dians, he quietly remarked,
"Gentlemen, you saved our lives; many thanks! Now we will do as
much for you. Where are the Injuns?" All the tree-climbers arose
respectfully, saluted, and a tall, cadaverous-looking, long-haired,
coon-skin-capped leader advanced, took the general by the hand, and
slowly drawled,--

"Ginrul, the red niggers air skulkin' yender to the river, waitin' to
chaw up you uns tonight.

"Colonel Tompkins," came the quick command, "_climb_ your forces to
the river, pour a volley into the red-skins at sundown, yell for all
you're worth, we'll do the rest."

"All right, Ginrul, we uns will be thar," and away went the "flying
Crackers," facing unspeakable dangers as calmly as a child looks into
the loving eyes of its mother.

Sometimes they glided noiselessly as the autumn leaves cleave the
air over the pine-needle carpet of the forest, and when this was
impossible on account of the bogs and morasses, which would swallow
them down to unknown depths, they swung through the tops of the
sighing pines until they had flanked their unsuspecting foes; then,
just as the sun was setting, they struck terror to the hearts of the
Seminoles by an unexpected volley from their rifles and by frightful
yells,

"As if all the fiends from heaven that fell,
Had pealed the banner-cry of hell."

The red-men fled in panic along the narrow isthmus between the swamps
and river straight upon the ambushed army of Jackson, who mowed them
down with bullets as falls the grass before the scythes. The spirits
of the Indians were crushed, and the remnant of a once powerful tribe
fled into the vast, to the whites, inaccessible everglades, where
their descendants now live on their fertile oasis, which is cultivated
by their negro slaves, who never heard of Abraham Lincoln, or his
proclamation of emancipation. "Old Hickory" and his gallant soldiers
have all the glory; but their heroic allies returned quietly to their
huts, their "hog and hominy," as unconcernedly as if they had done
nothing more important than catching a trout or shooting a quail.

The stolidity and patience of the "Cracker" is equalled only by that
of "their cousins, the Indians"; I have seen one of them sit for
twelve hours continuously in one place fishing without being
encouraged by even a little nibble; his face was as placid as that of
a mummy which he closely resembles; then suddenly he would pull in
scores of trout, but with the same imperturbable compo