In the Current of the Revolution 137 



the chief of such a backwoods levy was the leader, 

 rather than the commander, of his men. 



At the mouth of the Licking Clark met the rifle- 

 men from the interior stations, among them being 

 Kenton,Harrod,and Floyd, and others of equal note. 

 They had turned out almost to a man, leaving the 

 women and boys to guard the wooden forts until 

 they came back, and had come to the appointed place, 

 some on foot or on horseback, others floating and 

 paddling down the Licking in canoes. They left 

 scanty provisions with their families, who had to 

 subsist during their absence on what game the boys 

 shot, on nettle tops, and a few early vegetables ; and 

 they took with them still less. Dividing up their 

 stock, each man had a couple of pounds of meal and 

 some jerked venison or buffalo meat. 37 



All his troops having gathered, to the number of 

 nine hundred and seventy, Clark started up the 

 Ohio on the second of August. 38 The skiffs, laden 

 with men, were poled against the current, while bod- 

 ies of footmen and horsemen marched along the 

 bank. After going a short distance up stream the 

 horses and men were ferried to the further bank, 

 the boats were drawn up on the shore and left, with 

 a guard of forty men, and the rest of the troops 



37 McAfee MSS. ; the Bradford MS. says six quarts of 

 parched corn. 



38 This date and number are those given in the Bradford 

 MS. The McAfee MSS. say July ist; but it is impossible 

 that the expedition should have started so soon after Bird's 

 inroad. On July ist, Bird himself was probably at the mouth 

 of the Licking. 



