The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and Clark

By such demonstrations and enormous gifts, the Indians were held to the British standard.

It was Wabasha and his brothers, Red Wing and Little Crow, who in 1767 gave a deed to Jonathan Carver of all the land around St. Anthony's Falls, on which now stand the cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis, but no government confirmation of the deed has ever been discovered.

"The reduction of St. Louis will be an easy matter, and of the rebels at Kaskaskia also," continued Sinclair. "All the traders who will secure the posts on the Spanish side of the Mississippi have my promise for the exclusive trade of the Missouri."

The Northwest red men were gathering,—Menomonies, Sacs, Foxes, Winnebagoes,—at the portage of the Wisconsin and Fox Rivers, collecting all the corn and canoes in the country, to set out on the tenth of March. Again Sinclair writes, "Seven hundred and fifty men set out down the Mississippi the second of May."

Another party assembled at Chicago to come by the Illinois,—Indians, British, and traders.

"Captain Hesse will remain at St. Louis," continued Governor Sinclair. "Wabasha will attack Ste. Genevieve and the rebels at Kaskaskia. Two vessels leave here on the second of June to attend Matchekewis, who will return by the Illinois River with prisoners."

Very well De Peyster knew Matchekewis, the puissant chief who

at Michilimackinac in Pontiac's war. It was Matchekewis himself who kicked the ball over the pickets, and rushing in with his band fell on the unprepared ranks of the British garrison. On the reoccupation of Mackinac, Matchekewis had been sent to Quebec and imprisoned, but, released and dismissed with honours and a buffalo barbecue, now he was leading his Chippewas for the King.

All this was part of a wider scheme, devised in London, for the subjugation of the Mississippi.

XV
THE ATTACK ON ST. LOUIS

Scarce had Clark time to set his men to work on Fort Jefferson, on the Chickasaw Bluffs overlooking the Mississippi, before he received two other expresses, one from Montgomery, one from the Spanish Governor himself,—"Haste, haste to our relief."

Not wishing to alarm his men, Clark picked out a strong escort,—"I shall be gone a few days. Finish the fort. Keep a constant guard."

They thought he had gone to Kentucky.

All through the year 1779 the Frenchmen remembered Clark's warning. At last, so great became the general apprehension, that the people themselves, directed by Madame Rigauche, the school-mistress, erected a sort of defence of logs and earth, five or six feet high, and posted a cannon in each of the three gates.

"Pouf! Pouf!" laughed the Governor. But he did not interfere.

But so many days elapsed, so little sign of change appeared in the accustomed order of things, that the reassured Frenchmen went on as usual digging in their fields, racing their horses, and clicking their billiard balls. Night after night they played their fiddles and danced till dawn on their footworn puncheon floors.

And all the while the Lake Indians of the North were planning and counselling. All through the Spring they were gathering at rendezvous, paddling down Lake Michigan's shore into the Chicago River, and then by portage into the Illinois, where they set up the cry, "On to St. Louis!"

So long had been the fear allayed, so much the rumour discredited, that when old man Quenelle came back across the river, white with excitement, the people listened to his tale as of one deranged.

"What? Do you ask? What?" His teeth chattered. "Ducharme, Ducharme the absconder, meet me across te river an' say—'Te Injun comin'!' Fifteen huntert down te river of te Illinois!"

Terrified was the old man. Hearers gathered round plying him with questions. The incredulous laughed at his incoherence. "What? What?" he gasped. "You laugh?" Some believed him. Dismay began to creep over the more timid ones.

"What is it?" inquired the burly Governor De Leyba, bustling up. "What? That same old yarn to frighten the people? Quenelle is an old dotard. Take him to prison." Thus reassured, again the people went on with work, games, festivity.

But now the people of Cahokia became excited. Early in March Colonel Gratiot sent a boatload of goods for trade to Prairie du Chien. It was captured by Indians on the Mississippi. Breathless half-breed runners reported the apparition upon the waters,—"All te waves black with canoes. A great many sauvages."

"Clark," was the spoken and unspoken thought of all. "Clark, the invincible, where is he?"

Some said, "He is camped with his Long Knives in the American Bottom."

"No, he is building a fort at the Chickasaw Bluffs."

Hurriedly the villagers prepared an express for Clark. Charles Gratiot was sent, the brainiest man in Cahokia, one who could speak English, and, moreover, a great friend of Clark.

On the swiftest canoe Charles Gratiot launched amid the prayers of Cahokia. Down he swept on the Mississippi with the precious papers calling for succour. Safely he passed a thousand snags, safely reached the bluffs of Chickasaw, and saw the fort. Toiling up he gave his message.

"Colonel Clark? He is gone. We think he left for Louisville." Without delay a messenger was dispatched to follow his supposed direction.

Meanwhile, Clark and his soldiers, joining Montgomery by land, had hurried to Cahokia. Immediately he crossed to St. Louis. It was the feast of Corpus Christi, May 25. Service in the little log chapel was over.

"Come," said the people in holiday attire, "Let us gather strawberries on the flowery mead."

From their covert, peeped the Indians. "To-morrow!" they said, "to-morrow!"

Out of the picnic throng, with lap full of flowers, the beautiful Donna ran to greet her lover.

"So long"—she drew a sigh—"I haf watched and waited!" Love had taught her English. Never had the Donna appeared so fair, with shining eyes and black hair waving on her snowy shoulders.

With tumultuous heart Colonel Clark bent and kissed her. "Vengeance I swear on any Indian that shall ever mar this lovely head!" Then crushing her hand with the grip of a giant,—"Wait a little, my dear, I must see your brother the Governor."

Outside the maiden waited while Clark entered the Government House.

