the colonel was quite indifferent
to my arrival. Nearly an hour passed before my meditations were
interrupted.

This was not my first visit to Richfield to report to the colonel, but I
felt no better acquainted at the last meeting than at the first. There was
a certain reserve in his manner which held folks at arm's length. This
impression of aloofness was increased by his personal appearance. His tall
figure and stern dark eyes made for austerity.

In military affairs he was said to be overstrict in discipline; this from
those who had served under him in former wars. Yet he stood very high in
the esteem of the county militia and his superiors. Perhaps his severe
mien was the natural result of a life filled with stormy experiences. From
early manhood he had been employed in fighting Indians.

He was a captain of militia at the age of twenty-two. Twelve years later
he was a major, serving under Colonel George Washington. He was seriously
wounded at Fort Necessity. He would have played a prominent part in
Braddock's first and last Indian battle had he not been detailed to
complete a chain of frontier forts. He was in the disastrous Sandy Creek
expedition the year following Braddock's defeat.

In 1758 he was an officer under Forbes, and was one of those captured with
Grant's detachment. He escaped the stake only to be held a prisoner in
Montreal. Later he led a force against the Cherokees; and in Pontiac's War
he commanded two hundred and fifty riflemen under Colonel Bouquet. Now he
was picked to command one of the two armies that Governor Dunmore proposed
to send against the Indian towns above the Ohio.

Among the Indians the name of Lewis stood very high. The natives knew the
colonel to be the son of that John Lewis who was long famed as an Indian
fighter. It was commonly believed by red and white, and I have no reason
to doubt the truth of it, that it was John Lewis who introduced red clover
to America.

Whether he did or did not, the Ohio Indians credited him with planting the
first seed and said the color resulted from the blood of the red men he
had slain. William and Charles Lewis, the colonel's brothers, also were
noted border men. Charles undoubtedly ranked as high for courage and
astuteness as any frontiersman in Virginia.

The colored man at last turned the corner of the house. Behind him, and
not yet in sight, was the colonel, and he was not alone for I could hear
his grave voice addressing some compani