Many of our readers will doubtless bear in mind the spot called Elliott's Point, at the western extremity of Lake Erie, to which we have already introduced them. At a considerable distance beyond that again (its intermediate shores washed by the silver waves of the Erie) stretches a second, called also, from the name of its proprietor, Hartley's Point. Between these two necks are three or four farms; one of which, and adjoining Hartley's, was, at the period of which we treat, occupied by an individual of whom, unfortunately for the interests of Canada, too many of the species had been suffered to take root within her soil.

This person had his residence near Hartley's Point. Unlike those however whose dwellings rose at a distance, few and far between, hemmed in by the fruits of prosperous agriculture, he appeared to have paid but little attention to the cultivation of a soil, which in every part was of exceeding fertility. A rude log hut, situated in a clearing of the forest, the imperfect work of lazy labor, was his only habitation, and here he had for years resided without its being known how he contrived to procure the necessary means of subsistence; yet, in defiance of the apparent absence of all resources, it was subject of general remark, that he not only never wanted money, but had been enabled to bestow something like an education on a son, who had, at the epoch opened by our narrative, been absent from him upwards of five years. From his frequent voyages, and the direction his canoe was seen to take, it was inferred by his immediate neighbors, that he dealt in contraband, procuring various articles on the American coast, which he subsequently disposed of in the small town of Amherstburg (one of the principal English posts) among certain subjects domiciliated there, who were suspected of no very scrupulous desire to benefit the revenue of the country. So well and so wisely however, did he cover his operations, that he had always contrived to elude detection—and, although suspicion attached to his conduct, in no instance had he openly committed himself. The man himself, tall, stout, and of a forbidding look, was of a fearless and resolute character, and if he resorted to cunning, it was because cunning alone could serve his purposes in a country, the laws of which were not openly to be defied.

For a series of years after his arrival, he had contrived to evade taking the customary oaths of allegiance; but this, eventually awakening the suspicions of the magistracy, brought him more immediately under their surveillance, when year after year, he was compelled to a renewal of the oath, for the imposition of which, it was thought, he owed more than one of those magistrates a grudge. On the breaking out of the war, he still remained in undisturbed possession of his rude dwelling, watched as well as circumstances would permit, it is true, but not so narrowly as to be traced in his various nocturnal excursions by water. Nothing could be conceived more uncouth in manner and appearance than this man—nothing more villanous than the expression of his eye. No one knew from what particular point of the United States he had come, and whether Yankee or Kentuckian, it would have puzzled one of that race of beings, so proverbial fer acumen—a Philadelphia lawyer—to have determined.

The day following that of the capture of the American detachment was just beginning to dawn, as two individuals appeared on the skirt of the rude clearing in which the hut of the man we have just described, had been erected. The persons of both these, wrapped in blue military cloaks, reposed upon the dark foliage in a manner to enable them to observe, without being themselves seen, all that passed within the clearing, from the log hut to the sand of the lake shore. There had been an indication by one of these of a design to step forth from his concealment into the clearing, and advance boldly towards the house; but this had been checked by his companion, who, laying his hand upon his shoulder, arrested the movement, pointing out at the same time, the leisurely but cautious advance of two men from the hut towards the shore, on which lay a canoe half drawn up on the sands. Each, on issuing from the hut, had deposited a rifle against the rude exterior of the dwelling, the better to enable them to convey a light mast, sail, paddles, several blankets and a common corn-bag, apparently containing provisions, with which they proceeded towards the canoe.

"So," said the taller of the first party, in a whisper, "there is that d——d rascal Desborough setting out on one of his contraband excursions. He seems to have a long absence in view, if we may judge from the contents of his provision sack."

"Hist," rejoined his companion, "there is more here than meets the eye. In the first instance, remove the pistols from the case, and be prepared to afford me assistance, should I require it."

"What the devil are you going to do?" asked the first speaker, following however the hint that had been given him, and removing a pair of duelling pistols from their mahogany case.

While he was in the act of doing this, his companion had, without replying, quitted his side, and cautiously and noiselessly advanced to the hut. In the course of a few minutes he again appeared at the point whence he had started, grasping in either hand the rifles so recently deposited there.

"Well, what is the meaning of this feat? you do not intend, Yankee fashion, to exchange a long shot with poor Molineux, I hope—if so, my dear fellow, I cry off, for upon my honor, I cannot engage in anything that is not strictly orthodox."