At last Don Francisco De Leyba was come to his senses: "I fear, but I conceal from de people. I sent for Lieutenant Cartabona from de Ste. Genevieve. He haf arrived with twenty-five soldier. Will you not command of both side de river? I need you. You promised."

De Leyba wore a long scarf of crape for his lately deceased wife. Clark had never seen him look so ill; he was worn out and trembling. The ruffle at his wrist shook like that of a man with palsy.

Clark took the nervous hand in his own firm grasp.

"Certainly, my friend, I will do everything in my power. What are your defences?"

"We haf a stockade, you note it? De cannon at gates? I assure de people no danger, de rumour false; I fear dey scarce will believe now." Together they went out to review Cartabona's soldiers and the works of defence.

"Le Colonel Clark! Le Colonel Clark!" the people cheered as he passed. "Now we are safe!"

De Leyba had sent out a hunter to shoot ducks for the Colonel's dinner. And while the Governor and Clark were in discussion, the hunter met a spy.

"Who commands at Cahokia?" inquired the stranger.

"Colonel Clark; he has arrived with a great force."

"Colonel Clark! Oh, no," answered the spy in amazement, "that cannot be! Clark is in Kentucky. We have just killed an express with dispatches to him there."

"I don't know about that," answered the hunter, in his turn surprised. "Colonel Clark is at this moment in St. Louis, and I have been sent to kill some ducks for his dinner."

The stranger disappeared.

Clark was in St. Louis about two hours. "Cartabona is here. I shall be ready to answer his slightest signal. Be sure I shall answer." He turned to go.

"Going? No, no, Señor Colonel, I cannot permit—" The hands of Governor De Leyba shook still more. "I expect you to dine,—haf sent a hunter for ducks."

But when did George Rogers Clark ever stop to eat when there was fighting on hand? Hastily recrossing the river, he put Cahokia into immediate defence.

The next day dawned clear and bright, but the people, wearied with all-night dancing, slumbered late. Grandfather Jean Marie Cardinal had not danced. He was uncommonly industrious that morning. Hastening away in the dewy dawn, he went to planting corn in his slightly plowed fields. Gradually others strolled out on the Grand Prairie. It was high noon when an Indian down by the spring caught the eye of Grandfather Jean Marie Cardinal.

"He must not give the alarm," thought the savage, so on the instant he slew and scalped him where he stood.

Then all was tumult. The people in the village heard the sound of firearms. Lieutenant Cartabona and his garrison fired a gunshot from the tower to warn the scattered villagers in the fields. Erelong they came stumbling into the north gate half dead with fright and exhaustion.

"The Chippewas! The Chippewas!"

They had crossed the river and murdered the family of François Bellhome.

"Sacre Dieu! le Sauvage! la Tour! la Tour!" cried the frantic habitants, but the tower was occupied by Cartabona and his coward soldiers.

Every man rushed to the Place des Armes, powder-horn and bullet-pouch in hand.

"To arms! To arms!" was the terrified cry.

"Where is the garrison? Where is the Governor?"

But they came not forth. Cartabona and his men continued to garrison the tower. The Governor cowered in the Government House with doors shut and barricaded. Women and children hid in the houses, telling their beads.

It was about noon when the quick ear of Clark, over in Cahokia, heard the cannonading and small arms in St. Louis. He sent an express.

"Here, Murray and Jaynes, go over the river and inquire the cause."

Slipping through the cottonwood trees, the express met an old negro woman on a keen run for Cahokia. She screamed, "Run, Boston, run! A great many salvages!"

All together ran back, just in time to meet Colonel Clark marching out of the east gate. In the thick woods of Cahokia Creek he caught a view of the foe. "Boom!" rang his brass six-pounder,—tree-tops and Indians fell together.

Amazed at this rear fire the Indians turned in confusion. One terrified look,—"It is the Long Knife! We have been deceived. We will not fight the Long Knife!" With one wild whoop they scurried to their boats. The handful of traders, deserted, raised the siege and retired.

It was the period of the spring rise of the powerful and turbulent Mississippi, which, undermining its shores, dumped cottonwood trees into the river.

"The whole British army is coming on rafts!" In terror seeing the supposed foe advancing, Cartabona's soldiers began firing at the white-glancing trees on the midnight waters. On, on came the ghostly flotilla.

"Cease firing!" demanded De Leyba emerging from his retreat.

"De cowardly, skulking old Goffner! hide heself! abandon de people!" In wrath they tore toward him, sticks and stones flying. The Governor fled, and the daft Spaniards, watching the river, spiked the cannon, preparing to fly the moment the British landed.

Cahokia trembled all night long. There were noises and howls of wolves, but no Indians. Clark himself in the darkness made the rounds of his sentinels. Even through the shadows they guessed who walked at night.

"Pass, grand round, keep clear of my arms and all's well," was the successive cry from post to post in the picket gardens of old Cahokia.

With the first pale streak of dawn the sleepless habitants looked out. All was still. The Indians were gone, but over at St. Louis seven men were found dead, scalped by the retreating foe. Many more were being carried off prisoners, but Clark's pursuing party rescued thirty.

The prisoners, dragged away to the north by their captors, suffered hardships until restored at the end of the war, in 1783.

When Clark heard of the incompetence of De Leyba he was furious. On his way to the Government House, he saw the lovely Donna at her casement. Her hair was dishevelled, her eyes wet with tears. She extended her hand. Clark took one step toward her, and then pride triumphed.

"Never will I become the father of a race of cowards," and turning on his heel he left St. Louis forever.

In one month De Leyba was dead, some said by his own hand. He knew that Auguste Chouteau had gone to complain of him at New Orleans,—the people believed he had been bribed by Great Britain; he knew that only disgrace awaited him, and he succumbed to his many disasters and the universal obloquy in which he was held. He was buried in the little log chapel, beneath the altar, by the side of his wife, where his tomb is pointed out to this day.

