University of Virginia Library

Dear Father—We stick by here yet, takin' care
of our disputed territory and the logs; and while
we stay here the British will have to walk as

straight as a hair, you may depend. We ain't had
much fighting to do since my last letter; and some
how or other, things seem to be getting cooler
down here a little, so that I'm afraid we ain't agoing
to have the real scratch, after all, that I wanted to
have. A day or two arter we took the logging
camp and brought the men and oxen off here prisoners
of war, we was setting in the fort after dinner
and talking matters over, and Sargent Johnson
was a wondering what a plague was the reason
the British didn't come up to the scratch as
they talked on. He said he guessed they wasn't
sich mighty fairce fellers for war as they pretended
to be, arter all.

“Well,” said Colonel Jarvis, “I got some despatches
from Governor Fairfield this morning,
that says Sir John Harvey seems to be a little
inclined to haul in his horns; and I don't believe
they'll try to drive us out of our disputed territory,
or come a near us. But still the governor
says we must hold on and look out sharp,
for he don't know how 'twill turn out yet; and
we must keep possession of the territory, and
not let any body come into it, nor any logs go
out of it, till we have further orders.”

“Well,” says Sargent Johnson, “I don't like
this staying about here doing nothing; I ain't used
to it. If them British are any notion of coming
here and having a tug with us, I wish they'd
come and have it over. Why don't we go clear
to the line, colonel? How do we know but what
they'll get over this side on't sometimes, if we
ain't there to see to it? And besides, I want to see
that boundary line, that I've heard so much tell
of; and I'm determined to see it before I go
home, if I have to march down to it all alone;
so I can have it to tell my children of, when I
get to be an old man, and can say to 'em, I
have seen the boundary line myself, and marched
clear down to it and stood on it.”

Here I couldn't help putting in a word tu;
and says I—

“So do I, colonel, I want to see that are
boundary line, and go right up to it, and toe the
mark; I never was dared to toe the mark yet,
but what I did it, let who would stand t'other
side. And I should like to go right up to this
line, and put my toes on to it, and look over on
to the British side, and stump them to come up to
it if they dared.”

At that Colonel Jarvis turned round and looked
at me, and haw-hawed right out; and, says he—

“Well done, John, you are growing quite
wolfy. I like your spunk any how; but you are
young and inexperienced, and don't understand
all the turns of the game exactly. You hain't
seen so much war as your old great grandfather
has; you must try to keep cool and foller your
officers.”

“But, colonel,” says I, “do you know grandfather?”

“Yes, I do,” says he; “I have heard him tell
his war stories many a time. Didn't he give you
no good advice when you come away?”

“Nothing,” says I; “only he charged me not
to be in too much of a hurry to fire.”

“Well,” says the colonel, “you'd better remember
that advice, and foller it. And it's a pity
Billy Wiggins hadn't a grandfather to advise
him.”

At that Billy Wiggins rolled up his little gray
eyes at the colonel, and fairly looked red; and
says Billy, says he—

“Well, colonel, my gun goes too easy, and I
can't help it. I've been a squirrel hunting with it

so much, it'll almost go off itself, before you think
on't.”

“But this ain't what we was talking about,”
said Sargent Johnson; “and I don't see as it
brings us any nearer the line. As I said afore,
colonel, I don't like this staying about here and
doing nothing; and if things are getting cooled
down a little, so as like as not we shall have to go
off home pretty soon, I think the sooner we take
a peep at that boundary line the better.”

The colonel said, the boundary line wasn't but a
few miles off, and we was as near to it now as
'twas prudent to have our head-quarters. We'd
got a good strong place here on Fitzherbert's farm
for a fort, and we must stick by it and keep it well
manned and guarded. And he said, bein' Sargent
Johnson and his company was so good on a
scouting-party, and did so well t'other day when
we took the logging camp, he didn't keer if we
tried it again the next day. We might go out
and scour round awhile, and see if we could find
any more trespassers, and go down as far as the
line if we'd a mind to; only be careful and not get
over on t'other side of the line; for if the British

nabb'd us there, we should be lawful game, and it
would be hard work to make 'em give us up.

