Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 292, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 December 1916 — Page 2

TIPPECANOE

CHAPTER X. J The Cougar CroucheC TO an Indian mother, lying in a squalid tepee in the forest, once were given three sons at a birth. One of the three died in infancy; two lived to become the most famous leaders the terrible inhabitants of the forest wilderness ever knew. As one of the two grew to manhood and forced his way to the head of his tribe by his daring, his cunning, his matchless 'eloquence and power, the red man, with his love of imagery in names, chose the cougar, the panther, the great cat of the forest, as the fitting type of the chief whose lightest wosd was law. 1 The cougar! It was from this demoniac beast that the Shawnee chief received his name—Tecumseh, “the cougar about to spring.” A Yankee surveyor predicted one day an eclipse of the sun. ‘Tecumseh’s brother, on account of his frequent drunken babblings, had been dubbed “The Open Door;” but a glimmer of shrewdness lighted up his rumsodden brain at the words of the white man; he returned to his tribe, and saying to all who would listen that he had been given a message from the Great Manitou himself, prophesied ■ that on a certain day the sky would be darkened —a sign that he, “The Open Door,” was divine and was henceforth to lead his people. They laughed; but the darkness came as he had foretold, and from that day he was looked up to by every warrior in the forest as the greatest of conjurers. He was no longer called “The Open Door,” but Elkskatawa, “The Loud Voice;” and his voice in council was the voice of authority. But years had now passed; and he prayed in secret for another sign to bolster up his wavering strength. . . . The white men came farther and farther into the wilderness, reared their cabins in greater and greater numbers in the red man’s forest, bartered and bought larger and larger territories from the stupid savage, who reached out eagerly for a handful of toys, a jug of the white man’s fiery drink, and gave in return the countless acres of his hunting ground. But now for years his dumb resentment grew more and more bitter. To Tecumseh and his brother, Elkskatawa, the Prophet, the red men looked impatiently for a leadership which should restrain the encroaching settler, or which might even regain for them their lost lands. The young warriors could not wait for council; here and there they struck down a settler, took a woman captive, dashed out the brains of a child, and hurried back into the forest. To Harrison in Vincennes came Tecumseh for council and promised redress; then slipped away to the South, down the great river, to the tribes along the Gulf, to implore them to stand with their brothers of the North against the white man’s advance. The Prophet meanwhile remained at his village, 120 miles north of Vincennes, and spent the time in incantations and ominous mutterings; and the little town of Vincennes lay in anxious uncertainty on the banks of the Wabash river, down which came the news of the Prophet's restless plotting. ' The little village presented a scene of the most unusual activity. Here and there in vacant fields the various companies of the territorial militia were drilling —four companies of mounted men and eight of infantry—a force of some six hundred men, which Harrison had caused to be assembled hastily. Women and children stood watching the evolutions of the volunteers. The French inhabitants chattered away in tremendous excitement. As- far as military drill and accouterment were concerned, the men were ridiculously awkward and untrained. They could not keep step to save their souls, and only one of the twelve companies made any pretense at a uniform; this one was the company Commanded by Spier Spencer of Corydon. These wore yellow hunting shirts trimmed with red feathers; they were promptly dubbed “the Yellow Jackets,” and were marked men. But the rest wore whatever clothes they were-possessed of in their daily ..life —tow jeans "or linsey-woolsey, -»r the hunter’s dress of tanned deerJkin; and each-man carried the rifle of his choice, firearms of every make and of any length of barrel. One morning was enlivened by a shooting match. Someone got a whitewood plank, and pacing off 00 yards, propped it up firmly., A circle ten inches in diameter was smeared on the board with wet powder, and in the center of this black spot a bit of white paper, the size of a dollar, was pinned. One after anpther of the awkward militiamen stepped to the line and fired, seemingly without pausing to alm. Not a man failed to send his bullet Into the white. Then' the target was moved to 80 yards’ distance, lheh a hundred; and the deadly accuracy continued, as the better marksmen took their turns. And then they tossed pieces of wood into the air. These,.too, came down pierced by the miraculous bullets. The afternoons passed in the same state of suppressed excitement. The men lolled around the shady side of the taverns and chewed their tobacco ■