And the beautiful Donna De Leyba? She waited and wept but Clark came not. Then, taking with her the two little orphan nieces, Rita and Perdita, she went down to New Orleans. Here for a time she lingered among friends, and at last, giving up all hope, retired to the Ursuline convent and became a nun.

Presently Auguste Chouteau returned from New Orleans with the new Governor, Don Francisco de Cruzat, who pacified fears and fortified the town with half-a-dozen circular stone turrets, twenty feet high, connected by a stout stockade of cedar posts pierced with loopholes for artillery. On the river bank a stone tower called the Half Moon, and west of it a square log tower called the Bastion, still stood within the memory of living men.

"Next year a thousand Sioux will be in the field under Wabasha," wrote Sinclair to Haldimand, his chief in Canada.

But the Sioux had no more desire to go back to "the high walled house of thunder," where the cannon sounded not "Hail to great Wabashaw!"

Their own losses were considerable, for Clark ordered an immediate pursuit. Some of the Spaniards, grateful for the succour of the Americans, crossed the river and joined Montgomery's troops in his chase after the retreating red men.

"The Americans are coming," was the scare-word at Prairie du Chien. "Better get up your furs."

With Wabasha's help the traders hastily bundled three hundred packs of their best furs into canoes, and setting fire to the remaining sixty packs, burned them, together with the fort, while they hurried away to Michilimackinac. Matchekewis went by the Lakes. "Two hundred Illinois cavalry arrived at Chicago five days after the vessels left," is the record of the Haldimand papers.

The watchfulness and energy of Clark alone saved Illinois; nevertheless, De Peyster felt satisfied, for he thought that diversion kept Clark from Detroit.

After the terror was all over, long in the annals of the fireside, the French of St. Louis related the feats of "l'année du coup."

"Auguste Chouteau, he led te defence, he and he brother."

"No, Madame Rigauche, te school-meestress, she herself touch te cannon."

"Well, at any rate, we hid in te Chouteau garden, behind te stone wall."

XVI
OLD CHILLICOTHE

With a wrench at his hot heart stifled only by wrath and determination, Clark strode from St. Louis. At Cahokia French deserters were talking to Montgomery.

"A tousand British and Indians on te march to Kentucky with cannon."

"When did they start?" thundered Clark. The Frenchman dodged as if shot.

"Dey start same time dis. Colonel Bird to keep Clark busy in Kentucky so Sinclair get San Loui' an' brak up te fur trade."

For once in his life Clark showed alarm. "I know the situation of that country. I shall attempt to get there before Bird does."

Drawing Montgomery aside, he said, "And you, Colonel, chase these retreating Indians. Chase them to Michilimackinac if possible. Destroy their towns and crops, distress them, convince them that we will retaliate and thus deter them from joining the British again."

Without pausing to breathe after the fatigue of the last few days, with a small escort Clark launched a boat and went flying down to Chickasaw Bluffs. Disguised as Indians, feathered and painted, he and a few others left Fort Jefferson.

Clark's army the year before had carried glowing news of Illinois. Already emigration had set in. On the way now he met forty families actually starving because they could not kill buffaloes.

A gun?—it was a part of Clark. He used his rifle-barrelled firelock as he used his hands, his feet, his eyes, instantly, surely, involuntarily. He showed them how to strike the buffalo in a vital part, killed fourteen, and hurried on, thirty miles a day, fording stream and swamp and tangled forest to save Kentucky.

Kentucky was watching for her deliverer. Into his ear was poured the startling tale. With Simon Girty, the renegade, and six hundred Indians, down the high waters of the Miami and up the Licking, Bird came to Ruddle's station and fired his cannon. Down went the wooden palisades like a toy blockhouse before his six-pounders.

"Surrender!" came the summons from Colonel Bird.

"Yes, if we can be prisoners to the British and not to the Indians."

Bird assented. The gates were thrown open. Indians flew like dogs upon the helpless people.

"You promised security," cried Captain Ruddle.

"I cannot stop them," said Bird. "I, too, am in their power."

Madly the Indians sacked the station and killed the cattle. Loading the household goods upon the backs of the unfortunate owners, they drove them forth and gave their cabins to the flames.

The same scenes were enacted at Martin's Station. The Indians were wild for more. But Bird would not permit further devastation. He could easily have taken every fort in Kentucky, not one could have withstood his artillery; but to his honour be it said, he led his forces out.

Loaded with plunder, the wretched captives, four hundred and fifty men, women, and children, were driven away to Detroit. Whoever faltered was tomahawked.

Clark immediately called on the militia of Kentucky. Hastening to Harrodsburg he found the newcomers wild over land entries.

"Land!" they cried, "you can have all you can hold against the Indians."

It was a grewsome joke. The Indians would not even let them survey. Like a military dictator, Clark closed the land office,—"Nor will it be opened again until after this expedition."

Immediately a thousand men enlisted. Logan, Linn, Floyd, Harrod, all followed the banner of Clark. Boone and Kenton set on ahead as guides, into the land they knew so well.

"Is it not dangerous to invade the Shawnee country?" inquired one.

"I was not born in the woods to be scared by an owl," was Clark's sententious reply.

All the provisions they had for twenty-five days was six quarts of parched corn each, except what they got in the Indian country.

Canoeing down the Licking, on the first day of August they crossed the Ohio. Scarce touching shore they heard the scalp halloo. Some fell. Within fifteen minutes Clark had his axes in the forest building a blockhouse for his wounded. On that spot now stands Cincinnati.

