The Women Defending the Wagon.—_Page_ 8. ] TALES, TRADITIONS AND ROMANCE OF BORDER AND REVOLUTIONARY TIMES. WOMEN DEFENDING THE WAGON. CAPTIVITY OF JONATHAN ALDER MOODY THE REFUGEE. THE LEAP FOR LIFE. NEW YORK: BEADLE AND COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, 118 WILLIAM STREET. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, by BEADLE AND COMPANY, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. THE WOMEN DEFENDING THE WAGON. Between the Blue Ridge and the western range of the Alleghany Mountains, in the northern part of the State of Virginia, is located Shenandoah County, which derives its name from the beautiful river, one branch of which flows through its entire length, from south to north. Its county seat is Woodstock, a thriving town, with a population of between one and two thousand inhabitants. This place was settled, previous to the French and Indian war, by hardy German yeomanry from Pennsylvania, who were tempted to leave the rugged hills of the Keystone State, by the glowing reports which had reached their ears of the surprising fertility and beauty of the valley of the Shenandoah. Gathering up their household goods, they turned their backs upon the homes of their first choice, and took their way through pathless forests to "the promised land." Arrived at their new home, they selected the site of the present flourishing town as the nucleus of the settlement, and commenced, with a will, the laborious task of felling the forest and the erection of their homes. A stockade fort was erected as a protection against the incursions of predatory bands of Indians. A short time sufficed to place them in circumstances which, if not actually flourishing, were comparatively thrifty, and so far promising as to the future, that they were led to look forward with hope to a long continued prosperity. They were a plain, frugal and industrious people, unacquainted with the luxuries and only desiring the substantial requisites of an humble life, which were furnished in abundance by the fertile soil of the valley in which they had taken up their abode. A traveler among them during the French and Indian war thus speaks of their happy condition: