Chapter 28 - Page 2

quicken his apprehension. We will therefore
turn to more instant and temporal exercises. Have all of thy household
escaped unharmed throughout the strivings of this bloody day?"

"We praise the Lord that such hath been his pleasure," returned Content.
"Other than as sorrow hath assailed us through the mourning of friends the
blow hath fallen lightly on me and mine."

"Thou hast had thy season; the parent ceaseth to chastise, while
former punishments are remembered. But here is Sergeant Ring, with
matter to communicate, that may still leave business for thy courage
and thy wisdom."

Content turned his quiet look upon the yeoman, and seemed to await his
speech. Reuben Ring, who was a man of many solid and valuable qualities,
would most probably have been exercising the military functions of his
brother-in-law, at that very moment, had he been equally gifted with a
fluent discourse. But his feats lay rather in doing than in speaking, and
the tide of popularity had in consequence set less strongly in his favor
than might have happened had the reverse been the case. The present,
however, was a moment when it was necessary to overcome his natural
reluctance to speak, and it was not long before he replied to the
inquiring glance of his commander's eye.

"The Captain knows the manner in which we scourged the savages at the
southern end of the valley," the sturdy yeoman began, "and it is not
necessary to deal with the particulars at length. There were
six-and-twenty red-skins slain in the meadows, besides as many more that
left the ground in the arms of their friends. As for the people, we got a
few hurts, but each man came back on his own limbs."

"This is much as the matter hath been reported."

"Then there was a party sent to brush the woods on the trail of the
Indians," resumed Reuben, without appearing to regard the interruption.
"The scouts broke off in pairs in the duty, and finally men got to
searching singly, of which number I was one. The two men of whom there is
question--"

"Of what men dost speak?" demanded Content.

"The two men of whom there is question," returned the other, continuing
the direct course of his own manner of relating events, without appealing
to see the necessity of connecting the threads of his communication; "the
men of whom I have spoken to the Minister and the Ensign--"

"Proceed," said Content, who understood his man.

"After one of these men was brought to his end I saw no reason for making
the day bloodier than it already was, the more especially as the Lord had
caused it to begin with a merciful hand which shed its