CHAPTER XVIII
SCOUTING THROUGH A WILDERNESS
"FELLERS," said Skinny, panting and wetting his lips with his tongue."We've done it this time. We've killed somebody."
"Killed nothin'!" Bill told him. "Didn't you hear her holler?"
"She's running, too," said Benny. "Killed folks don't run, especiallygirls."
We could hear a crashing through the bushes beyond, and knew that whatBenny said was true.
"Let's sneak back and get our arrows, anyhow," said Skinny, when thenoise had stopped.
So we crept back again, ready to run if any one should come, but therewas nobody in sight. One arrow was lying on the ground where the girlhad been standing when we took her for a bear. It was Skinny's; we couldtell by the way it was painted.
It made him real chesty, after he had found out that we had not killedanybody.
"Didn't I tell you, Bill," said he, "that I'd show you whether I couldhit a bear or not? It must have struck a button or something, or whoeverit was would have bit the dust, and don't you forget it."
While we were standing there talking about it, a man burst through thebushes, followed by a girl, about eighteen years old, I guess.
"Are these your Injuns?" he asked, before we had time to run. Then heburst out laughing in such a way that we were not afraid to stay.
In a minute we had found out all about it. They were fern gatherers andBenny had taken them for bears. A lot of people go up on the mountain inAugust, picking what they call Boston ferns to sell to florists. Theyput them in cold storage and keep them a long time. There is a crazylittle railroad at the foot of the mountain, on the east side, thatcarries whole train loads of those ferns to Hoosac Tunnel station, andafterward they are shipped all over the country to be put in bouquets.
Skinny's arrow had struck the girl and hurt her a little, but not much.She was scared half to death.
Mr. Norton had a fine supper ready when we reached the camp again, andwe ate until we couldn't eat any longer.
"You boys ought to know what you are doing every minute you are in thewoods," he told us, after he had heard about the scare. "Suppose thatGabriel had been carrying a gun, as he wanted to, instead of a bow andarrows. Just think what would have happened. Hundreds of people havebeen killed in exactly that way. Careless hunters have mistaken them forbear or deer or some other game. You ought to have known what you wereshooting at. It was a foolish thing to do, anyway. I don't believe therecan be any bears around where so many people are looking for ferns andberries. We'll see dozens of pickers on the other side of the mountain,probably. If there ever were any bears they have been frightened awaylong before this. But suppose that had been a bear. For a bunch of boysto attack a bear with bows and arrows isn't bravery. It is foolishness.I am ashamed of you."
We didn't feel quite so chesty when Mr. Norton had finished talking tous.
"Well, I am not going to spoil the day by scolding," he went on, afterwe'd had time to think it over a little. "You can see the folly of it aswell as I. Let us sit here and watch the sun go down behind the westmountains. Did you ever see such glory? Then, when it grows dark, we'llbuild a campfire and I'll tell you about a great scout and a trip heonce made through a wilderness."
It was fine sitting there, watching the sun sink into a golden seabehind the mountains, while the valley below was already in the shadowand the dark was creeping up the hillsides.
We sat there a long time without speaking, until finally the golden seafaded into a streak of gray, and up and down the valley we could see thetwinkling lights of a half dozen towns and the farmhouses between.
Then Mr. Norton threw an armful of brush on the coals, and in the lightof the blaze, which made the shadows dance like ghosts of Indian braves,he began his story.
"Some of you boys went out to Illinois, last summer," said he, "and Iknow from what you have told me that you learned much about the greatFrench scout, LaSalle; how he explored the Ohio River and went up anddown the Mississippi, taking possession of the country in the name ofthe king of France. We already have had one story which grew out ofthose early explorations. The Lewis and Clark Expedition through theNorthwest, which I told you about, can be traced back to those scoutingtrips of LaSalle and the others, on account of which France claimed thecountry.
"This story is of another scouting trip, long after LaSalle's time andbefore Lewis and Clark were born, probably. It took place even beforethe United States was born, but, in a way, it grew out of those sametrips of LaSalle and Tonty, Marquette and Joliet, the French explorersof the seventeenth century."
"Was this scout a Frenchman, then?" asked Benny.
"No, he was of English parentage, one of the finest English countrygentlemen who ever lived, but born in America, and one of the greatestAmerican scouts.
