I know not how it chanced that I erred in my scouting and lost direction, but on the tenth day of August my Indians and I came out into a grassy place where trees grew thinly. The first thing I saw was an Indian, hanging by the heels from a tree, and lashed there with the traces from a harness. At the same time one of my Oneidas discovered a white man lying with his feet in a pool of water. But when Tahioni drew the cocked hat from his head to see his countenance, hair and skin stuck to it, and a most horrid smell filled the woods. And now, everywhere, we beheld evidences of the Oriska combat, for here lay a soldier's empty knapsack, and yonder a ragged shirt, and there a rusting tin cup, and here a boot all bloody and slit to the toe. And now, looking about me, I suddenly comprehended that we were nearer to Stanwix Fort than to Oriska; and had no business any nearer to either place. We now were in a most perilous region and must proceed with every caution, for in this forest Brant's Iroquois must be roaming everywhere in the rear of the troops which had invested Stanwix. My Oneidas understood this without explanation from me; and they and I also became further alarmed when, to our astonishment, we came upon a broad road running through a forest where I swear no road had existed a twelve-month past. Where this road led, and from whence, neither my Oneidas nor I knew. It was a raw and new road, yet it had been heavily travelled both ways by horse, foot, and waggons. It seemed to have as many windings as the Kennyetto at Fonda's Bush; and I saw it had been builded to run clear of hills and swampy land, as though made for a traffic heavier than a log road might easily sustain. We left the road but scouted eastward along its edge, I desiring to learn more of it; for it seemed to bear toward Wood Creek; and if there were enemy batteaux to be seen I wished to count them. Suddenly Thiohero touched my arm,--caught my sleeve convulsively. "Hahyion--Royaneh--my elder brother--O my white Captain!" she stammered, clinging to me in her excitement, "here is the _place_! Here is the place I saw in my vision! Here I saw strange uniforms and cannon smoke--and a strange white shape--and you--O Hahyion--my Captain!----" I looked around me, suddenly chilled and shivering in spite of the heat of a summer afternoon. But I perceived nobody except my Oneidas. We were on a long, sparsely-wooded hillock where juniper spread waist high. Below I could see the new road curving sharply to the eastward. But nobody moved down there; there was not a sound to be heard, not a movement in the forest. All around us was still as death. Something about the abrupt bend in the empty road below me attracted my attention. I examined it intently for a while, then, cautioning my Indians, I ventured to move forward and around the south slope of the hillock, wading waist-deep in juniper, in order to get a look at what might lie behind the bend in this road of mystery.