By SAMUEL McCOY

Do you mind the time you had a quarrel with your best girl and vowed never again to go near her? That was the plight In which David Larrence found himself after ’Toinette O’Bannon had been given evidence that he was a spy, had asked him to explain and had been rebuffed for her apparent doubts by the proud young man. Gloomy as a ghost, he left the Corydon settlement and went to Vincennes to live. And soon there comes into his life an event which makes the pretty lovers’ quarrel seem just less than nothing. It marks the turning point in his existence. The hand of Destiny is seen moving relentlessly in this installment David, you’ll remember, had come all the way from England to the frontier settlement of Indiana territory to kill an enemy. He makes friends with the Americans and falls in love with dainty ’Toinette. Among his acquaintances are Job Cranmer, who turns out to be a British spy, and Doctor Elliott, secretly in league with Cranmer. Ike Blackford is a true friend.

silently. The long, hot hours dragged by. At sunset they heard the bugle at Fort Knox, the stockade inclosure three miles up the river, sound faintly the end of the day. . Night came on and a group of men gradually gathered on the benches and the grass in front of the Jefferson house, as the tavern of Parmenas Beckes, bearing on its signboard a staring portrait of the statesman, was- grandly called. They talked in Ipw tones, and David, on the edge of the jfrowd, could not distinguish their Wbrdfe. He knew, however, that most ■ of the leaders of the town were there: Wash Johnson, the old postmaster, with his deep voice booming out at intervals; Henry Hurst and Henry Van der Burgh, the judges; Benjamin Parke, more recently appointed to the bench; old John Small, who had been sheriff twenty years before and scalped with his own hand marauding Indians whom his posse had pursued and captured; Peter Jones, who had seen the error of his ways as a tavern keeper and had reformed and become the territorial auditor and the custodian of the Infant publid library; the hot-headed Virginian, Thomas Randolph, scarred with the knife wounds; received in his row with “Sawney” Mclntosh, the defamer of Harrison; the two sawbones, “Doc”’ Elias McNamee and “Doc” Jake Kuykendall; and a dozen more. Francois Vigo, the old Spanish merchant, who had seen George Rogers Clark storm Vincennes 32 years before, sat at David’s side, a fine old fellow of seventy-five. The only light visible V’as that in the shop of the printer, Elihu Stout, industriously aiding his apprentice at the types or wiping his inky fingers to exa aine a proof pulled on the broad hand-press. The moths and insects fluttered around his candles and the sweat poured off his forehead; but the Western Sun was due for publication on the morrow and he meant to see it through. David listened with closer attention when he overheard Governor Harrison address a square-jawed young man in the uniform of a captain in the United States army, telling him that he had just written to Eustis, the secretary of war, at Washington, and had commended to the department the work of the young captain in transforming the little fort near Vincennes from a place wretchedly neglected into an adequate stronghold. Vigo’ whispered to David that the boy was Cfipt. Zachary Taylor from Kentucky, who had been placed in command at Fort Knox but a few weeks previously. “I trust,” went on Harrison, “that Mr. Eustis will be thoughtful enough to bring my letter to the attention of

His Voice in Council Was the Voice of Authority.

your uncle, President Madison. I would like him to know that we are well pleased with your work.” Taylor flushed through his tan with pleasure. He would have liked to say that he hoped shat Harrison might some day occupy the presidential chair, but he was as taciturn as most of the men of the frontier; far less would he have permitted himself to dream that the great office might be his own.

(Copyright, 1916, by Bobbs-Merrill Co.)

