"Oh! sir, he is not wanting in natural organs, and he is free to tell
all that he has seen and heard. The whole amount is this; there is a
fort of his majesty's on the banks of the Hudson, called Edward, in
honor of his gracious highness of York, you'll know; and it is well
filled with armed men, as such a work should be."

"But was there no movement, no signs of any intention to advance to our
relief?"

"There were the morning and evening parades; and when one of the
provincial loons--you'll know, Duncan, you're half a Scotsman
yourself--when one of them dropped his powder over his porretch, if it
touched the coals, it just burned!" Then, suddenly changing his bitter,
ironical manner, to one more grave and thoughtful, he continued: "and
yet there might, and must be, something in that letter which it would be
well to know!"

"Our decision should be speedy," said Duncan, gladly availing himself
of this change of humor, to press the more important objects of their
interview; "I cannot conceal from you, sir, that the camp will not be
much longer tenable; and I am sorry to add, that things appear no better
in the fort; more than half the guns are bursted."

"And how should it be otherwise? Some were fished from the bottom of
the lake; some have been rusting in woods since the discovery of
the country; and some were never guns at all--mere privateersmen's
playthings! Do you think, sir, you can have Woolwich Warren in the midst
of a wilderness, three thousand miles from Great Britain?"

"The walls are crumbling about our ears, and provisions begin to fail