This formidable stockade (where now is the city of Pittsburg) had three hundred and thirty soldiers, traders, and hardy backwoodsmen in the garrison, with numbers of women and children. In command was Captain Simeon Ecuyer, a brave Swiss officer who had enlisted with the British and who was as doughty a warrior as the stubborn Gladwyn,--and with an equal contempt for the red men. "I believe from what I hear that I am surrounded by Indians," he wrote to his commanding officer in the settlements, two hundred miles away. "I tremble for our outposts. I neglect nothing to give them a good reception, and I expect to be attacked tomorrow morning. Please God I may be, I am fairly well prepared. Everybody is at work, and I do not sleep; but I tremble lest my messenger should be cut off." Well might he tremble, for the Tuscaroras and the Delawares were gathering in force to attack the fort, burn it to the ground, and, if possible, to massacre the captured garrison. Rumors of terrible outrages upon the settlers came hourly to the ears of the startled soldiers. Men, women and children flocked to the protection of the walls of the fort, while it became dangerous to venture outside the palisades, as the few who did were shot and scalped by lurking Indians. All night the savages fired upon the sentinels, and soon during the day no one dared to put his head above the rampart, because of the hidden redskins on the edge of the forest. It was apparent that the surrounding woods were full of Indians, whose numbers daily increased, though they made no attempt at a general attack upon the frowning log walls of Fort Pitt, where, with courage, cheer, and resolution, those within waited for the onslaught which they knew to be at hand. Finally, on a bright June day, numbers of painted warriors appeared in the cleared lands behind the fort, drove off the horses which were grazing there, killed a herd of cattle belonging to the soldiers, and then began a hot fire at the stockades, which soon broke with a dull roar from every thicket of the forest. In reply, the garrison turned some howitzers upon the woodland, touched them off, and, as the iron shells burst in the dense underbrush with a loud and ominous report, the frightened red men could be seen scurrying out of harm's way, in every direction. The day wore to a close, and, as darkness settled upon the forest, the flashes from the guns of the Indians grew less; gradually their weird war whoops melted away, and in their place sounded the shrill piping of frogs. As darkness came, occasionally the sharp crack of a rifle warned the sentinels on the ramparts that the savages were still upon the alert.