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

This is a story of pioneer days in Indiana, when courageous frontiersmen fought the redskins and the - wilderness and won vast territory

William Henry Harrison! Vincennes was 118 years old; the man thirtyeight. There had never beep anything commonplace in the existence of place or man. Each had already had a history whose telling must move the heart more than with a trumpet. The face of the man was the face of the soldier —strong, resolute, proud, indomitable. But it was likewise the face of the man of the people, th£ man in whom they trusted for his calm patience and his warm friendliness. With what unfaltering devotion had they come to rely on him! And how the men and women of the wilderness, seeing that tall and martial figure pass, paused, to mark that long, grave face, the eyes deep-set under bushy brows on either side the lengthy, humorous nose, and smiled in love and deep regard in answer to the slow smile of the wide and kindly mouth. What had he not done for them 1 He was a warm admirer of the democratic Jefferson and he was an aristocrat of the ne\V territory. Steeped in the classic scholarship of the Old Dominion, the son of a signer of the Declaration of Independence, at eighteen he had chosen to leave behind him the culture of the older states and to plunge into the rude but generous wilderness. At twenty-eight he was governor of the Indiana territory. At thirty, master of an empire of 150,000,000 acres, ruler over a province twice as large as ’ England and Ireland, larger, indeed, than all of France.

Within the ten years following his appointment as governor, the negotiator, with absolute power, of treaties which added to the new nation fifty millions of acres, a domain large as England and Scotland combined. At thirty-one," holding in his hand for .five months the destinies of a tract of 250,000 square miles, an imperial province greater than any other one man ever controlled in the history of the United States, before or since . . . Opposed to him the great protagonist of the tragic drama of the savage, Tecumseh. Ruler of five Indian tribes, master mind of the great Indian confederacy of another score of tribes. Chief of 5,000 warriors, ranging over 100,000 miles of territory. .•. . Harrison had policed the same territory with exactly twenty backwoodsmen. Twenty men to guard an empire. They threaded their ways through the wilderness from St. Louis to Detroit. They reported, to him at Vincennes. On this enormous stage the curtain is abou,t to be lifted on the titanic duel of the 'West. **•♦*♦•

The group of men, lolling in the shadows by the Jefferson house, began to speak of the latest dispatches from the East. News had just come that the younger Wellesley had driven Massena’s French columns off the field of Fuentes-de-Onoro, adding to the laurels gained at Talavera and Busaco. Napoleon was beginning to wonder at this Englishman. The Little Corporal himself was snarling Russian bear; the White Czar was disobeying his commands to starve the trade of England by closing the ports of the Continent. England, driven to desperation, was seizing American seamen on the pretext that they were Englishmen, and forcing tJ?em to serve tigainst the French; and still the government at, Washington kept ujf) its endless attempts to stop these 1 insults by words, words, words. 1

■The little group of Westerners.under the stars of the wildbrnc-ss felt themselves hopelessly remote flora the world of leadership; their affairs seemed petty and narrow. David Larrene'e alone, gazing silently over the broad prairies,- misty under the newly risen moon, and remembering the crowded cities of his native England, suddenly saw how great a prize the ample lands would be to her and sawas in a vision of what mighty stature were these backwoodsmen who held the land for America. 1

The feeling of apprehension which had been growing ail summer seemed to have reached an unendurable pitch. It was inevitable that something should happen. z In the skies of early September a comet gleanfedi a miraculous portent. But nothing happened. . ■ The men and women continued their speculations as to Tecumseh’s whereabouts and intentions. They invented new theories each hour and every other hour they turned old theories over and over till they were threadbare and people got tired of hearing

