Show wis this is a story of pioneer days in 11 P pa oana OAN 0 n ILA indiana when courageous frontiers i i assa ess v oy f i 1 j i i 1 men fought the redskins red skins and the by SAMUEL mccoy wilderness and won vast territory t i copyright 1918 1916 by dobbs merrill jerriaco co chapar CHAP CHAPTER Tr arx X 6 the cougar crouches T ino 0 an indian mo mother ther lying dying in a A squalid I 1 tepee f in the forast forest once were given three tons sons af it a birth one died I 1 iw infancy two lived to td become the famous leaders the terrible Inhabitants inhabitant th the elforest forest wilderness ever knew As two I 1 grew tom to manhood arihood and forced his hia way headst by his daring hla his cunning ning his matchless matfess eloquence and power Ithe tred man with his love of imagery in names chose the cougar the panther the great c cat a t of the forest asAhe fitting type of the chief chletis whose lightest word was law at it was from this demo dilag alac beast that tite the shawnee chief received his name tecumseh the cougar about to spring A yankee surveyor predicted one day flay dayan a an eclipse eltse of the sun tecum behs brother on account of his fits frequent drunken babb lings had been dubbed the open door but a glint glim mer of shrewdness lighted up his rum ram sodden brain at the words of the white man he returned to his tribe and saying rig to all who would listen that he had been given n message from the great manitou himself prophesied that on a certain day the sly sky would be darkened a sign that he be the open door was divine and was henceforth to lead his bis people they laughed but the darkness came as jib he had foretold and from that day he was looked up to by every warrior in the forest as the greatest of conjurers he was no longer called the open door but the loud voice and his voice in council was the voice of authority but ye years arshad had now passed and he be prayed in secret for another sign to bolster up his wavering strength the white men came farther and farther into the wilderness reared their cabins in greater and greater numbers inthe in the ted red mans forest bar acred and bought larger and larger territories from the stupid savage who reached out eagerly for a handful of toys a jus jug of the white mans fiery i drink and gave in return the countless acres of his hunting ground but now for years his dumb resentment grew more and more bitter to tecumseh and his brother the Prop prophet bet the red men looked impatient P ly for a leadership which should restrain the ille encroaching settler or which might even regain for them their lost lands the young warriors could not wait for council here and there they struck down a settler took a woman captive dashed out the brains of a child and hurried back into the forest to harrison in vincennes came tecumseh for council and promised redress then slipped away to the south down the great river to the tribes along the gulf to implore them to stand with their brothers of the north against the white mans advance the prophet meanwhile remained at ills village miles north of vincennes and spent the time in incantations and ominous mutterings rings and the little town of vincennes lay in anxious uncertainty on the banks of the wabash river down which came the news of the prophets restless plotting the little village presented a scene ot of the mo most st unusual activity here and there in vacant fields tho the various companies of the territorial militia were drilling four companies of mounted men and eight of infantry a force of some six hundred men which harrlson harrison had caused to be assembled hastily women and children stood watching the evolutions of the volunteers the french inhabitants chattered away in tremendous excitement As far as military drill and accouterment accouterment w were vere concerned the men were ridiculously ridiculous u lo 10 1 r ly i awkward and untrained they could not mot keep step to save their souls and only one of the twelve companies mide made tiny any pretense at a uniform this one was waa the company commanded by spier spencer of corydon these I 1 wore yet yel jow ilow hunting shirts trimmed with red feathers feather 9 they were promptly dubbed the yellow jackets Jachet Vand and were marked men but the rest wore whatever clothes they were possessed of in their dally life tow jeans or linsey woolsey or the hunters dress of tanned deerskin an deach man carried the rifle of its ills choice firearms of at every make 1 and i ifancy any length of barrel barre 1 one wa nr aing was eau enU ned by a shooting match someone got Zot a whiter 1 wood plank and pacing oft off CO 60 yards yard propped it up firmly A circle ten inches in diameter was smeared on oa the board with wet powder and in the center of this blacksto black spot a bit of white paper the size of a dollar was planed pinned one after another of the awkward militiamen stepped to the line and fired seemingly without pausing to elm alm not a man failed to send tas bis bullet into the avhlee then the target was moved to 80 60 yards distance tren a hundred and the deadly accuracy racy continued as the bettar marksmen took their turns and then they tossed pieces of wood into the air these too came down pierced by the miraculous b ducts the afternoons passed in the same