CHAPTER

      I when the cannon roared
     II “Come and take it”
    III CUPID’S arrow
     IV the warning
      V “Try it”
     VI when the bow-string twanged
    VII out of the storm
   VIII beneath the spreading maple
     IX love’s charm
      X while the water flows
     XI the summons
    XII plotters in council
   XIII the King’s rangers
    XIV where the rangers led
     XV the line in the sand
    XVI under cover of night
   XVII the unknown quantity
  XVIII loyal friends
    XIX the smoke signal
     XX tempered punishment
    XXI through the wilderness
   XXII in desperate Straits
  XXIII six candles and one
   XXIV Timon of the wilderness
    XXV unmasked
   XXVI behind the bolted door
  XXVII through the night and the storm
 XXVIII within the Lone cabin
   XXIX sheltering arms
    XXX the round-up
   XXXI peace at evening time
  XXXII after many days
 XXXIII seeds of Empire

  The loyalists

  (1783)

  “Broad lands, ancestral homes, the gathered wealth
  Of patient toil and self-denying years
  Were confiscate and lost. . . . 
  Not drooping like poor fugitives they came
  In exodus to our Canadian wilds,
  But full of heart and hope, with heads erect,
  And fearless eyes, victorious in defeat.”

  William Kirby

“No one will know, because none has told, all that those brave pioneers underwent for their devotion and fidelity.  You will see to-day on the outskirts of the older settlements little mounds, moss-covered tombstones which record the last resting-places of the forefathers of the hamlet.  They do not tell you of the brave hearts laid low by hunger and exposure, of the girlish forms washed away, of the babes and little children who perished for want of proper food and raiment.  They have nothing to tell of the courageous, high-minded mothers, wives and daughters, who bore themselves as bravely as men, complaining never, toiling with men in the fields, banishing all regrets for the life they might have led had they sacrificed their loyalty. . . .  No great monument is raised to their memory; none is needed; it is enshrined forever in the hearts of every Canadian and of every one who admires fidelity to principle, devotion and self-sacrifice.”

“Romance of Canada,” Beckles H. Willson

THE KING’S ARROW

CHAPTER I

WHEN THE CANNON ROARED

A keen wind whipping in from the west swayed the tops of innumerable pines, firs, spruces, and maples.  They were goodly trees, unharmed as yet by scathing fire or biting axe.  Proudly they lifted their crests to the wind and the sun, while down below, their great boles were wrapped in perpetual shade and calm.  Life, mysterious life, lurked within those brooding depths, and well did the friendly trees keep the many secrets of the denizens of the wild.