"What has been done," replied the commanding officer, with unfeigned sorrow at his heart as he reflected on the subject, "cannot be undone; but, ray dear Wells, it was impossible that we could divine the generous interest which was sending you to our rescue; and had not the powder and other ammunition been destroyed it must have fallen into the hands of those who I grieve to say are but too ready to use it against us. Moreover, purposing as I did, and do, to march to-morrow morning, at all risks and under whatever circumstance, I had given up this day all provisions not necessary for our subsistence on the march. If then even the ammunition had remained, we must have suffered from want of food." "What, with those five-and-twenty horses, Headley?" returned the other, pointing to the group that stood in the centre of the barrack square. "Not so. They would have been sufficient when killed and dried to have yielded us food for a month. No man knows better how to make pimmecan than myself. Still," he continued, with greater vivacity, "there is a hope. I have shown the manner in which the provisions can be replaced, and I know you have a well within the sally-port into which can be received the waters of Lake Michigan--let search be made and instantly, and no doubt out of all that you have thrown away, sufficient serviceable powder may be found to enable us to defend the fort for ten days longer, when something will assuredly turn up to better our condition." "Would that it could be so," returned Captain Headley, with a solemnity rendered more profound from the very smallness of the contingency on which the safety of so much depended, "but there is no hope. Anticipating that the Indians would attempt the very course you now suggest--that of saving what powder might be uninjured by the slimy bed into which it was thrown, all has been so mixed up with rum and other liquids as to be rendered utterly useless. Everything seems to be against us." "Then, since all hope is over," returned the stranger with marked disappointment, "we will not indulge in vain regrets for the past, but make the best preparation for to-morrow. It is only to die in harness after all. But, alas! I pity the poor women. How is my dear Ellen--how does she support this severe affliction?" "Bravely--nobly, like herself," returned the commanding officer with emotion. "She will be delighted, yet grieved to behold you--delighted at the generous devotion that has brought you so far, and at the head of so small a force to our assistance; grieved because she will know that you have only come in time to share our fate. But dispose of your party and come in. Serjeant Nixon," he called to that official, whom he saw passing from the rampart to the guard-house.