ith, that the train would be destroyed at once by the Indians,
thus avoiding any call upon the militia; but the emigrants had behaved
with such effectiveness that the Indians were unable to complete the
task. They had corralled their wagons, dug a rifle-pit in the center,
and returned the fire, killing one Indian and wounding two of the
chiefs. The siege was being continued.

The misgiving that this tale caused Joel Rae he put down to unmanly
weakness--and to an unfamiliarity with military affairs. A sight of the
order in Brigham's writing for the train's extermination would have set
his mind wholly at rest; but though he had not been granted this, he was
assured that such an order existed, and with this he was obliged to be
content. He knew, indeed, that an order from Brigham, either oral or
written, must have come; otherwise the local authorities would never
have dared to proceed. They were not the men to act without orders in a
matter so grave after the years in which Brigham had preached his right
to dictate, direct, and control the affairs of his people from the
building of the temple "down to the ribbons a woman should wear, or the
setting up of a stocking."

Late on the following day, Wednesday, while they were anxiously waiting
for news, a messenger from Lee came with a call for reinforcements. The
Indians, although there were three hundred of them, had been unable to
prevail over the little entrenched band of Gentiles. Ten minutes after
the messenger's arrival, the militia, which had been waiting under arms,
set out for the scene in wagons. From Cedar City went every able-bodied
man but two.

Joel Rae was with them, wondering why he went. He wanted not to go. He
preferred that news of the approaching victory should be brought to
him; yet invisible hands had forced him, even while it seemed that
frenzied voices--voices without sound--warned him back.

The ride was long, but not long enough for his mind to clear. It was
still clouded with doubts and questionings and fears when they at last
saw the flaring of many fires with figures loitering or moving busily
about them. As they came nearer, a strange, rhythmic throbbing crept to
his ears; nearer still, he resolved it into the slow, regular beatings
of a flat-toned drum. The measure, deliberate, incessant,
changeless,--the same tones, the same intervals,--worked upon his
strained nerves, at first soothingly and then as a pleasant stimulant.

The wagons now pu