With Ethan Allen at Ticonderoga

He ran to the loophole, through which the smoke was now pouring. But after a moment there was a break in the cloud and he saw the group of frightened Yorkers plainly. They stood not many rods away and poking his rifle through the hole, he aimed at the villainous Halpen and, pulling the trigger, ran back to the hearth before the echo of the shot died away. Down the ladder he darted, dropping the heavy hearthstone into place, and leaving the cabin which for so many years had been their home, to be consumed above their heads. But his heart sank when he found how closely the six packed the tiny room and realized how little air reached them down here in the earth.

CHAPTER XII

BACKWOODS JUSTICE

At daybreak on this very morning when the Yorkers attacked the Harding place, ’Siah Bolderwood returning from the direction of Old Ti, suddenly came upon a little glade on the bank of the Walloomscoik Creek. With the instinct long gained by his life as hunter and woodsman, he never crossed an open space in the forest without examining it well. In this glade he saw, at first glance, the signs of recent occupancy. The smouldering ashes of a campfire and the marks on the creek bank told him that a canoe party had camped there during the night and that they had been under way but shortly. Making sure that they were now out of sight he more closely examined the spot. The party numbered at least half a dozen, and there had been two canoes. He had come up the creek bank himself; therefore, not having seen the strangers, they had gone on ahead of him. Five miles or so up the stream lay the ox-bow at which his old friend Jonas Harding settled when he came into the Disputed Grounds, and where the widow and her brood now lived. After examining the camp he quickened his step toward the Harding place.

A mile further on, however, he heard the stroke of paddles and the sound of men’s voices. He would have gone to the fringed river bank and peered out upon the stream had not a figure suddenly risen before him as though from the ground itself and barred his way. “How d’ye, Crow Wing!” he exclaimed, yet showing no surprise at the Indian youth’s appearance. The latter bore a brace of rabbits on his gun and Bolderwood guessed that he belonged to the canoe party and had left them to get this game for their dinner.

“Umph!” returned the Indian and looked at him stolidly.

“Your people?” asked the ranger, with a gesture toward the river.

“Umph!” was the reply. It might have meant yes or no. Crow Wing seemed undecided. “Why you no at Hardings?” he demanded finally.

“I’m bound that a-way now,” said the white man.

“Hunting?” grunted Crow Wing.

“Been up to Old Ti. Bought some land up there.”

Crow Wing seemed about to pass on. But over his shoulder he said: “You go to Hardings’ farm. They want you–mebbe.”

“What for?”

The Indian shrugged his shoulders and walked on. But Bolderwood strode after him. “What’s going on?” he asked, anxiously. “Who’s that out yonder?” nodding again toward the creek.

“Umph! Men hire Crow Wing to paddle canoe. They go to Hardings’.”

“Yorkers!” exclaimed Bolderwood.

But the Indian youth said no more and quickly disappeared in the bushes which overhung the creek. The ranger hesitated a moment, appeared to think of following him, and then turned abruptly and plunged into the forest on a course diagonal from the river. Therefore, when Nuck and Bryce were fighting the bears in the swamp he did not hear their guns, being by that time some miles away and striding rapidly toward Arlington. He had suspected the truth and instead of wasting time observing the party of which Crow Wing was a member, he had it in his mind to rouse the neighbors to go to the aid of the widow and her children. After the affair at Otter Creek, which he was sorry indeed to have missed, Bolderwood had expected something like the present raid. He, like the Hardings, believed that Simon Halpen would find the time ripe for the carrying out of his nefarious designs.

It was the season of the year when the farm work having been completed, the pioneers felt free to go about more, and hunting was popular. Many men were off with their rifles; but Bolderwood picked up some half dozen determined fellows and hastened back to the Harding place. While yet some distance away they heard a rifle shot and so disturbed was the ranger by this, that he started on the run for the ox-bow farm, and was far ahead of his friends when he broke cover at the edge of the forest and beheld the cabin.

His horror and despair when he saw the house wrapped in flames and the Yorkers running across the fields toward the river, knew no bounds. Yet even then he did not suppose that the widow and her family were within the burning dwelling. He presumed they must be hiding in the outbuildings and he ran on after the fleeing Yorkers, thinking only to take vengeance upon them for their wanton cruelty in burning down the poor woman’s house at the beginning of winter.

