But the combatants did not notice the heralds of storm.Their attention was only for each other.
It seemed to Henry that emotions and impulses in him had culminated.Before him were the worst of all their foes, and his pitiless resolve was not relaxed a particle.The thunder and the lightning, although he did not notice them, seemed to act upon him as an incitement, and with low words he continually urged those about him to push the battle.
Drops of rain fell, showing in the moonshine like beads of silver on boughs and twigs, but by and by the smoke from the rifle fire, pressed down by the heavy atmosphere, gathered among the trees, and the moon was partly hidden.But file combat did not relax because of the obscurity.Wandering Indians, hearing the firing, came to Wyatt's relief, but, despite their aid, he was compelled to give ground.His were the most desperate and hardened men, red and white, in all the allied forces, but they were faced by sharpshooters better than themselves.Many of them were already killed, others were wounded, and, although Wyatt and Coleman raged and strove to hold them, they began to give back, and so hard pressed were they that the Iroquois could not perform the sacred duty of carrying off their dead.No one sought to carry away the Tories, who lay with the rain, that had now begun to fall, beating upon them.
So much had the riflemen advanced that they came to the point where bodies of their enemies lay.Again that fierce joy surged up in Henry's heart.His friends and he were winning.But he wished to do more than win.This band, if left alone, would merely flee from the Seneca Castle before the advance of the army, and would still exist to ravage and slay elsewhere.
"Keep on, Tom! Keep on!" he cried to Ross and the others.
"Never let them rest!"
"We won't! We ain't dreamin' o' doin' sech a thing," replied the redoubtable one as he loaded and fired."Thar, I got another!"The Iroquois, yielding slowly at first, began now to give way faster.Some sought to dart away to right or left, and bury themselves in the forest, but they were caught by the flanking parties of Shif'less Sol and Heemskerk, and driven back on the center.They could not retreat except straight on the town, and the riflemen followed them step for step.The moan of the distant thunder went on, and the soft rain fell, but the deadly crackle of the rifles formed a sharper, insistent note that claimed the whole attention of both combatants.
It was now the turn of the riflemen to receive help.Twenty or more scouts and others abroad in the forest were called by the rifle fire, and went at once into the battle.Then Wyatt was helped a second time by a band of Senecas and Mohawks, but, despite all the aid, they could not withstand the riflemen.
Wyatt, black with fury and despair, shouted to them and sometimes cursed or even struck at them, but the retreat could not be stopped.Men fell fast.Every one of the riflemen was a sharpshooter, and few bullets missed.
Wyatt was driven out of the forest and into the very corn field through which Henry had passed.Here the retreat became faster, and, with shouts of triumph, the riflemen followed after.Wyatt lost some men in the flight through the field, but when he came to the orchard, having the advantage of cover, he made another desperate stand.
But Shif'less Sol and Heemskerk took the band on the flanks, pouring in a destructive fire, and Wyatt, Coleman, and a fourth of his band, all that survived, broke into a run for the town.
The riflemen uttered shout after shout of triumph, and it was impossible to restrain their pursuit.Henry would have stopped here, knowing the danger of following into the town, especially when the army was near at band with an irresistible force, but he could not stay them.He decided then that if they would charge it must be done with the utmost fire and spirit.
"On, men! On!" he cried."Give them no chance to take cover."Shif'less Sol and Heemskerk wheeled in with the flanking parties, and the riflemen, a solid mass now, increased the speed of pursuit.Wyatt and his men had no chance to turn and fire, or even to reload.Bullets beat upon them as they fled, and here perished nearly all of that savage band.Wyatt, Coleman, and only a half dozen made good the town, where a portion of the Iroquois who had not yet fled received them.But the exultant riflemen did not stop even there.They were hot on the heels of Wyatt and the fugitives, and attacked at once the Iroquois who came to their relief.So fierce was their rush that these new forces were driven back at once.Braxton Wyatt, Coleman, and a dozen more, seeing no other escape, fled to a large log house used as a granary, threw themselves into it, barred the doors heavily, and began to fire from the upper windows, small openings usually closed with boards.Other Indians from the covert of house, tepee, or tree, fired upon the assailants, and a fresh battle began in the town.
The riflemen, directed by their leaders, met the new situation promptly.Fired upon from all sides, at least twenty rushed into a house some forty yards from that of Braxton Wyatt.Others seized another house, while the rest remained outside, sheltered by little outhouses, trees, or inequalities of the earth, and maintained rapid sharpshooting in reply to the Iroquois in the town or to Braxton Wyatt's men in the house.Now the combat became fiercer than ever.The warriors uttered yells, and Wyatt's men in the house sent forth defiant shouts.From another part of the town came shrill cries of old squaws, urging on their fighting men.
