door-step, and began to compose myself to sleep, when a man came and
wakened me, inquiring at the same time whose boy I was. I replied that I
lived with Mr. Tower. "Follow me," said he; I arose and followed him into
the house, where he procured for me a bed, to be shared with another
"boy," who had already occupied it.

I had just began to doze, when the explosion of firearms startled all in
the house. The keeper of the tavern ran up stairs in great alarm, and when
an examination was made, we found that a drunken fellow had discharged his
musket in the room below the one where we were sleeping, and that the ball
had passed up through the second floor and completely through the bed on
which I slept, to the roof, where, having passed through that also, rolled
from thence to the ground! And yet, strange as it may appear, no one was
injured, though the house was filled to overflowing with guests.

There were groups of disorderly and drunken men continually roaming over
the camp-ground at night, who seemed to have no other object than to annoy
others, and torment any one they might find sleeping, by shaking them, or,
if soundly asleep, dragging them out of their beds by their feet. Among
these thus annoyed by them was a physician from Canandaigua. Being a
passionate man, they seemed to think it fine sport to arouse him from
sleep and hear him scold. The first time they dragged him from his tent he
merely remonstrated in a very gentlemanly manner, and quietly crept back
again. The rowdies were disappointed; they had expected a "scene." As soon
as he was asleep they attacked him again, dragging him out by the heels;
then he was angry, and told them if they repeated the offence it would be
at the peril of their lives, and a third time retired to his tent; but a
third party soon came, and one, more bold than the rest, entered the tent
and laid hold of the Doctor. He sprang to his feet and drew his sword,
which he ran through the body of a man supposed to be that of his