were painted, his head clean shaved except for one tuft on top called “the scalp lock,” which amongst the Indians it was the custom to leave in order to facilitate the operation of scalping by their enemies should the owners chance to fall in battle.  A scalp was the recognised trophy of victory.  It was not regarded as absolutely necessary to kill an enemy; if his scalp could be torn from his head, no more was required, and not infrequently a wounded man was left scalpless on the ground, writhing in speechless agony, to linger and die miserably.

After undergoing the preliminaries of an Indian toilet, young Kerr had moccasins given to him, and a blanket to wear—­a costume perhaps more convenient than becoming—­and he entered on a round of duties new and strange.  He was not, after a time, unkindly treated by Peewash and his squaw.  But the work was far from pleasant, and many were the terrible sights forced on his unwilling notice at this time.  Once, when the little garrison of Detroit sent out a small party, which, making a dash at the Indian camp, succeeded in killing a Chippeway Chief, the Redskins in revenge tortured and killed Captain Campbell, a Scot, who had been captured by the Ottawas.  Such sights filled the boy with sick horror, and with a not unnatural dread of the fate which might yet await himself.  Rather than remain to furnish in his own person the leading feature of an Indian festival, it was surely better, he thought, to die in attempting escape.

As it chanced later, a French trader—­these tribes were the allies of the French—­arrived in camp, and remained there some time.  Moved to pity by the boy’s unhappy condition, this man, with some difficulty, persuaded Peewash to sell the lad to him for goods to the value of L40.  Great was Kerr’s exultation; once more he was free, free too without having had to face the terrible ordeal of attempting to escape from these murderous Indian devils.  All would now be well, for assuredly he, or his friends, would repay to the Frenchman the ransom money.  The boy felt as if his troubles were already over; in a day or two at longest he would sleep again under the flag of his own land; perhaps even, at no distant date, he might once more gaze on scenes for which throughout his captivity his soul had hungered, see, once more, Cheviot lying blue in the distance, the Eildons with their triple crown, hear the ripple of the Border streams.  What tales of adventure he would have to tell.

Alas! he counted without his hosts.  The Chippeways when they heard of the transaction would have none of it.  The captive boy had been the property of the tribe, they said, and they refused to part with him; he must be given up by the Frenchman.  And the latter had no choice but to comply.

Black now were the nights, gloomy the days, for Andrew Kerr, the blacker and the more gloomy for the false dawn that for brief space had cheered him; unbearable was his burden, more hopeless and wretched than ever before, a thousandfold, his captivity.  It was as it might be with a man dying of thirst if a cup of cold water were dashed from his lips and spilt on the sandy desert at his feet.  Who can blame the boy if only the knowledge of what treatment he would avowedly receive from the young Indians if he should play the squaw and weep, kept him from shedding tears of misery and vexation.