[Illustration: HIS SWIFT EYES SEARCHED IT FOR THE SIGN]
IN KENTUCKY
WITH
DANIEL BOONE
_By_
JOHN T. McINTYRE
_Illustrations by_
Ralph L. Boyer and A. Edwin Kromer
[Illustration]
THE PENN PUBLISHING
COMPANY PHILADELPHIA
1913
COPYRIGHT
1913 BY
THE PENN
PUBLISHING
COMPANY
[Illustration]
Contents
I. THE GRAY LIZARD SPEAKS 7
II. A COMING STRUGGLE 18
III. DANIEL BOONE, MARKSMAN 33
IV. IN THE WILDERNESS 61
V. CAPTURED BY THE SHAWNEES 70
VI. BOONE IN THE WILDERNESS 93
VII. ATTACKED! 105
VIII. THE THREE BOYS RIDE ON A MISSION 114
IX. DEFENDING A LOG CABIN 125
X. A NIGHT EXPERIENCE 139
XI. THE BATTLE OF POINT PLEASANT 147
XII. THE FORT AT BOONESBOROUGH 164
XIII. CONCLUSION 174
XIV. SKETCH OF BOONE’S LIFE 185
Illustrations
HIS SWIFT EYES SEARCHED IT FOR THE SIGN _Frontispiece_
CLOSELY BOONE STUDIED THE TRAIL 75
THE RIFLES SPOKE THROUGH THE PORT-HOLES 136
HE INCREASED HIS SPEED 159
In Kentucky With Daniel Boone
CHAPTER I
THE GRAY LIZARD SPEAKS
Along the trail which wound along the banks of the Yadkin, in North
Carolina, rode a tall, sinewy man; he had a bronzed, resolute face,
wore the hunting shirt, leggins and moccasins of the backwoods, and
had hanging from one shoulder a long flint-locked rifle. A small buck,
which this unerring weapon of the hunter had lately brought down, lay
across his saddle bow.
Away along the trail, at a place where the river bent sharply, a cloud
of dust arose in the trail; and as the hunter rode forward he kept his
keen eyes upon this.
“Horsemen,” he told himself. “Two of them, I reckon, judging from the
dust.”
Nearer and nearer rolled the cloud; at length the riders within it
could be seen. One was a middle-aged man who rode a powerful black
horse; the other was a boy of perhaps thirteen whose mount was a
long-legged young horse, with a wild eye and ears that were never still.
Catching sight of the hunter, the man on the big black drew rein.
“What, Daniel!” cried he. “Well met!”
“How are you, Colonel Henderson?” replied the backwoodsman. “I didn’t
calculate on seeing you to-day.”
“I rode over for the express purpose of having a talk with you,” said
Colonel Henderson. “I was at your house, but they told me you’d gone
away early this morning to try for some game.”
The hunter glanced down at the buck across his saddle. There was a
discontented frown upon his brow.
“Yes, gone since early morning,” he said. “And this is all I got. The
hunting ain’t so good in the Yadkin country as it was once. As a boy
I’ve stood in the door of my father’s cabin and brought down deer big
enough to be this one’s granddaddy.”
The boy on the long-legged horse bounced up and down in his saddle at
this; the nag felt his excitement and began to rear and plunge.
“Steady, boy, steady,” said Colonel Henderson. “Hold him in.”
“It’s all right, uncle,” replied the lad. “He don’t mean anything by
it.” Then to the hunter, as his mount became quiet: “That was good
shooting, Mr. Boone, wasn’t it? And,” pointing to the carcass of the
buck, “so was that. Right behind the left shoulder; and it left hardly
a mark on him.”
Daniel Boone smiled.
“I always treat my old rifle well,” said he, humorously. “And she never
goes back on me.”
“Some time ago I had a talk with John Finley,” said Colonel Henderson.
“He told me wonderful tales of the hunting country beyond the Laurel
Ridge.”[1]
Daniel Boone’s eyes went toward the northwest where the great mountain
chain reared its peaks toward the sky until they were enveloped in a
blue mist.
“Beyond the Laurel Ridge,” said he, “there is a country such as no man
has ever seen before. Such hills and valleys, such forests and streams
and plains can only be in one place in the world. And there are deer
and bear and fur animals; and buffalo cover the plains. Also,” and a
grim look came into his face, “there are redskins!”
There was a short silence; Colonel Henderson looked at the backwoodsman
very thoughtfully.
“For some time,” said he, “it has seemed to me that these settlements
are not what they should be. The laws enforced by the British governor
Tryon, have sown discontent among the people. New emigrants go to other
places where there are better laws and less taxes.”
Daniel Boone nodded.
“Tax gatherers, magistrates, lawyers and such like live like
aristocrats,” said he, “and the farmers and other settlers are asked to
support them. We are here in the settlements, it seems, for no other
purpose than to give these fellows a soft living. And they take our
money and treat us like servants. A peddler who hucksters among the
Indians is thought a better man than the one who has cut a form out of
the wilderness with his axe.”