He, thus addressed, could scarcely restrain a laugh at the serious tone in which his companion expressed himself, as if he verily believed he had that object in view.

"Would you not like," he asked, "to be in some degree instrumental in banishing wholly from the country a man whom we all suspect of treason, but are compelled to tolerate from inability to prove his guilt—this same notorious Desborough?"

"Now that you no longer speak and act in parables, I can understand you. Of course I should, but what proof of his treason are we to discover in the mere fact of his departing on what he may choose to call a hunting excursion? even admitting he is speculating in the contraband, that cannot banish him; and if it could, we would never descend to become informers."

"Nothing of the kind is required of us—his treason will soon unfold itself, and that in a manner to demand, as an imperative duty, that we secure the traitor. For this have I removed the rifles which may, in a moment of desperation, be turned at backwoodsman's odds against our pistols. Let us steal gently towards the beach, and then you shall satisfy yourself; but I had nearly forgotten—suppose the other party should arrive?"

"Then they must in their turn wait for us. They have already exceeded their time ten minutes."

"Look," exclaimed his companion, as he slightly grasped the shoulder on which his hand had rested, "he is returning for the rifles."

Only one of the two men now retrod his steps from the beach towards the hut, but with a more hurried action than before. As he passed where the friends still lingered, he gave a start of surprise, apparently produced by the absence of the rifles. A moment's reflection seeming to satisfy him it was possible his memory had failed him, and that they had been left within the building, he hurried forward to assure himself. After a few moments of apparently ineffectual search, he again made his appearance, making the circuit of the hut to discover his lost weapons, but in vain; when in the fierceness of his anger, he cried aloud, with a bitterness that gave earnest of sincerity.

"By ——. I wish I had the curst British rascal who played me this trick, on t'other shore—if I wouldn't tuck my knife into his b——y gizzard, then is my name not Jeremiah Desborough. What the h—ll's to be done now?"

Taking advantage of his entrance into the hut, the two individuals, first described, had stolen cautiously under cover of the forest, until they arrived at its termination, within about twenty yards of the shore, where however there was no outward or visible sign of the individual who had been Desborough's companion. In the bows of the canoe were piled the blankets, and in the centre was deposited the provision bag that had formed a portion of their mutual load. The mast had not been hoisted, but lay extended along the hull, its sail loosened and partially covering the before-mentioned article of freightage. The bow half of the canoe pressed the beach, the other lay sunk in the water, apparently in the manner in which it had first approached the land.

Still uttering curses, but in a more subdued tone, against "the feller who had stolen his small bores," the angry Desborough retraced his steps to the canoe. More than once he looked back to see if he could discover any traces of the purloiner, until at length his countenance seemed to assume an expression of deeper cause for concern, than even the loss of his weapons.

"Ha, I expect some d——d spy has been on the look out—if so, I must cut and run I calculate purty soon."

This apprehension was expressed as he arrived opposite the point where the forest terminated. A slight rustling among the underwood reduced that apprehension to certainty. He grasped the handle of his huge knife that was thrust into the girdle around his loins, and riveting his gaze on the point whence the sound had proceeded, retreated in that attitude. Another and more distinct crush of underwood, and he stood still with surprise, on finding himself face to face, with two officers of the garrison.

"We have alarmed you, Desborough," said the younger, as they both advanced leisurely to the beach. "Do you apprehend danger from our presence?"

A keen searching glance flashed from the ferocious eye of the ruffian. It was but momentary. Quitting his firm grasp of the knife, he suffered his limbs to relax their tension, and aiming at carelessness, observed with a smile, that was tenfold more hideous from its being forced:

"Well now, I guess, who would have expected to see two officers so fur away from the fort at this early hour of the mornin'?"

"Ah," said the taller of the two, availing himself of the first opening to a pun which had been afforded, "we are merely out on a shooting excursion."

Desborough gazed doubtingly on the speaker. "Strange sort of a dress that for shootin' I guess—them cloaks must be a great tanglement in the bushes."

"They serve to keep our arms warm," continued Middlemore, perpetrating another of his execrables.

