avage force in flight
to shelter.

But Timmendiquas, who had chosen the position, had reckoned well. The
field was not only covered with high weeds, but the portion near the
town was intersected with deep gullies. The warriors fell back in good
order and sought refuge in these gullies which would hold hundreds. Here
bullets, cannon balls and grape shot alike passed over their heads, and
suffering but little loss, they sent back a storm of their own bullets.

The army advanced to the edge of the woods, and was ready to charge
across them but Colonel Clark hesitated. Before they could reach the
gullies his men might be cut in pieces by a protected foe. The five,
Boone, and many other of the best frontiersmen had already sought the
shelter of stones or little hillocks, and were firing at every head that
appeared above the edge of the gullies. Before the smoke became too
dense Henry saw beyond the gullies that Piqua was a large town, larger
than they had supposed. It would perhaps be impossible for the army to
envelop it. In fact, it was built in the French-Canadian style and ran
three miles up and down Mad River.

Henry heard the fierce war whoop rising again and again above the firing
which was now an unbroken crash. He also heard another and shriller
note, and he knew it was the shouting that came from the vast swarm of
squaws and children in Piqua. The yell of the Indians also took on a
triumphant tone. It seemed that the beginning of the battle was in their
front, and the ambushed warriors in the gullies were strengthened by
other forces on their right and left that crept forward and opened a
heavy fire from cover. Along a range of more than a mile there was a
steady flash of firing, and it seemed impossible for any force to
advance into it and live.

Fortunate, again fortunate, and thrice fortunate were the frontiersmen
who were veterans, also! The cannon were sheltered in the wood and the
men were made to lie down. The great guns still thundered across the
field, but the riflemen held their fire, while the Indian shout of
triumph swelled higher and higher. In this terrible moment when many
another commander would have lost his head, the staunch heart of Clark
never faltered. He hastily called his leading officers and scouts, and
while the battle flamed before them, he gave his orders behind a screen
of bushes. He bade Colonel Logan, assisted by Colonel Floyd and Colonel
Harrod, to take four hundred men, circle to