them. The children ran up and down the lanes in the twilight, playing at Indians, until their mothers called them Indoors with a shudder at the thought of the nearness of the lurking savages who might turn those shrieks of pretended fear Into shrieks of actual terror. There seemed to be nothing to do but wait. But at noon on the seventeenth of September, a serene and cloudless day, a backwoodsman, passing through the lanes of Vincennes, pausing carelessly to glance up at an eagle soaring into the face of the sun, uttered an ejaculation. A piece had been bitten out of the sun’s edge, he thought. Little by little the dark shadow gnawed its way into the blazing disk, and the people stopped their tasks to gaze upward at the growing eclipse. The •simpler French inhabitants chattered in an agitation which was as nothing, however, compared with the dismay of (he squalid Piankeshaw Indians, who dragged on their harmless, wretched existence in the village of tepees on the edge of town. By three o’clock only a ring of light was visible, the center of the sun being obscured by a smoky disk which cast the earth into twilight darkness. The Indian villagers cast themselves upon the ground in abject fright, and sacrificed their dogs alive to appease the angry Manitou. Half-blind Elkskatawa, Prophet, had received the answer to his prayer. And Tecumseh, the Crouching Cougar, was far to the south.

CHAPTER XI. By Break of Day. Still the depredations of marauding bands of Indians continued. Horses were stolen; more than once a settler at work in a field, far from help, was surprised and murdered; his body, found lying by his plow, always bearing a red scar upon the forehead. Indignation ran higher and higher. David Larrence, who had enlisted as soon as he reached Vincennes, drilled daily with the grim frontiersmen. He had told himself that Corydon should be wiped from his memory; bpt, in spite of all, his mind could not blot out the image of a girl whose blue eyes smiled above her smiling lips; could not forget the little cabin which she hallowed with her grace, the little house on the edge of the woods; lonely, pathetically exposed to the- unseen danger of the dark forest that overshadowed it. ‘ n The sun that had been veiled at midday of the seventeenth struggled all the next day through gathering clouds and sank among the shoulders of gray giants. David was walking in the twilight toward the Jefferson house when the sdund of flying hoofs thudding along the dirt lane, the old rue St. Louis, struck on his ear. He turned idly to see who rode so furiously, and as the horseman drew rein and pulled the smoking steed to its haunches a cry of mutual recognition broke from both men. “Ike!” But Blackford paused for no greeting. “The Indians —Toinette!” He flung himself from his horse and staggered with exhaustion. His face was as white as the lather of foam on the heaving flanks of his mount. “What?” “They took her last night—at dark — O’Bannon had left the house scarcely an hour —God help him, it struck him like a palsy! Oh, David, we must save her!” “I will go,” said David quietly. His face had become suddenly aged with suffering. “Is it known what course they |ook?” “To the north,” gasped Ike. “There was not a ranger in the country to follow; they are all hertji in Vincennes with Spencer’s company; but the Frenchman, Devan, followed them and overtook them at their camp that night. There were eight, of them, and he could do nothing; but he crawled close enough tp t hear their talk. They are taking her to Jhe Prophet’s town at a creek called Tippecanoe. She is to be sold to the British at They will take the trace on the east bank of the Wabash.” Ike tottqred in sheer exhaustion. “You must fggt,” said David. “I shall start at daybreak.” But Blackford shook his head. “I go with you, David,” he said simply. The two " young men gripped hands in silence. They entered the tavern and David began to make his hasty preparations. Benjamin Parke, the judge of the general court, an especial friend of Governor Harrison, sat at his dinner in the tavern; he heard the story that spread from lip to lip and setting down his glass hastily, he strode over to the young mem' > “Do you actually intend to follow these Indians?” he demanded. “We shall set out at dawn," said David. Judge Parke looked <at him in amazement. “Great God, Larrence!” he exclaimed, “this is sheer madness!" “I must ask you to procure my temporary discharge from Captain Hargrove’s company. Judge Parke,” an-