"To keep your arms warm! well sure-ly, if that arn't droll. It may be some use to keep the primins dry, I reckon; but I can't see the use of keepin' the fowlin' pieces warm. Have you met with any game yet, officers? I expect as how I can point you out a purty spry place for pattridges and sich like."

"Thank you, my good fellow; but we have appointed to meet our game here."

The dry manner in which this was observed had a visible effect on the settler. He glanced an eye of suspicion around, to see if other than the two officers were in view, and it was not without effort that he assumed an air of unconcern, as he replied:

"Well, I expect I have been many a long year a hunter, as well as other things, and yet, dang me if I ever calculated the game would come to me. It always costs me a purty good chase in the woods."

"How the fellow beats about the bush to find what game we are driving at," observed Middlemore, in an under tone, to his companion.

"Let him alone for that," returned he whom our readers have doubtless recognised for Henry Grantham. "I will match his punning against your cunning any day."

"The truth is, he is fishing to discover our motive for being here, and to find out if we are in any way connected with the disappearance of his rifles."

During this conversation apart, the Yankee had carelessly approached his canoe, and was affecting to make some alteration in the disposition of the sail. The officers, the younger especially, keeping a sharp look-out upon his movements, followed at some little distance, until they, at length, stood on the extreme verge of the sands. Their near approach seemed to render Desborough impatient.

"I expect, officers," he said, with a hastiness that, at any other moment, would have called down immediate reproof, if not chastisement, "you will only be losin' time here for nothin'; about a mile beyond Hartley's there'll be plenty of pattridges at this hour, and I am jist goin to start myself for a little shootin' in the Sandusky river."

"Than I presume," said Grantham, with a smile, "you are well provided with silver bullets, Desborough; for, in the hurry of departure, you seem likely to forget the only medium through which leaden ones can be made available—not a rifle or a shot-gun do I see."

The man fixed his eyes for a moment, with a penetrating expression, on the youth, as if he would have sought a meaning deeper than the words implied. His reading seemed to satisfy him that all was right.

"What," he observed, with a leer, half cunning, half insolent, "if I have hid my rifle near the Sandusky swamp, the last time I hunted there?"

"In that case," observed the laughing Middlemore, to whom the opportunity was irresistible, "you are going out on a wild goose chase indeed. Your prospects for a good hunt, as you call it, cannot be said to be sure as a gun; for in regard to the latter, you may depend some one has discovered and rifled it before this."

"You seem to have laid in a store of provisions for this trip, Desborough," remarked Henry Grantham; "how long do you purpose being absent?"

"I guess three or four days," was the sullen reply.

"Three or four days! why your bag contains"—and the officer partly raised a corner of the sail, "provisions for a week, or, at least, for two for half that period."

The manner in which the two was emphasised did not escape the attention of the settler. He was visibly disconcerted, nor was he at all reassured when the younger officer proceeded:

"By the bye, Desborough, we saw you leave the hut with a companion—what has become of him?"

The settler, who had now recovered his self-possession, met the question without the slightest show of hesitation:

"I expect you mean, young man," he said, with insufferable insolence, "a help as I had from Hartley's farm, to assist gittin' down the things. He took home along shore when I went back to the hut for the small bores."

"Oh ho, sir! the rifles are not then concealed near the Sandusky swamp, I find?"

For once the wily settler felt his cunning had overreached itself. In the first fury of his subdued rage, he muttered something amounting to a desire that he could produce them at that moment, as he would well know where to lodge the bullets—but, recovering himself, he said aloud:

"The rale fact is, I've a long gun hid, as I said, near the swamp, but my small bore I always carry with me—only think, jist as I and Hartley's help left the hut, I pit my rifle against the outside wall, not being able to carry it down with the other things, and when I went back a minute or two after, drot me if some tarnation rascal hadn't stole it."

"And if you had the British rascal on t'other shore, you wouldn't be long in tucking a knife into his gizzard, would you?" asked Middlemore, in a nearly verbatim repetition of the horrid oath originally uttered by Desborough. "I see nothing to warrant our interfering with him," he continued in an under tone to his companion.

Not a little surprised to hear his words repeated, the man lost somewhat of his confidence as he replied, "Well now, sure-ly, you officers didn't think nothin' o' that—I expect I was in a mighty rage to find my small bore gone, and I did curse a little hearty, to be sure."

"The small bore multiplied in your absence," observed Grantham; "when I looked at the hut there were two."