"He was a friend of yours, too, Skinny," he added, laughing to himself.
"Not me," Skinny told him, shaking his head. "I think a lot more ofEngland than I did, on account of General Baden-Powell and the Boy Scoutbusiness, but I don't know this feller."
"That is strange. It seems to me that I have heard you remark somethingabout his being able to lick Napoleon Bonaparte with one hand tiedbehind his back."
"George Washington!" shouted Skinny. "The Father of his Country. Firstin----"
"Say, who's tellin' this story, anyhow?" said Bill, pulling Skinny overand sitting on him.
"Yes, George Washington, who, it seems to me, would have made the finestkind of a Boy Scout in his younger days--a scout worthy of membershipin Raven Patrol. He seems to have had all of the Scout virtues. He wastrustworthy, loyal to his home and his native land; he was thrifty; hewas brave; he was reverent."
"I'll bet he couldn't bandage a broken leg like we can," Benny told him.
"Maybe not, but he could find his way through the forest and he didn'tgo around shooting at girls, thinking that they were bears. He likedgirls too well for that. I believe he liked the girls better, even, thanour patrol leader does."
We set up a yell at that.
"Aw, I ain't stuck on no girls," said Skinny. "I just rescue 'em, that'sall."
"It's all right," Mr. Norton told him. "A girl is the greatest thing inthe world, unless it is a boy. Anyhow, George Washington was a splendidtype of American boyhood and he surely liked the girls; used to writepoetry about them when he was your age."
I don't know why, but somehow we seemed to think more of Washingtonafter we had heard that. It seemed to bring him closer to us and makehim a real person, instead of a picture on the wall, praying at ValleyForge or crossing the Delaware. Most always Washington is crossing theDelaware when you see him.
"He was a big fellow in the first place, while Napoleon was small. Sizeof body doesn't always count. Some of the greatest men the world hasproduced have been small of stature. But George Washington was a bigfellow. Like Lincoln, he could outwrestle, outthrow, and outjump any ofhis mates. They still show a spot down in Fredericksburg where he stoodand threw a stone across the Rappahannock River. He didn't seem to knowthe meaning of fear. From his early youth he was a fine horseman, tamingand riding horses that nobody else could manage."
"Did his mother call him Georgie?" asked Benny, before we could stophim.
"Perhaps she did, although I hardly can imagine it. At the age offourteen George wanted to enter the English navy and he came pretty neardoing it. If he had, perhaps he would have become a great admiralinstead of the father of his country. Who knows?
"A midshipman's warrant was obtained for him, so the story goes, and hisclothes actually had been sent aboard a man-of-war. Then, at the lastminute, his mother found that she could not give up her oldest boy andshe withdrew her consent. It was a great disappointment to the boy, butlike the good Scout that he was he obeyed his mother and went back toschool. He learned to be a surveyor.
"Boys matured earlier in those days when the country was new. WhenWashington was only sixteen he set out on horseback through the BlueRidge Mountains on a surveying trip. A year
afterward he was givencommand of the militia in a Virginia district, with the rank of major."
"I don't see what LaSalle had to do with all that," said Harry.
"He didn't have anything to do with it, but he had something to do withthe scouting trip which came later. You see, France and England each hadobtained a strong foothold in this country; France, along the GreatLakes and Mississippi River; England, along the Atlantic Coast. Betweenthe Mississippi and the coast stretched a beautiful and fertile country,the valley of the Ohio. When LaSalle made his explorations he tookpossession of the Mississippi in the name of the king of France. On thataccount France claimed to own all the land along the Mississippi andalong all the rivers which flowed into the Mississippi. That took in agreat part of the continent."
"I don't see how because LaSalle stood on a rock and hollered out somewords," Hank told him, "that made the whole country belong to France."
"England couldn't see it. Still, the English claim was not much better.Commissioners from Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia made a treatywith the Iroquois Indians in 1741. By the terms of that treaty, forsomething like $2,000, the Indians gave up all right and title to allthe land west of the Alleghany Mountains, clear to the MississippiRiver. There were all kinds of Indians living in the Ohio Valley but,according to the traditions of the Iroquois Indians, their forefathersonce upon a time had conquered it."
"It looks like six of one and half a dozen of the other," I said.
