Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 by Various
page 133 of 313 (42%)
page 133 of 313 (42%)
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The dominie, Blomin, escaped, and has left a description of the tragical
event.[J] 'There lay,' he writes, 'the burnt and slaughtered bodies, together with those wounded by bullets and axes. The last agonies and the moans and lamentations were dreadful to hear.... The houses were converted into heaps of stones, so that I might say with Micah, "We are made desolate;" and with Jeremiah, "A piteous wail may go forth in his distress." With Paul I say, "Brothers, pray for us." I have every evening, during a whole month, offered up prayers with the congregation, on the four points of our fort, under the blue sky.... Many heathen have been slain, and full twenty-two of our people have been delivered out of their hands by our arms. The Lord our God will again bless our arms, and grant that the foxes who have endeavored to lay waste the vineyard of the Lord shall be destroyed.' Among the prisoners were Catharine Le Fever, the wife of Louis Dubois, with three of their children. These were Huguenots; and a friendly Indian gave information where they could be found. The pursuers were directed to follow the Rondout, the Walkill, and then a third stream; and a small, bold band, with their knapsacks, rifles, and dogs, undertook the perilous journey. Towards evening, Dubois, in advance of the party, discovered the Indians within a few feet of him, and one was in the act of drawing his bow, but, missing its string, from fear or surprise, the Huguenot sprang forward and killed him with his sword, but without any alarm. The party then resolved to delay the attack until dark; at which hour the savages were preparing for slaughter one of their unfortunate captives, which was none other than the missing wife of Dubois himself. She had already been placed upon the funeral pile, and at this trying moment was singing a martyr's psalm, the strains of which had often cheered the pious Huguenots in days of the rack and bloody trials. The sacred notes moved the Indians, and they made signs |
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