big fleet of boats and
canoes loaded with arms, ammunition, and all kinds of supplies. It is
commanded by a brave man, Adam Colfax, and they mean to take all these
things up the river to Pittsburgh, where they will be carried over the
mountains to our people in the east who are fighting Great Britain."

"I've heard of that fleet, too," said Boone, "an' it's got to get to
Pittsburgh, but it won't have any summer trip. Now, what did you hear
among the Wyandots?"

"I saw chiefs from all the valley tribes, Wyandots, Shawnees, Miamis,
Lenni-Lenape, Ottawas, and Illinois," replied Henry, "and they've bound
themselves together for a great war. Their bands are on the march now to
the meeting place on the Ohio, opposite the mouth of the Licking. The
renegades, too, are with the Wyandots, Mr. Boone. I saw with my own eyes
Girty, Blackstaffe, McKee, Eliot, Quarles, and Braxton Wyatt."

Boone's mild eyes suddenly became threatening.

"They'll all be punished some day," he said, "for making cruel war on
their own kind. But I can tell you somethin' else that we've just found
out. While you were down the Mississippi, some new people have built a
settlement an' fort on the south bank of the Ohio some distance before
you get to the mouth of the Licking. I think it was a plum' foolish
thing to do to settle so far north, but they've got a strong fort and
the river is narrow there. They say that they can stop the Indian canoes
from passing and help our own people. They call their place Fort
Prescott."

"But won't it help, Mr. Boone?" asked Henry.

"It would if they could hold it, but that man Girty has gone on ahead
with five hundred picked warriors to take it. It's only a little fort,
an' there ain't more than seventy or eighty men in it. I'm afraid he'll
take it."

"They must have help," said Henry impulsively. "My friends and I travel
light and fast, and we can at least warn them of what is coming. There's
a lot in being ready."

"That's so," said Boone, "an' I reckoned that you'd go when you heard
what I had to say. Me an' Simon would have gone if we didn't have to
warn another place back of the river. But we'll come with help, if they
can hold out a while."

"Then it's all settled," said Henry.

"It's settled," said Daniel Boone.

Tom Ross at once went back for the others, and they quickly came. They,
too, were delighted to meet the famous Boone and Kenton, but they wasted
little time in talk. Boone, with his hunting kn