On pressed Clark in his retaliatory dash,—before the Shawnees even suspected, the Kentuckians were at Old Chillicothe. They flew to arms, but the Long Knives swooped down with such fury that Simon Girty drew off.

"It is folly to fight such madmen."

Chillicothe went down in flames; Piqua followed; fields, gardens, more than five hundred acres of corn were razed to the level of the sod.

Piqua was Tecumseh's village; again he learned to dread and hate the white man.

"That will keep them at home hunting for a while," remarked Clark, turning back to the future Cincinnati.

XVII
"DETROIT MUST BE TAKEN"

Again George Rogers Clark sped through Cumberland Gap, fair as a Tyrolean vale, to Virginia. And dashing along the same highway, down the valley of Virginia, came the minute men of the border, in green hunting shirts, hard-riders and sharp-shooters of Fincastle.

"Hey and away, and what news?"

The restless mountaineers of the Appalachians, almost as fierce and warlike as the Goths and Vandals of an earlier day, answered:

"We have broken the back of Tarleton's army at King's Mountain, Cornwallis is facing this way, and cruisers are coming up into the Chesapeake."

"Marse Gawge! Marse Gawge!"

This time it was little York, the negro, who, peeping from the slave quarters of old York and Rose, detected the stride of George Rogers Clark out under the mulberry trees.

The long, low, Virginia farmhouse was wrapped in slumber, an almost funeral pall hung over the darkened porch, as John Clark stepped out to grasp the hand of his son.

"Three of my boys in British prisons, we looked for nothing less for you, George. William alone is left."

"Girls do not count, I suppose," laughed the saucy Lucy, peeping out in her night-curls with a candle in her hand. "Over at Bowling Green the other day, when all the gallants were smiling on me, one jealous girl said, 'I do not see what there is so interesting about Lucy Clark. She is not handsome, and she has red hair.' 'Ah,' I replied, 'I can tell her. They know I have five brothers all officers in the Revolutionary army!'"

"What, Edmund gone, too?" exclaimed George. "He is but a lad!"

"Big enough to don the buff and blue, and shoulder a gun," answered the father. "He would go,—left school, led all his mates, and six weeks later was taken prisoner along with Jonathan and the whole army."

That was the fall of Charleston, in the very May when Clark was saving St. Louis.

"We are all at war," spoke up Elizabeth, the elder sister, sadly. "Even the boys drill on mimic battlefields; all the girls in Virginia are spinning and weaving clothes for the soldiers; Mrs. Washington keeps sixteen spinning-wheels busy at Mount Vernon; mother and all the ladies have given their jewels to fit out the army. Mrs. Jefferson herself led the call for contributions, and Mrs. Lewis of Albemarle collected five thousand dollars in Continental currency. Father has given up his best horses, and Jefferson impressed his own horses and waggons at Monticello to carry supplies to General Gates. All the lads in the country are moulding bullets and making gun-powder. We haven't a pewter spoon left."

"An' we niggers air raisin' fodder," ventured the ten-year-old York.

York had his part, along with his young master, William. Daily they rode together down the Rappahannock, carrying letters to Fielding Lewis at Fredericksburg. It was there, at Kenmore House, that they met Meriwether Lewis, visiting his uncle and aunt Betty, the sister of Washington. "And when she puts on his chapeau and great coat, she looks exactly like the General," said William.

"What has become of my captured Governors?" George asked of his father.

"I hear that Hamilton was offered a parole on condition that he would not use his liberty in any way to speak or influence any one against the colonies. He indignantly refused to promise that, and so was returned to close captivity. But I think when Boone came up to the legislature he used some influence; at any rate Hamilton was paroled and went with Hay to England. Rocheblave broke his parole and fled to New York."

The five fireplaces of the old Clark home roared a welcome that day up the great central chimney, and candles gleamed at evening from dormer window to basement when all the neighbours crowded in to hail "the Washington of the West."

"Now, Rose, you and Nancy bake the seed cakes and have beat biscuit," said Mrs. Clark to the fat cook in the kitchen. "York has gone after the turkeys."

"Events are in desperate straits," said George at bedtime; "I must leave at daylight." But earlier yet young William was up to gallop a mile beside his brother on the road to Richmond, whither the capital had been removed for greater safety.

"Is this the young Virginian that is sending home all the western Governors?" exclaimed the people. An ovation followed him all the way.

"What is your plan?" asked Governor Jefferson, after the fiery cavalier had been received with distinction by the Virginia Assembly.

"My plan is to ascend the Wabash in early Spring and strike before reinforcements can reach Detroit, or escape be made over the breaking ice of the Lakes. The rivers open first."

George Rogers Clark, born within three miles of Monticello, had known Jefferson all his life, and save Patrick Henry no one better grasped his plans. In fact, Jefferson had initiative and was not afraid of untried ventures.

"My dear Colonel, I have already written to Washington that we could furnish the men, provisions, and every necessary except powder, had we the money, for the reduction of Detroit. But there is no money,—not even rich men have seen a shilling in a year. Washington to the north is begging aid, Gates in the south is pleading for men and arms, and not a shilling is in the treasury of Virginia."

"But Detroit must be taken," said Clark with a solemn emphasis. "Through my aides I have this discovery: a combination is forming to the westward,—a confederacy of British and Indians,—to spread dismay to our frontier this coming Spring. We cannot hesitate. The fountain head of these irruptions must be cut off, the grand focus of Indian hostilities from the Mohawk to the Mississippi."

Even as he spoke, Jefferson, pen in hand, was noting points in another letter to Washington.

