“And smash me if Joe didn’t kill that one when his musket went off before he was ready,” said Sneak.

“Yes, I saw him fall when Joe fired; and that accident was, after all, a fortunate thing for us,” continued Boone.

“But I’m sorry for poor Joe,” said Sneak.

“Pshaw!” said Boone; “he’ll be well again, in an hour.”

“No, he’s a gone chicken.”

“Why do you think so?”

“Didn’t he say so himself? and didn’t he gabble out a whole parcel of purgatory talk?  He’s as sure gone as a stuck pig, I tell you,” continued Sneak.

“He will eat as hearty a breakfast to-morrow morning as ever he did in his life,” said Boone.  “But let us attend to the business in hand.  I hardly think we will be annoyed any more from this quarter, unless yonder dead Indian was a chief, and then it is more than probable they will try to steal him away.  However, you may remain here.  I, alone, can manage the others.”

“Which others?” inquired Sneak.

“Those under the snow,” replied Boone; “they are now within twenty paces of the palisade.”

“You don’t say so?” said Sneak, cocking his gun.

“I have been listening to them cutting through the snow a long while, and it will be a half hour yet before I spring the mine,” said Boone.

“I hope it will kill ’em all!” said Sneak.

“Watch close, and perhaps you will kill one yet from this loophole,” said Boone, returning to his post, where the slow-match was exposed through the palisade near the ground; and Roughgrove stood by, holding a pistol, charged with powder only, in readiness to fire the train when Boone should give the word of command.

Boone applied his ear to a crevice between the timbers near the earth, where the snow had been cleared away.  After remaining in this position a few moments, he beckoned Glenn to him.

“Place your ear against this crevice,” said Boone.

“It is not the Indians I hear, certainly!” remarked Glenn.  The sounds resembled the ticking of a large clock, differing only in their greater rapidity than the strokes of seconds.

“Most certainly it is nothing else,” replied Boone.

“But how do they produce such singular sounds?  Is it the trampling of feet?” continued Glenn.

“It is the sound of many tomahawks cutting a passage,” replied Boone.

“But what disposition do they make of the snow, when it is cut loose.”

“A portion of them dig, while the rest convey the loose snow out and cast it down the cliff.”