So we was all alive in a minute, fitting out for
a new campaign. We went to work and rubbed
up our guns, and put new flints into 'em, and got
'em so they'd go as quick as a stream of lightning.
And the next morning we was up by times and
got our breakfasts, and filled our knapsacks, and
started off. We hunted round most all the forenoon
to find some more trespassers, but we
couldn't find hide nor hair of a single one. We
thought we must be pretty near the line, and
sometimes we begun to feel a little skittish for
fear we might get acrost and not know it, and the
British might hop up behind some of the old logs
and trees and nab us before we could have time to
take aim at 'em. Bime-by Billy Wiggins started
on ahead of us and run like a two-year-old, up on
to a little hill there was a little ways ahead; and
then he begun to climb a slim, tall pine tree, and
he hitched and scrabbled up as fast as a young
bear.

“What upon earth,” said Sargent Johnson,
“is Billy arter now?”

“A squirrel, I guess,” said I; “I'll bet a potato,
Billy has treed a squirrel.”

When we got along up a little nearer, Sargent
Johnson called out to him to know what he was
doing up there.

“I'm jest a looking off here to see if I can see
the line,” said Billy, stretching his neck away to
the eastward, and looking with all the eyes in his
head.

“Well, do you see it?” said Sargent Johnson.

“See it? no;” said Billy, “I don't see nothing
but woods, and woods, as fur as I can see.”

Sargent Johnson told him he guessed he would
see it quicker if he was down on the ground, than
he would up there. So Billy come down again,
and we jogged along. Bime-by we come to a tree
that had some old marks and spots on two sides
of it. And we looked along north and south of
this tree, for Sargent Johnson said the line runs
due north from the monument, and we found some
more trees marked and spotted jest like it.

“Ah,” says Sargent Johnson, “we've found it.
This is the boundary line we've heard so much tell
of; we've got it at last. Now look and see if you
can see the British on t'other side of it; and let

every man hold on to his gun and be ready to fire
if I say the word.”

We looked across the line, and looked and looked,
but we couldn't see nothin' but trees, and
bushes, and woods, and swamps. We hollered
across the line as hard as we could holler, to see
if we could raise any of the British, for we all felt
as if we wanted to have a brush. And we thought
at first they answered us; but when we come to
holler again, we found it was only the echo of our
own voices, that come back from the hills a little
ways off. So we marched along on the line two
or three miles, but we couldn't see nor hear nothin'
of nobody. At last we sot down and got the
victuals out of our knapsacks and eat our dinners,
and rested awhile. When we got ready to start
again to go back to our fort, Sargent Johnson said
we should give the British one broadside before
we left 'em, jest to let 'em know what the Yankee
boys are made of. So he told us to see that our
guns was all right; and then he ordered us to
stand up all in a row, and toe the line, facing to the
British side; and then he give us off the word—

“Make ready, take aim—fire.”

“There,” says Sargent Johnson, “now I can

go home contented, war or no war; for we've
poured one good grist into their own territory, and
they may help themselves if they can.”

Then we put on our knapsacks and shouldered
our guns and started back towards the fort. We
fit our way along through the bushes and swamps
two or three miles, till we come out a little more
into the upland, and as we was walking along and
talking and telling how we guessed the British
wouldn't dare to come up and toe the line as we
had done, all at once we come across a great track
in the snow. We stopped and looked at it awhile,
but we couldn't tell what sort of a track it was.
Some guessed it was a bear, and some guessed it
was an ox, and some guessed it was a hoss, but
they all said it didn't look like nary one on 'em.
At last Billy Wiggins said, he didn't believe but
what it was the British Lion got over on to our
side of the boundary line. At that we all had a
good laugh, and Sargent Johnson said, if that was
the case we'd have a hunt for him, for no British
lion had a right to set his foot in our disputed
territory. So we turned off and followed the
track. Bime-by we looked away ahead a little
ways amongst the trees, and there we see it.

'Twas a great crittur, that looked some like an
ox, only 'twas about as tall and long as a hoss;
and he had a great mess of horns sprangling out
both sides of his head like a great bunch of dry
hemlock knots.

“There,” says Billy Wiggins, “didn't I tell
you it was the British lion? Don't you see his
horns?”

“But, tain't the lion that has horns, it's the
unicorn that has horns, according to my book,”
said Jonathan Downing; “and I guess it's a unicorn.”

“No,” says I, “tain't a unicorn; unicorns don't
have but one horn, and this feller's got a dozen.”

He stood with his head up, eating the bark off
the limbs of the trees. And as soon as Sargent
Johnson got up so near he could have a fair sight
of him, he sung out, “it's a moose—it's a moose;
now we'll have some fun; now for a moose
chase.”

