at this chief Timmendiquas and
his men, they will strike hard at us. I shall put it to the men in my
fleet; if they favor it we will go. What do you say about yours, Major?"

Major George Augustus Braithwaite looked at the men about him, and the
battle light came into his eyes, also.

"It shan't be said, Mr. Colfax, that my men stayed behind when yours
were willing to go. I shall take the vote, and if they say fight--and
they certainly will say it--we go with you."

Messengers hurried forth and polled the two camps. An overwhelming
majority were in favor of making the attack. In the fleet the men, used
to danger and loving it as the breath of their nostrils, were
practically unanimous. But Adam Colfax and Major Braithwaite agreed to
drag first for the cannon.

At three in the morning a dozen boats went forth upon the river. They
contained the two commanders, Boone, Kenton, Henry, and others, besides
the divers and the men with grappling hooks. It was a dark night, and,
in addition, Simon Kenton and a dozen good men went upon the northern
shore to search the woods for a watching enemy.

Henry and Seth Cole were in the boat with Adam Colfax and Major
Braithwaite, and the two sought to mark the exact spot upon the water at
which the cannon had been sunk. This might seem a most difficult task,
but the last detail of that eventful night had been photographed upon
Henry's mind. It seemed to him that he could remember, within a foot,
the exact spot at which the guns had gone beneath the current of the
Ohio.

"It is here," he said to Adam Colfax, and the scout nodded. All the
boats anchored, and the divers dropped silently into the muddy stream.
Henry watched eagerly, and in a minute or so they came up sputtering.
Their hands had touched nothing but the bottom. Adam Colfax and Major
Braithwaite looked disappointed, but both Henry and the scout insisted
that it was the right place.

"Try again," said Adam Colfax, and the divers went down a second time.
The last of them to come up looked over the side of their boat, and when
he wiped the water from his eyes, triumph showed there.

"They are here," he said. "I touched one of them. It is sunk in the mud,
but we can raise it."

They uttered a little suppressed cry of triumph, and presently the
divers touched the other, also. The grappling hooks were sent down, and
those in the boats watched eagerly to see if the cannon could be raised.
Every big gun was precious in those