430 THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES

—_—

left those untouched (for the people were all asleep), they could not
tell which way to look for the town.

However, the last was the best advice; so they resolved to leave
those houses, and look for the town as well as they could. They went
on a little way, and found a cow tied to a tree; this they presently
concluded would be a good guide to them; for they said the cow cer-
tainly belonged to the town before them, or the town behind them, and
if they untied her, they should see which way she went: if she went
back, they had nothing to say to her, but if she went forward, they
had nothing to do but to follow her; so they cut the cord, which was
made of twisted flags, and the cow went on before them. In a word,
the cow led them directly to the town, which, as they reported, con-
sisted of above two hundred houses, or huts; and in some of these
they found several families living together.

Here they found all silent; as profoundly secure as sleep and a
country that had never seen an enemy of that kind could make them.
Upon this, they called another council, to consider what they had to
do, and, in a word, they resolved to divide themselves into three
bodies, and to set three houses on fire in three parts of the town; and
as the men came out, to seize them and bind them; if any resisted,
they need not be asked what to do then, and so to search the rest of
the houses for plunder; but resolved to march silently first through
the town, and see what dimensions it was of, and consider if they
might venture upon it or no.

They did so, and desperately resolved that they would venture upon
them; but while they were animating one another to the work; three
of them that were a little before the rest called out aloud, anu told
them they had found Thomas Jeffrys; they all ran up to the place,
and so it was, indeed, for there they found the poor fellow hanged up
naked by one arm, and his throat cut. There was an Indian house
just by the tree, where they found sixteen or seventeen of the princi-
pal Indians, who had been concerned in the fray with us before, and
two or three of them wounded with our shot; and our men found
they were awake, and talking one to another in that house, but knew
not their number.

The sight of their poor mangled comrade so enraged them, ae
before, that they swore to one another they would be revenged, and
that not an Indian who came into their hands should have quarter ;
and to work they went immediately, and yet not so madly as by the
rage and fury they were in might be expected. ‘heir first care was
to get something that would soon take fire; but, after a little search,
ther found that would be to no purpose, for most of the houses were