of the scabbard, Morgan, giving his finger a severe screw with his teeth, twitched it out of his hand, cutting it most greviously. By this time they were both got partly on their feet, and the Indian was endeavouring to disengage himself; but Morgan held fast by the finger, and quickly applied the point of the knife to the side of its savage owner. A bone happening in the way prevented its penetrating any great depth; but a second blow directed more towards the belly, found free passage into his bowels. The old man turned the point upwards, made a large wound, burying the knife therein, and so took his departure instantly, to the fort, with the news of his adventure.

"On the report of Mr. Morgan, a party went out from the fort, and found the first Indian where he had fallen; the second they found, not yet dead, at 100 yards distance from the scene of action, hid in the top of a fallen tree, where he had picked the knife out of his body, after which had come out some parched corn, &c. and had bound up his wound with the apron aforementioned. On first sight he saluted them with, "How do do broder? how do do broder?" but alas poor savage, their brotherhood to him extended only to tomahawking, scalping, and (to gratify some peculiar feelings of their own) skinning them both; and they have made drum-heads of their skins."

Many of the old hunters still retain a feeling of

savage hostility against their ancient foe. During the last war, when the great Indian Chief Tecumtha was killed, some of the Western Militia disfigured his dead body, and even went so far as to cut razor straps from his skin. I long disbelieved this story; but when in Kentucky, I met an officer who had commanded a party of Militia in the action, and he informed me that it was true, and that he himself had seen the disfigured body. At the same time he expressed his indignation at the circumstance; saying, that Tecumtha was really a brave and magnanimous warrior, as well as a most extraordinary man; and that the American officers would have most severely punished the perpetrators of the outrage offered to his body, if they could have been discovered.

A story never loses by travelling; and I have seen it asserted in an English publication, that the Kentuckians cut razor straps from the backs of even the living Indians. I need hardly state that this is false, as the most fierce of the old Backwoodsmen would shrink with horror at the very idea of such a crime. Surely every conscientious individual should hold up to universal detestation, the author of such calumnies; for they tend more than anything else to excite hostile feelings between two nations, who ought, if any ought, to be friends.

But the capability of misrepresentation is not limited to our side of the Atlantic; for "a Col

lection of Official Naval and Military Letters" published in America, contains even greater calumnies concerning the English.

In one of these letters, Brigadier General M'Clure asserts with boldness, and of course with veracity, that the inhabitants of Youngstown, Lewistown, &c, "were massacred, without distinction of age or sex, by a band of inhuman savages, led on by British officers painted." Some of our worthy captains and lieutenants must have been amusing figures, when stripped and coloured like Indians!

In the same collection, is a letter from General Harrison, in which, after describing an action that took place between the Americans and the British, he says, that his second in command, General Winchester, was taken prisoner; after which he was killed and his bowels torn out. He then comments upon the extreme barbarity of the British. The only objection I know to this statement of General Harrison's, which is quite probable and strictly true, is that General Winchester is at present alive and well, and when I was in the United States wrote at least a dozen tremendously long letters in the public journals, the object of which was, to throw the whole blame of the failure of the campaign in question, upon the aforesaid General Harrison. Now either poor General Winchester is a very extraordinary person and lives without bowels, or he must have afterwards had them put in again by

some American surgeon; for I can hardly suppose that the cruel and inhuman British who took them out, would have been at the trouble of putting them in again.

I am certain, that a white prisoner would meet with as good treatment among the Backwoodsmen, as among any soldiery in the world. It is only towards the Indians that they feel this implacable hatred, which may be easily accounted for, from the circumstance, that almost every one of the old hunters has had parents, brothers, sisters, or other relations, killed and scalped by them in former wars. I have spoken to many with whom I have hunted, and I am certain they would feel no more compunction at shooting an Indian, than they would at shooting a deer or a bear, while they would look upon the killing a white man with as much horror as I should.

The Backwoodsmen not only make excellent Militia, but are the very best light troops in the world. They can subsist upon a very small quantity of food, care nothing about sleeping out in the woods for weeks together, and are perfectly unequalled in the use of the rifle.

This is the only fire-arm used throughout all the Western States, and is generally from three and a half to four feet long in the barrel. It has one turn in four feet, weighs from twelve to fourteen pounds, has a very small and crooked stock, and carries a remarkably small bullet. The great

weight keeps the gun steady; and the charge is so small, that one might almost balance one of their rifles across a gate, and fire it without its falling, the recoil, if any, being imperceptible. The usual size of the balls for shooting squirrels and wild turkeys, is from 100 to 150 to the pound. For deer and bear, the size varies from 60 to 80, and for larger animals, as the buffalo and elk, from 50 to 60; though a rifle carrying a ball of a larger size than 60 to the pound, is very seldom made use of. For general use, and for shooting at a mark, the favourite size is from 60 to 80.

Every boy, as soon as he can lift a rifle, is constantly practising with it, and thus becomes an astonishingly expert marksman. Squirrel shooting is one of the favourite amusements of all the boys, and even of the men themselves. These animals are so numerous in the forests of the West, that it requires no labour or trouble to find them. Indeed they may be shot in the trees almost from the door of every man's house. It is reckoned very unsportsmanlike, to bring home a squirrel or a turkey, that has been shot any where, except in the head. I have known a boy put aside and hide a squirrel that had been struck in the body; and I have often seen a Backwoodsman send a ball through the head of one which was peeping from between a forked bough at the top of one of the highest trees, and which I myself could hardly distinguish.