-house into a court-house, arrest 'em, try 'em, and hang a few for
luck! In the old days, I'll warrant you, the Cosbys would have stood no
such nonsense--no, nor the Livingstons, nor the Van Cortlandts. A
hundred lashes here and there, a debtor's jail, a hanging or two, would
have made things more cheerful. But I, curse me if I could ever bring
myself to use my simplest prerogatives; I can't whip a man, no! I can't
hang a man for anything--even a sheep-thief has his chance with me--like
that great villain, Billy Bones, who turned renegade and joined Danny
Redstock and the McCraw."

He snorted in self-contempt and puffed savagely at his clay pipe.

"La patroon? Dammy, I'm an old woman! Get me my knitting! I want my
knitting and a sunny spot to mumble my gums and wait for noon and a dish
o' porridge!... George, my rents are cut in half, and half my farms
left to the briers and wolves in one day, because his Majesty, General
Schuyler, orders his Highness, Colonel Dayton, to call out half the
militia to make a fort for his Eminence, Colonel Gansevoort!"

"At Stanwix?"

"They call it Fort Schuyler now--after his Highness in Albany.

"Sir Lupus," I said, "if it is true that the British mean to invade us
here with Brant's Mohawks, there is but one bulwark between Tryon County
and the enemy, and that is Fort Stanwix. Why, in Heaven's name, should
it not be defended? If this British officer and his renegades, regulars,
and Indians take Stanwix and fortify Johnstown, the whole country will
swarm with savages, outlaws, and a brutal soldiery already hardened and
made callous by a year of frontier warfare!

"Can you not understand this, sir? Do you think it possible for these
blood-drunk ruffians to roam the Mohawk and Sacandaga valleys and
respect you and yours just because you say you are neutral? Turn loose a
pack of famished panthers in a common pasture and mark your sheep with
your device and see how many are alive at daybreak!"

"Dammy, sir!" cried Sir Lupus, "the enemy are led by British gentlemen."

"Who doubtless will keep their own cuffs clean; it were shame to doubt
it! But if the Mohawks march with them there'll be a bloody page in
Tryon County annals."

"The Mohawks will not join!" he said, violently. "Has not Schuyler held
a council-fire and talked with belts to the entire confederacy?"

"The confederacy returned no belts," I said, "and the Mohawks were not
present."

"Kirkland saw Brant," he persisted, obs