One man kept turning back to look at the blazing structure which was now more than half consumed; and this fellow the ranger quickly overtook. It was the surveyor and he was wringing his hands and weeping as he ran. Bolderwood dashed past him without a word, seeing plainly that he was not armed and was sore frightened. “I’ll attend to your case later,” the ranger muttered, and spurred on after the rest of the party. But they were too quick for him, and having reached the bank of the creek leaped into their canoes and the Indians pushed off. The fear of what they had done pressed them hard and they had run like madmen from their single pursuer. Now at an order from Halpen the Indians stolidly paddled down the river again and were quickly out of sight around the nearest bend in the stream.

Bolderwood went back and found the surveyor prone upon the ground and weeping like a woman. “Get up, you great ca’f!” cried the ranger. “Nobody’ll kill you for your part in this matter though you desarve little mercy… Was that Simon Halpen?”

“It was indeed–the demon!” gasped the fellow, dragged unceremoniously to his feet by the borderer.

“If he ever comes into this colony again I doubt but he’ll be hung as high as Haman,” Bolderwood declared. “And you were the surveyor, eh? One of Duane & Kempe’s men? Well, sir, your back will be well tickled, or my name’s not ’Siah Bolderwood! But bear up, man–’tis no killing punishment.”

“What, sir?” cried the fellow. “Do you think I weep because of your promised punishment? I fear you not–I am a leal subject of the King and peaceful. You cannot touch me. But I weep because of the work that dastard has done this day.”

“What do you mean?” cried Bolderwood, fiercely. “Where is the woman and her bairns?”

The surveyor pointed a shaking finger at the cabin, the smoking walls of which were now all that were standing. “They are there. Wait! let me tell you. I had nothing to do with the dreadful work. Nor, indeed, did Simon Halpen mean to destroy the house and the poor woman and children. They meant to burn the roof off to scare them out, and one man threw burning clods on it. But those inside tore off the flaming roof and it fell all around the cabin and set the walls afire. They dared not run out through that wall of flame and smothered to death they were–God pity them!” and he began to weep aloud again.

Bolderwood was speechless–well-nigh overcome, indeed, with the horror of this. He saw his friends appear from the wood on the other side of the house and he walked toward them like one in a dream. But still he clung to the surveyor’s arm and forced him to approach the cabin. The roof had, of course, been completely consumed, and the outside of the walls was blackened and still blazed fiercely at the corners. The window shutters and door were burned away and the interior of the place was badly demolished.

“Where’s the widder and the boys?” shouted one of the newcomers to Bolderwood. The old ranger did not answer, but his hand tightened upon the surveyor’s arm. Suddenly the latter shrieked and would have fallen to the ground had not the grasp upheld him. In the door of the burning cabin stood the figure of Enoch Harding, his face covered with smut and his clothing half burned off his back. For a moment the surveyor believed the dead had risen and he covered his face with his hands to shut out the sight of the boy.

“Are ye all alive, lad?” shouted Bolderwood, dropping the surveyor and running forward.

“We’re all right, but well-nigh smothered,” returned Enoch, hoarsely. “Bring–bring some water!”

He staggered out of the cabin and fell upon the ground. In a moment the surprised neighbors were running with buckets and pans from the well, for Mistress Harding’s milk vessels had been left to dry outside the springhouse. Bolderwood took it upon himself to revive the half-strangled Enoch, while the others dashed water over the smouldering interior of the cabin, putting out the fire on the floor which was burning briskly, and finally being able to draw the widow and the smaller children from the secret room under the hearth and carry them to the outer air. Here they quickly revived and Mistress Harding with the girls and little Harry took shelter in one of the hovels.

The destruction of the cabin was practically complete. There was not a log that was not charred, and the interior furnishings of the house were ruined. The kind-hearted neighbors saved the chests of bedclothing and the family’s best garments, for the flames had not gotten at them. But everything was sadly smoked. And the house would have to be torn down and rebuilt with new timber throughout. It was a sad spectacle indeed for Enoch and Bryce to look upon. “I wish I had shot them all!” cried the latter in a rage. But Enoch said nothing. He would not whisper how his anger had made him aim to kill Simon Halpen. Now, in cool blood, he was glad that the bullet had not sped true.

