it necessary to add his own exertions to those of his comrades, he now stripped himself, desiring those who had preceded him to throw on their shirts and rest themselves for another plunge, when he should have succeeded in finding out where the missing musket had lodged.

"What's that?" exclaimed Jackson, pointing to a small dark object of an oblong shape, which was floating about half-way between the surface of the place into which the divers had plunged and the weeds below.

Corporal Nixon was a fearless soldier, whose nerves were not easily shaken, but the idea of a nasty muskrat, as they termed it, floating so near, and touching his naked person, produced in him unconquerable disgust, even while it gave him the desperate energy to clutch the object with a nervous grasp, without any regard to the chances of his being bitten in the act by the small sharp teeth of the animal. But the Corporal's consternation was even greater when, on enclosing it within his rough palm, he felt the whole to collapse, as though it had been a heavy air-filled bladder burst by the compression of his fingers. A new feeling, a new chain of ideas now took possession of him, and leaving the musket where it was, he rose near the spot from whence he had started, and still clutching his hairy and undesirable prize, threw it from him towards the boat, into the bottom of which it fell after grazing the cheek of Collins.

"Pooh! pooh! pooh!" spluttered the latter, moving as if the action was necessary to disembarrass him of the unsightly object no longer there.

A new source of curiosity was now created, not only among the swimmers, but the idlers who were smoking their pipes and looking carelessly on. All now, without venturing to touch the loathsome-looking thing, gathered around it, endeavouring to ascertain what it really was.

"What do you make of the creature?" asked Corporal Nixon, who, now ascending the side of the boat, observed how much the interest of his companions had been excited.

"I'm sure I can't say," answered Jackson; "it looks for all the world like a rat-dead enough, though, for it does not budge an inch."

“I should say it was a great bat, rather," added Weston, "for when I saw it, before it

"Where? where?" inquired several voices, but in the next instant it had wholly disap-hit Collins's face,"-here the latter shuddered, peared from their view.

"it seemed to have its wings quite spread

"What did it look like," asked the Corporal, out like." ever on the qui vive.

"It must have been a muskrat," said Jack-the son; "there's plenty of them about here, and I reckon our diving has disturbed the fellow."

Corporal Nixon now took his leap, but some paces farther out from the shore than his companions. The direction he had taken happened to be the right one. Extending his arms as he reached a space entirely free from weeds, his right hand encountered the cold barrel of the musket; but as he sought to glide it along in order, that he might grasp the butt, and thus drag it endwise up, his touch encountered the hair of some animal which rested on the weapon, and caused it to float slightly upwards, until it

"Let's see what it is," said the man with long hooked nose and the peaked chin, whose name was Cass. By no means anxious, however, to touch it with his hands, he took up a spear and turned over and over the clammy and moveless mass.

"Just as I thought," exclaimed the Corporal shuddering, as the weapon, unfolding the whole to view, disclosed alternately the moistened hair and thick and bloody skin of a human head.

"Gemini !" cried Jackson, "how can this be? That scalp has been freshly taken-this very day-yet how could it get here?"

"Depend upon it," said Green, "that chief

that was here just now could tell us somethin' | friendly there," exclaimed the Virginian, the about it if he had a mind." moment his glance had taken in the scene. "Then he must have had it stuck in his “Out with the arms and divide the dry ammubreechcloth," said the Corporal quietly, "fornition. Collins, you are a smart fellow, do you not a rag else had he about him. No, no, it couldn't be him, and yet it's very strange."

"Of course it couldn't be him," maliciously interposed Collins, who at that moment had so far conquered his first disgust as to take the subject of discussion in his own hands; "for you know he was a Pottawatomie, and therefore wouldn't scalp for the world."

"But whose can it be?" resumed Jackson, "and how did it get here? I am sure it is that of a boy."