abat state e of suppressed excitement the inan men lolled around the shady side of atje fabel ng jaud flod chewed their tobacco do you the time you had a quarrel with your best girl and vowed never again to go near her that was the plight in which david larrence found himself after tobnette Tol nette obannon had been given evi dence that Ahat ho he was a spy had asked him to explain and had been rebuffed for her apparent doubts by the proud young man gloomy as a he left eft the corydon settlement and went to vincennes to live and eoon soon there comes into his bla life an event which makes the pretty lov ers quarrel seem just less than nothing it marks the turning point lahla in his existence the hand of destiny Is seen moving relentlessly in this installment david remember had come all the way mayrom from england to the frontier settlement of indiana territory 0 to o kill an enemy he makes friends with the americans and falls in love with dainty tobnette Tol nette amongas Among ls acquaintances are job cranmer who turns out to be a brit ish spy epy and doctor elliott El llott secretly in league with braniner Cra niner ike blackford Black blackford foid Is a true friend silently the long hot hours dragged by at sunset they heard tho the bugle tit it port fort knox tho the stockade inclosure three miles up tho the river sound faintly the end of the day night cama icamen on and a group of men gradually gathered on the benches and the wass grass in front of the jefferson house as the tavern of parmenas beckos beckes bearing on its lt signboard a staring portrait of the statesman was wast grandly called they talked in low tones and david on the edge of the crowd could not distinguish their words ile he knew however that most of the leaders of the town were there wash johnson the old postmaster with ills his deep voice booming out at intervals henryl henry hurst and henry vander van der burgh the judges benjamin parke more recently appointed to the bench old john small who had been sheriff twenty years before and scalped scalded with his own hand ma indians whom his bis posse had pursued and captured peter jones who had seen the error of his ways as a tavern keeper and had reformed and become the territorial auditor tind lind the custodian of the infant public library the hotheaded hot headed virginian thomas randolph scarred with the ille knife wounds received in his row with sawney mcintosh the defamer of harrlson harrison the two sawbones doe doc ellas elias me ile namee and doe doc jake kuykendall and a dozen more francois vigo the old spanish merchant who had seen george rogers dark clark storm vincennes 32 years years before sat at davids side it a fine old fellow of seventy five the only light visible was that in the shop of the printer ellhu stout industriously aiding his apprentice at the types or wiping his inky fingers to can line aine a proof pulled on the broad liand hand press the moths and insects fluttered around hi his s candles candle 8 a and ad the poured off its his forehead but the western sun was due for publication on alie ae morrow and he meant to see it through david listened with closer attention when he oyer overheard heard governor harrlson harrison address a square jawed young man in the uniform of a captain in the united states army telling him that lie he had just written to eustis the see sec rotary of war at washington and had commended to the department the work of the young captain in transforming the little fort near vincennes from a place wretchedly neglected into an adequate stronghold vigo whispered to david that the boyeas loy was capt zachary taylor from kentucky who had been placed in command at fort knox knos but a fengi weeks previously 1 I trust went on harrison that mr eustis will enough to bring my letter to the attention of esste his voice in council was the voice of authority your uncle president madison I 1 would like him to knola kno that we are well pleased with your work taylor flushed through his bis ton tan with pleasure he would have liked to ofay bay that he be hoped that harrison might ebbe ome day occupy the presidential thil chair but ho he aisis I asas as taciturn turA as most of the men of 0 the frontier for far less would lie have permitted himself to dream that the great grent office might bo be his bis own william henry harrison Harris I 1 vincennes was vas years old the man thirty eight there had never been anything commonplace in the existe existence nee of place or man each had already had a history whose telling must move the heart more than with a trumpet the face of the man was the face of the soldier strong resolute proud indomitable but it was likewise the face of the man of the ilie people the man in whom they trusted for his calm patience and ills his warm friendliness with what unfaltering devotion had they como come to rely on him I 1 and how the men and women of the wilderness seeing that tall and martial figure pass paused to mark that long grave face the eyes deep set under bushy brows on either side the lengthy humorous nose and smiled inlove in love and deep regard in answer to the slow smile of the wide and kindly mouth what had he not donefer done for them 1 he was a warm admirer of the democratic jefferson and he was an aristocrat of the new territory st