But the condition of the house filled him with despair. Winter was at hand and it would be next to impossible to build a good house before spring, although the timbers could be drawn and squared while the snow was on the ground. What would they do for a shelter until then? “We’ll make yonder hovel that you boys play in, all tight and warm for the winter, Nuck,” Bolderwood observed, seeing the tears running down the boy’s cheeks. “Don’t cry about it. And we’ll have up a better house than this in the spring, lad. The neighbors will all help ye.”

Meanwhile, however, Bolderwood had kept his eye upon the surveyor. The latter, seeing that the family had been so miraculously saved from the fire, sought to get away while the men were saving those goods which were unconsumed. But Bolderwood was after him with mighty strides and dragged him back, a prisoner. “Nay, friend, you’ll be needed here as a witness,” he said, grimly. “We don’t allow such gentry as you in the Hampshire Grants without presenting you with a token of our respect and consideration. Ha!” he added, suddenly, “whom have we here?”

A horseman rode quickly out of the wood and approached the burned cabin. Before he pulled in his steed the men welcomed him vociferously, for it was Captain Baker. “Look at this, ’Member!” cried Bolderwood, dragging the trembling surveyor forward. “What a sight this is to blister the eyes of decent men! A poor widder’s house burned about her ears and only by the mercy of God were she and her youngsters saved.”

“The villains!” roared Baker. “And is that one of them?”

“He was with the party. But I truly believe that he had little to do with this dastardly work. He’s only a poor surveyor body.”

“We’ll find shelter with some neighbor for Mistress Harding and the little ones,” said Baker, “and then attend to his case without delay.”

But the widow was not minded to leave her homestead. It was not yet very cold and the hovel in which the children had had their frolic a fortnight before was easily made comfortable for the family. She set about this at once while Captain Baker and the neighbors sat in judgment upon the trembling surveyor. These impromptu courts held by the Green Mountain Boys when they happened to capture a Yorker guilty of meddling with the settlers, were in the nature of a court martial. Sometimes the sentences imposed were doubtless unjust, for the judges and juries were naturally bitter against the prisoners; but the punishment seldom went beyond a sound whipping, and in this case the surveyor, still sputtering and objecting to the illegal procedure, was sentenced to two score lashes, save one, and Enoch and Bryce selected the blue beech wands with which the sentence was to be carried out.

The surveyor was taken behind the log barn, his coat and shirt stripped from his back, and Bolderwood and one of the other neighbors fulfilled the order of Captain Baker as judge of the military court. Bolderwood, remembering the tears the prisoner had shed when he thought the family burned alive, could not be too hard upon him, and although the woodsman made every appearance of striking tremendous blows, he scarce raised a welt upon the man’s back. But when the other executioner laid on for the last nineteen strokes, the surveyor roared with pain and without doubt the lesson was one which did him good. It would be many a day before he ventured to survey the lands east of the Twenty-Mile Line–at least, not until his back stopped smarting. Finally he was given his clothing, and part of the band marched him across country to the New York border and turned him loose.

The attack of Simon Halpen upon the Hardings had practically failed. Yet the loss of their home was a sore blow. In a couple of days, with the help of Bolderwood, the old hovel was made very habitable. But it was small and so many of their possessions had been burned that even Bryce cried about it. Nevertheless their supply of food was all right, and the cattle had not been injured. Also, with Bolderwood’s assistance, the three bears which the boys had so happily killed, were brought home, the hams smoked, some of the meat salted, and the pelts stretched and dried for winter bed coverings. By the time the snow lay deep upon the earth the Hardings were once more comfortable.