"We have determined to undertake it," wrote Jefferson, "and commit it to Clark's direction. Whether the expense of the enterprise shall be defrayed by the Continent or State we leave to be decided hereafter by Congress. In the meantime we only ask the loan of such necessaries as, being already at Fort Pitt, will save time and expense of transportation. I am, therefore, to solicit Your Excellency's order to the commandant at Fort Pitt for the articles contained in the annexed list."

Clark had the list in hand. "It is our only hope; there is not a moment to be lost."

On fleet horses the chain of expresses bore daily news to the camp of Washington, but before his answer could return, another express reined up at Richmond.

"Benedict Arnold, the traitor, has entered the Capes of Virginia with a force of two thousand men."

It was New Year's Eve and Richmond was in a tumult. On New Year's day every legislator was moving his family to a place of safety. The very winds were blowing Arnold's fleet to Richmond.

Virginia had laid herself bare of soldiers; every man that could be spared had been sent south.

And Arnold? With what rage George Rogers Clark saw him destroy the very stores that might have taken Detroit,—five brass field-pieces, arms in the Capitol loft and in waggons on the road, five tons of powder, tools, quartermaster's supplies. Then the very wind that had blown Arnold up the river turned and blew him back, and the only blood shed was by a handful of militia under George Rogers Clark, who killed and wounded thirty of Arnold's men.

"I have an enterprise to propose," said the Governor to Clark on return. "I have confidence in your men from the western side of the mountains. I want to capture Arnold and hang him. You pick the proper characters and engage them to seize this greatest of all traitors. I will undertake, if they are successful, that they shall receive five thousand guineas reward among them."

"I cannot, Arnold is gone, I must capture Detroit."

More determined than ever, Clark and Jefferson went on planning. "Yes, you must capture Detroit and secure Lake Erie. You shall have two thousand men, and ammunition and packhorses shall be at the Falls of the Ohio, March 15, ready for the early break of the ice."

Washington's consent had come, and orders for artillery. With Washington and Jefferson at his back, Clark made indefatigable efforts to raise two thousand men to rendezvous March 15.

Up the Blue Ridge his agents went and over to the Holston; he wrote to western Pennsylvania; he visited Redstone-Old-Fort, and hurried down to Fort Pitt. Fort Pitt itself was in danger.

The Wabash broke and ran untrammelled, but Clark was not ready. Cornwallis was destroying Gates at Camden; De Kalb fell, covered with wounds; Sumter was cut to pieces by Tarleton. The darkest night had come in a drama that has no counterpart, save in the Napoleonic wars that shook Europe in the cause of human liberty.

War, war, raged from the Atlantic to the Mississippi. The land was covered with forts and blockhouses. Every hamlet had its place of refuge. Mills were fortified, and private houses. Every outlying settlement was stockaded. Every log house had its pickets and portholes. Chains of posts followed the river fords and mountain gaps from Ticonderoga to the Mohawk, from the Susquehanna to the Delaware, to the Cumberland, to the Tennessee. Anxious sentinels peered from the watchtowers of wooden castles. Guns stood on the ramparts. The people slept in barracks. Moats and drawbridges, chained gates and palisades, guarded the sacred citadels of America.

"And what if England wins?" said one to Washington.

"We can still retire to the Ohio and live in freedom," for, like the last recesses of the Swiss Alps, it was thought no nation could conquer the Alleghanies.

In desperation and unaware of the Virginian crisis behind him, George Rogers Clark embarked four hundred men, all he could get of the promised two thousand. Only a line he sent to Jefferson, "I have relinquished all hope," but Jefferson at that hour was flying from Tarleton, Cornwallis was coming up into Virginia, and Washington with his ragged band of veteran Continentals was marching down to Yorktown. There was no time to glance beyond the mountains.

All the northwest, in terror of Clark, was watching and fearing. If a blow was struck anywhere, "Clark did it." Shawnees and Delawares, Wyandots at the north, Choctaws and Chickasaws and Cherokees at the south, British and Indians everywhere, were rising against devoted Kentucky.

As Clark stepped on his boats at Pittsburg word flew to remotest tribes,—

"The Long Knives are coming!"

The red man trembled in his wigwam, Detroit redoubled its fortifications, and Clark's forlorn little garrisons in the prairies of the west hung on to Illinois.

In those boats Clark bore provisions, ammunition, artillery, quartermaster's stores, collected as if from the very earth by his undying energy,—everything but men, men! Major William Croghan stood with him on the wharf at Pittsburg, burning, longing to go, but honour forbade,—he was out on parole from Charleston.

Peeping, spying, gliding, Indians down the Ohio would have attacked but for fear of Clark's cannon. The "rear guard of the Continental army" little knew the young Virginian, the terror of his name. For him, Canada staid at home to guard Detroit when she might have wrested Yorktown.

With shouts of thanksgiving Louisville greeted Clark and his four hundred; the war had come up to their very doors. Never had the Indians so hammered away at the border. Across the entire continent the late intermittent cannon shots became a constant volley.

Every family had its lost ones,—"My father, my mother, my wife, my child, they slaughtered, burned, tortured,—I will hunt the Indian till I die!"

Detroit, Niagara, Michilimackinac—the very names meant horror, for there let loose, the red bloodhounds of war, the most savage, the most awful, with glittering knives, pressed close along the Ohio. The buffalo meat for the expedition rotted while Clark struggled, anguished in spirit, a lion chained, "Stationed here to repel a few predatory savages when I would carry war to the Lakes."

But troops yet behind, "almost naked for want of linen and entirely without shoes," were trying to join Clark down the wild Ohio. Joseph Brandt cut them off,—Lochry and Shannon and one hundred Pennsylvanians,—not one escaped to tell the tale.

