THE DESOLATION. 291 



looked for my father's log-house, and saw a heap of 

 smokin' ruins where it had stood. I came out from 

 my hidin' place, and stood among the people, and 

 heard them talkin', as if I was in a dream. Presently 

 memory came back to me by slow degrees, and when 

 I thought of all I'd seen, a sorrow, almost greater 

 than human sorrow, carne over me. I could not 

 vveep. My eyes refused to shed tears. My tongue 

 ;vould not speak, and I shrieked aloud in my great 

 grief, like one whose senses are gone. The neighbors 

 gathered around, and spoke kindly to me ; and one 

 old man, I remember, put his arm gently around me, 

 and led me to the little spring, and as he set me down 

 on the green grass, dipped his hand in the cold water, 

 and passed it over my burnin' temples. He sat down 

 beside me, and drew me gently to his bosom. 1 

 seemed to think it was my mother that I leaned 

 against, and tears gushed from my eyes, like a fountain 

 from beneath a rock. This revived me, and I told 

 them all I'd seen. Ten stout men, with rifles, started 

 on the trail of the Ingens, into the deep woods, vowing 

 vengeance against the murderers. 



" ' I stood -by the smoulderin' ruins, while they 

 were removed from above the burned bodies of my 



