Nathan began a list, mentioning this neighbor or that, and as often seeing among the collection the craft to which he referred, until finally he was forced to admit that to the best of his knowledge there were no more. "I thought you knew of more than a hundred?" Corporal 'Lige cried fiercely. "That's what I reckoned myself; but when I come to figger 'em up they wasn't there." "You come with us, an' it may be we'll find another." "What? After I've walked down to Castleton an' back to-day, I go with you out rowin'? It'll take more'n six shillings to hire me to do anything like that this night; besides you haven't got time before the troops get here." "How near are they?" Corporal 'Lige asked in alarm. "Well, they ought'er be showin' up by this time, for I wasn't five minutes ahead of 'em, and--there they are now!" Nathan pointed to a group of men who had just come into the clearing from amid the thicket, and as the old man looked up one of the party motioned for him to approach. Although Nathan had announced that he was nearly exhausted from his ardent labors, his weariness was not so great as his curiosity, and he followed the corporal and Isaac. It was Colonel Arnold, Colonel Easton and the two representatives of the Connecticut Assembly, who had thus come into view, and the former, after explaining to Corporal 'Lige that the troops had been halted in the thicket lest they might be seen from the fort even in the gloom, asked concerning the means of transportation. Chagrined though he was at his inability to do more, the corporal was forced to admit that he had hardly a sufficient number of boats to take over seventy-five or eighty of the men; but this the colonel did not at the time believe to be of great importance, for it seemed positive Captain Herrick from Skenesborough, and Captain Douglas from Panton, must before midnight send craft enough to transfer the entire force. Therefore it was that the leaders of the party appeared well satisfied, and the corporal must have come to the conclusion that he had fretted himself without reasonable cause. "You will remain in charge of the fleet," Colonel Allen said to the old soldier, "with the boy to act as your lieutenant, and you may detail two men as oarsmen in each boat. We will set out as soon as the remainder of the craft arrives." Then it was that Nathan believed he saw an opportunity to add to his earnings of the day, and made the proposition that if the further sum of four shillings be paid him he would aid in ferrying the troops across, providing the work could be finished before midnight; but if it should be delayed until morning he desired to be paid twice that amount. No one seemed disposed to take advantage of this very generous offer; now that his particular portion of the work had been done, it was very much as if every one save Isaac ignored him.