"Could it have floated here from the farm?" half questioned Green, musingly; "somethin' struck me like shots from that quarter about an hour before the Injin swum across, and dash me! now I recollect it, I'm sure I heard a cry just after the Corporal left us to go after that bear."

"Nonsense," said the Virginian, “how could it float against the current? and as for the shot, you must have taken Eph Giles's axeblows for them-you know he's chopping wood not far off-besides, you couldn't hear shots at that distance. If you did, it must have been from some of the hunters."

and Green set to work and light a fire, but out of sight, and dry those muskets as fast as you can. There are twelve rounds in each of the four remaining cartouch boxes; these will do for a spell. Jackson, Philips, take two stand of arms, no matter where, and tree yourselves so as to cover the boat, while Cass lies flat in the stern, and keeps a good look-out on the movements of the devils without exposing himself. Now, my lads, do all this very quietly, and as if you didn't think there was danger at hand. If they see any signs of alarm they will pitch it into you directly. As it is, they are only waiting to settle themselves, and do it at their leisure."

"Pity they don't make a general of you, Corporal," remarked Collins, as he proceeded quietly with Green to the execution of the duty assigned to them. "Sure Washington or Hull himself couldn't better command a little army. Is your battle order finished, General ?"

"None of your nonsense, Master Collins. This is no time for jesting. Go and dry those arms, and when you have made them so that they can send a bullet from their throats, join

"But, Corporal, the cry Green says he heard Jackson and Philips in covering the boat; when you left us?" urged Jackson. Weston, we'll take up our old station."

"All stuff!" said the Corporal. "Did anybody else hear it besides Green ?-You were all sitting on the bank with him."

No one answering in the affirmative, Corporal Nixon declared the thing was impossible, or he should have heard it too, nor could he see what connexion there was between that cry-supposing even there had been one-and the facts that had come immediately under their own observation.

"Hist!" interrupted Collins, placing one hand upon the speaker's shoulder, and with the other directing his attention to what, now seen by the whole of the party, was ill calculated to reassure them.

CHAPTER IV.

STEALTHILY gliding through the fresh and thinly-foliaged wood that skirted the opposite shore, yet almost concealed them from view, Corporal Nixon now beheld the crouching forms of several armed Indians, nearly naked, and evidently in war costume. They were following the serpentine course necessitated by the interposing trees, and seeking cautiously to establish themselves behind cover, on the very verge of the bank.

And in less time than we have taken to describe the cause of the alarm, and the orders given in consequence, the men had hastened to execute the several duties assigned to them on shore, while Cass remained, not only with a view of showing the Indians that the boat was not wholly unguarded, but to be enabled to inform his comrades, who could distinctly hear him without rendering any particular elevation of his voice necessary, of any important demonstration on the part of the former. This quietude of arrangement on the part of Corporal Nixon had seemingly not been without effect. It was evident that the Indians had no suspicion that they had been seen, and even when the men coolly quitted the boat, they showed no impatience indicative of an impression that the party were seeking to shield themselves from an impending danger.

"This silence is strange enough,” said the Corporal to his companions, after they had been for some minutes secreted in the cavity from which the departure of the Indian with the boat had been arrested. "I almost wish they would fire a shot, for that would at once tell us how to act, and what we are to expect, whether they're friendly Indians or not."

But no shot was fired-and from the moment when the men quitted the boat, and took up "Back, men, for your lives-there's nothing the positions assigned to them, everything had

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continued silent as the grave on the opposite | smoke, and crack, crack, went two rifles, while, shore, and not the vestige of an Indian could be seen.

But for that scalp," again remarked the Corporal, "I should take the party to have been friendly Indians, perhaps just returned from a buffalo hunt, and come down to the water to drink. They are surely gone again."

simultaneously with the report, fell back into the boat the perforated forage-cap. Both balls had passed through it, and lodged in the trunk of the tree to which the skiff was moored, and behind which Jackson and Philips had taken their stand.

