no The Winning of the West 



kept up with very little intermission throughout 

 the night. At one o'clock the moon set, and Clark 

 took advantage of the darkness to throw up an in- 

 trenchment within rifle-shot of the strongest bat- 

 tery, which consisted of two guns. All of the can- 

 non and swivels in the fort were placed about eleven 

 feet above the ground, on the upper floors of the 

 strong block-houses that formed the angles of the 

 palisaded walls. At sunrise on the 24th the rifle- 

 men from the intrenchment opened a hot fire into 

 the port-holes of the battery, and speedily silenced 

 both guns. 38 The artillery and musketry of the de- 

 fenders did very little damage to the assailants, who 

 lost but one man wounded, though some of the 

 houses in the town were destroyed by the cannon- 

 balls. In return, the backwoodsmen, by firing into 

 the ports, soon rendered it impossible for the guns 

 to be run out and served, and killed or severely 

 wounded six or eight of the garrison ; for the Amer- 

 icans showed themselves much superior, both in 

 marksmanship and in the art of sheltering them- 



bastic. If his account of the incessant "blaze of fire" of the 

 Americans is true, they must have wasted any amount of 

 ammunition perfectly uselessly. Unfortunately, most of the 

 small western historians who have written about Clark have 

 really damaged his reputation by the absurd inflation of their 

 language. They were adepts in the forcible-feeble style of 

 writing, a sample of which is their rendering him ludicrous 

 by calling him "the Hannibal of the West," and "the Wash- 

 ington of the West." Moreover, they base his claims to 

 greatness not on his really great deeds, but on the half- 

 imaginary feats of childish cunning he related in his old age. 

 38 Clark's letter to Henry. 



