s if moved by some mechanical
impulse, the fierce band that lined the bomb-proof sank below the
surface, and were no longer visible, while the warriors in the forest
again sought shelter behind the trees. The captured soldiers were also
liberated without injury, so sudden and startling had been the terror
produced in the savages by the lightning flash that announced its heavy
messengers of destruction. Discharge after discharge succeeded without
intermission; but the guns had been levelled so high, to prevent injury
to their own men, they had little other effect than to keep the Indians
from the attack. The rush of bullets through the close forest, and the
crashing of trees and branches as they fell with startling force upon
each other, were, with the peals of artillery, the only noises now to
be heard; for not a yell, not a word was uttered by the Indians after
the first discharge; and but for the certainty that existed in every
mind, it might have been supposed the whole of them had retired.

"Now is your time," cried Captain Erskine; "bring in the litter to the
rear, and stoop as much as possible to avoid the shot."

The poor half-strangled fellows, however, instead of obeying the order
of their captain, looked round in every direction for the enemy by whom
they had been so rudely handled, and who had glided from them almost as
imperceptibly and swiftly as they had first approached. It seemed as if
they apprehended that any attempt to remove the body would be visited
by those fierce devils with the same appalling and ferocious
threatenings.

"Why stand ye there, ye dolts," continued their captain, "looking
around as if ye were bewitched? Bring the litter in to the
rear.--Mitchell, you old fool, are you grown a coward in your age? Are
you not ashamed to set such an example to your comrades?"

The doubt thus implied of the courage of his men, who, in fact, were
merely stupified with the scene they had gone through, had, as Captain
Erskine expected, the desired effect. They now bent themselves to the
litter, on which they had previously deposited their muskets, and with
a self-possession that contrasted singularly with their recent air of
wild astonishment, bore it to the rear at the risk of being cut in two
at every moment by the fire from the fort.

One fierce yell, instinctively proffered by several of the lurking band
in the forest, marked their disappointment and rage at the escape of
their victims; but all at