"Then may be you can tell me who was the particular d——d rascal that stole them," said the settler eagerly.

Middlemore laughed heartily at his companion who observed:

"The particular d——d rascal who removed, not stole them thence, stands before you."

Again the settler looked disconcerted. After a moment's hesitation he continued, with a forced grin that gave an atrocious expression to his whole countenance:

"Well now, you officers are playing a purty considerable spry trick—it's a good lark, I calculate—but you know, as the saying is, enough's as good as a feast. Do tell me, Mr. Grantham," and his discordant voice became more offensive in its effort at a tone of entreaty, "Do tell me where you've hid my small bore; you little think," he concluded, with an emphasis then unnoticed by the officers, but subsequently remembered to have been perfectly ferocious, "what reason I have to vally it."

"We never descend to larks of the kind," coolly observed Grantham; "but as you say you value your rifle, it shall be restored to you on one condition."

"And what may that be?" asked the settler, somewhat startled at the serious manner of the officer.

"That you show us what your canoe is freighted with. Here in the bows, I mean."

"Why," rejoined the Yankee quickly, but, as if without design, intercepting the officers' near approach, "that bag, I calculate, contains my provisions, and these here blankets that you see, peepin' like from under the sail, are what I makes my bed of while out huntin'."

"And are you quite certain there is nothing under those blankets?—nay do not protest—you cannot answer for what may have occurred while your back was turned, on your way to the hut for the rifle."

"By hell," exclaimed the settler, blusteringly, "were any man to tell me, Jeremiah Desborough, that there was anythin' beside them blankets in the canoe, I would lick him into a jelly, even though he could whip his own weight in wild cats."

"So is it? Now then, Jeremiah Desborough, although I have never yet tried to whip my own weight in wild cats, I tell you there is something more than those blankets; and what is more, I insist upon seeing what that something is."

The settler stood confounded. His eye rolled rapidly from one to the other of the officers, at the boldness and determination of this language. Singly, he could have crushed Henry Grantham in his gripe, even as one of the bears of the forest, near the outskirt of which they stood; but there were two, and while attacking the one, he was sure of being assailed by the other—nay, what was worse, the neighborhood might be alarmed. Moreover, although they had kept their cloaks carefully wrapped around their persons, there could be little doubt that both officers were armed, not, as they had originally given him to understand, with fowling pieces, but with (at the present close quarters at least) far more efficient weapons—pistols. He was relieved from his embarrassment by Middlemore exclaiming:

"Nay, do not press the poor devil, Grantham; I dare say the story of his hunting is all a hum, and that the fact is, he is merely going to earn an honest penny in one of his free commercial speculations—a little contraband," pointing his finger to the bows, "is it not, Desborough?"

"Why now, officer," said the settler, rapidly assuming a dogged air, as if ashamed of the discovery that had been so acutely made, "you won't hurt a poor feller for doin' a little in this way. Drot me, these are hard times, and this here war jist beginnin' quite pits one to one's shifts."

"This might do, Desborough, were your present freight an arrival instead of a departure, but we all know that contraband is imported, not exported."

"Mighty cute you are, I guess," replied the settler warily, with something like the savage grin of the wild cat to which he had so recently alluded; "but I expect it would be none so strange to have packed up a few dried hog skins to stow away the goods I am goin' for."

"I should like to try the effect of a bullet among the skins," said Grantham, leisurely drawing forth and cocking a pistol, after having whispered something in the ear of his companion.

"Nay, officer," said Desborough, now for the first time manifesting serious alarm, "you sure-ly don't mean to bore a hole through them innocent skins?"

"True!" said Middlemore, imitating. "If he fires, the hole will be something more than skin deep, I reckon—these pistols, to my knowledge, send a bullet through a two inch plank at twenty paces."

As Middlemore thus expressed himself, both he and Grantham saw, or fancied they saw, the blankets slightly agitated.

"Good place for a hide that!" said the former, addressing his pun to the settler, on whom it was totally lost, "show us those said skins, my good fellow, and if we find they are not filled with anything it would be treason in a professed British subject to export thus clandestinely, we promise that you shall depart without further hindrance."

"Indeed, officer," muttered Desborough sullenly and doggedly, "I shan't do no sich thing. You don't belong to the custom-house, I reckon, and so I wish you a good day, for I have a considerable long course to run, and must be movin'." Then seizing the paddles that were lying on the sand, he prepared to shove the canoe from the beach.

