Once, while on the march, he made a bold rush for liberty, all unarmed though he was; breaking out of the line and running into the forest.  His speed was so great and his wind so good that he fairly outran his pursuers; but by ill-luck, when almost exhausted, he came against another party of Indians.  After this he abandoned himself to despair.  He was often terribly abused by his captors; once one of them cut his shoulder open with an axe, breaking the bone.

His face was painted black, the death color, and he was twice sentenced to be burned alive, at the Pickaway Plains and at Sandusky.  But each time he was saved at the last moment, once through a sudden spasm of mercy on the part of the renegade Girty, his old companion in arms at the time of Lord Dunmore’s war, and again by the powerful intercession of the great Mingo chief, Logan.  At last, after having run the gauntlet eight times and been thrice tied to the stake, he was ransomed by some traders.  They hoped to get valuable information from him about the border forts, and took him to Detroit.  Here he stayed until his battered, wounded body was healed.  Then he determined to escape, and formed his plan in concert with two other Kentuckians, who had been in Boon’s party that was captured at the Blue Licks.  They managed to secure some guns, got safely off, and came straight down through the great forests to the Ohio, reaching their homes in safety. [Footnote:  McClung gives the exact conversations that took place between Kenton, Logan, Girty, and the Indian chiefs.  They are very dramatic, and may possibly be true; the old pioneer would probably always remember even the words used on such occasions; but I hesitate to give them because McClung is so loose in his statements.  In the account of this very incident he places it in ’77, and says Kenton then accompanied Clark to the Illinois.  But in reality—­as we know from Boon—­it took place in ’78, and Kenton must have gone with Clark first.]

Boon and Kenton have always been favorite heroes of frontier story,—­as much so as ever were Robin Hood and Little John in England.  Both lived to a great age, and did and saw many strange things, and in the backwoods cabins the tale of their deeds has been handed down in traditional form from father to son and to son’s son.  They were known to be honest, fearless, adventurous, mighty men of their hands; fond of long, lonely wanderings; renowned as woodsmen and riflemen, as hunters and Indian fighters.  In course of time it naturally came about that all notable incidents of the chase and woodland warfare were incorporated into their lives by the story-tellers.  The facts were altered and added to by tradition year after year; so that the two old frontier warriors already stand in that misty group of heroes whose rightful title to fame has been partly overclouded by the haze of their mythical glories and achievements.

CHAPTER II.