Page:Tomlinson--The rider of the black horse.djvu/349

Rh Utica now stands until word might be received from the fort, to which he had already sent scouts with the promise of his coming; and he was expecting a force to come from the colonel to meet his own advancing troops, and then together they might enter the fort in safety. For he feared, and justly, as the event proved, the ability of his inexperienced followers to withstand an attack if they should be compelled to meet it alone.

Taunted by his over-confident men with cowardice, at last in anger he gave the word to advance; and at Oriskany his men marched into the trap which Brant had laid for them, and there the old general lost his life and many of his men fell. The Indians at last fled when they became alarmed by the rumored approach of a force from Fort Stanwix, but the promised aid to the young colonel did not fully materialize.

It was soon after this that Benedict Arnold with his men drew near, but, mindful of the catastrophe at Oriskany, he hesitated to proceed lest he, too, might be drawn into an ambush similar to that into which General Herkimer's men had fallen. About two miles from Fort Dayton there was living one of the most bitter and treacherous of all the Tories