they really settled nothing whatever and conferred no rights
that were not taken with the strong hand; yet they are solemnly quoted
in some books as if they were the real sources of title to parts of the
Northwest.]

Continued Ravages.

All the while the ravages grew steadily more severe. The Federal
officers at the little widely scattered forts were at their wits' ends
in trying to protect the outlying settlers and retaliate on the Indians;
and as the latter grew bolder they menaced the forts themselves and
harried the troops who convoyed provisions to them. Of the innumerable
tragedies which occurred, the record of a few has by chance been
preserved. One may be worth giving merely as a sample of many others. On
the Virginian side of the Ohio lived a pioneer farmer of some note,
named Van Swearingen. [Footnote: State Dept. MSS., No. 150, vol. ii.,
Van Swearingen to William Butler, Washington County, Sept. 29, 1787.]
One day his son crossed the river to hunt with a party of strangers.
Near a "waste cabbin," the deserted log hut of some reckless adventurer,
an Indian war-band came on them unawares, slew three, and carried off
the young man. His father did not know whether they had killed him or
not. He could find no trace of him, and he wrote to the commander of the
nearest fort, begging him to try to get news from the Indian villages as
to whether his son were alive or dead, and to employ for the purpose any
friendly Indian or white scout, at whatever price was set--he would pay
it "to the utmost farthing." He could give no clue to the Indians who
had done the deed; all he could say was that a few days before, one of
these war parties, while driving off a number of horses, was overtaken
by the riflemen of the neighborhood and scattered, after a fight in
which one white man and two red men were killed.

The old frontiersman never found his son; doubtless the boy was slain;
but his fate, like the fate of hundreds of others, was swallowed up in
the gloomy mystery of the wilderness. So far from being unusual, the
incident attracted no comment, for it was one of every-day occurrence.
Its only interest lies in the fact that it was of a kind that befell the
family of almost every dweller in the wilds. Danger and death were so
common that the particular expression which each might take made small
impress on the minds of the old pioneers. Every one of them had a long
score of slain friends and kinsfolk to avenge upon his s