212 BOUQUET IN THE INDIAN COUNTRY. [1764, Oct. 



of woods, they emerged into the light of an open 

 meadow, rich with herbage, and girdled by a zone 

 of forest ; gladdened by the notes of birds, and 

 enlivened, it may be, by grazing herds of deer. 

 These spots, welcome to the forest traveller as an 

 oasis to a wanderer in the desert, form the precur- 

 sors of the prairies ; which, growing wider and more 

 frequent as one advances westward, expand at last 

 into the boundless plains beyond the Mississippi. 



On the tenth day after leaving Fort Pitt, the army 

 reached the River Muskingum, and approached the 

 objects of their march, the haunts of the barbarian 

 warriors, who had turned whole districts into deso- 

 lation. Their progress had met no interruption. A 

 few skulking Indians had hovered about them, 

 but, alarmed by their numbers, feared to venture 

 an attack. The Indian cabins which they passed 

 on their way were deserted by their tenants, who 

 had joined their western brethren. When the 

 troops crossed the Muskingum, they saw, a little 

 below the fording-place, the abandoned wigwams 

 of the village of Tuscaroras, recently the abode of 

 more than a hundred families, who had fled in 

 terror at the approach of the invaders. 



Bouquet was in the heart of the enemy's country. 

 Their villages, except some remoter settlements of 

 the Shawanoes, all lay within a few days' march ; 

 and no other choice was left them than to sue for 

 peace, or risk the desperate chances of battle 

 against a commander who, a year before, with a 

 third of his present force, had routed them at the 

 fight of Bushy Run. The vigorous and active 