gwered David quietly. “Inasmuch as the militia has not yet been ordered Into active service—” “I will do what I can with General Harrison,” assured the judge hastily. “Gcd be with you.” The woodsmen who crowded about them at the news warned them against the quest. To all objections they returned the same disregard; their duty lay plain before them. Those who bade them goodby looked on them as men going to certain death. It was an hour before sunrise, but the sky was paling with the light preceding dawn. They drew deep breaths and set off at a trot. They went on at a steady shuffle, their eyes alert for any signs, their ears strained for any sound. At noon they stopped long enough to eat a little of the smoked venison in their packs, then went on at the same pace. By night they had covered more than thirty miles; the Indians whom they pursued had probably made forty miles with no more difficulty than they had put behind them twenty. The two knew that it was a losing game, if one factor was not taken into consideration the probability that sooner or later Toinette’s captors would consider themselves beyond the possibility of pursuit, would make camp in the woods for two or three days while they hunted game; it was lon this off-chance that the two young men hung doggedly to the chase. They dared not trayel by night. At dark they made camp in a ravine where their campfire would be un-

“The Indians Toinette!”

seen. One of the two kept guard constantly. At dawn they were up again, made their breakfast of cold “johnnycakes,” tightened their belts and set off, silent, grim as hounds. So passed two days of the forlorn chase. In the afternoon the clouds heaped up before a northerly wind, growing blacker and blacker, hour upon hour. At nightfall the gale broke. The rain wrapped them in gray garments of water, drenching them to the skin instantly, blinding them with its resistless rush. They plunged wretchedly along through the blinding downpour, forcing their way through the hollows. Their deerskin' clothing had long ceased to be any more than a sort of mere cohesive fluid. Everything, except the powder in their horns, was water. The world was water. And growing colder. It rained all night long. The two half-drowned men, chilled to the bone, finally gave up all effort to find protection from the deluge and lay prone in the grass w’ith the flood rustling all around them. Their heads alone, pillowed on their arms, were above the sluicing streams. Once or twice, so utter was their exhaustion, they slept.

ItT rained in showers in the morning. There was no sun, no opportunity to dry their clothing. They ate a morsel of rain-soaked venison, plodded on and on through the dripping wilderness in dogged silence, too weary to speak. David turned once to look nt Ike and was startled at the sight of Blackford’s lips and the suffering lines of his face. When he caught David’s eyes on him, Ike forced a smile that shone through the pouring rain'. “Shouldn’t be surprised if it rains before the day is over,” he grinned. “I’m getting tired of this drought.” . But the mortal weariness came back to his face as David turned forward again. All through the day he forced himself forward, summoning every reserve of strength to compel his limbs to persist in the. relentless struggle onward. A sudden pain shot through his slide, almost making him cry out. His head began to feel strangely light and his pulses throbbed in his ears. He wanted to cry out to David to stop. The rain ceased and the breeze which drove some early-yellowing leaves downward was chilly; but he burned with a heat that made him dizzy. Finally he began to stagger from side to side as he walked;; and then, with a pitiful, inarticulate moan, which David barely heard, he pitched forward and fainted.

Do you think this is the end for Blackfordf/'SiJVhaf chance has David to rescue the girl with the sick man on his hands in the wilderness? f (TO BE CONTINUED.)

Her Way.

“I hope,” said the advocate of moral uplift, “that you do not castigate your children as i means of development.” . “No, ma’am,” said % the practical mother; “I’m a-bringin' up of ’em by hand.”

“IN SEARCH OF A TOWEL!”

By JOAN COSBY.

