few days at Fort Harmar, where the Muskingum pays
its tribute to the Ohio, built by the Federal government to hold the
territory which Clark had won. And leaving that hospitable place we took
up our journey once more in the very miracle-time of the spring. The
sunlight was like amber-crystal, the tall cottonwoods growing by the
water-side flaunted a proud glory of green, the hills behind them that
formed the first great swells of the sea of the wilderness were clothed
in a thousand sheens and shaded by the purple budding of the oaks and
walnuts on the northern slopes. On the yellow sandbars flocks of geese
sat pluming in the sun, or rose at our approach to cast fleeting shadows
on the water, their HONK-HONKS echoing from the hills. Here and there
a hawk swooped down from the azure to break the surface and bear off a
wriggling fish that gleamed like silver, and at eventide we would see at
the brink an elk or doe, with head poised, watching us as we drifted.
We passed here and there a lonely cabin, to set my thoughts wandering
backwards to my youth, and here and there in the dimples of the hills
little clusters of white and brown houses, one day to become marts of
the Republic.

My joy at coming back at this golden season to a country I loved was
tempered by news I had heard from Captain Wendell, and which I had
discussed with the officers at Fort Harmar. The Captain himself had
broached the subject one cool evening, early in the journey, as we
sat over the fire in our little cabin. He had been telling me about
Brandywine, but suddenly he turned to me with a kind of fierce gesture
that was natural to the man.

"Ritchie," he said, "you were in the Revolution yourself. You helped
Clark to capture that country," and he waved his hand towards the
northern shore; "why the devil don't you tell me about it?"

"You never asked me," I answered.

He looked at me curiously.

"Well," he said, "I ask you now."

I began lamely enough, but presently my remembrance of the young man who
conquered all obstacles, who compelled all men he met to follow and obey
him, carried me strongly into the narrative. I remembered him, quiet,
self-contained, resourceful, a natural leader, at twenty-five a bulwark
for the sorely harried settlers of Kentucky; the man whose clear vision
alone had perceived the value of the country north of the Ohio to the
Republic, who had compelled the governor and council of Virginia to see
it likewise. Who had gua