The officers, with Allen, then sprung into their saddles; and as the latter reached his allotted post, and faced round to the lines, the general commanded attention, and added,-- “My men, let me introduce you to Mr. Allen, the patriotic secretary of the Vermont Council of Safety, and say that I hold myself voucher for the truth of what he shall tell you. Listen to his communication.” The secretary, now bowing respectfully to the attentive and already prepossessed ranks before him, began by saying that among the recreant few of any note in the Green Mountains, who had basely deserted their country and joined the enemy, there was one who had a daughter of whom he was wholly unworthy. The speaker then proceeded to relate Miss Haviland's noble stand for the American cause, from which she was not to be allured or driven by all the inducements and menaces held out by a tory father and lover, both of whom had received royal commissions--her absolute refusal to go with them, on their late departure for the British army, and her more recent capture and abduction, while on her way to her friends, by the probable instigation of the rejected lover, and with the connivance, perhaps, of the father; all of which was concluded by reading the letter just received, it was added, by a trusty messenger, who had gone in disguise to the enemy's camp to receive it, and who had now returned to keep open the important communication. “Men of New Hampshire!” now cried Stark, in a loud, animated voice, as with flashing eyes he glanced over the throng of upturned and excited faces before him, “is it any wonder the Green Mountain Boys are so gallant and brave in fighting for their wives and sweethearts, when such is a specimen? Will you join them in defence of their homes and country, and help fulfil this matchless girl's expectations when we meet that taunting foe at Bennington, as by God's favor we will? If so, then let it now be told in three cheers for _the good cause_, and as many more as you please for _The Tory's Daughter!_” The next instant, as the bidden drummers brought their sticks to the bounding parchment of their instruments with blows that seemingly would have thrown their arms from their shoulders, a thousand men were seen leaping wildly into the air, and giving their patriotic response in a round of cheers that rent the ringing heavens above, and shook the startled wilderness for miles around them. “Order in the ranks!” at length broke in the deep, stern voice of the general, as the last cheer was dying away. “Prepare to march! March!” And the excited troops could scarcely be kept in their places as, with the stirring strains of lively fife and rattling drum, they went rushing and pouring along on their way to the seat of war. CHAPTER IX. “In dreams the haughty Briton bore The trophies of a conqueror.”