my fusil and the matter ended by the return of the
jug.

In 1753 he met his end at the hands of western Indians in the French
interest, who shot him as he was helping to carry a battoe, and he was
burried in the wilderness. My mother then returned to her home in
Massassachusetts, journeying with a party of traders but I staid with
the Dutch on these frontiers because I had learned the indian trade and
liked the country. Not having any chances, I had little book learning in
my youth, having to this day a regret concerning it. I read a few books,
but fear I had a narrow knowledge of things outside the Dutch
settlements. On the frontiers, for that matter, few people had much
skill with the pen, nor was much needed. The axe and rifle, the paddle
and pack being more to our hands in those rough days. To prosper though,
men weare shrewd-headed enough. I have never seen that books helped
people to trade sharper. Shortly afterwards our trade fell away, for the
French had embroiled the Indians against us. Crown Point was the Place
from which the Indians in their interest had been fitted out to go
against our settlements, so a design was formed by His Majesty the
British King to dispossess them of that place. Troops were levid in the
Province and the war began. The Frenchers had the best of the fighting.

Our frontiers were beset with the Canada indians so that it was not safe
to go about in the country at all. I was working for Peter Vrooman, a
trader, and was living at his house on the Mohawk. One Sunday morning I
found a negro boy who was shot through the body with two balls as he was
hunting for stray sheep, and all this within half a mile of Vrooman's
house. Then an express came up the valley who left word that the
Province was levying troops at Albany to fight the French, and I took my
pay from Vrooman saying that I would go to Albany for a soldier. Another
young man and myself paddled down to Albany, and we both enlisted in the
York levies. We drawed our ammunition, tents, kettles, bowls and knives
at the Albany flats, and were drilled by an officer who had been in her
Majesty's Service. One man was given five hundred lashes for enlisting
in some Connecticut troops, and the orders said that any man who should
leave His Majesty's service without a Regular discharge should suffer
Death. The restraint which was put upon me by this military life was not
to my liking, and I was in a mortal dread of the whippings which men
were