rrod?" says he.

"No, Colonel," answers Captain Harrod, amid the laughter of the men at my
end.

"What!" says the Colonel, "what an oversight! From this day he is
drummer boy and orderly to the Commander-in-chief. Beat the retreat, my
man."

I did my best, and as the men broke ranks they crowded around me,
laughing and joking, and Cowan picked me up, drum and all, and carried me
off, I rapping furiously the while.

And so I became a kind of handy boy for the whole regiment from the
Colonel down, for I was willing and glad to work. I cooked the Colonel's
meals, roasting the turkey breasts and saddles of venison that the
hunters brought in from the mainland, and even made him journey-cake, a
trick which Polly Ann had taught me. And when I went about the island,
if a man were loafing, he would seize his axe and cry, "Here's Davy,
he'll tell the Colonel on me." Thanks to the jokes of Terence McCann, I
gained an owl-like reputation for wisdom amongst these superstitious
backwoodsmen, and they came verily to believe that upon my existence
depended the success of the campaign. But day after day passed, and no
sign from Colonel Clark of his intentions.

"There's a good lad," said Terence. "He'll be telling us where we're
going."

I was asked the same question by a score or more, but Colonel Clark kept
his own counsel. He himself was everywhere during the days that
followed, superintending the work on the blockhouse we were building, and
eying the men. Rumor had it that he was sorting out the sheep from the
goats, silently choosing those who were to remain on the island and those
who were to take part in the campaign.

At length the blockhouse stood finished amid the yellow stumps of the
great trees, the trunks of which were in its walls. And suddenly the
order went forth for the men to draw up in front of it by companies, with
the families of the emigrants behind them. It was a picture to fix
itself in a boy's mind, and one that I have never forgotten. The line of
backwoodsmen, as fine a lot of men as I ever wish to see, bronzed by the
June sun, strong and tireless as the wild animals of the forest, stood
expectant with rifles grounded. And beside the tallest, at the end of
the line, was a diminutive figure with a drum hung in front of it. The
early summer wind rustled in the forest, and the never ending song of the
Great Falls sounded from afar. Apart, square-shouldered and indomitable,
stood a young man of twenty-six