There was a bitterness in the man’s tone which seemed to please the
other.
“There are a great many who feel just as you do about it,” said he.
“And it was this very thing that I rode over to speak about.”
Daniel Boone shook his head.
“Signing writings and sending them to Tryon will do no good,” said
he. “He’s a tyrant and understands nothing but oppression.” Then in a
longing tone, his eyes on the distant hills, “I wish I were away from
the Yadkin for good and all. No man can be free here as long as we have
public officers who think of nothing but plunder.”
“As I said before,” said Colonel Henderson, in a satisfied tone, “there
are a great many others who are of the same way of thinking as you. But
they have nowhere to go; if a new country was opened for them, they
would sell their farms, pack their goods upon their horses’ backs and
be gone.”
There was something in the speaker’s tone that took the attention of
the backwoodsman. His keen eyes studied Colonel Henderson’s face; but
he said nothing.
“Ever since I heard Finley talk of the country beyond the ridge,” said
the colonel, resuming after a moment, “I’ve felt that such a rare
region should be opened up for settlement.”
“Right!” cried Daniel Boone and his eyes began to glow.
“But,” said the colonel, “I’ve also felt that it should not be done
until the country was explored further--until it had been penetrated
to its interior, until its streams were worked out on a chart, a trail
made for the passage of emigrants and the most promising places fixed
upon for settlements.”
“Right again,” said Daniel Boone. “I’ve been in the country and so have
Finley and some others; but none of us has studied it. To do that would
take a year or more; and to live a year so far from the settlements a
man would have to make up his mind to troubles from the Indians.”
“The Shawnees claim it,” said the colonel. “If it is what I want, I
will buy it from them.”
“It’s a hunting-ground for Cherokees, Shawnees and Chickasaws,” said
Boone, and he shook his head as he spoke. “So far as I could see, it
belonged to all of them. And it’s a fighting place; when two hunting
parties meet, the hatchet, knife and arrow begin their work.”
Once more the colonel regarded the backwoodsman attentively.
“I never knew the prospect of danger or hard work to hold you back in
anything you wanted to do,” he said.
Boone laughed.
“I’ve always tried not to let them, I reckon,” said he.
“This fall,” and the colonel spoke slowly, “I am going to send an
exploring party into the northwest country; and later, if it’s what I
think it is, I’ll want a party of trail makers and a man to treat with
the Shawnees. How would you like to take charge of this matter for me?”
For a moment Boone sat his horse, staring at the speaker.
“You mean it?” he said, at last.
“I do.”
The backwoodsman held out a strong brown hand; Colonel Henderson
gripped it.
“I’m with you,” said Boone, in a tone of deep satisfaction. “It’s a
thing I’ve been sort of dreaming of for years. That great region,
now given over to the Indian hunters and wild beasts, is calling the
white man. I heard its voice as I stood among the lonely hills, in
the forests, and upon the banks of its rivers. Once there with their
families, their plows and their horses, their cabins built, the settler
will meet----”
“Death!” said a strange voice; and, startled, both Boone and Colonel
Henderson turned their eyes in the direction from which it came.
An Indian stood there--an ancient savage, clad in skins upon which
were painted queer symbols. Strings of amulets, bears’ claws and the
teeth of foxes and wolves hung about him; his face was lined with the
deep wrinkles of great age, his eyes were small, black, and glittered
coldly like those of a snake.
“What, Gray Lizard!” said Boone, in surprise. “Are you here?”
The old Indian advanced a step or two, supporting himself by a long
staff. Keenly the serpent eyes gazed at the three whites.
“Death will meet the paleface,” said he. “He will never build his lodge
in the country beyond the mountains. Let him once pass the great gap,
and he is no more.”
Boone laughed.
“I’ve been through the gap, Gray Lizard,” he said, good-naturedly; “and
so have other white men. And we still live.”
The cold eyes fixed themselves upon the resolute face; one skinny
finger was lifted until it pointed at Boone’s breast.
“You have,” said Gray Lizard. “You have, and you are marked. Let your
rifle once more break the silence of the hills or ring over the waters
of the red man’s rivers, and your death song is sung.”
Then he turned to Colonel Henderson, and continued:
“And you, white chief, take care! The Gray Lizard has known these
many moons of what you mean to do, and now he warns you. If you love
your friends, do not send them beyond the Laurel Ridge. For in the
wilderness their fate awaits them at the hands of the Shawnees.”
He turned and was about to go; then he paused, and added:
“The Gray Lizard is old. He has seen many things. He knew the Yadkin
when the white man was a stranger on its banks. Take warning by his
words: do not venture beyond the blue hills.”
Then, his long staff ringing on the stones, he went limping down the
trail.