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Altsheler, Joseph A. (Joseph Alexander), 1862-1919

"The Scouts of the Valley"

These, they knew, came from burning
houses, and they knew, also, that the valley would be ravaged
from end to end and from side to side. After the surrender of
the fort the Indians would divide into small bands, going
everywhere, and nothing could escape them.
The sun rose higher, gilding the earth with glowing light, as if
the black tragedy had never happened, but the frontiersmen
recognized their greatest danger in this brilliant morning.
Objects could be seen at a great distance, and they could be seen
vividly.
Keen of sight and trained to know what it was they saw, Henry,
Sol, and Tom searched the country with their eyes, on all sides.
They caught a distant glimpse of the Susquehanna, a silver spot
among some trees, and they saw the sunlight glancing off the
opposite mountains, but for the present they saw nothing that
seemed hostile.
They allowed the distance between them and the retreating file to
grow until it was five or six hundred yards, and they might have
let it grow farther, but Henry made a signal, and the three lay
down in the grass.

"You see 'em, don't you!" the youth whispered to his comrade.
"Yes, down thar at the foot o' that hillock," replied Shif'less
Sol; " two o' em, an' Senecas, I take it.


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