With the approach of summer, Indian outrages became increasingly frequent. No large bodies of savages were seen, nor was any concerted attack made upon a settlement. It was evident, however, that numbers of redskins were in the country, which was not strange, for at this time of the year hundreds of them had been in the habit of hunting in Kentucky. Settlers were picked off at the plough, or while traversing the forest. Women and children were killed and scalped or seized and carried into captivity. Cattle and horses were frequently found dead, with arrows in their sides, for the redskins still used that weapon upon animals in order to save valuable ammunition for fighting. Another and more extensive exodus took place. All but three of the stations were abandoned, those maintained being Boonesborough, Harrodsburg, and McClellan’s, and the last-named was deserted early in the following year. There were hardly one hundred “guns,” that is, fighting men, left in the entire territory. Fair Kentucky was soon to be in the throes of a life-and-death struggle for possession of the soil. As yet the settlers did not realize the fearful danger that beset them. Had they done so, all but the very stoutest hearts must have quailed before it. The Revolution was now in progress and, incited and armed by British agents, the Shawnees, Cherokees, and Mingos were preparing to exterminate the invaders of their old-time hunting-grounds. Virginia could afford but scanty aid to her distant territory. All the men and munitions that the State could command were needed to support the Continental Army. To the devoted band of backwoodsmen, isolated from their fellows and dependent upon their own resources, two courses were open,--either to retreat, or to stand their ground and face the flood of savage onslaught. It is characteristic of such men as Boone and his companions that the former alternative was not even considered by them. Among the families at Boonesborough was that of Colonel Richard Callaway, an intimate friend of Boone. One day early in July, 1778, the two daughters of the former and Jemima Boone entered a canoe near the fort and cast it off from its moorings. This act was contrary to the injunctions of their parents, who realized that lurking Indians might be encountered even in the immediate neighborhood of the stockade. However, the girls were young and careless and as they drifted idly upon the placid stream that lovely summer evening, no thought of danger entered their minds.