n, the nearest
point of which was at least three hundred miles distant! He forthwith
set about raising a company--and, at the end of three days, found
himself invested with the command of _sixteen men_! With these, on the
first of October, he started on a journey of more than one hundred
leagues, through the vast solitudes of the prairies and the thousand
perils of the forest, to take a military station, occupied by a
detachment of British soldiers! After a long and toilsome march, they
reached the banks of the St. Joseph's river, on which the object of
their expedition stood. Awaiting the security of midnight, they suddenly
broke from their cover in the neighborhood, and by a _coup de main_,
captured the fort without the loss of a man! Thus far all went well--for
besides the success and safety of the party, they found a large amount
of stores, belonging to traders, in the station, and were richly paid
for their enterprise--but having been detained by the footsore, on their
homeward march, and probably delayed by their plunder, they had only
reached the Calumet, on the borders of Indiana, when they were overtaken
by three hundred British and Indians! They were forced to surrender,
though not without a fight, for men of that stamp were not to be
intimidated by numbers. They lost in the skirmish one fourth of their
number: the survivors were carried away to Canada, whence Brady, the
leader, escaped, and returned to Cahokia the same winter. The twelve
remained prisoners until seventeen hundred and seventy-nine.

Against most men this reverse would have given the little fort
security--at least, until the memory of the disaster had been obscured
by time. But the pioneers of that period were not to be judged by
ordinary rules. The very next spring (1778), another company was raised
for the same object, and to wipe out what they considered the stain of a
failure. It was led by a man named Maize, over the same ground, to the
same place, and was completely successful. The fort was retaken, the
trading-station plundered, the wounded men of Brady's party released,
and, loaded with spoil, the little party marched back in triumph!

There is an episode in the history of their homeward march, which
illustrates another characteristic of the ranger--his ruthlessness. The
same spirit which led him to disregard physical obstacles, prevented his
shrinking from even direful necessities. One of the prisoners whom they
had liberated, bec