ndians, faint from
hunger, worn out with fatigue and exposure, hardly able to walk. We had
no blankets or shelter. The nights were cold and frosty, and when it
rained we were soaked and chilled to the bone.

We found almost no game. Edmund had the luck to shoot a big white owl.
We plucked it, cut it up, and drew lots for the different portions. I
got a leg. It was tough--almost as tough as our fate. But after one has
been chewing leather straps for sustenance, an old owl's leg tastes
good. I would not have sold it for its weight in the most precious
stones.

I shall not tell all the horrors of that march,--the pangs of hunger
that we suffered, the greed for food, the sights that I saw, nor what
men did in their despair. Some things had better remain unwritten.

CHAPTER XVIII

STARVATION--DRIFTING DOWN THE AMMONUSUC--FORT NO. 4, AND GOOD FORTUNE AT
LAST

At last we arrived at the Ammonusuc River, where our provisions were to
meet us, and found _nothing_.

Fires were still burning which showed us that the relief party had been
there, and had left just before we arrived. We shouted and fired our
guns, but got no response. We learned afterward that the lieutenant who
had brought the supplies had waited two days for us, and then quitted
the place two hours before we arrived, taking the provisions with him.
He heard our guns, but thought that they were fired by Indians, and kept
on his way down the river.

Our condition was terrible. We had been stumbling along, feeble, gaunt,
half crazed by hunger and fatigue. But the expectation of food, the
certainty that we should find plenty at the Ammonusuc, had nerved us up
to the effort to reach it, and now it was gone. It had been there and
was gone. We broke down completely and cried and raved. Some became
insane.

I have already said that I did not like Rogers for several good reasons.
But he was a man of tremendous nerve, energy, and resource. Though his
great strength had been wasted by starvation, so that he could hardly
walk, he still remained the leader, and said:--

"Don't lose your courage, men. I'll save all of you. It is sixty miles
from here to Fort No. 4. Bring some dry logs. Hurry up. I am going to
make a raft, and float down to No. 4 and fetch back food and help."

We brought logs and made a raft.

"You can find enough lily-roots and ground-nuts to keep you alive till I
return. If any of you do not know how to clean and cook them, Captain
Grant w