steeped epe in the classic scholarship of the old dominion the son of a signer of the declaration of independence at eighteen he had chosen to leave behind him the culture of the older states and to plunge into the rude but generous wilderness at twenty eight he was governor of the indiana territory at thirty master of nn in empire of acres ruler over a province twice as large as england and ireland larger indeed than all of fra france a ce within the ten years following ills appointment as governor the negotiator with absolute power of treaties which added to the new nation fifty millions of acres a domain la large rge as england and scotland combined at thirty one holding in its his hand for five months the destinies of a tract of square miles tin an imperial province greater than any other one man ever controlled in the lil history story of the united states before or since opposed to him the great protagonist of the tragic drama of the savage tecumseh ruler of flie five indian tribes master mind of the great indian confederacy of another score of tribes chief of warriors wan lors iii langing nging over miles of territory harrison had policed the same territory with exactly twenty backwoods men twenty men to guard tin an emalio they threaded their ways through the wilderness from st louis to detroit they reported to hira him at vincennes on this enormous stage the curtain Is about to be lifted on the titanic duel of the west the group of men lolling in the shadows by the Jefre jefferson house began to speak of the latest dispatches from the east news had just come that the younger wellesley had driven mas senas french columns olt off the field of fuentos de ae onoro adding to the laurels gained at talavera and busacc napoleon was beginning to wonder at tilts this englishman the little corporal himself was snarling at the russian bear the white czar was disobeying his commands to starve the trade of england by closing the ports of the continent england driven to desperation was seizing american seamen on the pretext that they were englishmen and forcing them to serve against the french and still the government at washington kept up its endless attempts to stop these insults by words words words the little group of westerners under the stars of the wilderness felt themselves hopelessly remote from the world of leader leadership ship their affairs seemed petty and narrow david larrence alone gazing i silently over the broad prairies misty under the newly risen ibsen moon and remembering t the e crowded cities of his native engla england d suddenly saw how great a prize the ample lands would be to her and saw as in it a vision of what mighty stature were these backwoodsmen backwoods men who held beld the land for america the feeling of apprehension which had been growing all summer seemed to have reached an unendurable pitch it was inevitable that something should happen in tho the skies of early september a comet gleamed a miraculous portent but nothing happened the men and women continued their speculations as to whereabouts and Intent intentions lons they invented new theories each lour hour and every other hour they turned old theories over and over 1111 they were threadbare and people got cut tired of bearing them the children ran up and down the lanes la in the twilight playing nt at indians until their mothers called them indoors with a shudder at the thought of the nearness of the lurking savages who might turn those shrieks of pretended tear fear into shrieks of actual terror there seemed to be nothing to do but wait cut but at noon noan on tho the seventeenth of september a serene and cloudless day a backwoodsman passing through the lanes of vincennes pausing carelessly to glance up at nn an eagle soaring into the face of the sun uttered an ejaculation A piece had been bitten out of the suns edge he thought little by little the dark shadow gnawed its way into the blazing disk and the people stopped their tasks to gaze gaye upward at the growing eclipse the simpler french inhabitants chattered in an agitation which waa as nothing however compared with the dismay of the he squalid indians who dragged on their harmless wretched existence in the village of tepees on the edge of town by three only at ai ring of light was visible the center of the sun being obscured by a smoky disk which cast the earth into twilight darkness the indian villagers east cast themselves upon the ground in abject fright and sacrificed their dogs alive to appease the angry half blind Elks katami prophet had received the answer to his prayer and tecumseh Tecum ieh the crouching cougar was far to the south CHAPTER XI by break of day still the depredations of ma hands bands of indians continued horses were stolen more than once a settler at work in a field far from help was surprised and murdered his body found lying by his plow always bearing a red sear scar upon the forehead indignation dig dign nation atlon ran higher and higher david larrence who had enlisted as soon as he reached vincennes drilled dally daily with the grim frontiersmen ile he find told himself that corydon should be wiped from his bis memory but in spite of all his mind could not blot 0 out ut the linage image of a girl whose blue eyes os es smiled above her smiling lips could not forget |