Evidently believing that they had killed a man, the whole band of Indians, hitherto concealed behind logs and trees and among the underwood, now rose to their feet, and uttered

"Look there," said Weston in a more subdued tone, while he placed his hand on the shoulder of his superior, as they crouched in their hiding-place, “look there, Corporal," | a fierce and triumphant yell. and he pointed with his finger to the opposite bank; "do you see that large black-looking log lying near the tall hickory, and with its end towards us?"

"Yes; what of it?"

"Well, don't you see something crouching between the log and the tree - something jammed in like-see, it moves a little."

Corporal Nixon strained his gaze in the direction indicated, but was obliged to admit that, although he distinctly enough saw the log and the tree, he could not discern anything between them.

“Now, do you see it?" again eagerly inquired Weston, as at that moment the body of some animal was seen to turn itself within the very limited space which had been indicated.

“Yes, I see it now," replied the Virginian, "but it's as likely to be a hog as a man, for anything I can make of the shape-a hog that has been filling his skin with hickory nuts, and but now waking out of his sleep. Still, as the Indians were there just now, it may be that, if they are gone, they have left a spy behind them. We'll soon know though how matters stand, for it won't do to remain here all night. Cass," addressing the man in the boat, who was crouched at the stern, only occasionally taking a sly peep and immediately withdrawing his head, "place your cap on the top of the rudder, and lie flat in the bottom. If they are there, and mean to fire at all upon us, they will try their hands upon that."

"I hope they are good marksmen," replied the man, as, raising his right arm, he removed his forage-cap and placed it conspicuously on the rudder. "I've no great fancy for those Pottawatomie bullets, and give them a wide berth when I can."

"Now are you convinced?" asked Weston addressing the Corporal, as both distinctly saw the object upon which their attention had been anxiously fixed raise his head and shoulders, while he deliberately rested his rifle against the log on his right.

"Close down, Cass-don't move," enjoined the Virginian; "the bait has taken, and we shall have a shot presently."

"Devilish good fun that," remarked Green, whose face had been touched by a splinter of bark torn from the tree by one of the balls.

"Don't uncover yourselves, my lads," hastily commanded the Corporal; "all the fellows want now is to see us exposed, that they may have a crack at us."

"We've dried the muskets after a fashion," said Collins, as he now approached Jackson and Philips. "Give us a cartridge, and let's see whether we can't match the devils at that work." Then, having loaded, he, without asking the permission of his superior, leaned his musket against the tree, and taking a steady aim at the man who had fired from the point first noticed by Weston, drew the trigger.

The shot had evidently taken effect, for two other Indians were now seen going to the assistance of their comrade, whom they raised from the ground (where all had again secreted themselves after the first yell), and hurried to the rear.

A loud cheer burst from the lips of Collins, which was answered immediately by the whole of the savages, who, from various contiguous points, sprang again to their feet, and vociferating the war-whoop, dashed into the river nearly up to their necks, seemingly thirsting to overcome the only obstacle which prevented them from getting at their desired victims. But at the very moment when several of them were holding their rifles aloft with the right hand, and securing their powder-horns between their teeth, while Corporal Nixon issued to his small party the strictest injunction not to pull another trigger until the savages should begin to swim, to the astonishment of all, came the sullen and unusual booming of the cannon from the Fort.

For a moment the men, taking their eyes off the sights of their muskets, listened attentively for a repetition of the sound. But no second report reached their ears.

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"It was," observed the Corporal. "Had the danger been there, they would have fired again. Depend upon it, my lads, there is more going "Two almost imperceptible jets of spiral on here than we think. So don't throw away

your ammunition. Every ball that you send | Indian for me to pink? If so, just point him must tell." out, and this good barrel of Uncle Sam's will soon do his job."

"Well, we can but sell our scalps as dearly as possible," interposed Collins, who had again loaded, and was now in the act of raising and supporting his musket against a tree. "But look, look! see how the fellows are scampering."