Clark never recovered, never forgot the fate of Lochry. "Had I tarried but one day I might have saved them!" In the night-time he seemed to hear those struggling captives dragged away to Detroit,—"Detroit! lost for the want of a few men!" For the first time the over-wrought hero gave way to intoxication to drown his grief,—and so had Clark then died, "Detroit" might have been found written on his heart.

Despair swept over Westmoreland where Lochry's men were the flower of the frontier. Only fourteen or fifteen rifles remained in Hannastown,—the Indians swooped and destroyed it utterly.

XVIII
ON THE RAMPARTS

In all his anguish about Detroit, with the energy of desperation Clark now set to work making Louisville stronger than ever.

"Boys, we must have defences absolutely impregnable; we know not at what moment cannon may be booming at our gates."

A new stronghold was founded, and around it a moat eight feet deep and ten feet wide; surrounding the moat itself, was built a breastwork of log pens, filled with earth and picketed ten feet high on top of the breastwork. An acre was thus enclosed, and in that acre was a spring that bubbles still in the streets of Louisville. Within were mounted a double six-pounder captured at Vincennes, four cannon, and eight swivels, and heaped around were shells, balls, and grapeshot brought for the Detroit campaign. With bakehouse and blockhouse, bastion and barrack, no enemy ever dared attack Fort Nelson.

"General Clark is too hard on the militia," the soldier boys complained, but the hammering and pounding and digging went on until Louisville was the strongest point beyond the Alleghanies.

Back and back came the Indians, in battles and forays, and still in this troublous time settlers were venturing by flatboat and over the Wilderness Road into the Blue Grass country. They seemed to fancy that Clark had stilled the West, that here the cannon had ceased to rattle.

Emigrants on packhorses bound for the land of cane and turkeys saw bodies of scalped white men every day. Logan and his forest rangers, like knights of old, guarded the Wilderness Road. Kenton and his scouts patrolled the Ohio, crossing and recrossing on the track of marauding savages. Boone watched the Licking; Floyd held the Bear Grass.

Fort Nelson was done,—its walls were cannon-proof. Clark's gunboat lay on the water-front when a messenger passed the sentinel with a letter.

In the little square room that Clark called his headquarters, the envoy waited. The young commandant read and bowed his head,—was it a moment of irresolution? "Who could have brought this letter?"

"Any Indian would bring it for a pint of rum," answered a well-known voice. Pulling off a mask, Connolly stood before him.

It was as if Lord Dunmore had risen from the floor,—Connolly had been Lord Dunmore's captain commandant of all the land west of the Blue Ridge. What was he saying?

"As much boundary of land on the west bank of the Ohio as you may wish, and any title under that of a duke, if you will abandon Louisville. I am sent to you by Hamilton."

"What!" gasped Clark. "Shall I become an Arnold and give up my country? Never! Go, sir, before my people discover your identity."

Resolved to lock the secret in his own heart, Clark spoke to no one. But that same night a similar offer was made to John Floyd on the Bear Grass. He mentioned it to Clark.

"We must never tell the men," they agreed; "starving and discouraged they might grasp the offer to escape the Indian tomahawk." But years after Clark told his sister Lucy, and Floyd told his wife, Jane Buchanan,—and from them the tale came down to us.

As if enraged at this refusal, British and Indians rallied for a final onslaught.

"The white men are taking the fair Kain-tuck-ee, the land of deer and buffalo. If you beat Clark this time you will certainly recover your hunting-grounds," said De Peyster at the council fire.

In unprecedented numbers the redmen crossed the Ohio,—station after station was invested; then followed the frightful battle of Blue Licks where sixty white men fell in ten minutes. Kentucky was shrouded in mourning.

Again Clark followed swift with a thousand mounted riflemen.

Among the Indians dividing their spoils and their captives there sounded a sharp alarm, "The Long Knives! The Long Knives!"

"A mighty army on its march!"

Barely had the Shawnees time to fly when Clark's famished Kentuckians entered Old Chillicothe. Fires were yet burning, corn was on the roasting sticks, but the foe was gone.

"The property destroyed was of great amount, and the quantity of provisions burned surpassed all idea we had of the Indian stores," Clark said in after years.

This second destruction of their villages and cornfields chilled the heart of the Indians. Their power was broken. Never again did a great army cross the Ohio.

But standing again on the ruins of Old Chillicothe, "I swear vengeance!" cried the young Tecumseh.

And Clark, the Long Knife, mourned in his heart.

"This might have been avoided! this might have been avoided! Never shall we have peace on this frontier until Detroit is taken!"

XIX
EXIT CORNWALLIS

"The boy cannot escape me!"

Lafayette was all that lay between Cornwallis and the subjugation of Virginia. The lithe little Frenchman, only twenty-three years old, danced ever on and on before him, fatiguing the redcoats far into the heats of June.

The Virginia Legislature adjourned to Charlottesville. In vain Cornwallis chased the boy and sent Tarleton on his raid over the mountains, "to capture the Governor."

Like a flash he came, the handsome, daring, dashing Colonel Tarleton, whose name has been execrated for a hundred years.

Virginia was swept as by a tornado. Never a noise in the night, never a wind could whistle by, but "Tarleton's troop is coming!"

"Tarleton's troop!" Little John Randolph, a boy of eight, his mother then lying in childbed, was gathered up and hurried away ninety miles up the Appomattox.

"Tarleton's troop!" Beside the dead body of her husband sat the mother of four-year-old Henry Clay, with her seven small children shuddering around her. Standing on a rock in the South Anna River, the great preacher had addressed his congregation in impassioned oratory for the last time, and now on a bier he lay lifeless, while the gay trooper raided the lands of his children.

Even Tarleton was moved by the widow's pallor as he tossed a handful of coins on her table. She arose and swept them into the fireplace,—"Never will I touch the invaders' gold."

