no time to foolish away wi' a
Bedlamite. Take him away and peg him out, and gi' him a dash o' water to
cool his head."

Pengarvin fought like a fury, and his venomous rage defeated all his
attempts to say calmly the words which might have got him a hearing. So
he was haled away, spitting and struggling like a trapped wildcat; and
when we were rid of him the major bade us good night again.

Tybee held his peace like a good fellow till we had rolled us in our
blankets before one of the camp-fires. But just as I was dropping asleep
he broke out with, "I would you might tell me what piece of rebel
villainy this is that I've been a winking accomplice to."

I laughed. "'Tis a thing to make Major Ferguson rejoice, as you saw. And
surely, it can be no great villainy to give a man what he's thirsting
for. Bide your time, Lieutenant, and you shall see the outcome."

XXXIX

THE THUNDER OF THE CAPTAINS AND THE SHOUTING

The camp was astir early the next morning, and it soon became noised
about that we were to fall back, but only so far as might be needful to
find a strong position. From this it was evident that a battle was
imminent, though as yet there were no signs of the approach of the
patriots.

From the camp talk we, Tybee and I, gleaned some better information of
the situation. A fortnight earlier Major Ferguson had captured two of
the over-mountain men of Clark's party and had sent them to the
settlement on the Watauga with a challenge in due form--or rather with
the threat to come and lay the over-mountain region waste in default of
an instant return of the pioneers to their allegiance to the king.

This challenge, so our scouts told us, had been immediately accepted.
Sevier and Shelby had embodied some two hundred men each from the
Watauga and the Holston settlements, and Colonel William Campbell, the
stout old Presbyterian Indian fighter, had joined them with as many more
Virginians.

Crossing the mountain these three troops had fallen in with other
scattered parties of the border patriots under Benjamin Cleaveland,
Major Chronicle and Colonel Williams, of South Carolina, until now, as
the scouts reported, the challenged outnumbered the challengers.
Learning this, Ferguson, who was as prudent as he was brave, thought it
best to make his stand at some point nearer the main body of the army;
and so the withdrawal from Gilbert Town had fallen into a retreat and a
pursuit.

From what Captain de Peyster h