Little Eph Stearns was, for the nonce, a glorified being. Hitherto the heroisms of his life had been of the obscure and pathetic kind. Angels had inspired them, and a cloud of witnesses beheld them, but here the chance had come for a heroism brilliant and jubilant. Ethan Allen told him to go ahead and the big boys would see him do it. No wonder that he wrought marvels. Besides lassoing the mule, he had got a bag of shavings larger than himself, and a stout clothes line; the last two were for some secret service of his own suggestion, though approved by the captain. But the mule seemed to be a purely ornamental feature of the occasion. He had been half-shoved, half-carried to the place of rendezvous; here he seemed unwilling to go any farther. He was hitched ignominiously to the tailboard of the wagon, and being pulled in front, and poked in the rear by his doughty rider who walked behind for this purpose, he moved off in spite of himself. Away into the darkness of that quiet summer night the expedition passed on. The sleepy lights twinkled in the distant farmhouses, the dewy winds came over the meadows and grain fields, and the stars looked down from their solemn depths. The boys were rather quiet, for boys. The secrecy of the affair, the chances for a fight which might prove dangerous, the honorable and important character of the undertaking all conspired to give a sombre coloring to the occasion. These were veritable Green Mountain Boys, too, with the legends of heroic ancestry all aglow in their young hearts and the strength of their own hills in their sturdy purpose. After a half-hour’s ride the boys reached the place and found everything all quiet. The gun was in bad shape, dislodged from the carriage and pitched into the gully. Nobody knew how to go at it and the darkness of the night added confusion to the situation. Now the Secret Service blazoned itself splendidly forth. Eph emptied his shavings on the ground in two piles, one or each side of the gun; upon these he heaped the brushwood and in less than two minutes he had two grand bonfires for the boys to work by. Then the little scout, with mule and clothes line, disappeared over the brow of the hill. A few rods below this point of vantage he stretched the clothes line across the road; it was about a foot from the ground and fastened on either side to the trunk of a tree. He then reported to his chief and received reinforcements: one boy and munitions of war--an empty bag, in which he gathered stones. Meanwhile at the gun the skids had been well adjusted by the firelight, and the lifting went sturdily on. Upon the height of the hill Eph awaited the onslaught of the enemy. The deploying force made a brave line of battle: Eph on the right flank with a pile of stones, his aide on the left, and the mule in the centre. They had not long to wait. A heavy team was heard laboring up. Moving shadows soon were seen in advance of it.