“My mother, I bring you a child to supply the place of my brother, who was killed by the Lenape six moons ago.  She shall dwell in my lodge, and be to me a sister.  Take the white woman and her children and treat them kindly—­our father will give us many horses and guns to buy them back again.”

He referred to the British Indian Agent of his tribe, Colonel Johnson, an excellent and benevolent gentleman, who resided at Port Niagara, on the British side of the river of that name.

The old queen fulfilled the injunctions of her son.  She received the prisoners, and every comfort was provided them that her simple and primitive mode of life rendered possible.

* * * * *

We must now return to the place and period at which our story commences.

Late in the evening of that day the father returned to his dwelling.  All within and around was silent and desolate.  No trace of a living creature was to be found throughout the house or grounds.  His nearest neighbors lived at a considerable distance, but to them he hastened, frantically demanding tidings of his family.

As he aroused them from their slumbers, one and another joined him in the search, and at length, at the house of one of them, was found the servant-maid who had effected her escape.  Her first place of refuge, she said, had been a large brewing-tub in an outer kitchen, under which she had, at the first alarm, secreted herself until the departure of the Indians, who were evidently in haste, gave her an opportunity of fleeing to a place of safety.  She could give no tidings of her mistress and the children, except that they had not been murdered in her sight or hearing.

At length, having scoured the neighborhood without success, Mr. Lytle remembered an old settler who lived alone, far up the valley.  Thither he and his friends immediately repaired, and from him they learned that, being at work in his field just before sunset, he had seen a party of strange Indians passing at a short distance from his cabin.  As they wound along the brow of the hill, he could perceive that they had prisoners with them—­a woman and a child.  The woman he knew to be a white, as she carried her infant in her arms, instead of upon her back, after the manner of the savages.

Day had now begun to break, for the night had been passed in fruitless searches, and the agonized father, after a consultation with his kind friends and neighbors, accepted their offer to accompany him to Fort Pitt to ask advice and assistance of the commandant and Indian Agent at that place.

Proceeding down the valley, as they approached a hut which the night before they had found apparently deserted, they were startled by observing two children standing upon the high bank in front of it.  The delighted father recognized two of his missing flock, but no tidings could they give him of their mother and the other lost ones.  Their story was simple and touching.