"Tarleton's troop!" Back at Waxhaw, South Carolina, a lad by the name of Andrew Jackson bore through life the scars of wounds inflicted by Tarleton's men. At that very hour, alone on foot his mother was returning from deeds of mercy to the patriots caged in prison pens by Tarleton. But the streams were cold, the forests dark; losing her way, overworn and weary, sank and died the mother of Andrew Jackson.

"Tarleton's troop!" Jack Jouett at the Cuckoo Tavern at Louisa saw white uniforms faced with green, and fluttering plumes, and shining helmets riding by.

The fiery Huguenot blood rose in him. Before daylight Jack's hard-ridden steed reined up at Monticello.

"Tarleton's troop, three hours behind me! Fly!"

There was panic and scramble,—some of the legislators were at Monticello. There was hasty adjournment and flight to Staunton, across the Blue Ridge.

Assisting his wife, the slender, graceful Mrs. Jefferson, into a carriage, the Governor sent her and the children under the care of Jupiter, the coachman, to a neighbouring farmhouse, while he gathered up his State papers.

"What next, massa?" Martin, the faithful body-servant, watching his master's glance and anticipating every want, followed from room to room.

"The plate, Martin," with a wave of the hand Jefferson strode out from his beloved Monticello.

With Cæsar's help Martin pulled up the planks of the portico, and the last piece of silver went under the floor as a gleaming helmet hove in sight. Dropping the plank, imprisoning poor Cæsar, Martin faced the intruder.

"Where is your master? Name the spot or I'll fire!"

"Fire away, then," answered the slave. The trooper desisted.

Tarleton and his men took food and drink, but destroyed nothing. The fame of Jefferson's kindness to Burgoyne's captured army had reached even Tarleton, for in that mansion books and music had been free to the imprisoned British officers.

"An' now who be ye, an' whar are ye from?"

An old woman peered from the door of a hut in a gorge of the hills, late in the afternoon.

"We are members of the Virginia Legislature fleeing from Tarleton's raid."

"Ride on, then, ye cowardly knaves! Here my husband and sons have just gone to Charlottesville to fight for ye, an' ye a runnin' awa' wi' all yer might. Clar out; ye get naething here."

"But, my good woman, it would never do to let the British capture the Legislature."

"If Patterick Hennery had been in Albemarle, the British dragoons would naever ha' passed the Rivanna."

"But, my good woman, here is Patrick Henry."

"Patterick Hennery? Patterick Hennery? Well, well, if Patterick Hennery is here it must be all right. Coom in, coom in to the best I have."

But Daniel Boone and three or four others were captured, and carried away to Cornwallis to be released soon after on parole.

"Tarleton's troop!" cried little Meriwether Lewis, seven years old.

Sweeping down the Rivanna came the desperado to the home of Colonel Nicholas Lewis, away in the Continental army.

"What a paradise!" exclaimed Tarleton, raising his hands.

"Why, then, do you interrupt it?" inquired Mrs. Lewis, alone at home with her small children and slaves.

The trooper slept that night in his horseman's cloak on the kitchen floor. At daylight Mrs. Lewis was awakened by a clatter in her henyard. Ducks, chickens, turkeys, the troopers were wringing their necks. One decrepit old drake only escaped by skurrying under the barn.

Bowing low till his plume swept the horse's mane, Tarleton galloped away.

The wrath of Aunt Molly! "Here, Pompey, you just catch that drake. Ride as fast as you can, and present it to Colonel Tarleton with my compliments."

On flying steed, drake squawking and flouncing on his back, the darkey flew after the troopers.

"Well, Pompey, did you overtake Colonel Tarleton?" was Aunt Molly's wrathful inquiry.

"Yes'm."

"What did he say?"

"He put de drake in his wallet, and say he much obleeged!"

Little Meriwether, sitting on the gate-post, laughed at his aunt's discomfiture.

The roll of a drum broke the stillness of Sabbath in the Blue Ridge.

"Tarleton's troop!" By the bed of her sick husband sat a Spartan mother at Staunton. Her sons were in the army at the north, but three young lads, thirteen, fifteen, and seventeen were there.

Placing their father's old firelock in their hands, "Go forth, my children," she said, "repel the foot of the invader or see my face no more."

But Tarleton did not force the mountain pass,—the boys went on down to join Lafayette.

From farm and forest, children and grandsires hurried to Lafayette. The proud earl retired to the sea and stopped to rest at the little peninsula of Yorktown, waiting for reinforcements.

Down suddenly from the north came Washington with his tattered Continentals and Rochambeau's gay Frenchmen, and the French fleet sailed into the Chesapeake. Cornwallis was bottled up at Yorktown.

The boy, Lafayette, had simply put the stopper in the bottle and waited.

Seventy cannon rolled in on Yorktown. George Rogers Clark, all the West, was appealing to Washington, but the great chief unmoved kept his eye on Lord Cornwallis.

On the 19th of October, 1781, the aristocratic marquis, who had commenced his career as aide-de-camp to a king, surrendered to the rebels of America.

"'Wallis has surrendered! surrendered! surrendered!"

Meriwether Lewis and William Clark flung up their caps with other boys and shouted with the best of them, "'Wallis has surrendered!"

After the surrender of Cornwallis, Washington and Lafayette and the officers of the French and American armies went to Fredericksburg to pay their respects to Mary, the mother of Washington. The entire surrounding country was watching in gala attire, and among them the old cavalier, John Clark of Caroline.

On his white horse Washington passed the mulberry trees. Quick as a flash little William turned,—"Why, father, he does look like my brother George! Is that why people call our George the 'Washington of the West'?"

