d have followed the varmints, and picked off any stragglers
I might have come across."

"As you, my friends, are safe for the present, I must be off to-morrow
morning with my men," said the lieutenant when I got back; "but I will
report the position you are in at Fort Harwood, and should you have
reason to expect an attack you can dispatch a messenger, and relief
will, I am sure, be immediately sent you."

I do not know that Uncle Jeff cared much about this promise, so
confident did he feel in his power to protect his own property,--
believing that his men, though few, would prove staunch. But he thanked
the lieutenant, and hoped he should have the pleasure of seeing him
again before long.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

During the night the sergeant was taken ill; and as he was no better in
the morning, Lieutenant Broadstreet, who did not wish to go without him,
was further delayed. The lieutenant hoped, however, that by noon the
poor fellow might have sufficiently recovered to enable them to start.

After breakfast I accompanied him to the hut to visit the other men.
Although he summoned them by name,--shouting out "Karl Klitz," "Barney
Gillooly," "Pat Sperry,"--no one answered; so, shoving open the door, we
entered. At first the hut appeared to be empty, but as we looked into
one of the bunks we beheld the last-named individual, so sound asleep
that, though his officer shouted to him to know what had become of his
comrades, he only replied by grunts.

"The fellow must be drunk," exclaimed the lieutenant, shaking the man.

This was very evident; and as the lieutenant intended not to set off
immediately, he resolved to leave him in bed to sleep off his debauch.

But what had become of the German and the fat Irishman? was the
question. The men belonging to the hut were all away, so we had to go
in search of one of them, to learn if he could give any account of the
truants. The negro, who went by no other name than Sam or Black Sam,
was the first we met. Sam averred, on his honour as a gentleman, that
when he left the hut in the morning they were all sleeping as quietly as
lambs; and he concluded that they had gone out to take a bath in the
stream, or a draught of cool water at the spring. The latter the
lieutenant thought most probable, if they had been indulging in
potations of whisky on the previous evening; as to bathing, none of them
were likely to go and ind