the Clinch river is but one of the many magnificent
ravines amid the gigantic ranges of the Alleghany mountains. Boone,
speaking of these ridges which he so often had occasion to cross, says:

"These mountains in the wilderness, as we pass from the old settlements
in Virginia to Kentucky, are ranged in a south-west and north-east
direction and are of great length and breadth and not far distant from
each other. Over them nature hath formed passes that are less difficult
than might be expected from a view of such huge piles. The aspect of
these cliffs is so wild and horrid that it is impossible to behold them
without terror. The spectator is apt to imagine that nature has formerly
suffered some violent convulsion, and that these are the dismembered
remains of the dreadful shock."

One cannot but regret that no memorials are left of a wonderful journey,
full of romantic interest and exciting adventure, which Boone at one
time took to the Falls of the Ohio, to warn some surveyors of their
danger. He reached them in safety, rescued them from certain death, and
conducted them triumphantly back to the settlements. So long as the
white men, with their rifles, could keep upon the open prairie, they
could defend themselves from almost any number of Indians, who could
only assail them with bows and arrows. But the moment they entered the
forest, or any ravine among the hills, the little band was liable to
hear the war-whoop of a thousand Indian braves in the ambush around, and
to be assailed by a storm of arrows and javelins from unseen hands.

A few days after Boone's arrival at the encampment near the Falls of the
Ohio, and as the surveyors were breaking camp in preparation for their
precipitate retreat, several of their number who had gone to a spring at
a short distance from the camp, were suddenly attacked on the twentieth
of July by a large party of Indians. One was instantly killed. The rest
being nearly surrounded, fled as best they could in all directions. One
man hotly pursued, rushed along an Indian trail till he reached the Ohio
river. Here he chanced to find a bark canoe. He jumped into it and
pushed out into the rapid stream till beyond the reach of the Indian
arrows. The swift current bore him down the river, by curves and
head-lands, till he was far beyond the encampment.

[Illustration]

To return against the strong flood, with the savages watching for him,
seemed perilous, if not impossible. It is said that