There were a few dim figures to be seen, leaning over the logs; but I supposed them to be members of the night-guard, and, feeling no desire for companionship, I halted in a lonely spot at the northeastern corner of the stockade.

How desolate, how solemnly impressive, was the scene! To the north all was black in the dense night, the shadows of the scattering trees obscuring the faint glow of the moon and yielding little of detail to the searching eye.

Even the single ray of light which the evening previous had blazed forth as a friendly beacon from the Kinzie home, was now absent.

I could vaguely distinguish the dim outlines of the deserted house in the distance, and noticed a large boat moored close to the bank beneath the Fort stockade,--doubtless the one in which the fugitives expected to venture out upon the lake on the morrow.
It was the wide stretch of water, gleaming like silver, that fascinated me, as it always did in its numberless changing moods.

What unutterable loneliness spoke to the soul in those unknown leagues of tossing sea! how far the eye wandered unchecked, searching vainly for aught to rest upon other than glistening surge or darkling hollow! The mystery of the ages lay unexpressed in those tossing billows, sweeping in out of the black east, making low moan to the unsympathetic and unheeding sky.