s from rollin' in on us. Two black boys
helped the captain and I to manage the boat, and an old black woman
waited on the wimin folks and did the cooking.

"You see yon pint thar, up the river?" continued the narrator, pointing
his long, bony finger towards a great bend, and a point on the Kentucky
side of the stream.

"Yes," I replied, "I see it distinctly."

"Well, it war thar, or jest above thar, about sunset of a pleasant day,
that we came drifting along with our flat-boat, or _broad horn_, as they
were called in them days, when Captain Paul said he thought it would be
a snug place just behind the pint, to tie up to them same big trees yet
standin' thar as they did then. Ben, poor Ben and I concluded too, it
would be a clever place to camp for the night; so we headed the boat
in--for, you see, we always kept in the middle of the stream, as near as
possible, to keep clear of the red skins who committed a mighty heap of
depredations upon the movers and river traders, by decoyin' the boat on
shore, or layin' in ambush and firin' their rifles at the incautious
folks in the boats that got too nigh 'em. Guina and Joe, the two black
boys, rowed enough to get around the pint. We had no fear of the Ingins,
as we expected we war beyond thar haunts just thar; mother war gettin'
out the supper things, and Captain Paul's wife and sister were nestling
away the children. Just then, as we got cleverly under the lee of the
shore thar, I heard a crack like a dry stick snappin' under foot--

"'Thar's a deer or bar,' said the captain.

"'Hold on your oars,' says I--'boys, I don't like that--it 'tain't a
deer's tread, nor a bar's nether,' says I.

"By this time we had got within thirty yards of the bank--another slight
noise--the bushes moved, and I sung out--'Ingins, by the Lord! back the
boat, back, boys, back!'

"Poor Ben snatched up his rifle, so did the captain; but before we could
get way on the boat, a band of the bloody devils rushed out and gave us
a volley of shouts and shower of balls, that made these hills and river
banks echo again. Poor Ben fell mortally wounded and bleeding, into the
bottom of the boat; two of the captain's children were killed, his wife
wounded, and a bullet dashed the cap off my head.

"I shouted to the boys to pull, and soon got out of reach of the Ingins.
They had no canoes, bein' only a scoutin' war party; they could not
reach us. The wounded horses and cows kicked and plunged among the
good