Oncle Jazon could hold in no longer.
"Ya! ya! ya!" he yelled.

"Look out! the ladder is a fallin' wi' ye!" Then all the lurking crowd shouted as one man, and, sure enough, down came a ladder--men and all in a crashing heap.
"Silence! silence!" Beverley commanded; but he could not check the wild jeering and laughing, while the bruised and frightened scouts hastily erected their ladder again, fairly tumbling over one another in their haste to ascend, and so cleared the wall, falling into the stockade to join the garrison.
"Ventrebleu!" shrieked Oncle Jazon.

"They've gone to bed; but we'll wake 'em up at the crack o' day an' give 'em a breakfas' o' hot lead!" Now the fighting was resumed with redoubled spirit and noise, and when morning came, affording sufficient light to bring out the "bead sights" on the Kentucky rifles, the matchless marksmen in Clark's band forced the British to close the embrasures and entirely cease trying to use their cannon; but the fight with small arms went merrily on until the middle of the forenoon.
Meantime Gaspard Roussillon had tied Francis Maisonville's hands fast and hard with the strap of his bullet-pouch.
"Now, I'll scalp you," he said in a rumbling tone, terrible to hear.
And with his words out came his hunting knife from its sheath.
"O have mercy, my dear Monsieur Roussillon!" cried the panting captive; "have mercy!" "Mercy! yes, like your Colonel's, that's what you'll get.

You stand by that forban, that scelerat, that bandit, and help him.

Oh, yes, you'll get mercy! Yes, the same mercy that he showed to my poor little Alice! Your scalp, Monsieur, if you please! A small matter; it won't hurt much!" "But, for the sake of old friendship, Gaspard, for the sake--" "Ziff! poor little Alice!" "But I swear to you that I--" "Tout de meme, Monsieur, je vais vous scalper maintenant." In fact he had taken off a part of Maisonville's scalp, when a party of soldiers, among whom was Maisonville's brother, a brave fellow and loyal to the American cause, were attracted by his cries and came to his rescue.
M.Roussillon struggled savagely, insisting upon completing his cruel performance; but he was at last overpowered, partly by brute force and partly by the pleading of Maisonville's brother, and made to desist.
The big man wept with rage when he saw the bleeding prisoner protected.
"Eh bien! I'll keep what I've got," he roared, "and I'll take the rest of it next time." He shook the tuft of hair at Maisonville and glared like a mad bull.
Two or three other members of Lamothe's band were captured about the same time by some of the French militiamen; and Clark, when on his round cheering and directing his forces, discovered that these prisoners were being used as shields.