As soon as the moose see us, he jumped his
whole length, and started to run. He threw his
head back on his shoulders, and tipped it one side,
so as to bring one bunch of his horns over his back,
while 'tother bunch pinted forward, so he could run

between the trees and bushes; and he jumped and
run like a young ox, and we arter him, as tight as
we could spring. We couldn't fire at first, for we
had forgot to load our guns again arter firing our
broadside on the line; and Sargent Johnson said
it was no matter about stopping to load, for if we
could get him in a good stout snow-bank, we could
take him alive. So we pulled foot arter him as
hard as we could go. Some of the way the snow
was pretty deep, and so hard we could run on the
top of it. But the moose broke through almost
every step, and he had sich hard work jumping
and floundering along, he couldn't gain ahead of
us hardly a bit. At last he got kind of wedged up
between some high rocks on one side, and some
old trees that was blowed down on 'tother side,
and there he was in as bad a fix as Billy Wiggins
was, behind the great pine log that I told you about
in my last letter. There was no chance for the
poor moose to get away, but to turn right back and
make his way right through among us. He looked
round at us, and shook his head a few times, and
bime-by he turned round and fetched a spring and
come right at us, full chisel. We sprung, some
one way and some 'tother, and give him a chance
to go by, and Jonathan Downing fetched him a lick
acrost his nose with his gun, and broke his gun
stock. But poor Billy Wiggins couldn't spring
out of the way so quick as the rest of us, and the
moose run right against him, and knocked him
head-over-heels, as much as a rod, and the next
jump he stepped on to one of Billy's legs, and
broke it off as short as a pipe-stem. We run and
helped Billy up, and found he wasn't hurt much,
only his leg was broke; so Sargent Johnson told
one of the men to stay by him, and we took arter
the moose agin. Arter we chased him about half
a mile further, he got into sich a deep snow-bank,
it stopped him. He jumped and floundered round,
but he couldn't get out, and only got deeper and
deeper into it, till at last he was all covered in the
snow-bank, but his head and horns, and there he
stuck, pretty well tired out. We walked right up
to him. His eyes looked as wild as if he'd eat us
up; but he couldn't help himself. We took some
strong lines that we had with us, and tied 'em to
his horns, on both sides of his head, and took a
slip-nuse round his nose, and trod the snow down,
and got him out of the bank. We found, by trying
him round a little, that we could manage him

[ILLUSTRATION]

so as to lead him and drive him to the fort alive.
So we sent two hands back to bring Billy Wiggins
up; and they brought him along, and we took and
sot him a straddle of the moose, and told him to
hold on to the horns. Then Sargent Johnson took
command of the ropes on one side, and I on 'tother,
and each of us took a hand to help us hold on, and
Jonathan Downing took hold of the line that had
the slip-nuse round the nose, and went ahead to
pick out the best path; and the other five went
behind with sticks and whipped up. When we
got all fixed, we started off and made pretty good
headway. Poor Billy Wiggins begun to cry some,
and said he would never get home, now his leg was
broke; but Sargent Johnson comforted him up,
and told him “to never mind, for if he hadn't his
leg broke, he might never have had a chance to
ride home to the fort in triumph on the British
lion.” At that Billy laughed, and seemed to be in
pretty good spirits the rest of the way. We'd got
out pretty near the fort before we'd ketched the
moose, and a little before sunset we got out into
the opening, and was marching up the hill towards
the fort.

When we got pretty near, Colonel Jarvis come
running to meet us, and says he,

“Sargent Johnson, what sort of a prisoner have
you got here?”

“Why, this is the British lion,” said Sargent
Johnson; “we took him this side of the line, and,
therefore, he's fairly our prisoner.”

“You are the boys for me,” said the Colonel;
and he went back and told the men, and they give
three the loudest cheers for Sargent Johnson's
company that ever I heard. The Colonel had
supper for us in a few minutes, and took Billy
Wiggins into the hospital, and had his wounds
dressed, and he bids fair to do well; and took the
moose and tied him in the barn. Colonel Jarvis
says we must keep him alive, and carry him home
as a grand trophy of the war.

P. S.—I want mother to send me down two pair
of stockings and a pair of trousers, for we've got 'em
torn out terribly down here among the bushes. So
I remain your loving son,