These were like the notches on the stock of his rifle.

They were a sign of the stories of adventure to be found in that wary, watchful brain of his.
Johnson enjoyed his reports on account of their humor and color and he describes him in a letter to Putnam as a man who "when he is much interested, looks as if he were taking aim with his rifle." To some it seemed that one eye of Mr.Binkus was often drawing conclusions while the other was engaged with the no less important function of discovery.
His companion was young Jack Irons--a big lad of seventeen, who lived in a fertile valley some fifty miles northwest of Fort Stanwix, in Tryon County, New York.

Now, in September, 1768, they were traveling ahead of a band of Indians bent on mischief.

The latter, a few days before, had come down Lake Ontario and were out in the bush somewhere between the lake and the new settlement in Horse Valley.

Solomon thought that they were probably Hurons, since they, being discontented with the treaty made by the French, had again taken the war-path.