in readiness. The start was made on the 24th of June. Just as the
little flotilla of clumsy flatboats was caught by the rapid
current, the landscape was darkened by an eclipse of the sun. The
superstitious said that this was surely an evil omen. But Clark
was no believer in omens, and he ordered the bateaux to proceed.
He had lately received news of the French alliance, and was surer
than ever that the habitants would make common cause with his
forces and give him complete success.

To appear on the Mississippi was to run the risk of betraying the
object of the expedition to the defenders of the posts. Hence the
wily commander decided to make the last stages of his advance by
an overland route. At the deserted site of Fort Massac, nine
miles below the mouth of the Tennessee, the little army left the
Ohio and struck off northwest on a march of one hundred and
twenty miles, as the crow flies, across the tangled forests and
rich prairies of southern Illinois.

Six days brought the invaders to the Kaskaskia River, three miles
above the principal settlement. Stealing silently along the bank
of the stream on the night of the 4th of July, they crossed in
boats which they seized at a farmhouse and arrived at the
palisades wholly unobserved. Half of the force was stationed in
the form of a cordon, so that no one might escape. The remainder
followed Clark through an unguarded gateway into the village.

According to a story long current, the officials of the post were
that night giving a ball, and all of the elite, not of Kaskaskia
alone but of the neighboring settlements as well, were joyously
dancing in one of the larger rooms of the fort. Leaving his men