. And from that day we ground as much corn as
could be brought to us from miles around.

Polly Ann and I ran the mill and kept the accounts. Often of a crisp
autumn morning we heard a gobble-gobble above the tumbling of the water
and found a wild turkey perched on top of the hopper, eating his fill.
Some of our meat we got that way. As for Tom, he was off and on. When
the roving spirit seized him he made journeys to the westward with Cowan
and Ray. Generally they returned with packs of skins. But sometimes
soberly, thanking Heaven that their hair was left growing on their
heads. This, and patrolling the Wilderness Road and other militia
duties, made up Tom's life. No sooner was the mill fairly started than
off he went to the Cumberland. I mention this, not alone because I
remember well the day of his return, but because of a certain happening
then that had a heavy influence on my after life.

The episode deals with an easy-mannered gentleman named Potts, who was
the agent for a certain Major Colfax of Virginia. Tom owned under a
Henderson grant; the Major had been given this and other lands for his
services in the war. Mr. Potts arrived one rainy afternoon and found me
standing alone under the little lean-to that covered the hopper. How we
served him, with the aid of McCann and Cowan and other neighbors, and
how we were near getting into trouble because of the prank, will be seen
later. The next morning I rode into Harrodstown not wholly easy in my
mind concerning the wisdom of the thing I had done. There was no one to
advise me, for Colonel Clark was far away, building a fort on the banks
of the Mississippi. Tom had laughed at the consequences; he cared little
about his land, and was for moving into the Wilderness again. But
for Polly Ann's sake I wished that we had treated the land agent less
cavalierly. I was soon distracted from these thoughts by the sight of
Harrodstown itself.

I had no sooner ridden out of the forest shade when I saw that the place
was in an uproar, men and women gathering in groups and running here
and there between the cabins. Urging on the mare, I cantered across the
fields, and the first person I met was James Ray.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"Matter enough! An army of redskins has crossed the Ohio, and not a
man to take command. My God," cried Ray, pointing angrily at the swarms
about the land office, "what trash we have got this last year! Kentucky
can go to the devil, half the sta