would hear
the gobble of a wild turkey. He would listen a moment, then he would
say, That is not a wild turkey, but an Indian, imitating that bird;
but he won't fool me and get me to come near enough to put a bullet
through my head.

One evening an old hunter, on his way to his cabin, heard what seemed
to be two young owls calling to each other. But his quick ear noticed
that there was something not quite natural in their calls, and what
was stranger still, that the owls seemed to be on the ground instead
of being perched on trees, as all well-behaved owls would be. He crept
cautiously along through the bushes till he saw something ahead which
looked like a stump. He didn't altogether like the looks of the stump.
He aimed his rifle at it, and fired. The stump, or what seemed to
be one, fell over backward with a groan. He had killed an Indian,
who had been waiting to kill him.

150. Boone makes the "Wilderness Road," and builds the fort at
Boonesboro'.--In 1775 Boone, with a party of thirty men, chopped a
path through the forest from the mountains of Eastern Tennessee to
the Kentucky River,[4] a distance of about two hundred miles. This
was the first path in that part of the country leading to the great
west. It was called the "_Wilderness Road_." Over that road, which
thousands of emigrants travelled afterward, Boone took his family,
with other settlers, to the Kentucky River. There they built a fort
called Boonesboro'. That fort was a great protection to all the first
settlers in Kentucky. In fact, it is hard to see how the state could
have grown up without it. So in one way, we can say with truth that
Daniel Boone, the hunter, fighter, and road-maker, was a
state-builder besides.

[Illustration: MAP SHOWING BOONE'S "WILDERNESS ROAD."]

[Footnote 4: See map in this paragraph.]

151. Boone's daughter is stolen by the Indians; how he found
her.--One day Boone's young daughter was out, with two other girls,
in a canoe on the river. Suddenly some Indians pounced on them and
carried them off.

One of the girls, as she went along, broke off twigs from the bushes,
so that her friends might be able to follow her track through the
woods. An Indian caught her doing it, and told her that he would kill
her if she did not instantly stop. Then she slyly tore off small bits
of her dress, and dropped a piece from time to time.

Boone and his men followed the Indians like bloodhounds. They picked
up the bits of dress, an