"Not at least before I have sent a bullet to ascertain the true quality of your skins," said Grantham, levelling his pistol.

"Sure-ly," said Desborough, as he turned and drew himself to the full height of his bony and muscular figure, while his eye measured the officer from head to foot, with a look of concentrated but suppressed fury, "you wouldn't dare to do this—you wouldn't dare to fire into my canoe—besides, consider," he said, in a tone somewhat deprecating, "your bullet may go through her, and you would hardly do a feller the injury to make him lose the chance of a good cargo."

"Then why provoke such a disaster by refusing to show us what is beneath those blankets?"

"Because it's my pleasure to do so," fiercely retorted the other, "and I won't show them to no man."

"Then it is my pleasure to fire," said Grantham. "The injury be on your own head, Desborough—one—two—"

At this moment the sail was violently agitated—something, struggling for freedom, cast the blankets on one side, and presently the figure of a man stood upright in the bows of the canoe, and gazed around him with an air of stupid astonishment.

"What," exclaimed Middlemore, retreating back a pace or two, in unfeigned surprise; "has that pistol started up, like the ghost in Hamlet, Ensign Paul Emilius Theophilus Arnoldi, of the United States Michigan Militia—a prisoner on his parole of honor? and yet attempting a clandestine departure from the country—how is this?"

"Not this merely," exclaimed Grantham, "but a traitor to his country, and a deserter from our service. This fellow," he pursued, in answer to an inquiring look of his companion, "is a scoundrel, who deserted three years since from the regiment you relieved. I recognised him yesterday on his landing, as my brother Gerald, who proposed making his report to the general this morning, had done before. Let us secure both, Middlemore; for, thank heaven, we have been enabled to detect the traitor at last in that which will excuse his final expulsion from the soil, even if no worse befall him. I have only tampered with him thus long to render his conviction more complete."

"Secure me! secure Jeremiah Desborough?" exclaimed the settler, with rage manifest in the clenching of his teeth and the tension of every muscle of his iron frame, "and that for jist tryin' to save a countryman—well, we'll see who'll have the best of it."

Before Grantham could anticipate the movement, the active and powerful Desborough had closed with him in a manner to prevent his making use of his pistol, had he even so desired. In the next instant it was wrested from him, and thrown far from the spot on which he struggled with his adversary, but at fearful odds against himself. Henry Grantham, although well and actively made, was of slight proportion, and yet in boyhood. Desborough, on the contrary, was in the full force of a vigorous manhood. A struggle, hand to hand, between two combatants so disproportioned, could not, consequently, be long doubtful as to its issue. No sooner had the formidable settler closed with his enemy, than pressing the knuckles of his iron hand, which met round the body of the officer, with violence against his spine, he threw him backward with force upon the sands. Grasping his victim with one hand as he lay upon him, he seemed, as Grantham afterwards declared, to be groping for his knife with the other. He was evidently anxious to despatch one enemy, in order that he might fly to the assistance of his son, for it was he whom Middlemore, with a powerful effort, had dragged from the canoe to the beach. While his right hand was still groping far the knife—an object which the powerful resistance of the yet unsubdued, though prostrate, officer rendered somewhat difficult of attainment—the report of a pistol was heard, fired evidently by one of the other combatants. Immediately the settler looked up to see who was the triumphant party. Neither had fallen, and Middlemore, if anything, had the advantage of his enemy; but to his infinite dismay, Desborough beheld a horseman, evidently attracted by the report of the pistol, urging his course with the rapidity of lightning, along the firm sands, and advancing with cries and vehement jesticulations to the rescue.

Springing with the quickness of thought from his victim, the settler was in the next moment at the side of Middlemore. Seizing him from behind by for arm within his nervous grasp, he pressed the latter with such prodigious force as to cause him to relinquish, by a convulsive movement, the firm hold he had hitherto kept of his adversary.

"In, boy, to the canoe for your life," he exclaimed, hurriedly as, following up his advantage, he spun the officer round, and sent him tottering to the spot where Grantham lay, still stupified and half throttled. The next instant saw him heaving the canoe from the shore, with all the exertion called for by his desperate situation. And all this was done so rapidly, in so much less time than it will take our readers to trace it, that before the horseman, so opportunely arriving, had reached the spot, the canoe, with its inmates, had pushed from the shore.