"Don't fire then, don't fire," hastily enjoined the corporal. "If they will go quietly, let them. We must not lose our time dallying here, but make our way back to the Fort. That gun was meant to recall us as well as to warn us, and luckily it has frightened the Indians, so that they won't care much to attack us now."

Meanwhile the savages, obeying, as it appeared, the voice of their leader, who Collins swore he could identify, even at that distance, as the man who had attempted to carry off the boat, quitted the river for the cover of the wood, and, after a hurried consultation, retreated slowly in the direction of the prairie, without clamour of any description.

"Well rid of them, if they are gone," said the Corporal, well pleased at their departure. "We must keep a sharp look-out though, and see if they return."

|

"Not just yet," answered the Corporal," but hear my orders. You will follow the path along the bank, and move along cautiously until you reach Heywood's stacks. Conceal yourself behind them until we come down with the boat, and keep a sharp look-out on all that you see passing in and near the farm. Now remember, Collins, not a shot, unless it be to save your life-otherwise you will get us all into a scrape."

"Never fear me, General Nixon," and here he touched his cap with all the respect he would have evinced to an officer of that rank. "I've brought one of the imps down, and that I reckon is nearly as good work for one day as filling the old boat with fish, or having a shot at them ducks, as I wanted, this morning. Now, then, I'm off; but if I see anything, shall I halloo out, and let you know there's danger?"

"Not by a long chalk!" returned the Corporal. "All I want you to do is to keep your tongue in your head and your eyes open. If you see anything to alarm you, come back quietly and let us know. We shall be moving

"How many were they?" asked Jackson. down close to the bank of the river. “Can you give a guess, Collins ?”

"About a dozen of them I should say; indeed I counted that number exactly, as they passed through the small patch of clearing made by Eph Giles's axe."

"Can they have gone to the farm?" observed the Corporal musingly; "if so, my lads, we had better get away as soon as possible, for there they will find canoes to cross."

"Why sure they can swim across well enough. The river is not so wide as to prevent them from doing that on a pinch," remarked Philips. "Swim! of course they can," answered Collins, "but not without having their rifles as well wetted as our muskets were a little while ago. I say, Corporal, I see the trick of that rascally chief now. He jumped upon the arms purposely to overturn them in the river, when he found he couldn't get the boat and all our firelocks on the other side."

"Yes, that was a trick!" remarked Jackson; "but, Corporal, you havn't told us how the dickens that fellow came there, instead of the bear you went to spear."

"This is no time to talk about it," seriously rejoined the Virginian. "Some night when we are on guard I will tell you what little I know; at present let us see to getting back to our post. Collins, you seem the crack shot of the party; are you loaded?"

"I am, Corporal," returned Collins, somewhat self-sufficiently. "Have you got another

start."

And now

Collins threw his musket to the trail and advanced cautiously, though fearlessly, along the scarcely perceptible pathway, intercepted at every third or fourth step by creeping vines that protruded from the earth, and rendered it necessary, in order to prevent his tripping, that he should raise his feet somewhat in the manner of a horse with the stringhalt.

He had not proceeded half a mile, when, at an angle of the ill-defined path, formed by a point where the river was narrowest, he was startled at the sight of a human body lying across his course, evidently on its face, although the head was concealed from view by a large tree that bordered upon the road. His first impulse was to turn back and acquaint the Corporal with what he had discovered, but a few moments of reflection satisfying him of the ridicule he should incur in reporting, without being enabled to state with accuracy on what, he boldly advanced. On approaching it he found that the body was lifeless, while the red and scalpless head, previously hidden from his view, was exuding drops of thick blood, that trickled slowly over the pale features of a youth of tender age, the expression of which had been worked into an intensity of terror, and there remained. At a few paces from the head, and close upon the verge of the bank lay a dressed bearskin, which had evidently been saturated with wet, but was now fast drying

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