By this time others, too, were awake; windows flew open and heads were pushed out, and everybody asked, "What is it? What is it?" Some hurried out half-dressed, and frightened women and crying children gathered on the Green; they could not see one anothers' white faces in the darkness. The beating of drums drew nearer and nearer. "It is the French and Indians coming," cried the men; but no one could tell from which direction the enemy was advancing; the dreadful noise seemed to come from all sides at once, even from overhead in the sky. By and by they thought they could distinguish words in the uproar. Deep bass voices thundered, "We'll have Colonel Dyer; we'll have Colonel Dyer," and shrill high ones answered, "Elderkin, too; Elderkin, too." As these were the names of the two lawyers in Windham who had been most prominently connected with the Wyoming plan,--the "Susquehannah Purchase" as it was called,--every one was sure that a band of Indians bent on revenge was approaching, and hearts beat fast in fear. All night long the noises lasted, sometimes coming nearer, sometimes dying away in the distance, and all night long the people of Windham waited in dread and awful expectation. At last, toward daybreak, the dark clouds slowly lifted and with the first light in the east the sounds ceased. In the gray, early morning men looked at each other and then crept silently back, each to his own home. When the sun rose, clear and bright, and no French and no Indians had appeared, Windham regained its courage, and before the morning was over an explanation had been found of the strange noises of the night. The frogs in the millpond had had a great battle, or some terrible catastrophe had overtaken them. Dead and dying frogs lay on the ground all about the pond, and their gurgles and croaks and clamor had made all the trouble and excitement. The story was soon told all over Connecticut, and everybody laughed, and ballads and songs were written about it, to the great mortification of the people of Windham. Yet the danger that explained the terror of that night was a real one in the history of many a Connecticut town, and therefore the Frogs of Windham have their legitimate place in Connecticut's story. REFERENCES 1. Larned, Ellen. _History of Windham County_. Worcester, 1874. 2. Barber, J. W. _Connecticut Historical Collections_. J. W. Barber. New Haven, 1836. 3. Todd, Charles Burr. _In Olde Connecticut_. The Grafton Press. New York, 1906. 4. Sylvester, Herbert Milton. _Indian Wars of New England_. W. B. Clarke Co. Boston, 1910. OLD WOLF PUTNAM