224 WILD SCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 
William Smith had always exhibited a remarkable disinclina- 
tion for scenes of bloodshed, considering the character of the 
times. He did not, even now, join the patriot army; but, as 
the chief of the Vigilance Committee, did far better service with 
his prompt sagacity and profuse liberality than he could 
probably have done in the field. We cannot follow him 
through the details of the acts of this noblest period of his 
career; suffice to say, that when the war ended in our dear- 
bought independence,—he first took time to look upon the 
condition of his own affairs; the survey exhibited ‘himself to 
to himself a beggar / 
Everything had been swallowed up in the vortex, except 
some few fragments of landed estate; and they had only been 
spared him because nothing could be raised on them in such 
troublous times. He smiled upon Mattie as he looked around 
proudly upon five handsome, manly boys and three daughters, 
all pleasant variations upon her, and patting her still fresh 
cheek, said gaily,— 
“ Missus,—it’s all gone !—I am proud of the way it went 
—we’ve gained our holy cause,—I am content !—what say 
you, woman ?” 
“Dear Billy, what should I say!—Am I not proud of it 
as you!” 
“Well, missus, neighbor Daniel Boone has got back from 
Kan-tuck-ee, across the mountains, as he calls it. He says 
it’s a great country, greater and more beautiful than any on 
this side the Alleghanies,—and Daniel’s a reliable man, you 
know !—and that plenty of splendid land is to be had for the 
settling and defending it; our boys are good riflemen, — 
what say you, Mattie?” 
Mattie turned a, little pale, and laid her cheek against that 
of her husband, but answered in a firm, round voice,— 
“T am ready, Billy, to follow you!” 
And this is all that was said between them ; it was settled! 
This was a few years afte the time that Daniel Boone and 