A provisional treaty was signed at Paris, November 30, 1782, a few days after the return of George Rogers Clark from that last Chillicothe raid. Slowly, by pack-horse and flatboat, the news reached Kentucky.

The last of the British army sailed away. Washington made his immortal farewell, and went back to his farm, arriving on Christmas Eve. Bonfires and rockets, speeches, thanksgiving and turkey, ended the year 1782.

But with his return from the last scene at Yorktown, the father of Meriwether Lewis lay down and died, a martyr of the Revolution.

XX
THE OLD VIRGINIA HOME

Back over Boone's trace, the Wilderness Road he had travelled so many times, went General George Rogers Clark sometime in the early Spring of 1783, past the thrifty fields of Fincastle and the Shenandoah Germans, with their fat cattle and huge red barns. Every year the stout Pennsylvanians were building farther and farther up. Year by year the fields increased, and rosy girls stacked the hay in defiance of all Virginian customs across the Ridge.

But the man who a thousand miles to the west held Illinois by the prowess of his arm and the terror of his name, sprang not with the buoyant step of six years before when he had gone to Virginia after the gunpowder. His thoughts were at Kaskaskia, Vincennes, Louisville, where his unsustained garrisons were suffering for food and clothing.

"Peace, peace, peace!" he muttered. "'Tis but a mockery. Must Kentucky lie still and be scalped?"

Still the savages raided the border, not in numbers, but in squads, persistent and elusive. Isham Floyd, the boy drummer of Vincennes, had been captured by the savages and three days tortured in the woods, and burnt at the stake.

"My boy-brother in the hands of those monsters?" exclaimed the great-hearted John Floyd of the Bear Grass. A word roused the country, the savages were dispersed, but poor Isham was dead. And beside him lay his last tormentor, the son of an Indian chief, shot by the avenging rifle of John Floyd.

Riding home with a heavy heart on the 12th of April, a ball struck Colonel Floyd, passed through his arm, and entered his breast. Behind the trees they caught a glimpse of the smoking rifle of Big Foot, that chief whose son was slain. Leaping from his own horse to that of his brother, Charles Floyd sustained the drooping form until they reached the Bear Grass.

"Charles," whispered the dying man, "had I been riding Pompey this would not have happened. Pompey pricks his ears and almost speaks if a foe is near."

At the feet of Jane Buchanan her brave young husband was laid, his black locks already damp with the dew of death.

"Papa! Papa!" Little two-year-old George Rogers Clark Floyd screamed with terror. Ten days later the stricken wife, Jane Buchanan, gave birth to another son, whom they named in honour of his heroic father.

With such a grief upon him, General George Rogers Clark wended his lonesome way through the Cumberland Gap to Virginia. Now in the night-time he heard young Isham cry. Not a heart in Kentucky but bewailed the fate of the drummer boy. And John Floyd, his loss was a public calamity.

"John Floyd, John Floyd," murmured Clark on his lonely way, "the encourager of my earliest adventures, truest heart of the West!"

Lochry's men haunted him while he slept. "Had I not written they would not have come!"

His debts, dishonoured, weighed like a pall, and deep, deep, down in his heart he knew at last how much he loved that girl in the convent at New Orleans. At times an almost ungovernable yearning came over him to go down and force the gates of her voluntary prison-house.

In May he was at Richmond. A new Governor sat in the chair of Jefferson and Patrick Henry. To him Clark addressed an appeal for the money that was his due.

But Virginia, bankrupt, impoverished, prostrate, answered only,—"We have given you land warrants, what more can you ask?"

With heavy heart Clark travelled again the road to Caroline.

There was joy in the old Virginia home, and sorrow. Once more the family were reunited. First came Colonel Jonathan, with his courtly and elegant army comrade Major William Croghan, an Irish gentleman, nephew of Sir William Johnson, late Governor of New York, and of the famous George Croghan, Sir William's Indian Deputy in the West.

In fact young Croghan crossed the ocean with Sir William as his private secretary, on the high road to preferment in the British army. But he looked on the struggling colonists, and mused,—

"Their cause is just! I will raise a regiment for Washington."

While all his relatives fought for the King, he alone froze and starved at Valley Forge, and in that frightful winter of 1780 marched with Jonathan Clark's regiment to the relief of Charleston. And Charleston fell.

"Restore your loyalty to Great Britain and I will set you free," said Major General Prevost, another one of Croghan's uncles.

"I cannot," replied the young rebel. "I have linked my fate with the colonies."

Nevertheless General Prevost released him and his Colonel, Jonathan Clark, on parole. Lieutenant Edmund was held a year longer.

Directly to the home in Caroline, Colonel Jonathan brought his Irish Major. And there he met—Lucy.

Then, with the exchange of prisoners, Edmund came, damaged it is true, but whole, and John, John from the prison ships, ruined.

At sight of the emaciated face of her once handsome boy, the mother turned away and wept. Five long years in the prison ship had done its work. Five years, where every day at dawn the dead were brought out in cartloads. Stifled in crowded holds and poisoned with loathsome food, in one prison ship alone in eighteen months eleven thousand died and were buried on the Brooklyn shore. And then came the General, George Rogers, and Captain Richard, from the garrison of Kaskaskia where he had helped to hold the Illinois.

In tattered regimentals and worn old shirts they came,—the army of the Revolution was disbanded without a dollar.

"And I, worse than without a dollar," said General George Rogers. "My private property has been sacrificed to pay public debts."

But from what old treasure stores did those girls bring garments, homespun and new and woolly and warm, prepared against this day of reunion? The soldiers were children again around their father's hearth, with mother's socks upon their feet and sister's arms around their necks.

Jonathan, famous for his songs, broke forth in a favourite refrain from Robin Hood:—