The boys did very little trapping and hunting that winter of ’72-’73 for they could not attend to traps set very far from the ox-bow, and the Walloomscoik country was becoming scarce of game. ’Siah Bolderwood did not go back to Old Ti, either, but contented himself with making short hunting trips around the lower part of the lake, for he spent all the time he could spare in helping the widow and her boys to get the timber ready for their new abode. Enoch and Bryce were determined that this new structure should be much better than the log cabin which their father had erected ten years before, and every timber dragged to the site by the slow moving oxen was squared with the broad ax and carefully fitted so as to “lock” at the corners. Some planks were sawed at the mill and sledded to the ox-bow on the ice, too, and when the plaintive call of the muckawis–the Indian name for the “whip-poor-will,”–ushered in the spring, a noble company of Green Mountain Boys gathered to build the widow’s house again.

Although the new house was put up and made habitable in about ten days, it took some time to fit window-frames, build two partitions, for there were to be two sleeping chambers on the ground floor in this house, which was larger than the old structure, and lay the floor of the loft, build bunks to sleep in, make a new meal chest and dresser, and construct other articles of furniture which were needed to replace the stuff burned in the fire. Enoch had a mechanical turn of mind and Bryce made an able assistant. Between them they turned out a new table, several chairs with hide backs and seats, and even essayed a “rocker” for their mother which, although rudely built and with its rockers not exactly even, was declared by Mrs. Harding to be a marvel of workmanship.

All these things had to be done besides the regular work of the farm during the spring and summer, and the studies of the older boys were rather neglected that year, greatly to the delight of Bryce. Indeed, several of their mother’s precious books had been destroyed by the flames, and had it not been for the sorrow he knew she felt at their loss, Bryce would have openly expressed his satisfaction. He was born for the woods and fields, and although he made no objection to farmwork, it was plain that his father’s roving disposition had entered strongly into the make-up of the lad.

He still felt injured–indeed, the feeling grew with his own growth–because he was not allowed to join the military companies; but Mistress Harding had finally promised that if he could trap enough game the next winter to pay for a new gun–a rifle instead of the old musket which had once been Nuck’s and which their father had brought with him on his return from the French wars–he should be allowed to attend the Bennington drills. That was putting the privilege a year ahead, but Bryce was partially contented with it.

Lot Breckenridge had finally been allowed to join the Green Mountain Boys and so Enoch had somebody in his company near his own age. On several occasions there were frolics in the neighborhood to which the young people foregathered, and before the new house was built Lot and Enoch had gone on a very brief hunting trio. But as fall again approached the two friends, Lot and Enoch, planned to go trapping on the upper waters of the Otter and its branches as soon as harvest and hog-killing should be over and the winter really set in. Lot had several steel traps which had belonged to his father, and Enoch was likewise supplied. Both had canoes, but they agreed to use Enoch’s only, as one was all they cared to “pack” over the portage to the upper Otter.

CHAPTER XIII

THE WOLF PACK

Meantime throughout the Grants the line between the Whigs and Tories had become more distinct. Although it had been forbidden for any person to hold office or issue writs under advice from New York, in certain sections where the Tory sentiment was strong, New York justices continued to write papers of ejectment against the Hampshire settlers, and other Yorkers were found to serve the documents and on occasion to drive helpless farmers and their families from their homes. These affairs went on openly in the town of Durham, which was a Tory stronghold.

Justice Benjamin Spencer was the principal official who dealt out the New York brand of justice in this town, and he resided in the village of Clarendon. Early in the fall Ethan Allen and a force of Green Mountain Boys, appeared at Clarendon and read to the people the resolutions passed by the Bennington Council to the effect that no person should do any official act under New York authority, and that all lands should be held under title from New Hampshire. The Durhamites were threatened that, if they refused to comply with these orders within a reasonable time, they would be made to suffer for their temerity. At this visit Judge Spencer absconded, remaining away from home until he was sure “the awful Green Mountain outlaws” had decamped.

Enoch and Lot planned their start into the woods in November, and they were nearly ready when the second raid on Durham was proposed. The boys knew that the matter had been discussed by Colonel Allen and the other leaders for some time, for Justice Spencer still continued to disobey the orders of the Council of Safety, and the matter could not be ignored. It was past the middle of November when the commander of the Green Mountain Boys and some of his followers set out in the direction of Durham, and Lot and Enoch hurried their own going, determined to hide their canoe when once they reached the Otter and join in the descent upon Clarendon village.

