208 CORA MARKING THE TRAIL. 



or destroy their captives, with whom they returned in 

 triumph to the Fort. It seems that the two younger 

 girls had given themselves up for lost, but Betsy 

 Callaway kept up her courage, continually telling the 

 others she was sure they would be followed and rescued, 

 and in order to mark the line of their flight, every 

 now and again she broke off twigs from the bushes. 

 This did not escape the keen eyes of her captors, who 

 threatened her with the tomahawk if she was seen 

 again to repeat the experiment ; and they at once en- 

 deavoured to erase the trail thus given, by bending down, 

 or breaking the branches, so as to make it look like the 

 work of browsing deer ; they also thenceforth compelled 

 the girls to walk apart in the dense brushwood, and to 

 walk along the beds of streams, where no tell-tale foot- 

 steps would be left to show where they had passed ; but 

 Betsy still managed to tear off strips from her dress and 

 drop them unnoticed by her guards. Meanwhile the 

 avenging whites who were following swiftly upon 

 the trail, faithfully interpreted all these "signs of 

 the wilderness." They saw the broken twigs; they 

 detected the attempted imposition of the Indian 

 artifice to make it look as if done by deer; they 

 deciphered the footsteps on the ground; and no 

 doubt found and identified the bits of torn dress. 

 Fortunately in such cases, it is impossible for a man 

 to pass without leaving some mark ; his footmarks will 

 leave their imprint in soft places, or upon dead leaves ; 

 and the place where they enter the streams will be 

 marked in the same way: so will the points of exit; 

 a clever scout like Daniel Boone would read these 

 things as plainly as if they were printed handbills 

 attached to the trees; and his knowledge of the tribe 



