will probably so remain until near morning; or Indian tactics have
undergone a change. The fellows have lighted camp-fires on their rocks,
and seem disposed to rest for the present, at least. Nor do I know that
they are bent on war at all. We have no Indians near us, who would be
likely to dig up the hatchet; and these fellows profess peace, by a
messenger they have sent me."

"Are they not in their war-paint, sir? I remember to have seen
warriors, when a boy, and my glass has given these men the appearance
of being on what they call 'a war-path.'"

"Some of them are certainly in that guise, though he who came to the
Knoll was not. _He_ pretended that they were a party travelling
towards the Hudson in order to learn the true causes of the
difficulties between their Great English and their Great American
Fathers. He asked for meal and meat to feed his young men with. This
was the whole purport of his errand."

"And your answer, sir; is it peace, or war, between you?"

"Peace in professions, but I much fear war in reality. Still one cannot
know. An old frontier garrison-man, like myself, is not apt to put much
reliance on Indian faith. We are now, God be praised! all within the
stockade; and having plenty of arms and ammunition, are not likely to
be easily stormed. A siege is out of the question; we are too well
provisioned to dread that."

"But you leave the mills, the growing grain, the barns, even the cabins
of your workmen, altogether at the mercy of these wretches."

"That cannot well be avoided, unless we go out and drive them off, in
open battle. For the last, they are too strong, to say nothing of the
odds of risking fathers of families against mere vagabonds, as I
suspect these savages to be. I have told them to help themselves to
meal, or grain, of which they will find plenty in the mill. Pork can be
got in the houses, and they have made way with a deer already, that I
had expected the pleasure of dissecting myself. The cattle roam the
woods at this season, and are tolerably safe; but they can burn the
barns and other buildings, should they see fit. In this respect, we are
at their mercy. If they ask for rum, or cider, that may bring matters
to a head; for, refusing may exasperate them, and granting either, in
any quantity, will certainly cause them all to get intoxicated."

"Why would not that be good policy, Willoughby?" exclaimed the
chaplain. "If fairly disguised once, our people might steal out upon