Jimmy, blinking and blinded by the shower, reached for a bath towel. His fingers, clutching the first one with which they came in contact, gave it a Jerk off the rack, but the towel caught on a faucet of the bathtub, and that had Jimmy known it, settled his fate forever, Tor his Aunt Brewster had given him the towel and Aunt Brewster was his chief hope for the future. “D n it!” said Jimmy. Suddenly the towel, or rather the lace of the towel, let go, and Jimmy didn’t. Out he went over the end of the tub. When the fireworks in Jimmy’s head had subsided and he had cautiously tested every bone for breaks, he swore again. “You blankety-blank fool thing, you, with your silly blue roses and lace. Get out of here!" And without any apologies to the donor, he hurled the cause of his troubles through the window and reached for another towel. We’ll leave Jimmy to dry and dress and rub his and follow the towel out of the bathroom window on tl»e sixth floor of the apartment hotel. It floated downward —hardly floated, either, for it was as wide and heavy as a rug—but it arrived, at any rate, at a certain point in the street over which a roadster was passing at the instant, and having a penchant for catching on things, it caught on a button of the car’s top. All unconsciously beneath her gay canopy of lace and blue roses sat Eileen Brannon. She saw people stare, laugh and point, but there was nothing wrong that she could see. But in front of “Anna Katherine’s Shop” she stopped to investigate. What was attracting such attention? And then "She saw the towel spread shamelessly over her natty little car. “Where did yogi get that towel so blue? Out of the sky as you came through?”' She turned quickly. “Oh, Charley, isn’t it the limit! Where do you sup|pse it came from? Get it down, will you, and I’ll fake it into Anna Katharine. These things are in her line and maybe she’ll know something about it." But Anna Katharine didn’t except that there were weeks of work on the lace.

“Then keep it,” offered Eileen. “May’ be some nice old lady will bqy it for her college grandson.” L r In the meantime more things were happening to Jimmy. The postman brought some letters, and there was one from Aunt Brewster. “I’m starting for Florida,” she wtote, “and I’m stopping to see you for a day en route. I forgot to take off the pattern of the lace on that towel I gave you for your birthday. Besides there’s something else I want to see you about that 1 can’t explain here. Until Friday then. Affectionately, Aunt B.” “For the love of Peter Jones!" groaned Jimmy. “Can you beat Itl Where in this nickel-plated town do you suppose that towel is?” Then someone rang the bell. It was Charley Blogett, he of the titulating rhyme. “Hello, Charley, come in. I just need a tonic like you after a bally hoc day. Aunt Brewster’s coming and as she carries my prospects around in her bank book we’ll have to concoct some way to amuse her. Proceed, Charles!” Charles ilt a cigarette. “Poor Jimmy i Well, I’ve got a story saved up for her that ought to help some.” And he told of Eileen and the towel. “Mine, by jingoes! Where did you say it is?” - . 1 “At a fancy-work" shop on Fifth avenue. Come along and I’ll show you the place.” But When they reached the shop and inquired for thejaath towel they were told that it had just been sold! “Heavens!” cried Jimmy in dismay. “Who bought it?” [I But the girl didn’t remember. A lady, 'she thought. “We’ll get Eileen,” suggested Charlie. “Maybe she can do something. Women can always think of a way.” So they took a taxi and went to her house. She had just cpme in and was still dressed for the street. Charley started an introduction, but to his surprise the two were shaking hands. “You’re Jimmy -Young, aren’t you?" smiled the girl, w’hile Jimmy was saying: “If it isn’t my little old playmate, Dot Brannon!” “We used to play together at Aunt Brewster’s,” they explained to Charley, quite forgetting to let go hands and looking back at each other with interest that hitd evidently been compounding rapidly for ten years. “Aunt Brewster is here!” went on Eileen. “I’ve just brought her from the station.” “But she was to visit me!” exclaimed Jimmy. “Funny, isn’t it!” . “But he doesn’t want her since he lost the towel, sq it’s all fight,” put in Charley. , “It’s all right,” said a quiet voice In the doorway. There stood Miss Brewster smiling, the; towel in her hand. “Eileen told me of her find on the way from the station, I was interested, so we drove around to the shop and bought it. I recognized it instantly. But the mystery is cleared up now, and it’s all right. The towel has done wW. I came/ to New York to do, to bring you and Eileen together again.” “The comedy is ended!” quoted Charley. / (Copyright, 1918, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.)

Joe Arnold of Weatherford, Tex., raised a,-watermelon that weighed 106 pounds.