Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 2).djvu/208



May I took a trip to Fort George, situated on a lake of the same name, called by the French, Saint Sacrement, where I stayed with some of the Mohawks, who were encamped there. In the beginning of the French and Indian war in 1757, there was a remarkable instance of resolution and cool deliberate courage in one of these Savages, occasioned by a sentence being passed upon a soldier to receive five hundred lashes for intoxication.

An Indian known by the name of Silver Heels, from his superior agility, as well as his admirable finesse in the art of war, and who had killed more of the enemy than any one of the tribes in alliance with Great Britain, accidentally came into the fort just before the soldier was to receive his punishment, and expressed his displeasure that a man should be so shamefully disgraced. He went up to the commanding officer, and asked him what crime the soldier had committed: the officer not chusing to be questioned, ordered one of his men to send Silver Heels away, and to inform him that the company of Indians ————