Without pausing to consider the rashness and apparent impracticability of his undertaking, the strange horseman, checking his rein, and burying the rowels of his spurs deep into the flanks of his steed, sent him bounding and plunging into the lake, in pursuit of the fugitives.

He himself evinced every symptom of one in a state of intoxication. Brandishing a stout cudgel over his head, and pealing forth a shout of defiance, he rolled from side to side on his spirited charger, like some laboring bark careering to the violence of the winds, but ever, like that bark, regaining an equilibrium that was never thoroughly lost. Shallow as the lake was at this point for a considerable distance, it was long before the noble animal lost its footing; and thus had its rider been enabled to arrive within a few paces of the canoe, at the very moment when the increasing depth of the water, in compelling the horse to the less expeditious process of swimming, gave a proportionate advantage to the pursued. No sooner, however, did the Centaur-like rider find that he was losing ground, than, again darting his spurs into the flanks of his charger, he made every effort to reach the canoe. Maddened by the pain, the snorting beast half rose upon the calm element, like some monster of the deep, and, making two or three desperate plunges with his fore feet, succeeded in reaching the stem. Then commenced a short but extraordinary conflict. Bearing up his horse as he swam, with the bridle in his teeth, the bold rider threw his left hand upon the stern of the vessel, and brandishing his cudgel in the right, seemed to provoke both parties to the combat. Desborough, who had risen from the stern at his approach, stood upright in the centre, his companion still paddling at the bows; and between these two a singular contest now ensued. Armed with the formidable knife which he had about his person, the settler made the most desperate and infuriated efforts to reach his assailant; but in so masterly a manner did his adversary use his simple weapon, that every attempt was foiled, and more than once did the hard iron-wood descend upon his shoulders, in a manner to be heard from the shore. Once or twice the settler stooped to evade some falling blow, and, rushing forward, sought to sever the hand which still retained its hold of the stern; but, with an activity remarkable in so old a man as his assailant, for he was upwards of sixty years of age, the hand was removed—and the settler, defeated in his object, was amply repaid for his attempt, by a severe collision of his bones with the cudgel. At length, apparently enjoined by his companion, the younger removed his paddle, and, standing up also in the canoe, aimed a blow with its knobbed handle at the head of the horse, at a moment when his rider was fully engaged with Desborough. The quick-sighted old man saw the action, and, as the paddle descended, an upward stroke from his own heavy weapon sent it flying in fragments in the air, while a rapid and returning blow fell upon the head of the paddler, and prostrated him at length in the canoe. The opportunity afforded by this diversion, momentary as it was, was not lost upon Desborough. The horseman, who, in his impatience to avenge the injury offered to the animal, which seemed to form a part of himself, had utterly forgotten the peril of his hand; and before he could return from the double blow that had been so skilfully wielded, to his first enemy, the knife of the latter had penetrated his hand, which, thus rendered powerless, now relinquished its grasp. Desborough, whose object—desperate character as he usually was—seemed now rather to fly than to fight, availed himself of this advantage to hasten to the bows of the canoe, where, striding across the body of his insensible companion, he with a few vigorous strokes of the remaining paddle, urged the lagging bark rapidly ahead. In no way intimidated by his disaster, the courageous old man, again brandishing his cudgel, and vociferating taunts of defiance, would have continued the pursuit; but panting as he was, not only with the exertion he had made, but under the weight of his impatient rider, in an element in which he was supported merely by his own buoyancy, the strength and spirit of the animal began now perceptibly to fail him, and he turned, despite of every effort to prevent him, towards the shore. It was fortunate for the former that there were no arms in the canoe, or neither he nor the horse would, in all probability, have returned alive; such was the opinion, at least, pronounced by those who were witnesses of the strange scene, and who remarked the infuriated but impotent gestures of Desborough, as the old man, having once more gotten his steed into depth, slowly pursued his course to the shore, but with the same wild brandishing of his enormous cudgel, and the same rocking from side to side, until his body was often at right angles with that of his jaded, but sure-footed beast. As he is, however, a character meriting rather more than the casual notice we have bestowed, we shall take the opportunity, while he is hastening to the discomfited officers on the beach, more particularly to describe him.