It was eleven o’clock at night, November 20th, that Colonel Allen, Captain Baker, and more than a score of their friends, entered the settlement with all the care and circumlocution of Indians. Nuck and Lot Breckenridge had joined the party at supper time in a certain rendezvous of Allen’s in the woods, having hidden their canoe and traps on the bank of the Otter several miles away. The attacking force of Green Mountain Boys was heavily armed and might have been bound upon an expedition against Fort Ticonderoga itself, one might imagine. But a show of force was thought to be necessary to overawe the Yorkers who made up more than half the population of the village.

The Green Mountain Boys awakened nobody in their approach to the house of Justice Spencer, until the leader himself thundered at the door and demanded that the New York official come down. After some parley, and seeing that there was no help for his case, Spencer descended and, as the next day was Sunday and nothing could be done then, the prisoner was hidden in the house of Mr. Green, some mile and a half from the settlement, until Monday morning. Early on that day, a still larger force of Grants men having gathered, as well as settlers whose titles had been derived from New York, Justice Spencer was taken to the door of his own house and tried.

The inquest, with Allen, Warner, Baker, and Cochran, sitting in judgment, was carried forward with all due formality, although the judges were the principal accusers of the prisoners, and the sentence was finally pronounced that the prisoner’s house be burned and he himself give his bond to not again act as a New York justice. At this the doughty justice broke down, for he plainly saw that his captors were quite able, and in the mind, to carry out the sentence. He told the court that if his house were burned his store of dry goods and all his property would be destroyed and his wife and children made destitute.

“And have you and your like not made many of our friends destitute?” cried some of the crowd. But more showed some heart for the justice, notably Captain Warner. Warner finally suggested that as the dry goods store was a public benefit and was one of the few stores in the township, it should be saved if possible; and it would be too hard at that time of year to turn the man and his family out of their home. He declared for taking off the roof of the prisoner’s house and then putting it on again, providing that Spencer acknowledged that it was put on under a New Hampshire title, and that he would purchase the same at once. Spencer, who might have felt some gratitude by this time, promised compliance in every particular, and with great shouting and good-nature, the roof of the house was lifted off and then put on again. And the lesson to the Durhamites was a salutary one.

Enoch Harding and his chum left immediately after the settlement of the case and returned to their canoe. They feared the approach of a storm which threatened, and were desirous of building their winter camp and getting their traps set before the forest would be full of snow and the streams completely frozen. Both boys were very good woodsmen by this time, for Bolderwood had been Enoch’s mentor and Lot’s uncle was an old ranger who knew every trick of the forest and trail. They selected a heavily wooded gulley not far from the Otter and built there a log lean-to against the rocky side-hill, sheltered from the north and open to such sunshine as might penetrate the forest. The traps were set along the bank of the stream, some of them in the water itself, where the boys’ sharp eyes told them that the fur-bearing game of which they were in search, were wont to pass.

A fortnight after the Durham riot, as the Yorkers were pleased to call the visit of the Green Mountain Boys, the two friends were very cozily fixed in the gully. One heavy snow had fallen, and their traps had begun to repay their attention most generously. Then the Otter froze over solidly and they had to keep the ice open about their traps with the axe. They were in a lonely piece of wood and day after day saw nor heard nobody but themselves. The bears had taken to their long winter sleep; but the fierce catamount was still abroad, and at night the howling of the wolf-pack as it followed some hard-pressed doe or decrepit buck, reached the boys’ ears. And at that day the timber-wolf of the Green Mountains–a long, lean, gray creature as big as a mastiff–was much to be feared.

The traps stretched so far along the creek that if one went out alone to examine and bait them, almost the entire day was consumed. The boys did not possess ice-runners, or skates, with which they might have skimmed over the frozen creek and visited the traps in a couple of hours. Each had brought a pair of snow-shoes, but these were of no use on the creek. So baiting the traps was no easy task. Usually they divided the work between them and thus got it over and had time to stretch and scrape their pelts in the afternoon. One day, however, Lot remained at camp to make some repairs on his clothing, and Enoch set out early to go the rounds by himself.