red,
and shot at by the Indians. Stephen fell dead, and James was taken
prisoner and carried to their towns.--He was there forced to undergo
repeated and intense suffering before death closed the scene of his
miseries.

According to the account given by Nathaniel Cochran on his return from
captivity, Washburn was most severely beaten, on the first evening of
his arrival at their village, while running the gauntlet; and although
he succeeded in getting into the council house, where Cochran was, yet
he was so disfigured and mutilated, that he could not be recognised by
his old acquaintance; and so stunned and stupified, that he remained
nearly all night in a state of insensibility. Being somewhat revived
in the morning, he walked to where Cochran sat by the fire, and being
asked if he were not James Washburn, replied with a smile--as if a
period had been put to his sufferings by the sympathetic tone in which
the question was proposed--that he was. The gleam of hope which
flashed over his countenance, was transient and momentary. In a few
minutes he was again led forth, that the barbarities which had been
suspended by the interposition of night, might be revived; and he made
to endure a repetition of their cruelties. He was now feeble and too
much exhausted to save himself from the clubs and sticks, even of the
aged of both sexes. The old men and the old women, who followed him,
had strength and activity enough to keep pace with his fleetest
progress, and inflict on him their severest blows. Frequently he was
beaten to the ground, and as frequently, as if invigorated by the
extremity of anguish, he rose to his feet. Hobbling before his
tormentors, with no hope but in death, an old savage passed a knife
across his ham, which cutting the tendons, disabled him from
proceeding farther. Still they repeated their unmerciful blows with
all their energy. He was next scalped, though alive, and struggling to
regain his feet. [185] Even this did not operate to suppress their
cruelty. They continued to beat him, until in the height of suffering
he again exhibited symptoms of life and exerted himself to move. His
head was then severed from his shoulders, attached to a pole, and
placed in the most public situation in the village.

After the attack on the Washburns, there were but two other outrages
committed in the upper country during that season. The cessation on
the part of the savages, of hostile incursions, induced an abandonment