Page:The Conquest.djvu/133

 Children age, young men frost and wrinkle, women turn into maniacs. Every log hut had its bedridden invalid victim of successive frights and nervous prostration. Only the stout and sturdy few survived in after days to tell of those fierce times when George Rogers Clark was the hope and safety of the border. To these, the Indian was a serpent in the path, a panther to be hunted.

"Hist! go slow. 'Tis the Delaware chiefs come down to visit George Rogers Clark," said Simon Kenton.

In these days of peace, remembering still their old terror of the Long Knife, a deputation of chiefs had come to visit Clark. In paint and blankets, with lank locks flapping in the breeze, they strode up the catalpa avenue, sniffing the odours of Mulberry Hill. General Clark looked from the window. Buckongahelas led the train, with Pierre Drouillard, the interpreter.

Drouillard had become, for a time, a resident of Kentucky. Simon Kenton, hearing that the preserver of his life had fallen into misfortune since the surrender of Detroit, sent for him, gave him a piece of his farm, and built him a cabin. George Drouillard, a son, named for George III., was becoming a famous hunter on the Mississippi.

"We have come," said Buckongahelas, "to touch the Long Knife."

Before Clark realised what they were doing, the Indians had snipped off the tail of his blue military coat with their hunting knives.

"This talisman will make us great warriors," said Buckongahelas, carefully depositing a fragment in his bosom.

Clark laughed, but from that time the Delaware King and his braves were frequent visitors to the Long Knife, who longed to live in the past, forgetting misfortune.

But George Rogers Clark was not alone in financial disaster. St. Clair had expended a fortune in the cause of his country and at last, accompanied by his devoted daughter, retired to an old age of penury.

Boone, too, had his troubles. Never having satisfied the requirements of law concerning his claim,