"There wasn't a white settlement in the whole territory. Some hardy furtraders from Pennsylvania had made trips into the valley and this led tothe formation of the Ohio Company of Virginia, with the object ofgetting ahead of the French and colonizing the lands. Then the Frenchbegan to get busy. France owned Canada at that time, you know. In 1749the French Governor of Canada sent three hundred men to the banks of theOhio River with presents for the Indians. They ordered the Englishtraders out of the country and nailed lead plates to trees, tellingeverybody that the land belonged to France. The Indians liked thepresents well enough, but the lead plates made them mad, when they foundout their meaning. One old chief exclaimed:
"'The French claim all the land on one side of the Ohio; the Englishclaim all the land on the other. Now, where does the Indian land lie?'
"I have gone into this explanation in order to make it clear to you whyWashington was sent on his scouting trip. Governor Dinwiddie of Virginiawanted to send some one whom he could trust to the French commander, toprotest against the French coming into the country. At the same time, hethought the messenger would be able to find out how strong the Frenchwere, how many canoes they had, and all that. It was a perilous missionto undertake through an unknown wilderness, with winter coming on. YoungWashington was only twenty-two years old, but he was selected as the oneto make the dangerous trip.
"Major Washington started from Williamsburg, October 31, 1753. On thefrontier he procured horses, tents, etc. Later he was joined by a famouswoodsman, named Christopher Gist. They took along a white man to act asinterpreter and some Indian guides. Chief White Thunder was one. Anotherwas known as the Half King. His friendship was very important to theEnglish.
"I imagine that the mountains which they went through were much likethese, except that rains and snow had made them almost impassable. Theparty pushed on, however, and early in December arrived at the firstFrench outpost. The French captain gave a feast in their honor, in thecourse of which he drank so much wine that it made him talkative. Hebegan to brag of what the French were going to do. He said that theywere going to take possession of the entire Ohio Valley. The youngAmerican scout kept his head clear and afterward wrote down in a bookall that he had heard.
"Then Washington set out again, and after four more days of weary travelthey came to the French fort on the west fork of French Creek, aboutfifteen miles south of Lake Erie. There he delivered his message, andafter a great deal of delay received a sealed reply.
"While pretending to be friendly, the French did their best to win theIndian guides away from Washington. They plied them with liquor and withpresents, so much so that the young scout had a hard time in startingthem toward home. He succeeded finally in getting away. They first wentup the creek in boats as far as an Indian village, called Venango; thenset out by land. Soon their pack horses became so jaded that Washingtonused his saddle horse for a pack horse and walked. After three days ofthat, he and Gist took their packs on their shoulders, their guns intheir hands, and started out alone, on a short cut to the Ohio River.
"You will find the story in any history. At one time a treacherousIndian guide wheeled suddenly and shot at Washington, but did not hithim. The two men quickly overpowered the savage, and Gist was forkilling him. Young Washington would not permit that, so they did thenext best thing. They took his gun away and sent him home, making himthink that they would follow in the morning. Instead of that, they lefttheir campfire burning and traveled all night and all the next day, toget as far away from the spot as possible. At last they reached theAlleghany River, which they hoped to find frozen. There was open water,however, and they were forced to build a raft. All they had to work withwas one hatchet, like Skinny's, I mean Gabriel's. On the way across, acake of ice struck the raft and threw Washington into the river."
"Gee, I'll bet that it was cold," said Skinny.
"It was, but Washington clung to the raft and finally, in a half-frozencondition, drifted against an island, where the two men camped thatnight. In the morning they found ice cakes so wedged in that they wereable to walk ashore.
"January 16, in the dead of winter, Washington succeeded in reachingWilliamsburg, and delivered the French commander's letter to GovernorDinwiddie. Soon after that came the French and Indian war, which I amsure you know all about, in which France lost all her Americanpossessions except the great tract west of the Mississippi, whichNapoleon later sold to President Jefferson.
"You see, being a scout in those days wasn't all play. It brought manyhardships that we know little about, but, after all, it called for thesame kind of boy. Washington was brave and true, helpful, kind, andclean, and he was prepared. When the time came, his preparedness put himin command of the American forces and afterward made him the firstPresident of the United States."
"Washington was great stuff, all right," said Skinny, shaking his headsadly, "but everything has been discovered now, and explored, and Injunsain't much good outside a show. There ain't anything for a feller to doany more."